Europe and Security in the Caucasus (original) (raw)

2005, Transition Studies Review

The Caucasus has become, as a long-lasting seismic wave, a framework of enormous and underestimated relevance and uncertainty. But even so, we have not to become prisoner of a short-term “cage”. There is neither strategy nor policy, diplomacy, or war that can exist without four fundamental intellectual preconditions: historical knowledge, security knowledge, ethnic-cultural-religious knowledge, and knowledge of the geopolitical, economic, and international order. These have been recalled by some crucial comments taken from a revisited version of Homer’s Iliad, recently published by the Italian writer Alessandro Baricco, to better focus the concepts. “Men have always flung themselves headlong into battle, like moths attracted towards a fatal flame. There is no fear or self-disgust which has managed to keep them away from that flame” – he wrote – “because it is within that flame that they have always found the only way of emerging from the shadows of life. For this reason, I believe that no one will stop searching for an alternative beauty to that represented by the war path or stop looking for a reason to about face. Sooner or later we will succeed in calling Achilles away from this fateful war. Neither fear nor horror will bring him home. It will be some other completely different beauty, more dazzling than his own and infinitely more humble”. We are, in fact, aware of examples of very poor governance skills at a global level as regards the management of medium-and long-term international order options. And the Caucasus is really a case study. For these many reasons Europe cannot avoid an effective “neighbourhood policy” with the Caucasian countries. In 2003, the European Union appointed a Special Representative for the region. Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia all have Partnership and Cooperation Agreements in force with the EU. Actions plans will be soon implemented and Europe represents by and large the preferred and more reliable interlocutor for the Caucasian region.