New
World Relationships
By Noam Chomsky
11 March, 2006
Khaleej
Times
The
prospect that Europe and Asia might move toward greater independence
has troubled US planners since World War II. The concerns have only
risen as the ‘tripolar order’ — Europe, North America
and Asia — has continued to evolve. Every day, Latin America,
too, is becoming more independent. Now Asia and the Americas are strengthening
their ties while the reigning superpower, the odd man out, consumes
itself in misadventures in the Middle East.
Regional integration in Asia
and Latin America is a crucial and increasingly important issue that,
from Washington's perspective, betokens a defiant world gone out of
control. Energy, of course, remains a defining factor — the object
of contention — everywhere. China, unlike Europe, refuses to be
intimidated by Washington, a primary reason for the fear of China by
US planners, which presents a dilemma: Steps towards confrontation are
inhibited by US corporate reliance on China as an export platform and
growing market, as well as China's financial reserves, reported to be
approaching Japan's in scale.
In January, the Custodian
of the Two Holy Mosques, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia
visited Beijing, which is expected to lead to a Sino-Saudi memorandum
of understanding calling for "increased cooperation and investment
between the two countries in oil, natural gas and investment,"
The Wall Street Journal reports. Already, much of Iran's oil goes to
China, and China is providing Iran with weapons that both states presumably
regard as deterrent to US designs. India also has options. India may
choose to be a US client, or it may prefer to join the more independent
Asian bloc that is taking shape, with ever more ties to Middle East
oil producers. Siddarth Varadarajan, deputy editor of The Hindu, observes
that "if the 21st century is to be an 'Asian century,' Asia's passivity
in the energy sector has to end."
The key is India-China cooperation.
In January, an agreement signed in Beijing "cleared the way for
India and China to collaborate not only in technology, but also in hydrocarbon
exploration and production, a partnership that could eventually alter
fundamental equations in the world's oil and natural gas sector,"
Varadarjan points out. An additional step, already being contemplated,
is an Asian oil market trading in euros. The impact on the international
financial system and the balance of global power could be significant.
It should be no surprise that President Bush paid a recent visit to
try to keep India in the fold, offering nuclear cooperation and other
inducements as a lure.
Meanwhile, in Latin America,
left-centre governments prevail from Venezuela to Argentina. The indigenous
populations have become much more active and influential, particularly
in Bolivia and Ecuador, where they either want oil and gas to be domestically
controlled or, in some cases, oppose production altogether. Many indigenous
people apparently do not see any reason why their lives, societies and
cultures should be disrupted or destroyed so that New Yorkers can sit
in their SUVs in traffic gridlock.
Venezuela, the leading oil
exporter in the hemisphere, has forged probably the closest relations
with China of any Latin American country, and is planning to sell increasing
amounts of oil to China as part of its effort to reduce dependence on
the openly hostile US government. Venezuela has joined Mercosur, the
South American customs union, a move described by Argentine President
Nestor Kirchner as ‘a milestone’ in the development of this
trading bloc, and welcomed as a "new chapter in our integration"
by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Venezuela, apart from
supplying Argentina with fuel oil, bought almost a third of Argentine
debt issued in 2005, one element of a region-wide effort to free the
countries from the controls of the International Monetary Fund after
two decades of disastrous conformity to the rules imposed by the US
-dominated international financial institutions. Steps towards Southern
Cone integration advanced further in December with the election of Evo
Morales in Bolivia, the country's first indigenous president. Morales
moved quickly to reach a series of energy accords with Venezuela.
The Financial Times reported
that these "are expected to underpin forthcoming radical reforms
to Bolivia's economy and energy sector" with its huge gas reserves,
second only to Venezuela's in South America. Cuba-Venezuela relations
are becoming ever closer, each relying on its comparative advantage.
Venezuela is providing low-cost oil, while in return Cuba organises
literacy and health programmes, sending thousands of highly-skilled
professionals, teachers and doctors, who work in the poorest and most
neglected areas, as they do elsewhere in the Third World.
Cuban medical assistance
is also being welcomed elsewhere. One of the most horrendous tragedies
of recent years was the earthquake in Pakistan last October. Besides
the huge death toll, unknown numbers of survivors have to face brutal
winter weather with little shelter, food or medical assistance. “Cuba
has provided the largest contingent of doctors and paramedics to Pakistan,"
paying all the costs (perhaps with Venezuelan funding), writes John
Cherian in India's Frontline, citing Dawn, a leading Pakistan daily.
President Pervez Musharraf
of Pakistan expressed his ‘deep gratitude’ to Fidel Castro
for the ‘spirit and compassion’ of the Cuban medical teams
—reported to comprise more than 1,000 trained personnel, 44 per
cent of them women, who remained to work in remote mountain villages,
"living in tents in freezing weather and in an alien culture"
after Western aid teams had been withdrawn. Growing popular movements,
primarily in the South, but with increasing participation in the rich
industrial countries, are serving as the bases for many of these developments
towards more independence and concern for the needs of the great majority
of the population.
Noam Chomsky, the author,
most recently, of Imperial Ambitions: Conversations on the Post-9/11
World, is a professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology in Cambridge, Massachussets
© 2005 Khaleej Times