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Advice and
Responsibility
Nikolas
Gvosdev
As an editor, I take very seriously the obligation that
our publications present accurate facts and reasoned
analysis. (On a side note, I am happy to note that the
"Rumors" column of several weeks back, our first stab
into the world of political speculation, wasn't entirely
off target; the December 15th issue of The
American Conservative, in its "Deep Background"
column, contains an item that "Some political advisors
to President Bush hope to persuade the president to dump
Vice President Cheney from the 2004 ticket … Some of
President Bush's Texas loyalists want to have Secretary
of State Colin Powell replace Cheney on the ticket.")
I believe that it is especially important to present
realistic assessments of what America can and cannot do
to the rest of the world. This is because, while I do
recognize the power of ideas in helping to shape policy,
we in the think-tank community cannot guarantee that our
vision for policy will be implemented, nor (unless we
also happen to control major financial-industrial
conglomerates) can we ensure that massive financial
flows will back up our policy initiatives.
I find myself becoming concerned about the gap between
rhetoric and deliverability, which is especially
pronounced with regard to the Black Sea basin. Let me
cite two examples.
The first concerns Turkey and the European Union. It is
becoming an article of faith among many in the
Washington think-tank community that Turkey must enter
the European Union as soon as possible, and preferably
by 2007. Expanding the EU to encompass
Turkey
would bring Europe's
boundaries squarely into the "Greater Middle East"-- to
directly border on
Iraq, Iran and Syria
(and the logic runs, give Europe
a greater stake in supporting
U.S. policies on the
Middle East). U.S. commentators constantly preach the
benefits that the United States would receive from
Turkish accession into the EU, and make it clear that
the U.S. will "do what it takes" to get Ankara into the
Union.
There is one small problem, however. Washington has no
way to deliver on such assurances. The high-water mark
of American influence occurred at the 1999 Helsinki
summit, when Turkey's candidacy was guaranteed. What
Washington cannot do, however, is modify the criteria
under which Turkey-EU accession talks would take place.
Certainly, the lack of a final settlement on Cyprus
remains a major stumbling block, but as Philip Gordon
and Henri Gordon wrote in their increasingly prescient
article on Cyprus, Turkey and the EU in the Winter
2001/02 issue of The National Interest, "For the
EU, Turkish accession still seems remote primarily
because of Turkish domestic problems" and that "in the
absence of progress in these areas, Ankara will not earn
Brussels' seal of approval."
I cannot reiterate the latter statement. Turkey's
membership in the EU depends on what happens in
Brussels, not in Washington. Washington's influence in
this matter has diminished even further, because many of
the same strong proponents for Turkish accession to the
EU are openly contemptuous of the institution itself and
of its core members, France and Germany. To turn around
and expect that the EU will admit Turkey primarily
because it is in the strategic interests of the United
States, especially for the U.S. position in the Middle
East, is preposterous. Writing in the forthcoming issue
of The National Interest, Zbigniew Brzezinski
notes: "It is already evident that the European Union,
as it begins to identify its own foreign policy
interests, will not remain merely a passive observer or
compliant supporter of whatever the American policy is
in the Middle East."
Europe will admit Turkey when Europeans feel it is in
their economic, political and strategic interests.
Certainly, U.S.-based commentators are free to utilize
their transatlantic connections to try and convince
European governments and publics of this proposition,
but, at the same time, they also need to be sending a
clear message to our Turkish ally about the realistic
limits of U.S. influence. I don't see this happening.
Nor do I see preparation for any sort of fall-back plan
should there be further delay in the opening of
accession negotiations. Would Washington extend NAFTA
eastward to encompass Turkey? Would the U.S. be
prepared to open up its borders to allow for the free
migration of Turks to the United States? In other
words, would the
U.S.
try to provide some of the economic benefits that would
be expected from EU membership? Not likely.
And herein lies the lack of responsibility. Analysts
can suggest wide-ranging measures for assistance. They
rarely get them implemented, precisely because we
think-tank denizens are not politicians elected to
office capable of persuading local voters why foreign
aid matters more than building more roads and schools
locally, and because we do not answer to the
shareholders of corporations who justify investments and
their profitability.
This is also a factor in "advice" that has been provided
to Georgia. Once one of the most prosperous republics
of the former USSR, Georgia was especially hard-hit by
the collapse of the Soviet Union.
A hallmark of U.S. strategy toward the former Soviet
Union has been to encourage the other republics to
emerge from
Russia's
shadow. Such a policy is all well and good. The
problem remains, however, that countries like Georgia
are akin to Mexico in Porfirio Diaz's lament: "Poor
Mexico! So far from God, so close to the United
States." And while Westernized elites delight in
promoting Georgia's transatlantic ties, the reality is
that the country needs to normalize its relationship
with Moscow. Georgia depends on Russia not only for the
energy that heats homes in the winter and powers the
electricity grid, but hundreds of thousands of Georgians
continue to live and work in Russia.
The United States wants to encourage Georgia to be more
independent of Russia. In so doing, however, in
"escaping dependency" in economic terms from Russia,
there must either be a new source of supply or this
creates real problems for the country. American firms
that have tried to invest in Georgia have found it quite
difficult to turn a profit. And let's be clear here:
American private investment is not some sort of
quasi-foreign aid. American firms will invest in places
that are profitable and that meet their economic needs.
Just as we don't see many Russian firms investing in
Mexico, we shouldn't be surprised that Russian firms
might want to invest a great deal in their neighbors--it
makes good business sense. And despite the large amount
of aid that the United States has given to Georgia, it
is unlikely to increase by leaps and bounds--and
certainly the United States is not going to supply
Georgia with energy or give Georgians hundreds of
thousands of
U.S. visas to
come study, work and live in the
United States.
So, we have to squarely realize that fostering rising
expectations--in Turkey about immediate EU membership or
in Georgia that it will be bailed out of its economic
and political crisis by large amount of Western aid--are
counterproductive. It would be better to promise what we
actually can deliver.
Nikolas K. Gvosdev is
editor of In the National Interest.
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