Hong Kong’s protests are part of the new great power conflict, but Chile’s are not. It’s all about the ‘rimland’
- For decades, the US dominated coastal areas needed to contain great power rivals, but this is now under threat
- Hong Kong is one such area, and the protesters are inserting themselves into this conflict by calling for US support
November 9 marks the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, when Communist East Germany decided to allow its people to move freely to West Berlin. To cold warriors, the wall’s collapse symbolically marked the end of the Iron Curtain separating the Soviet Union and its allies from the rest of Europe.
With the benefit of hindsight, the Berlin Wall was an artificial barrier dividing Communist Eastern Europe and Western Europe that was bound to fail. In the age of free information flows, the Eastern side saw how Western Europe was becoming more and more prosperous. Its fall enabled the reunification of Germany, with the creation of the euro as the monetary glue that sought to bind Europe politically.
Contrary to expectations, 30 years later, the game between the great powers has not only been revived, but intensified into a “revenge of history”, in which not only Russia, but China and other players have emerged to challenge the present order.
In the 19th century, when America was more isolated, the European powers fought what was called the “great game” for political hegemony. The intellectual godfather of this game was the then director of the London School of Economics, Halford Mackinder. His 1904 paper “The Geographical Pivot of History” placed geography at the heart of diplomacy and strategy.
Mackinder described the landmass of Afro-Eurasia – which he called the “world island” – as the world’s largest, richest and most critical combination of land.