Generolo Jono Žemaičio Lietuvos karo akademija

Nationalism is one of the great ideologies of the 19th and 20th centuries, whose demise was widely expected with certainty at the end of the 20th century. But Brexit, the election of Donald Trump as the President of the United States and constant gaining force by the Radical Right political parties in Europe sparkled discussion on the role of nationalism in the international system of the 21st century. The article answers the question whether this reanimation of nationalism is a long-term trend or merely an episode that supports predictions of its fading away.

This article is centered on the opportunities of small states in the emerging imperial world order. Particularly, policy options for Lithuania as a small state in the evolving new international arena are explored. The authors present a brief analysis of theoretical studies and historical researches on the empires and the roles of small states in imperial structures. The article focuses on the current characteristics of the U.S., Russia, and the EU "core" countries. This permits one to draw a conclusion concerning the imperial developments in domestic and foreign policies of these geopolitical actors. Having completed this analysis, the authors cautiously investigate foreign policy options for Lithuania that possibly follow from the interplay of the projects of the liberal global empire of American neoconservatives, projects of "enhanced cooperation" of the EU "core" and Putin's policies to reintegrate CIS states under Russian domination.

The changes in geostrategy of the United States have become clear after the events of September 11. These changes have encouraged the reformation and adaptation process of the geopolitical codes of the other main geopolitical actors. Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Russia and China are facing the necessity either to adapt to the transformed US geostrategy or to project and implement alternative geopolitical combinations striving for its neutralisation. The change of the geopolitical codes of the main geopolitical actors (including various alternatives variants) would_shape the main tendencies of global geopolitical development at the beginning of the 21st century. It is necessary to evaluate the action scenarios of the main geopolitical actors in order to identify the opportunities of Lithuania’s geopolitical code and also Lithuania’s foreign policy transformation in the global geopolitical environment since the possibilities of Lithuania’s foreign policy directly depend on the changes of the global geopolitical situation. The analysis of global geopolitical development and the identification of opportunities of Lithuania’s foreign policy are based both on static and dynamic approaches. This study identifies the interests of the US, Russia, major powers of the European Union (EU) and China in the global geopolitical environment. Such identification sets the conditions for Lithuania’s possible location in the geostrategic plans of the great powers and that is the static part of the analysis. The dynamic part of the analysis relies on the model of the strategic choice and presents the main geostrategic alternatives of the most important geopolitical actors. They depend on the changes of interaction among the geopolitical subjects. The models of this interaction allow identifying possible global geopolitical scenarios and evaluating Lithuania’s eventual geopolitical role in the changing geopolitical space.

The authors present the geopolitical analysis of global, regional and local (in the Eastern Baltics) situation for the 2001-2003 period. It is asserted that during this period the United States, Israel and Russia (in some areas) have received the biggest gains, at least in geostrategic terms. In the course of the counter-terrorist global campaign, EU countries have been divided on the issue of the war against Iraq and that, which has prevented consolidation of the common EU foreign, security and defence policies.