The Munich Crossroads

The below transcript is from Prof. Alexander Dugin’s latest episode of the Radio Sputnik Escalation Show, dealing with the Munich Security Conference.

The below transcript is from Prof. Alexander Dugin’s latest episode of the Radio Sputnik Escalation Show, dealing with the Munich Security Conference, the ascent of the neocons in the Trump administration, the dilemmas facing a multipolar world, and the ongoing negotiations over Ukraine.

Radio Sputnik, Escalation Show Host: Let’s start with the already infamous — and now even more infamous — city of Munich. This city is strangely connected with a huge number of dark pages in history: it is the cradle of Nazism, the Munich Agreement, and endless security conferences, the last of which has just ended. Perhaps the only unconditional watershed and key moment in history was Vladimir Putin’s Munich speech.

At the current conference, in my opinion, another rift occurred, which, according to many sources in Europe, has already taken place between the United States and Europe. Let’s start with that: how would you assess the overall consequences of what has happened in Munich in recent days? Your opinion here is certainly very, very interesting.

Alexander Dugin: I just published a fairly detailed article on this topic on RIA Novosti: I analyzed the latest events at the Munich conference, primarily the speech by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, comparing it with last year’s speech at the same event by Vice President JD Vance. And here I have presented the main arguments. The idea is as follows: a year ago, Vice President JD Vance proclaimed the MAGA program, which marked the end of globalization and the new Trump administration’s orientation towards the slogan “America First,” towards America’s national interest first and foremost. In principle, Vance said something very important at the time: “Your enemy is not Russia, not China. Your enemy is yourselves. And if you, Europeans, do not change yourselves, we cannot help you in this regard. Now it’s every man for himself.”

Thus, exactly a year ago, Vance drew this dividing line between the Old and New Worlds. And the Atlantic, geopolitically speaking, ceased to be an inland lake with the same civilization on both sides, and instead became a watershed and a border between the civilization of America, the New World, and the civilization of the Old World. That was a year ago. And, in fact, to some extent, all the announcements of a new geopolitical course made by Vice President Vance a year ago at the Munich Conference generally, in one way or another, found embodiment in actual policy over 2025. Hence the conflict over Greenland, which has nearly led to the final collapse of NATO, and hence Trump welcoming of the Russian president to Anchorage. However we may assess this event, it is ambiguous from our point of view, but from the West’s point of view, it is not just ambiguous — it is simply a slap in the face to the unity of globalist Russophobia. In other words, Trump is talking with the Russian president, and that in itself is something extraordinary.

In addition, there is Trump’s full support for Netanyahu and his genocide in Gaza, in stark contrast to the European Union’s significantly divergent position. There’s the kidnapping of Maduro, a sovereign ruler. And finally, Trump says that international law no longer exists: “It’s me and my morality” — and his morality, let’s just say, is so-so. Of course, based on what we know about him, this will now be a replacement, a substitute for international law. Of course, all this has horrified the globalist European elites, who continue to think of themselves in a world based on liberal rules.

The split that Vance indicated has took place. At the same time, it must be said that Trump himself has changed over the course of this year: he has become less and less in line with the original MAGA strategy — “Make America Great Again” — which Vance articulated, and has become more and more aligned with the neoconservatives. This is very important. Perhaps it was not so noticeable from the outside, but within American politics, Trump’s course was shifting from MAGA to the neocons, who are globalists, but of a different, tougher, more right-wing, and aggressive variety. These neoconservatives are not American patriots: they pursue the same policies as left-liberal globalists, but without the masks. They are simply more cynical and say that the West — note, the West — must assert its hegemony over the whole world, bypassing any liberal-democratic masks. These are the neoconservatives.

So, within America, there has been a shift from the MAGA strategy that Trump started with to a policy which is virtually indistinguishable from that of the neoconservatives, and which Trump finally adopted by the end of 2025. And now this is also telling: a year ago, it was Vance who voiced the principles of MAGA, and today it is Rubio, who is himself a neoconservative — this is very important, he himself comes from this neoconservative environment. Many even thought that this was a trap for Trump, because Trump, in principle, challenged both right-wing and left-wing globalism: initially, he came with ideas of a completely different nature, opposed to both left-wing and right-wing globalism. And so Rubio was a certain compromise, and yet in 2025, Rubio’s position had grown significantly.

