25 06 10 best fm serdar yayinda ziyareti

during the past decade mexico has assumed a position somewhat similar to that of turkey. just as turkey abandoned its historic opposition to europe and attempted to join europe, mexico has stopped defining itself by its opposition to the united states and is instead attempting to imitate the united states and to join it in the north american free trade area. mexican leaders are engaged in the great task of redefining mexican identity and have introduced fundamental economic reforms that eventually will lead to fundamental political change. in 1991 a top adviser to president carlos salinas de gortari described at length to me all the changes the salinas government was making. when he finished, i remarked: "that's most impressive. it seems to me that basically you want to change mexico from a latin american country into a north american country." he looked at me with surprise and exclaimed: "exactly! that's precisely what we are trying to do, but of course we could never say so publicly." as his remark indicates, in mexico as in turkey, significant elements in society resist the redefinition of their country's identity. in turkey, european-oriented leaders have to make gestures to islam (ozal's pilgrimage to mecca); so also mexico's north american-oriented leaders have to make gestures to those who hold mexico to be a latin american country (salinas' ibero-american guadalajara summit).
historically turkey has been the most profoundly torn country. for the united states, mexico is the most immediate torn country. globally the most important torn country is russia. the question of whether russia is part of the west or the leader of a distinct slavic-orthodox civilization has been a recurring one in russian history. that issue was obscured by the communist victory in russia, which imported a western ideology, adapted it to russian conditions and then challenged the west in the name of that ideology. the dominance of communism shut off the historic debate over westernization versus russification. with communism discredited russians once again face that question. president yeltsin is adopting western principles and goals and seeking to make russia a "normal" country and a part of the west. yet both the russian elite and the russian public are divided on this issue. among the more moderate dissenters, sergei stankevich argues that russia should reject the "atlanticist" course, which would lead it "to become european, to become a part of the world economy in rapid and organized fashion, to become the eighth member of the seven, and to put particular emphasis on germany and the united states as the two dominant members of the atlantic alliance." while also rejecting an exclusively eurasian policy, stankevich nonetheless argues that russia should give priority to the protection of russians in other countries, emphasize its turkic and muslim connections, and promote "an appreciable redistribution of our resources, our options, our ties, and our interests in favor of asia, of the eastern direction." people of this persuasion criticize yeltsin for subordinating russia's interests to those of the west, for reducing russian military strength, for failing to support traditional friends such as serbia, and for pushing economic and political reform in ways injurious to the russian people. indicative of this trend is the new popularity of the ideas of petr savitsky, who in the 1920s argued that russia was a unique eurasian civilization.(7) more extreme dissidents voice much more blatantly nationalist, anti-western and anti-semitic views, and urge russia to redevelop its military strength and to establish closer ties with china and muslim countries. the people of russia are as divided as the elite. an opinion survey in european russia in the spring of 1992 revealed that 40 percent of the public had positive attitudes toward the west and 36 percent had negative attitudes. as it has been for much of its history, russia in the early 1990s is truly a torn country.to redefine its civilization identity, a torn country must meet three requirements. first, its political and economic elite has to be generally supportive of and enthusiastic about this move. second, its public has to be willing to acquiesce in the redefinition. third, the dominant groups in the recipient civilization have to be willing to embrace the convert. all three requirements in large part exist with respect to mexico. the first two in large part exist with respect to turkey. it is not clear that any of them exist with respect to russia's joining the west. the conflict between liberal democracy and marxism- leninism was between ideologies which, despite their major differences, ostensibly shared ultimate goals of freedom, equality and prosperity. a traditional, authoritarian, nationalist russia could have quite different goals. a western democrat could carry on an intellectual debate with a soviet marxist. it would be virtually impossible for him to do that with a russian traditionalist. if, as the russians stop behaving like marxists, they reject liberal democracy and begin behaving like russians but not like westerners, the relations between russia and the west could again become distant and conflictual.(8)a confucian-islamic military connection has thus come into being, designed to promote acquisition by its members of the weapons and weapons technologies needed to counter the military power of the west. it may or may not last. at present, however, it is, as dave mccurdy has said, "a renegades' mutual support pact, run by the proliferators and their backers." a new form of arms competition is thus occurring between islamic-confucian states and the west. in an old-fashioned arms race, each side developed its own arms to balance or to achieve superiority against the other side. in this new form of arms competition, one side is developing its arms and the other side is attempting not to balance but to limit and prevent that arms build-up while at the same time reducing its own military capabilities.
implications for the west