How the World Works

w ith substantial poverty, corruption, crime and so on. Partial
extension of the NAT O system to industrial—or partially industrial—
countries like the Czech R epublic, Poland and Hungary w ould help
formalize all this.
But there w ill be conflicts. Europe and the U S have differing
expectations and goals for the region, and there are also differences
w ithin Europe. R ussia isn’t a trivial force either; it can’t be
disregarded and doesn’t like being excluded. T here are more
complex pow er plays, like the jockeying that’s going on around the
oil fields in Central Asia, w here the people involved w on’t have
much of a voice in the process.
In the case of NAT O, there are other factors, like the special
interests of military industry, w hich is looking forw ard to a huge
market w ith NAT O expansion and standardization of w eapons
(w hich are mainly produced by the U S). T hat translates into another
substantial taxpayer subsidy to high-tech industry, w ith the usual
inefficiencies of our system of industrial policy and “state socialism
for the rich.”