These Studies on Security contain only the results of my scientific views, research, analyses and models. In other words, they provide a SUMMARY of my MAJOR contributions to the Science of Security.
  
  STUDY 25. ASPECTS OF BULGARIAN NATIONAL SECURITY IN A EUROPEAN AND GLOBAL CONTEXT
  
  Essential dimensions and significant characteristics of Bulgaria's national security are examined from the point of view of international security and the leading processes in the world in general and above all in Europe.
  
  The following monograph of mine is devoted to an in-depth analysis of the global (i.e. the world), continental (i.e. Europe), regional (i.e. the Balkans and the Black Sea) and national (i.e. Bulgaria) dimensions of security:
  Николай Слатински. Рискът – новото име на Сигурността. София: Изток-Запад, 2019.
   [Nikolay Slatinski. Riskut – novoto ime na Sigurnostta. Sofia: Iztok-Zapad, 2019].
  Nikolay Slatinski. Risk – the new Name of Security. Sofia: Iztok-Zapad, 2019 (in Bulgarian)
  
  
  We are already in the Wave of Risk (see Study 3), in the Society of risks, in the Risk Society (see e.g. Study 19). Whether we like it or not, we will increasingly move from one out-of-order situation and abnormality to another. Out-of-order is the new, so to speak, in-order, the new order; abnormality is the new normality. That is why it is necessary not to react when the trouble has already happened, not even to think about prevention, i.e. not letting a small disaster become a big one, but to act with early warning – not to let the trouble overtake us, at all not to allow it to arise at all. And to learn more and more about forecasting, so that we can foresee what is ahead of us so that we are prepared for it.
  In the Risk Society, any missed, poorly managed risk evolves too quickly in time and space. In the Risk Society, there can be a very short period of time from the dam wall cracking to its bursting. And we should not wait and start removing, overcoming the crack only when it appears (reaction); we cannot limit ourselves to efforts to prevent the crack that has already appeared from becoming big (prevention). In other words, we should not allow the wall to have a crack, even just barely, even microscopically, because if it cracks even the slightest, it can, figuratively speaking, burst in „no time“ and finally the torrent of water will take us away. That is why it is necessary to monitor the state of the wall with sensors, calculations and other technical and scientific tools, the distribution of internal stresses and its vulnerabilities (early warning).
  
  In the Risk Society, we need a qualitatively different way of thinking, a qualitatively different attitude to disasters and troubles, to try not to fall into panic and fear, not to allow chaos and anarchy, not to disintegrate into atoms and not become frightened herds, but to mobilize, unite, consolidate and increase our solidarity.
  
  The Risk Society is a society of mobilization, transformational security (see e.g. Study 5), where extreme mobilization and systemic transformations are needed to continue to be in security. We emphasize – to continue to be in security.
  The Risk Society imposes a radically different approach to security, it uses radically different terminology: e.g. the mentioned early warning, as well as vulnerability diagnostics, criticality analysis, (re)prioritization of objectives and resources, etc.
  The Risk Society requires a much more developed, more flexible, more complex, more integrated as a network architecture national security system, with much more decentralization at the expense of centralization and with much more coordination at the expense of command.
  The Risk Society is associated with serious investments – in risk countermeasures; in first responders, in the army, police and special services.
  The Risk Society carries, with apologies for the tautology, many risks, but they can be managed when there is strong strategic leadership, scientific analysis and forecasting, when there is a sense of duty and responsibility to the present and, even more, to future generations.
  The Risk Society means that time and space are already different. We come across (see Study 7) unknown unknowns and must turn them into known unknowns or into unknown knowns. But less and less often we will come across, we will face, we will deal with the known knowns. It is so, and it cannot be otherwise – our life in the Risk Society is and will constantly be like shooting blindfolded at a moving target (the unknown unknowns). And the maximum (increasingly likely the only) we can do is to immobilize the target, even if we are blindfolded (the known unknowns) or remove the blindfold, never mind that the target is moving (the known unknowns). But we will never again be able to enjoy, or too rarely enjoy, the ease of shooting blindfolded at a stopped target (the known knowns).
  
  Yes, it certainly will be, and undoubtedly that is what awaits us. And we, in a common and united Europe, are called to persevere by minimizing our defects, weaknesses, delusions and mistakes and by maximizing our strengths, values, principles and true decisions.
  In these efforts of ours, we are not doomed at all. Nothing that if a person listens to a significant part of the Bulgarian society, with great anxiety he can ask himself the question: Is it alive, our society, or only so it seems to us that it is alive? Because a living and vibrant society should react much smarter and more compassionately, much braver and more European.
  
  We the Europeans – both truly Europeans and not quite Europeans – live in complicated times. Earlier, our differences with the rest of the world and especially with the underdeveloped world were mainly quantitative, i.e. then we were much more democratic and normal, much more developed and richer, much more happier and more orderly, much more satisfied and more complacent than they. But the differences turned from quantitative to qualitative. We are not only „more“ than them – we live in a different society compared to them, and it is: globalized and postmodern, networked and risky.
  The others, too much of the rest of the world and especially in its underdeveloped regions, continue to suffocate in the previous dimension of their torturous existence:
  • some vegetate in the regionalized society, and the even more underdeveloped than them are firmly stuck in the bottomless „black holes“ of disintegrating or already disintegrated states;
  • some vegetate in the modern society, and the even more undeveloped than them are firmly stuck in the pre-modern and even pre-societal (from pre-Society) herd-clan-tribal primitiveness with its shamanisms, paganisms, totemisms, animisms;
  • some vegetate in the hierarchical society, and the even more undeveloped than them are firmly stuck in chaos and anarchy, where there is a single regulator of relations and conflicts – force, where the stronger eats, robs, beats, cheats, enslaves or rapes the weaker;
  • some vegetate in the security society, i.e. with the limit of desires for at least some, minimal or – if possible, relative security, and the even more undeveloped than them are firmly stuck in the jungles of the endless war of all against all and where dangers lurk everywhere, and security is a chimera, a mystic, an illusion , an impossibility.
  
