The Grand Chessboard (Zbigniew Brzezinski)

**The Lawspeaker** · 01-24-2010, 06:23 AM

It's always good to know what the enemy writes (Thank you, John Preston):

LINK (PDF)

INTRODUCTION

EVER SINCE THE CONTINENTS started interacting politically,
some five hundred years ago, Eurasia has been the center of
world power. In different ways, at different times, the peoples
Inhabiting Eurasia—though mostly those from its Western European
periphery—penetrated and dominated the world's other
regions as individual Eurasian states attained the special status
and enjoyed the privileges of being the world's premier powers.
The last decade of the twentieth century has witnessed a tectonic
shift in world affairs. For the first time ever, a non-Eurasian
power has emerged not only as the key arbiter of Eurasian power
relations but also as the world's paramount power. The defeat and
collapse of the Soviet Union was the final step in the rapid ascendance
of a Western Hemisphere power, the United States, as the
sole and, indeed, the first truly global power.
Eurasia, however, retains Its geopolitical importance. Not only
is its western periphery—Europe—still the location of much of the
world's political and economic power, but its eastern region—
Asia—has lately become a vital center of economic growth and rising
political influence. Hence, the issue of how a
globally engaged America copes with the complex Eurasian
power relationships—
and particularly whether it prevents the emergence of a dominant
and antagonistic Eurasian power—remains central to America's
capacity to exercise global primacy.

It follows that—in addition to cultivating the various novel dimensions
of power (technology, communications, information, as
well as trade and finance)—American foreign policy must remain
concerned with the geopolitical dimension and must employ its influence
in Eurasia in a manner that creates a stable continental
equilibrium, with the United States as the political arbiter.
Eurasia is thus the chessboard on which the struggle for global
primacy continues to be played, and that struggle involves
geostrategy—the strategic management of geopolitical interests. It
is noteworthy that as recently as 1940 two aspirants to global
power, Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, agreed explicitly (in the secret
negotiations of November of that year) that America should
be excluded from Eurasia. Each realized that the injection of American
power into Eurasia would preclude his ambitions regarding
global domination. Each shared the assumption that Eurasia is the
center of the world and that he who controls Eurasia controls the
world. A half century later, the issue has been redefined: will America's
primacy in Eurasia endure, and to what ends might it be applied?
The ultimate objective of American policy should be benign
and visionary: to shape a truly cooperative global community, in
keeping with long-range trends and with the fundamental interests
of humankind. But in the meantime, it is imperative that no
Eurasian challenger emerges, capable of dominating Eurasia and
thus also of challenging America. The formulation of a comprehensive
and integrated Eurasian geostrategy is therefore the purpose of
this book.

Zbigniew Brzezinski
Washington, DC.
April 1997