The fight to rule Heartland – by Sea Power from without, or in Heartland itself from within – is the main formula of geopolitical history, the very essence of geopolitics. Geopolitics is the battle for Heartland. All schools of geopolitics are founded upon and proceed from this model [...] Just as the multi-polar world arises, so does a contradiction. If we take into consideration only one Sea Power and one Heartland, then when it comes to speaking of a multi-polar world, Russia cannot possibly be the only Heartland. Russia cannot achieve a multi-polar world on its own. In the very least, multipolarity entails four or five of the most important poles in the world. Russia could be the center of this multi-polar world or only one of its poles. But Russia cannot be the only Heartland.
» It is surprising that at the bottom of our politics we always find theology. «
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Les confessions d'un revolutionnaire, 1849.
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Les confessions d'un revolutionnaire, 1849.
[...] Over the course of numerous discussions, conferences, speeches, lectures, and articles, I have come to the conclusion that it is high time to introduce the notion of an apportioned, or “distributed Heartland.” To this end, I think it is important to attentively examine the German geopolitics of the 1920-’30’s, which proclaimed Germany to be the European Heartland. Of interest to us is not so much Germany itself as the very possibility of considering an additional Heartland [...] A Chinese Heartland is an altogether different question. China, after all, is Rimland, a coastal zone. If we recognize China as bearing the status of a Heartland, then we are recognizing China as an independent strategic space. If we qualify China as Heartland, then we are emphasizing the conservative aspect of China – China as Land Power. But if China declares itself to be a Heartland against Russia, just as Hitler’s Germany declared itself to be the heart of Eurasia against Soviet Russia, then conflict will immediately arise.
If Russia retains the status of an independent pole, then this “distributed Heartland” acquires a completely different meaning. Then it is possible to consider such Heartlands as a Russian Heartland, as in all traditional geopolitical maps as the “geographical pivot of history”, and a European Heartland. We also arrive at considering a Chinese Heartland, and this means that we consider China as a traditional, conservative, independent, and sovereign state as it is today – and it will only become more so in the future. In the very least, it is important to reconcile the Chinese Heartland with the Russian Heartland, and partially even the European Heartland. But even this is insufficient to constructing a multi-polar world. We necessarily have to consider an Islamic Heartland (covering the historical spaces of at least 3-4 empires, stretching from Turkey to Pakistan). The concept of a distributed Heartland can further be expanded to India, and projected onto Latin America and Africa as well.
As follows, there should be an American Heartland in the multi-polar system. We have become too accustomed to thinking in the terms of classical geopolitics that the US and Anglo-Saxon world can only be Sea Power. In a multi-polar world, America will not be able to play this role, its global maritime range will naturally be reduced, thereby changing the very nature of America. As follows, an American Heartland should arise which, in a multi-polar system, should not be seen exclusively as in opposition to other Heartlands. The vote for Trump represented the contours of this American Heartland. If we begin to conceive of Heartland as a distributed type of culture associated with the reinforcement of conservative identity, then “Make America Great Again” is the thesis of an American Heartland. Stop being a Sea Power, and you will be great again.
[...] Distributed Heartland is the imperative of the new geopolitical model, of multi-polar geopolitics. I think that this concept deserves very serious cogitation, pondering, and description. There should be a number of conferences, or an even entire volume devoted to this inevitable question. The efficacy of this concept of distributed Heartland is, in my opinion, extremely important, insofar as the construction of a multi-polar world now demands clearer and more precise roadmaps.
See also:
Carl
Schmitt (1941) - Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung mit
Interventionsverbot für raumfremde Mächte. Ein Beitrag zum Reichsbegriff
im Völkerrecht. (Great Space International Law with a ban on
intervention by powers alien to the area. A contribution to the concept
of empire in international law.)
Carl Schmitt (1940) - Großraum gegen Universalismus. (Great Space vs. Universalism.)
Carl Schmitt (1940) - Großraum gegen Universalismus. (Great Space vs. Universalism.)