You probably know that Rubio and Vance are two possible candidates for the next election. Trump has acknowledged this, and everyone in the Republican Party believes so. But they embody slightly different vectors: Vance is MAGA, and over the past year, this direction has significantly weakened among Trump supporters — many of them have broken away and left Trump. Rubio, on the other hand, is a neoconservative, and his position, on the contrary, has grown because Trump’s strategy over the past year — not in words but in deeds (and in words too) — has become essentially indistinguishable from that of the neoconservatives. Let me remind you that it was the neoconservatives who were behind the escalation of events in Ukraine, behind the support for the Maidan, and it was they who provoked this Ukrainian war.

And now Rubio comes to Munich and announces his program at the Security Conference, where the leaders of the European Union and NATO countries have gathered. What does this program consist of? It differs significantly from the program announced by Vance a year ago, and he is essentially saying: “Don’t be afraid, we won’t abandon you. We are strategic partners, we remain part of the same Atlantic community, we have common goals and common enemies. So don’t take some of our president’s actions too much to heart.” He was actually sent there to strengthen, consolidate, and, if you will, save Atlantic unity.

At the same time, Rubio criticized left-liberal ideology. He says: “Look, your attitude towards gender politics and migrants is what divides us.” That’s the ideological nuance. While Vance said, “You are your own enemies, and Russia and China are not your enemies or ours,” Rubio argues quite differently. He didn’t talk much about Russia, but what he said on the sidelines of the Munich Conference leaves no doubt that neoconservative politics and strategy represented by the US dominate here too — he made no gestures toward Russia. Of course, he did not fall into the hysteria that characterizes European leaders; he was restrained — to his credit. But, in principle, Rubio said: “The West remains united, but you must recognize some ideological corrections.”

While Vance said that what is happening is a tragedy and a catastrophe, Rubio simply lamented that left-wing liberals such as Fukuyama have been too hasty in their declaration that there is no more history and no opposition to the liberal West. He wants to say that there is opposition, and that the globalist hopes that after the fall of the Soviet Union there would be a unified world ruled by a global liberal world government have definitely not come true. He says that we are facing difficult times, that we must preserve the unipolar hegemony that we still have, and that this is not easy. So let’s put aside the illegitimate, overly hasty idea of the end of history and the liberal world order. Let’s focus, strike a blow against our common enemies — and we Russians are definitely among them — and prevent a multipolar world from coming into being, acting as a united front. But you have to admit that your hasty obsession with gender politics and uncontrolled migration simply does not correspond to the objective state of affairs. You were too quick to proclaim that victory is in the bag: this is not the case, we have to fight for it, so let’s regroup and move in that direction.

That is Rubio’s message. If you listen carefully, it is actually quite aggressive towards us and China. Formally, he refrained from making harsh attacks — that is what sets him apart. But if we look not at the form, but at the content, we will see exactly that: the Atlantic community must be united, the leadership position of the United States within it must be recognized, and the issue boils down solely to the left-liberal ideology that you, the leaders of the European Union, are desperately clinging to, but from which we have freed ourselves, giving ourselves a free hand. I would also like to remind you that it was Rubio who was one of the main supporters of the capture of Maduro and the invasion of Cuba which the US is now preparing for.

These neocons are aggressive, belligerent supporters of a unipolar world and hegemony, and their representative was sent by Trump to this conference. In my opinion, this does not bode well for anyone. You quite rightly drew our attention to the ominous city of Munich. “Munich” is a diminutive and affectionate name; in fact, it is Munch (Munich). Munich is a “town,” but in general it is Munich, and this Munich really plays an ominous role in history. And, in fact, Rubio to a certain extent confirms the dark, bad reputation of this city. Perhaps there is some kind of curse on it.

