Silver Lining in a Multipolar World

September 13, 2023

In this world, two things are predictable. ?

1.????? Any concentration of power—be it industrial, economic or political—is bad news for development and evolution of society.? One size does not fit all, and the sooner our politicians understand this, the better off we will be.

A few nights ago I experienced the downside of this kind of thinking over coffee with a younger friend. ?Here in Athens, Greece, an important regional hub that functions as a stop-over for politicians and business interests--some call it the East of the West and the West of the East—Greece’s history has been marred by political infighting and outside interests taking advantage of a vulnerable partner.?

With fists raised, my friend marveled that “America is back in Greece!” with the US military opening new a slew of bases and cozying up with the political class here. ??Between the military, the CIA, the State Department and even the Mossad ingratiating itself with local leaders, Greece was ‘back on the map,’ he smiled.?

Indeed, given our neighbors in both Turkey, Russia and Ukraine, Greece is extending an invitation to Uncle Sam to return, to pick up the pieces where it left off in the 1970s.? Recall, back in late 1960s, the US--compliments of the esteemed Dr. Henry Kissinger--supported the Greek Military Junta. ??We know how this turned out. ??Look up the history of Cyprus, circa 1970, and you understand the origins of its partition with Turkey, a border that remains in place some 50 years later.? Divide and conquer is the best the US can manage to organize with foreign policy these days.

But what few realize from the 1970s and 1980s, particularly my young coffee mate, is the resulting shameless departure from Greece by the USA, which closed most of its bases and sent its soldiers to locations where they weren’t target practice for local anarchists.??

“Do you not know the US has tried this game before?” I asked him.? They up and left with their tails between their legs back in the 1980s, ushering in a wave of political instability, assassinations and economic socialism that Greece is only now recovering from.? I was exhausted talking to this young guy, who seemingly missed out on most of the action back then.

The irony is that I am an American living here, in one form or another, since the 1970s, and I have witnessed much of this instability first hand.? Not surprisingly I am no fan of US military bases going up in port towns throughout the country.?? These things don’t end well for either country.? But with some 900 military bases throughout the world, the US doesn’t seem to mind throwing money around and creating turmoil.? Blind to the reality that political and military consolidation no longer works in our new multi-polar world, the US hammer continues to see everything as a nail.

2.????? ?This mantra holds for Economics as well.

Back in the days before the Chinese took over Hong Kong, I recall a conversation that led in a similar direction.? A friend working in finance at a top tier Wall Street firm in New York, told me he was uprooting his family to Hong Kong to show the Chinese how to manage their $Trillions.?

My friend was but one example of many I had spoken with back then who, without exception, had fallen in love with all things Chinese.? ?I remember asking him back in 1998, just after the People’s Republic of China took over Hong Kong, “Do you really think the Chinese are looking for advice from Wall Street?”? He thought the streets were paved with gold, but he assumed they were running one way, from New York to Kong Kong.?

Since then, we have discovered the Chinese were looking for access to our markets, and capital from our pension funds.? Hong Kong was a quick solution to legitimize their access to finance, taking over a hub overloaded with bankers from across the globe.? Hong Kong was a way to consolidate and speed their entry into the world of finance, to help build a new capital base to fund their real estate (read: ghost cities) and factories (read: slave centers). ??My friend failed to realize he was but one cog in a machine to pave one way roads in the other direction, from Hong Kong to New York and London.

Joe and Hunter Biden, and much of the US administrative state and their supporting staff also took the Chinese bait, and we know how this story ends.? Yes, you can teach your children Mandarin, but it’s better to realize, these days, the Chinese speak better English than most Americans.? In so many ways, they are leap frogging ahead of the West.

Yet, apart from these rather depressing anecdotes, the message here is positive.? The world needs much more multi-polar thinking, in part to encourage new ideas in politics, economics and culture. ?Innovation is about freedom, not consolidation. Americans and Europeans are fast becoming minorities on the world stage.? Together, we comprise less than 15% of world population. Why, then, do we still insist on a one-size-fits-all world?

Our leaders in Europe and the US are becoming brain dead, and unaware that their one way street paved with gold has become a multi-lane superhighway, moving quickly in both directions.

In previous dispatches I have alluded to a great play from Ancient Greece.? Sophocles has some great lines in his masterpiece, Antigone, worthy of committing to memory during these days of homogeneous thinking and uni-polarity.

First, for our leaders: ???"God moves swiftly to cancel the folly of stubborn men.”

Finally, for the rest of us: ??

It is not only men who move about on a charted landscape. The landscape itself is in constant motion, and men had best be quick enough to move with it. When they aren't, they go through the cracks that open under their feet.

A final note: A previous dispatch seems more prescient by the week. One of the players driving the shift toward multi-polarity, forging new relationships between disparate countries and regions, is Vladimir Putin. Here's our previous article from just after the Russian incursion began in 2022. Enjoy.