'India, Russia, China must join hands'

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW, NOV. 4.As the Prime Minister, Mr. A.B. Vajpayee, began a crucial visit to Russia, a leading Russian military analyst sent his message to the leaders of the two countries: global civilisation is in deep crisis and it is up to India, Russia, and China to save it.

The September 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S. highlighted the danger of the world sliding to a conflict of civilisations, says Gen. Alexander Vladimirov, head of a Russian military think-tank.

``Terrorism is a reaction to the West and America as its model, treating the world as its legitimate trophy,'' the analyst told The Hindu.

``Global civilisation has become thoroughly corrupted by a multiple crisis: ecology and healthcare are in crisis, there are States harbouring terrorists, more powerful nations are trampling international law and asserting a unipolar world, uncontrollable globalisation has denigrated into a mechanism of the `golden billion' strangling the rest of mankind.''

Major-General Vladimirov (retired) is the vice- president of the authoritative Collegium of Military Experts of Russia. A Vietnam war veteran, he served after retirement as military adviser to the Russian President and helped write Russia's military doctrine and a number of defence-related laws.

If the current confrontational trend in world politics, as exemplified by the U.S. war in Afghanistan, continues, the conflict of civilisations may become unavoidable and will engulf not only the West and the Muslim world, but also China and other nations.

``It is countries like India, Russia and China that must join forces to form a new global architecture, based not on centres of power, which cannot but clash, but on mutually and equally respected centres of civilisation - Western, Russian, Indian, Chinese, etc., with something like a world government at the top,'' Gen. Vladimirov said.

``Unless we interlace the world with a network of global and regional security structures and joint projects within the next 30 years, we may see numerous hotbeds of tension explode on our face,'' he said. ``There is Kashmir in India and there is the depopulated Far East and Siberia in Russia coming under growing pressure from overpopulated China. The American civilisation itself may collapse under the burden of global leadership and internal ethnic tensions.

``India should play a leading role in harmonising the interests of other States for a global turnaround thanks to its tolerance, wisdom, stability and high moral principles of its foreign policy,'' the General said.

``By joining hands with Russia, India can prevent the Muslim world from disintegrating into terrorist sects.''

He says his views are shared not only by defence experts but also by the Russian military and a large section of the body politic. A Delhi-Moscow-Beijing triangle was first proposed by the then Russian Prime Minister, Mr. Yevgeny Primakov, on a visit to India in 1998.

``India, Russia and China should start talking at the level of experts tasked with evolving a common philosophy and strategy on the basis of existing consensus on the inadmissibility of war of civilisations and domination of the world by any single nation,'' the Russian analyst urged.

The would be alliance of India, Russia and China is essential not only for building a non-confrontational world in which all nations should have equal access to global resources, but also for evolving a model of national development based on traditional values and rejecting Western consumerism and egoism, Gen. Vladimirov said.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : International
Previous : Osama's brigade marry off their women
Next     : Moscow approves of West's support for Pakistan