Host: A few clarifying questions, if I may, as I would like to talk about this in more detail. You mentioned the left-liberal ideology that Rubio criticized in his speech, calling the very idea of a liberal world order and a world without borders “stupid.” You even quote this in your article. But here’s the question, Alexander Gelyevich: isn’t left-liberal ideology one of the main pillars of globalism, especially in Europe? If Rubio calls for abandoning it as a “stupid idea” that is incapable of consolidating society on the basis of commercial transactions alone, isn’t there a contradiction here? How does he plan to unite Europe while demanding that it abandon the fundamental principle of its current existence — Euro-globalism itself?

Alexander Dugin: That’s a very good question, a very accurate one. In current politics, we need to distinguish between at least three poles— three ideological poles.

1. The first pole is the left-wing globalists we are talking about. They are predominant in Europe. The proponents of this approach are the US Democratic Party and many representatives within the administration, the so-called “Deep State,” who do not change depending on which party wins the election. Their main principle is this: history has ended, liberal democracy has triumphed on a global scale. There are elections everywhere, and the constitutions of almost all countries (including, incidentally, Russia) are written under Western dictation. We are dealing with the same system: liberal democracy and parliamentarism in politics, and a free market in economics. The media and technology are becoming internationalized. In this world, in their opinion, peoples and nations are meaningless; it is meaningless to talk about Europe, America, or even China — everyone is part of the same framework of a single Western paradigm. No one challenges it and no one can challenge it. And so let’s focus on “deepening democracy”: for example, on gender, transgender, and migration policies, in order to mix everything up and bring humanity to a common denominator. This is the position of the left-wing liberals who dominate Europe and the Democratic Party in America.

2. There is the MAGA position. It is staunchly anti-globalist. It says nothing of the sort. According to it, nation-states are to be preserved. America is a nation-state, so it must pursue its own interests and must not interfere in the affairs of humanity. It needs to focus on internal problems: putting its own house in order, arresting corrupt and perverted members of the elite, breaking almost completely with globalism (including Europe), and recognizing the existence of a multipolar world and other, non-American poles. This is the MAGA movement and its ideology: a return to conservative values, a ban on gender politics, DEI, and “woke” culture. Russia is not a threat in this case, so it is more of an ally. China poses something of a threat economically, but it just needs to be restrained — otherwise, let them build whatever they want. Trump won precisely on the basis of this anti-globalist ideology directed against the “deep state.” This is his electorate.

3. But there is also a third position: between MAGA and the left-wing globalists, there are the neoconservatives, or “neocons” as they are called. These neocons say that left-wing globalism is wrong in only one respect: it is too hasty in declaring that everything is already over. No, we need to be more precise: we are not talking about some kind of unified image of civilization or uniform rules for everyone. We are talking about Western domination, Western hegemony. And this hegemony is not yet fully secured. We have reached a critical point, but we have not yet reached the point of no return: China is rising, Russia is rising, India is rising. The Islamic world is desperately resisting at the regional level, Africa is trying to go its own way, and anti-globalist regimes are emerging in Latin America. All this is very dangerous, so we must discard the husk of liberal, humanistic, and pacifist ideology and recognize that the establishment of world order must be based on power. Therefore, European views are secondary. The fact is that American hegemony must be firmly established in order to deal a crushing blow to its opponents (China, Russia, the Islamic world), to put its vassals — in the guise of Europe, India, or Japan — in their place, and, in essence, to wage a final battle against all those anti-Western trends — BRICS, the multipolar world, attempts to differentiate the world’s reserve currency. Everyone must be made either vassals, enemies, or slaves. The Belgian prime minister told us about the difference between vassals and slaves — this is simply a figure of speech, a rhetorical distinction. In other words, the neocons would have everyone be slaves to progressive, hegemonic, imperialist America. And those who try to object to any issue will not fare well.

Trump came to power for the first time on the basis of MAGA — the first anti-globalist ideology. And the second time, in 2024, he won the election under the MAGA slogan. The neocons, along with the globalists, were against him: they are the so-called “never Trumpists.” They belonged to the “anyone but Trump” camp. But now these neocons have infiltrated the Trump administration and are gradually taking over. There is almost nothing left of MAGA, and the idea of American Atlantic hegemony is becoming increasingly prevalent and evident in Trump’s real politics.

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The Munich Crossroads