The Increasing Definition of Eurasia, Oceania, and East Asia

The Power Blocs of 1984:

Oceania, pink

Eurasia: orange

East Asia: green

Disputed Areas: white

These three groups of nations from George Orwell's novel 1984 are undergoing growing pains as they mature into their fully defined adulthood.

Oceania, led by NATO and the USA, is defining itself with its search for yet another war, a war not traveled, a war just over the horizon, a promise of a war, a fight against those chthonic elements of the Earth, of which is may be said - paraphrasing Robert Frost - that "...something there is that does not love a war."

Surprisingly enough, however, Airstrip One (Great Britain) has voted in Parliament against the leadership of Oceania.

Russia seeks to beef up as head of Eurasia, and possibly all the non-Islamic parts of the Middle East. It is seen as the one power that cares about the fate of minorities in Syria, a role which it assumes by default, since the USA has done nothing to save the religious minorities from the sectarian civil war which broke out when they invaded the region.

Then there's China, which within the folds of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (which at present also includes Russia), seeks to define its future area of hegemony.

Does it strike you as some sort of inflated literary conceit that we draw this parallel between the important events of these days - the real business of the world as done by the movers and shakers of Washington and other centers of power - and some out-of-date novel from the 1940's?

If it does, I answer that so far, Secretary of State Kerry has compared President Assad to Hitler at least once over the past month...
Mr. Kerry is filled with lines of narrative from 70 years ago...

(May we imagine that Mr. Kerry imagines himself no Anthony Eden to Mr. Obama's Neville Chamberlain, rather a
re-invigorated Eden, or - better yet - a Viscount Halifax to Mr. Obama's Winston Churchill!)

Please remember that we are still only at the gateway to the Future, and it is within our hands even now to change it in important and lasting ways.
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