(wikipedia.org)
Mackinder was well aware of the unfavourable configuration of Polish borders, especially towards Germany, including in the north – on the Baltic. He claimed that the reborn Polish state must have uninterrupted communication lines with the dominant maritime power. He also understood that the existence of Poland was threatened both from the west and from the east. Of course, this potentially threatened to destroy and recreate the Russian-German border. Therefore, he proposed the liquidation of East Prussia and its inclusion into Poland as a whole, which was to be associated with the displacement of the German population. In return, Poland would give up the western part of Greater Poland. At the time, these proposals were completely visionary and were strides ahead of the future.
In such a situation, Bolshevik Russia would have to be moved further north and east beyond the natural borders of the Baltic-Black Sea Intermarium, and thus beyond the Smolensk Gate (and even into the eastern foreground of this Gate) and of course beyond the Dnieper and part of its eastern tributaries. Eight days after the memorandum was written, Mackinder was summoned to a meeting of the British Government and was listened to on the issues raised in the memorandum. He spoke about the need to build a cordon to stop the Bolsheviks, and that to achieve this goal it would be necessary to offer the help of British naval power. Assistance was to be provided only if it were in alliance with Denikin’s white forces.
The possible help being suggested by Mackinder was not aimed so much at the collapse of Russia (as this would be in the obvious interest of Poland and the entire Baltic-Black Sea Intermarium), but rather at the appropriate stabilisation of the situation in a weak Russian state, which would ensure balance in Europe, including in the face of an always dangerous Germany. With this, however, would come the limitation of the aspirations of Russia, which, when weakened, could not threaten British power anywhere – including Central Asia or the imperial communication line across the Mediterranean. From the Polish interests prism such a weakened Russia – without great-power capability and still in decline, would still continue to fight the fragile (especially at the beginning) construct of the Baltic-Black Sea Intermarium.
In the long run Russia, despite its initial weakness, would strive to rebuild its position after the period of the post-war crisis. The same repeated 80 years later – after another crisis – when Putin took power. It could also prove useful to the naval power in its policy towards the Rimland of Europe or Asia, which was repeated in history – as, for example, during World War II. Here, the maritime power’s interests divide significantly with those of Poland. The Bolshevik victory in the civil war and the consolidation of the Soviets nullified the difficult Intermarium project. Mackinder’s appeals, calling for the defence of the sovereignty of the Caucasian countries and other ideas similar to Polish ‘Promethean’ thought from the interwar period, were similarly unheeded.
In a broader sense, Mackinder is the author of the famous continental concept. He recognised that the continent of Eurasia has more potential than its costal area, and a strike towards the coastal zone in order to gain dominance throughout the whole of Eurasia must leave the Heartland victorious.
The Heartland – “the heart of the continent” – is a concept commonly used by geopolitics and geographers. Mackinder was not personally the originator of this concept, but people dealing with geopolitics associate it with his considerations and use it widely in professional jargon. Since in the 20th century the “heart of the continent” was dominated for the most part by the powerful Soviet Union, it became clear that it was the power that had the potential and the aspirations to challenge the United States – the new hegemon of the world system and the global naval power – after making the Atlantic and Pacific internal seas of its own global maritime empire in 1945.
After defeating the Germans in World War II, the Soviets gained control of all of the Heartland and were on their way to conquering the World Island – through the central front near the Elbe in Germany towards the Atlantic, through the Danish Straits and GIUK towards the North Sea and the Atlantic sea routes, by dominating the Bosporus and Dardanelles towards the Mediteranean and the Middle East and the Suez, across the Korean Peninsula and Vietnam to the Pacific, and through Afghanistan and Iran to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. Between the powerful Soviet land power and the powerful American hegemon of the Sea, the struggle for primacy ended with the victory of the Sea in 1991.
Mackinder rightly believed that the foundations of the modern world were laid as a result of great geographical discoveries. At the same time that the nations of Western Europe were in the process of moving to the World Ocean, Moscow was not idle and having a continental emptiness populated by undeveloped civilisations in the east, it began to shift east overland to reach the Pacific Ocean, capturing the northeastern part of Eurasia, and then subordinating the peoples and space of Central Asia. These two fairly parallel processes brought important geopolitical consequences. Two powers arose: one connected with the Land and the other with the Sea. In permanent conditions, they are doomed to competition.
Mackinder, unlike Spykman, believed that Land would gain a clear advantage over the Sea over time, because the Heartland being the core of the Land is inaccessible to wealthy merchant ships, but at the same time remains inaccessible to the warships of the Sea. In the future, for a change, it will become well-available for modern rail, road and airplane connections. As he claimed – in the Eurasian land masses there are conditions for military and economic mobility, over great distances and more closely integrating space with a coherent communication system.
According to Mackinder, Russia is a kind of geopolitical successor to the Mongol empire created around the main axis of the Heartland. Its north, centre and west are the flatlands of Siberia, Turkmenistan, and the Volga basin; from the Urals to the Caspian Sea is a great lowland, then the plateau of Persia, Afghanistan and Balochistan. The steppes connecting Europe with the core of the Heartland begin in Europe in the Hungarian Plain, and just behind the Carpathians began the steppes of the main belt leading east and northeast along the Black Sea, and also south of the Russian forests and wilderness further north. In the south of the Urals there are forests again, but then the space turns into open steppes and grasslands. This is where the great plain from Asia to Europe is located between the Urals and the northern part of the Caspian Sea forming the Turanian Gate. Beyond this Gate, the steppes, traversing a wide belt, expand even more than in Europe, limited in the north as always by forests, and in the south by deserts and semi-deserts. It is an old historical trail that the Nomads: Huns, Avars, Magyars and Mongols followed to Europe and China from the heartland
From a global perspective, Russia has a central and strategic position throughout Eurasia similar to that of Germany in Europe alone or China in Asia alone (the so-called strategic hybridity). Russia can attack and be attacked from all sides except the Arctic North (except – as it turned out later with the development of technology – strategic aviation and missile systems, which, however, does not change the essence and sense of projection of the force necessary for domination and subordination). For Mackinder, the core of the force not subject to the influence of the Sea, and thus impossible to destroy or subordinate is the Heartland, affecting the inner zone of the World Island, roughly equivalent to that of Spykman’s Rimland. The outer zone of the World Island is the maritime world of the USA, Japan, Great Britain and Australia. From the point of view of potential, completely frozen and unstoppable in the middle of Eurasia (after marine geographical discoveries that structurally rewarded the Sea and possibly the development of those parts of Rimland that benefited from access to the World Ocean), the World Island contains the main continental part of the universal land and its hidden capabilities.
Most people in the world live there. According to Mackinder, this is the future of the world, but also its rich history, especially in times preceding the great maritime geographical discoveries. In this context, Mackinder predicted a land (continental) transport revolution as a result of the development of aviation, trains and road communication. The Heartland was to benefit greatly from this. It is hard to resist the impression that Mackinder’s plan is being implemented in the 21st century by China leading the New Silk Road through the centre of Eurasia towards Europe.
Autor
Jacek Bartosiak
CEO and Founder of Strategy&Future, author of bestselling books.
Strategy&Future
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