No. 279, MARCH - APRIL 2020

No. 279, MARCH - APRIL 2020 Motto:”Opinions are free, but not mandatory“ I.L.Caragiale 1 CONTENT Geostrategic Pulse, No 279, March - April 2020 45 Opinion: COVID-19 I. EDITORIAL IV. THE WESTERN Pandemic Impact on Defence BALKANS 3 Leadership and Trust 75 China Is Not Replacing the West in Serbia Ciprian-Mircea RĂDULESCU Constantin IACOBIȚĂ III. THE EUROPEAN UNION Jelena MILIĆ II. INTERNATIONAL 77 Old and New Challenges SITUATION 47 Interview : “The High to the European and Euro- Level of Interdependence of Atlantic Integration of the Today’s Globalised World Is 4 The Political Narratives of Countries in the Western Reflected in the Geopolitical a Global Crisis: Competing Balkans. The Western Articulation of the European Ideologies and Strategical Ri- Balkans – Always Something Commission” valries in the Symbolic Man- “Different” from the Rest of agement of the COVID-19 Cri- Europe sis Alexandru PETRESCU V. THE MEDITERANEAN SEE 87 Military Cooperation Alexis CHAPELAN Mihnea MOTOC between Israel, Greece and 20 A Very Distant and Lonely 50 Interview: “The Brexit Cyprus World Earthquake Was Read Differ- Eugene KOGAN ently Not Just by the Leaders V. THE MIDDLE EAST of the Member States, but also by the EU Leaders” 93 Idlib: Another Monstrous Face of the Syrian War Dumitru CHICAN Dumitru CHICAN 23 The Politics of Fear and 96 The Palestinians and the Loathing. Coming to Terms “Deal of the Century” - No with a Decade of Radical Dis- Sergiu MIȘCOIU News, No Deal content and Liberal Malaise 52 Romania and Hungary - Dinu COSTESCU Two Geographically Close Alexis CHAPELAN Neighbours. The Romanian- 98 Afghanistan: from Hungarian Relations between “Enduring Freedom” to 39 The Prisons – Potential 1918 and 2018 “Enduring Peace” Sources for the Expansion of Dumitru CHICAN COVID-19 VI. ABOUT THE AUTHORS Vladimir-Adrian COSTEA 102 Authors’ Biographies Alexandru GHIŞA 2 Geostrategic Pulse, No 279, March - April 2020 www.pulsulgeostrategic.ro Motto: “Opinions are free, but not mandatory” - I.L.Caragiale EDITORIAL Leadership and Trust Constantin IACOBIȚĂ The rows below are meant to re-emphasize things that have already been said repeatedly and in different forms, out of the need to strengthen ourselves against the threats we are facing and that will most probably leave deep marks on our conscience, way of life and future. Based on the proverb which says that nations and the society as a whole have the leaders they deserve, I would like to propose an addition: leaders are not only representative, they are also per- fectible. How precisely? - By reminding our leaders, that when we offered them our vote and trust we found ourselves – even if only in part – in what we sensed from them. - By realizing that tough times and challenges allow, or make us prove our qualities – be them inherited or shaped and developed, and that these qualities should serve the common good – of our society, not that of an ideology, a social class or an individual. - By acknowledging – when the case, or by admitting – even if only to their own conscience, that leadership comes with great responsibility. The responsibility of being a true model (of competence, honesty, respect, humanity) and not forgetting that they (the leaders) will be remembered in history as they were and not as they wanted to be and/or attempted to portray themselves. The above would entail the leaders: - To acknowledge their own limitations – personal, or even leadership related – and, conse- quently, attract – based mainly on competence, respect and mutual trust – relevant experts, who would be empowered and employed within these parameters. - Not to forget that leaders and nations cannot face alone challenges to the entire humankind and that in such crises the success of everyone will be the true measure of individual success. - To realize, time and time again that people are more than a resource, or a means for the leaders to getting ahead, as well as to ensuring common, or individual welfare. Namely, that people are the reason and purpose of our existence. As for each of those helping the few to become leaders, and sometimes maintain their positions, they can contribute to the success of leadership process as follows: - Firstly, by trusting. Trusting the choices that they have made, the leaders’ qualities and their potential for development. Trusting that the leaders will remain dedicated to the ideas and princi- ples they had been upholding, and trusting that any challenge can be overcome by working togeth- er. - By showing courage and responsibility in reminding the leaders all of the above, when con- vinced they have been forgotten or ignored. - By being really willing to see themselves in the place of leaders whose actions they disprove and criticize without knowing their circumstance, motivation and details. - Ultimately, by acknowledging the fact that they retain the leadership and responsibility of their own existence. Moreover, by being a model (of competence, honesty, respect, humanity) to themselves, they could contribute to the success of the leadership of the society. 