528
20 }
Constraining Unipolarity in an Unbalanced
International SystemAn “Extremely Unbalanced” International SystemThe end of the Cold War posed a great challenge for the PRC. Not only did
the global system not move in the direction of multipolarity that China
had extolled since the early 1970s as the desired future condition. Instead,
the United States emerged in a position of unparalleled global preeminence.
Moreover, China’s relation with a newly unrestrained American hegemon had
lost its vital strategic ballast; Washington no longer needed China’s support
to counter the Soviet Union. The basic premise of PRC-US cooperation since
1972, convergent interests in checking Soviet expansionism, was no more.
Russia’s new leaders were preoccupied dealing with the aftermath of state dis-
integration and had little time for foreign affairs. What little attention they
had was mostly spent dealing with regions close to Russia. The post-Soviet
Russian economy began a deeper decline than virtually anyone had expected,
greatly diminishing Moscow’s ability to continue to play the role of a world
power. Former Soviet military forces decayed. In short, there was no longer
a global power challenging the United States. Moreover, in the very early
post-Soviet period, there seemed a good possibility that newly democratic
Russia would become a partner of Europe and the United States, with Russia
returning to what many Russians saw as “Russia’s European home.” A pos-
sible harbinger of closer Soviet-Western cooperation came in fall 1990, when
Moscow gave a green light to Washington’s military campaign to undo Iraq’s
attempted annexation of Kuwait.
Contrary to long-standing Chinese predictions about the imminent
dawning of an era of multipolarity, Europe and Japan did not emerge as
poles in a new multipolar international system, but remained comfortably
within the US-led Western alliance system. The division of Europe between
free self-governing democracies and communist party–ruled and mostly