Chavez's balancing act

(Presidente Chávez en la graduación de la Misión Che Guevara Cargado originalmente por ¡Que comunismo!)

In his post- Cold War classic The Grand Chessboard Zbigniew Brzezinski argued that the maintenance of the United States exceptional position as the world's only superpower demanded the deployment of aggressive geopolitical strategy. Throughout his book Brzezinski adviced policy makers on keeping their eyes on the prize, the Eurasian continent:

A mere glance at the map also suggests that control over Eurasia would almost automatically entail Africa's subordination, rendering the Western Hemisphere and Oceania geopolitically peripheral.(Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard, Basic Books: 1989, p.31)

Enter Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez ready to crash Brzezinski's carefully crafted model. Backed by Venezuela's oil wealth and by elections and referenda which have legitimized his presidency, Chavez has pursued a foreign policy agenda counter to the Bush administration's objectives.

Rejecting his nation's peripheral status with his actions and declarations, Chavez has made a name for himself in American mainstream media and in the midst of the presidential campaign coverage he is consistently mentioned as one of those difficult world leaders the next U.S. administration will have to deal with.

Lately Chavez has made international headlines by rekindling his friendship with Russia - of recent Georgia invasion fame- hosting two strategic Russian bombers in Venezuela and preparing to conduct a joint naval exercise in Caribbean waters. The intrepid Venezuelan is also planning a state visit to Moscow next Friday.

Coming from a Western Hemisphere country where foreign policy options have been permanently constrained to different versions of bandwagoning I cannot help but to marvel at Chavez's sheer determination to participate in the often off limits game of balance of power. Thucydides would be proud at his awkward but persistent Venezuelan student.

Dear allies, please don't border Russia

(Courtesy of Patrick Q. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.)

The Onion reports on what must be the best foreign policy advice ever given to former Soviet republics and satellites:

Following Russia's controversial military excursions into neighboring Georgia, the Bush administration made its most direct commitment to the U.S.'s Eastern European allies to date by "strongly advising" those countries not to border Russia under any circumstance. "The United States stands by its allies, but will not be able to defend our friends in the region if they continue to share geographical lines with Russia," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at a Monday press conference.

Newsflash: Alaska is next to Russia!

It is a truth universally acknowledged that Americans favor governors over senators when picking their presidents even though the latter tend to have much more foreign policy experience. Nevertheless, it is important for all presidential and vice presidential candidates to affirm their knowledge of and interest in foreign policy to the American public.

Sometimes, valiant efforts to do so backfire. Back in 1999, George W. Bush infamously flunked a quiz on foreign affairs when he was asked to name the leaders of such exotic hot spots as Chechnya and Taiwan. Clearly, such things don't really matter in determining the outcome of elections, but I doubt that any other candidate will concede to answering similarly brazen questions ever again. Pity.

One of the biggest criticisms of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, John McCain's recently-picked running mate, is her lack of foreign policy experience. Steve Doocy, of Fox News, was trying really hard to find something,anything, to refute the claim and came up with: "[T]he other thing about her, she does know about international relations because she is right up there in Alaska right next door to Russia." Who knows, perhaps you do get a better view into Putin's soul from Juneau than Washington.

Republicans are somewhat undercutting their own argument about the importance of foreign policy experience by picking her. However, I doubt that Democrats will gain many points on this one since, ultimately, Barack Obama is still at the top of the ticket and his foreign policy experience is minimal. Obama's best bet is to argue, as he has been doing, that he knows enough to do better than the current mess. It is a very, very low bar to cross but John Kerry, a person infinitely more experienced, failed, and I am not sure if Obama will be any different.