THE LONE WOLF THEORY

 

America's diplomacy has started criticizing a concept put forward by Chinese diplomats, the Lone Wolf Theory, with the explicit aim of restraining China, seen as dangerous, more prone to aggression and violence than a pack of wolves. At least, a pack practice teamwork, a bit like the submariners of the Kriegsmarine in World War Two.

In their view, China practice Lone Wolf diplomacy, as a kind of Apex Predator. American diplomacy, in comparison, is presented as better, since it counts on the support of a strong coalition of peace-loving democracies. The trouble is that, sometimes, reality are not what we think they are. Sometimes, it is actually the opposite of what we may think.

Seen from a different point of view, the Lone Wolf that China is supposed to be in the minds of American diplomats is not really all that alone. It has two main allies, Russia and Iran, and numerous smaller ones, like North Korea and Nepal. Other small countries leans its way, like Burma (Myanmar) and Thailand, plus Laos and Cambodia. Others are more distant, politically, but remains in the economic orbit of the Middle Kingdom.

On the other side, the strong coalition that oppose the Middle Kingdom is really a group of five Anglo-Saxon countries, the Anglosphere, that includes the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia (the point-man of the team) and New-Zealand (the most peaceful one, even though it was built upon a series of pitiless wars against the Maoris, the first inhabitants of the twin islands, a bit in the manner of Canada, created over the resistance of the North American Indians and the French -the first two layers of the Canadian population-), plus America. The other allies are more distant, politically, like communist-run Vietnam, and some (Japan, the Philippines, etc.) that are having second thought or are edging their bets. The European Union is still part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), despite Trump-induced doubts, but the two of its most important members (France and Germany) are in no way America's pawns and knows how to make their own calculations. It can be predicted that they will start to distance themselves from the anglophones countries, despite the inevitable protests of many pro-American Eastern European countries (that used to be involuntarily part of the Pact of Warsaw) and some of the ex-Soviet Union's constituents republics, like the Baltic countries and Ukraine.

Who's really more aggressive? Is it China that builds defensive military bases on the South China sea, or the British destroyer that, a few days ago, in a deliberate act of provocation, violated the territorial waters of Crimea, the Russian-populated peninsula that was occupied by Russia some years ago? Is it China that has one, and just one, military base outside its borders, in Djibouti, near bases run by Japan, America, France, Italy and others? Or is it the United States of America that has bases all over the world, by the dozens? Is it China, with a military budget that is about half the size of the US military budget? Or is it the US, whose military budget, increased each year by the Trump administration, and one more time, recently, by the new administration of president Joe Biden, despite the necessity of financing infrastructure projects, of responding to the social needs of his own population and of trying to economically 'outcompete' China?

More to the point, who, of the US or China, has the stamina to go on the long run, on the economic plane, despite the drag induced by military budgets that are quite impressive by their size but very onerous and essentially non-productive? A carrier strike group is a very powerful instrument, if used when there's a war, but it remains an enormous expense, if there's none. To see and hear the brouhaha generated by the English-speaking press and the politicians of the Anglosphere, about this (the non-existent but horrendous genocide in the Xinjiang) or that (the supposed aggressivity of the Chinese diplomacy, compared to the style of Swagger Mike, the Trump-inspired warrior of the nationalist far right), the real sounds of military preparedness somehow seems to have English overtones, not Chinese ones. The Anglos are pumping themselves up for something, and that is a scary perspective, for anyone, but them.