The trade routes, “decoupling” and the Turkish threats (our article, 17/6/2022)

Trade Routes, “Decoupling,” and Turkish Threats The emerging trade routes in today’s revisionist era—at both global and regional levels—the concept of “decoupling,” and Turkey’s goals and threats. ΔΠ Dionysis Pantis 17/06/2022 | 10:08

Controlling trade routes and developing new ones has always been a key ambition of states and economic actors. This ambition takes on far greater urgency and significance in revisionist periods like the one we are living through today—periods when the global and regional balance of power has shifted so dramatically that the revisionist ambitions of rising powers can no longer be contained. These powers are actively seeking to establish a new world order and institutional framework that serves their interests. On 10 June, the new bridge linking the Russian city of Blagoveshchensk with the Chinese city of Heihe was inaugurated.

Costing 19 billion rubles (around $342 million), it is just one of many infrastructure projects connecting the two countries and their economies. At the same time, Russia and China are working together to reduce their reliance on maritime transport—largely because the West, particularly in the Pacific, still controls the seas—and, wherever possible, to gain control of these routes themselves (what is known as decoupling: separation or disconnection). This selective decoupling from the collective West—which showed remarkable unity in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—is currently being pursued in two main ways: a) reducing dependence on Western exports, technology, and investment (in China’s case) and on Western imports, technology, and investment (in Russia’s case); and b) developing overland Asian routes, bridges, pipelines (including oil pipelines, which had previously taken a back seat to gas pipelines), financial linkages, and other infrastructure that binds the two economies more tightly together. In Russia’s case, the sanctions imposed on it are being countered through widespread violation of intellectual property rights covering almost the entire range of Western goods and services (now even legalized, with domestic production wherever feasible). Russia is also disconnecting from the Western financial system and building alternative financial products and services that prioritize national currencies, bilateral barter deals with ad-hoc financial arrangements and guarantees, and service agreements in critical areas—such as maintaining seized Western-style aircraft with Thailand or Western-style vehicle fleets with China. Notably, the territories Russia has seized in Ukraine precisely fill the gaps in the agricultural and industrial imports it needs. This decoupling drive has intensified over the past three years and, since the invasion of Ukraine, has accelerated dramatically. The countries of South Asia are becoming particularly important: controlling them could completely shut out naval powers, denying them any access—and therefore any ability to provide assistance or exert influence—to Central Asia. Nations such as Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Cambodia are gaining major geopolitical weight, and intense struggles for political control over them are already underway. The ousting of Imran Khan in Pakistan, the collapse of the government in Sri Lanka, and the “ironclad agreement” between China and Cambodia to modernize (and effectively establish) a naval base are just some of the expressions of this intensifying geopolitical competition, especially in the wake of the war in Ukraine. In a recent article we asked: Are Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Iran correctly identified by everyone as key geopolitical players because they form the essential geographical ring needed to encircle Central Asia (the vital hinterland)? Turning to our own region, and reflecting these global trends, the corridor running from the Black Sea through the Bosporus Straits, the Aegean, and into the Mediterranean is gaining importance. Combined with the long-recognized significance of the maritime route from Suez through the Eastern Mediterranean, North Africa, and on to Western Europe, this helps explain—together with Turkey’s inherently aggressive nature and the global and regional revisionist ambitions of its current Turco-Islamic leadership—much of Turkey’s current “urgency” in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, as well as the surprising durability of the Russia–Turkey partnership. Clear signs of this urgency include Erdoğan’s eight cynical, aggressive, and threatening tweets containing direct threats against Greece’s sovereign rights and territorial integrity.The real question is how far Turkish-Russian coordination will go on issues that directly affect Greece. The importance of the Mediterranean maritime corridor is not limited to the transport of natural gas already being extracted—or yet to be extracted—in the region. To put it bluntly, Turkey is trying to control both of these maritime corridors in order to significantly boost its own geopolitical weight and importance (inevitably at Greece’s expense). Its explicit demands—the Aegean up to the 25th eastern meridian (Athens itself sits on the 24th!), the “Blue Homeland,” the Turkish-Libyan memorandum, and the challenge to Cyprus’s Exclusive Economic Zone—are all aimed precisely at securing control of these two commercial sea routes. Everything else is merely a convenient “legitimizing narrative” designed to dress up their true intentions. Turkey is, of course, unconcerned (and who, honestly, is?) about how thin this legal and political justification actually is. What matters is its usefulness as a tool for achieving the stated goals and elevating Turkey to regional-power status—at least in the first phase. Turkey’s foreign minister has loudly declared that no EastMed agreement can be valid without Turkey’s participation. Ankara is also pressuring the United States, in a distinctly threatening tone, to adopt a more “balanced” stance in the region—even though American positions on the Aegean have so far been those of a Pontius Pilate. If Greece fails to resist this pressure, it risks being “Finlandized” and losing the geopolitical significance that its geography confers. Never has there been a greater need for our country and its leadership to understand what is happening in the world and to act strictly on the basis of Greece’s own national interests—not anyone else’s. This is no longer an academic or theoretical exercise; it is a matter of survival. Do Greek citizens realize that the exercise of their rights and the economic well-being of themselves and their families depend, to a large extent, on national independence? In light of everything above, the need for a truly independent Greek foreign policy has never been greater. The time for half-truths and convenient illusions is running out. These are critical times. Events are moving fast and demand vigilance and sound decisions, because the consequences of the choices we make today will follow us for decades—either as a nightmare or as a source of pride. As the saying goes, once you leave the cash register, no mistakes are accepted…