Over the past four centuries, Europe has been the cradle of the classic diplomacy of the world. It is plain that the Renaissance had enlightened a new era in modern Europe where a state-system was born in an anarchic scenario. As Emer de Vattel argued then that Europe had formed a political system wherein the nations were bound together by their relations and various interests into a community. Due to this, constant attention of the resident embassies to each other and the negotiations between them made of Europe into a sort of republic, e.g. the members–each independent, but all bound together by a common interest–united for the maintenance of order and the preservation of liberty.”
Accordingly, sovereign states of Europe have interacted in line of the principle of the balance of power, by which is meant that “no state shall be in a position to have absolute mastery and dominance over the others.” It affirms that the legacy of European state-system appealed to a multipolar system and international law, while its evolution since the 16th century depended upon diplomacy for nothing more proper to raise the reputation of each nation, and to make it respected all efforts. By early the 20th century, Lasa Oppenheim argued that the balance of power was in fact an essential condition of the operation of public law, thus the steps necessary to maintain the equilibrium also often involve using force or open violation of the injunctions of international law. Given this, the most basic of the rules of public law—those dealing with sovereignty, security, equality, non-intervention, and the like—depend for the efficiency on the principle of “reciprocity” so that states are assumed to have mutual and lasting interests in the observance of rules and norms of public law.
Echoing to the balance of power, collective security is additional most far-reaching regime to overcome the deficiencies of a highly decentralized system of law enforcement. First, a logical development from the balance of power is that in a horizontal order of independent units, collective security has been held up by the consensus among states though it falls far short of the ideal, such as in the cases of Article 16 of Covenant of the League of Nations and Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations. Second, international law is usually seen as “positive international morality” since it affects the rational decisions made by statesmen who have opined the moral obligation to legitimate common interests and cooperation of all states for the creed of collective security.
In reality, states are assumed in a rational way only if the following three requirements are met: 1) security-i.e., dealing with the problem of conflict by assuring the survival and safety of all the members concerned; 2) satisfaction-i.e., dealing with the case of disputes through obtaining mutual constraint or general consent; 3) flexibility-i.e., dealing with the issue of uncertainty or change (which is crucial since assent is never definitive or total), by establishing reliable procedures capable of absorbing shocks and of channeling grievances. Otherwise, the remaining concerns exists that whether the aggrandizement of a neighboring state, in consequence of which a nation fears that it will one day be oppressed, is a sufficient ground for making war upon it.
It was first raised by Vattel in 1758 and then by many other scholars of international relations and public law. Historically, it is more perplexing for those who seek at all times to unite justice with prudence. On the one hand, it holds that as long as states increases its power by all efforts of a benign government, it would wrong no one simply because it acts on its natural rights. Yet, on the other hand, history teaches too well that predominant states rarely fail to trespass the legitimate interests and security concerns of their neighbors and beyond, when they have an opportunity of doing so with impunity.
The legacy of public law and international society can be traced in Europe even during the Cold War which was resulted from the two hostile blocs in Europe in terms of geopolitics and ideology. But the states of Europe, in either the West or the East, were driven by the political will to contribute to peace, security and cooperation from time to time. By 1975, thirty-three states agreed to conclude The Helsinki Final Act reaffirming “the indivisibility of security among their interplays and common interest in the development of cooperation throughout Europe. Later, three more treaties were signed respectively involving the terms of indivisible security and the legitimacy of the rights and obligations of all states in Europe, first in 1990, then in 1997 and finally in 1999. All of the documents reiterated the “formation of a common and indivisible security space” in Europe.
However, since the war broke out in Ukraine in 2022, the U.S. led the NATO and many other global allies and partners including a few semi-sovereign states in Asia to have intended to abandon the legacy of European classic diplomacy and the select doctrine of the indivisible security of all nations. First, the Anglo-American-Japanese axis have pursued the strategic defeat of Russia followed by a bunch of pundits to appeal to the prospect of “second Russia collapse like those in 1917 and 1991”. It is obvious that those groups have never been aware of the geopolitics championed by Vattel, Morgenthau, Kennan, Kissinger and Mearsheimer, here mentioned a few only. Second, the assembly of 100 states and international agencies held talks in Switzerland was a rejection of Russia which is one of the major fighting side into the conference for the purpose of making peace in Ukraine. What a ridiculous drama!
China was indeed invited to the peace meeting by the host country but Beijing decided to decline attending it due to the sound reasons as follows. First, the peace conference usually aims to achieve a fair and decent peace benefiting each side. Thus, it should be recognized by both Russia and Ukraine, yet, the latter has been backed up by the U.S.-led NATO in all means to make Russia suffer a strategic failure. Second, the participants of the conflict should be treated equally and fairly. Yet, it seems that the peace conference aims to create a scenario that Russia looks like a defeated state while being isolated diplomatically. Third, the agenda of the peace conference should fairly discuss the issues such as how to rebuild a sustainable peace and mutual trust other than making efforts to humiliate any side.
In theory, it is true that no one has the right to wage a war of aggression against a neighbor and undermine one of the basic principles of the UN Charter – the territorial integrity of states. Yet, in reality, it is also true that no one can ignore the legitimate security concerns of other states as Vattle defined. Moreover, as Kissinger argued that no sound foreign policy is possible without an awareness of the root courses of the disputes and conflicts. After all, states have their own memories of history, cultural links and religious legacies, not to mention the key elements of geopolitics. George Kennan warned in the 1990s that it was unwise for the U.S.-led NATO to drive into Ukraine without concerning with the core interests of Russia.
The argument in this piece has never disregarded the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine as it is actually a great Slavic nation with all resources to be a strong and wealthy country in Europe like Poland and Czech while having the potentials to be a manufacturing power like Italy, France or Germany. Yet, the U.S. and UK will never allow that to happen since it will move towards a more strategic autonomy of Europe. As a result, EU, Russia and China plus the Global South might call for multilateral world order rather than a unilateral hegemony dictated by the Anglo-American axis. To that end, it is time to call for a return of classic diplomacy of Europe which is in line with the time-tested wisdom of the equilibrium among nation-states.