United front of resistance to the West
The demarche of US President Joe Biden, who declared his readiness to "defend Taiwan by military means" is a landmark event. It is safe to say that the current world conflict ceases to be only a confrontation between Russia and the collective West. From now on, it acquires a global character. In fact, the United States refused to recognise the sovereignty of China over Taiwan.
This event can rightly be called a prelude to the beginning of a third world war. Even if this war is still being waged not by nuclear, but only by hybrid means, combining economic, informational, psychological and only partially military methods, the essence of the matter does not change from this. We see that the United States, NATO and their allies in the Asia-Pacific region (Japan, Australia, New Zealand) are preparing to suppress all alternative geopolitical and economic centres of the modern world.
In this situation, no one can feel safe anymore. And this applies not only to Russia and China, but also to the growing financial and technological centres of the Islamic world, Latin America, Southeast Asia, as well as potential growth points in Central Asia and Africa.
At the same time, the actions of the collective West are already having a devastating impact not only on global security, but also on the world economy. This is what politicians in different countries of the world are talking about today. The essence of this process was well formulated by former Brazilian President Lula da Silva, who accused the West of imposing sanctions not only against Russia, but also "against all mankind”.
In this context, the question arises of reassembling the entire system of international cooperation, of creating new formats of global ties without the participation of the collective West, who not only does not take a constructive part in solving common problems, but, worse, creates them itself, aggravating an already difficult situation.
In this regard, the question of the need to create a united front against the threats emanating from the collective West is becoming more relevant than ever.
The transformation of the global system of international cooperation can take place in two dimensions — military-political and economic. BRICS could become quite an effective working platform for both directions. That is why the recent proposal by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to expand BRICS by attracting new countries deserves the closest attention.
The entry into the BRICS of states that are regional leaders in the field of security and are actively involved in the fight against terrorism, piracy, and drug trafficking may be promising. In this case, the expansion of BRICS can play an important role in countering biological threats and in planting a network of biological laboratories around the world by the collective West, in preventing new pandemics, including man-made ones. Cybersecurity is also important.
From the point of view of economic cooperation, the expansion of BRICS carries great potential. At the same time, the association in "BRICS plus" can be carried out according to such criteria as the assessment of the economic potential of countries by purchasing power parity of gross domestic product. These are members of the top 30 (in addition to the current BRICS members) Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Thailand, Nigeria, Vietnam, Argentina, Philippines, Malaysia, UAE.
In addition, BRICS Plus can become a serious platform for consolidating the efforts of the largest organisations uniting “non-Western humanity" - the SCO, the EAEU, ASEAN, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, the League of Arab States, the African Union.
In fact, we are talking about the creation of a new G20, which has the potential of both a military-political bloc and an association of the world's largest economies (total GDP by PPP), which is sufficient to implement ideas related to building a new fair economic order. Within the framework of the "new twenty", it is possible to solve issues of global financial regulation, including the transition to mutual settlements in more reliable units than the current US dollar, which has become Washington's "economic weapon".
Taking into account the geography of the location of the "new twenty" states, it becomes real to create alternative transport and logistics corridors, new trade regimes and free economic zones, as well as to solve issues of food and energy security.
Currently, the collective West actively uses the term "world community" to describe itself, which has nothing to do with reality. In fact, we are talking about the same "golden billion" and a limited number of its satellites — represented by some Latin American, African countries and dwarf states of the Pacific Basin. Collectively, all of them make up no more than a quarter of humanity, that is, its absolute minority. The new "BRICS plus" will represent not a fictitious, but a real world community that has every reason to speak on behalf of the majority of the world.
A couple of years ago, such ideas could have been conceptual, theoretical in nature and expressed with an eye to a long discussion in expert and diplomatic circles. However, today the topic of creating a united front of resistance to the aggressive West is an urgent and priority issue.
If the peoples of the world manage to create a global resistance movement, the chances of the West establishing a colonial-type world order will be reduced to zero.
Elena Panina, Director of the RUSSTRAT Institute