3 www.pulsulgeostrategic.ro Geostrategic Pulse, No 279, March - April 2020 EUROPEAN UNION Alexis CHAPELAN possibly Russian jets1) added to the noxious The year 2020 was expected to be fraught with geopolitical stew of the turbulent Middle East, political turmoil. In preparation for the already simmering with a latent conflict November general elections, America was between Iran and the United States. warming up for a tense contest whose outcome This was, as of February 2020, the political was deemed decisive for the decade-long battle landscape of the world. For most observers, the waged between populism and liberalism. The burgeoning new decade felt plainly similar to the strong performance of Vermont Senator Bernie last, rhythmed as it was by populist bravado in Sanders, proponent of a robustly left-wing the West, military unrest in the Middle East, agenda, threatened what had been the DNA of rivalries in Asia and latent fears of economic the Democratic Party’s doctrine: a centrist slowdown or even financial crisis. “Business as liberal consensus hitherto viscerally wary of usual”, one might be tempted to say. That was upheavals and, crucially, of the world until an unknown infection from the family of “Socialism”. In addition, while America was coronaviruses sent history on a pivot towards seething with the energy of a fierce electoral uncharted territory. It took the world by storm, year, in Russia, a new constitutional reform literally ripping apart in a matter of weeks the project was sketching the future contours of fabric of social life, as we knew it, and ushering what is the most disruptive geopolitical force of in a historic juncture. the last decade, putinism. Europe was in the throes of the post-Brexit trade negotiation, and What is COVID-19? The Parameters of a the void the UK had left behind was prompting a Global Crisis process of internal re-equilibration, which pitted Coronaviruses (the name refers to the crown- two political brothers increasingly at odds: like spikes on their surface) are a large family of Angela Merkel’s Germany, who squarely opted pathogens and were not a novel threat; medical for a conservative roadmap for Europe, and practitioners were well acquainted with its Emmanuel Macron’s France, hell-bent on a earlier strains, who could cause both benign sweeping rethink of the EU. And, at the gates of diseases and more sinister afflictions, such as the European citadel, war was reigniting in Syria the 2002 SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory over Idlib, brutally thrusting into a similar highly Syndrome) and the 2012 MERS (Middle East volatile arena, two of the major regional powers Respiratory Syndrome). The severity of the new (anti-Assad Turkey and pro-Assad Russia), while strain (baptized COVID-19 in February 2020 by simultaneously setting in motion waves of the WHO) is moderate: it had a mortality rate refugees bound for the Western El Dorado. Thus, most likely inferior to 4%2 and an infectiousness the menace of a direct confrontation between (called reproduction number or R0) of roughly the Russian and Turkish forces (heightened by 2.2, meaning that an infected person will the alleged bombing of a Turkish convoy by contaminate on average 2.2 persons.3 These 1.See Carlotta Gall, “Airstrike Hits Turkish Forces in Syria, Raising Fears of Escalation”, The New York Times, 27 February 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/world/middleeast/russia-turkey-syria-war-strikes.html 2. “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Mortality Rate”, Worldometer, 5 March 2020, https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ coronavirus-death-rate/#who-03-03-20 3. “The average coronavirus patient infects at least 2 others, suggesting the virus is far more contagious than flu”, Business Insider, 17 March 2020, https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-contagious-r-naught-average-patient-spread-2020-3 4 Geostrategic Pulse, No 279, March - April 2020 www.pulsulgeostrategic.ro metrics are reassuringly manageable when tively drastic measures were taken early on. In pitted against those of SARS (mortality rate of mid-January, the City of Wuhan and the province 9.6%4) or MERS (over 35% mortality rate5) of Hubei were placed under quarantine order, epidemics, but they still are alarmingly high in but the virus was already circulating globally. comparison with seasonal flu (mortality rate of Around the 20th of January, first cases were rec- 0.1 and a R0 of 1.36). Furthermore, the metrics of orded outside China, in other Asian countries the Spanish Flu, which caused an estimated 50 such as Japan, South Korea or Thailand, then in million deaths between 1918 and 1920, should the United States (21st of January), Europe (24th act as a sobering wakeup call. With a case of January in France) and Africa (14th of Febru- fatality ratio of 2.5% (quite possibly widely ary in Egypt).

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