North Korea detonated a sizable explosion this week. Pyongyang claimed it was a thermonuclear bomb but experts think it unlikely. Whatever the nature of the explosion, it has alarmed many East Asian countries and western ones too. This is what it was intended to do.
The detonation is part of a pattern of testing – and planning to alter – the status quo in various parts of the world. Russia forcibly annexed the Crimea and is poised to do the same in the eastern Ukraine. Iran launched a missile probably in violation of a UN resolution, and fired a smaller missile near a US aircraft carrier in the Strait of Hormuz. China has been building airfields on newly created islets, and violated waters claimed by East Asian states.
Russia, China, Iran, and N Korea each has an interest in asserting itself and testing the resistance of rivals. Inasmuch as these four countries confer routinely, at very high levels, it is likely these probing actions are a concerted effort by the four Eurasian powers to test the international order and advance national interests.
Test and weaken the US-based world order
The four Eurasian states dislike American hegemony. The US has at times weakened or even wronged them, and today maintains a system of bases and alliances directed against them.
Probing actions test whether the US can uphold the world order or if it has wearied from overcommitment. The resolve of regional powers is also being tested: are they willing to counter aggression; are fishing waters and the Ukraine essentially irrelevant; do they expect the US to handle the threat?
In the case of China’s probes along its periphery, will economic elites in East Asia and the US convince their respective politicians and generals that cheap manufacturing costs and access to an immense economy are more important than archaic geopolitical interests?
The new power bloc
The Eurasian powers have a formidable amount of military, economic, and political power. Combined, they will one day exceed the power of the US and EU. Today they already greatly exceed the willingness of the EU to use military power. They see the US as a declining power, too divided at home for strategic vision, and no longer having the stomach for more military commitments.
The Eurasian powers will be able to attract other states into their fold – Pakistan (itself eager for revenge in the world) and commodity-producing states in Africa.
Today, Russia and Iran, in conjunction with the Syrian rump state, have built an anti-Islamist bloc that rivals and opposes that of the West. Facing a growing Islamist problem in its western provinces, and in Central Asian states it expects to dominate, China is not disinterested in foreign help, exclusive of the West.
Power prestige at home
Bold action in the world has long been a key to domestic power. Leaders have known this throughout history, though they haven’t always acted wisely in pursuit of prestige. Putin’s popularity soared when he took the Crimea. Iranians see their mullahs and generals as defending the nation from ISIL and Sunni powers. Chinese and North Korean applaud their assertive leaders.
Bold leaders are positioned to brush aside or even crush calls for political reform. Indeed, they can present such calls as conspiracies directed by menacing outside forces. Democracy, seen on the rise and an end point in history not long ago, may have reached its high water mark, at least in most of Eurasia.
©2016 Brian M Downing