  Explanation:
  Shaman – a person who, according to religious beliefs or word of mouth, can see and pass into the otherworldly and is considered a mediator between the worlds, a guide of souls to the „other world“.
  Paganism – heathendom, idolatry, polytheism.
  Totem – an animal, plant, object or phenomenon believed to have magical power, to be the progenitor of the tribe.
  Animism – primitive, widespread until now among some nationalities and individuals, belief in the existence of a soul in every object, plant and animal.
  Chimera – (here) an impracticable, strange, fanciful idea; impossible wish, dream, reverie, fantasy.
  Note. Clarifications for which no source is explicitly indicated are based on texts and definitions for them in Wikipedia.
  
  We, the Europeans are weaned from Fear, we have lost our sense of living in Fear and the very thought of it frightens us, we are afraid of Fear and even more of Fear of Fear itself. And here is our weak point, our vulnerability. Because others live with Fear, it is part of their existence, they have it in huge quantities and are ready to export it to us because they know it will work and we will lose our minds and words in the face of Fear. They are so successful in producing Fear because they live in the conditions in which, except for the last fifty years, mankind has always lived, and Fear has been the other name for Life. Man is a Fearful Being – Homo timens.
  
  Explanation:
  Homo timens (Lat.) – fearful being, being that lives in fear.
  
  Human history is a continuous coexistence and struggle with Fear. It moves in the direction of controlling and, why not, reducing Fear. We, the Europeans have already entered the society of the rapid elimination of Fear, but there are many Fear manufacturers around us and they don't care about that – how much we want to live without Fear. They have found this very weak point of ours and are taking advantage of it with cruel composure.
  
  We, the Europeans, also entered a society that does not want to make Security absolute, because it knows that along with it there are a number of other values – Freedom, Democracy, Human Rights, Right to personal happiness, Right to quality of life. We scrapped the Golden Cage of Security or melted it down into coins, rings, jewels and necklaces, we wanted outside the Cage to find the balance between Freedom and Security, whose golden ratio makes man active and creative, necessarily secure and sufficiently free.
  But the others, the different ones, the ones lagging behind us live in their own World, different from ours; they are still, and yet, kneaded from a much different dough – they do not rely on Liberty, but think it too big and particularly dangerous, and therefore hate it. And they felt here another of our weak point – that outside the Cage you can live normally and creatively only if there are no rapacious hawks with strong beaks, predatory cats with sharp claws, irresponsible children with slings, and evildoers who have come from the darkness of their sadistic subconscious with perverted and cannibalistic ambitions.
  So we want to go back to the Golden Cage of Security, but it's already been scrapped; we panic more and more, we look for a safe place to hide, but there is nowhere.
  
  We Europeans have raised to the maximum the price of human life, and along with this we have gradually given the exclusive right to the individual to live as he wishes to live and to dispose of his life as he wishes. In Europe, human life became the highest value. Moreover, it has become an absolute value – higher and more precious than all other values, and therefore there is no value, no good, no idea, no principle, for which it is worth giving one's life. At the same time, we face societies and communities, networks of violence and criminal cartels, in which rulers and lords, chiefs and bosses usurped the right to dispose of the lives of their subjects and sacrifice them in the name of their sacred imperial, conquest, religious or material goals. This is exactly what Russia is doing in Ukraine and Hamas in the Middle East right now.
  We, the Europeans have given up not just the main, but the only Role of the Man, of the male being – to be cannon fodder to be destroyed without a trace for the Great, the High, the Superhuman, the Unifying by violence, faith, ideology or cause – The Horde, The Tribe, The State, The Empire, The Monarchy, The Republic, The Socialist Country. At the same time, we face societies and communities, networks of violence and criminal cartels, in which rulers and lords, chiefs and bosses have usurped the right to inspire and-or compel their male subjects to be cannon fodder for the sake of their sacral imperial, conquest, religious or material goals. This is exactly what Russia is doing in Ukraine and Hamas in the Middle East right now.
  We, the Europeans have given up not just the main, but the only role of the Woman, of the female being – to be a childbearing machine that constantly, unfailingly and obediently provides more and more cannon fodder and more and more childbearing machines for The Great, The High, The Superhuman, The Unifying by violence, faith, ideology or cause – The Horde, The Tribe, The State, The Empire, The Monarchy, The Republic, The Socialist Country. At the same time, we face societies and communities, networks of violence and criminal cartels, in which rulers and lords, chiefs and bosses have usurped the right to inspire and-or compel their female subjects to be childbearing machines for the sake of their sacred imperial, conquest, religious or material goals. This is exactly what Russia is doing in Ukraine and Hamas in the Middle East right now.
  
  We, the Europeans have given free reign to our postmodernity, to surfing between roles and choices, identities and needs, we have become accustomed to the in-divid („indivisible“) becoming a divid („divisible“), even a multi-divid, we have accepted the near end of the great Narratives, of the great Stories – State, Religion, Ideology, Science, Security, etc., we no longer want to sacrifice and die for the Great Ideas – Fatherland, Freedom, Democracy, Future, etc. But those who are different from us are really radically different, and here they found perhaps our weakest point. Because they are willing to die for other Big Ideas, or there is someone who obliges them, by commanding them, by persuading them, or by manipulating them – to die for those Big Ideas. Pre-modernity and even more Pre-society is scary because it is reckless, suicidal, fanatical, brutal, cruel. While we are already subtle, delicate, refined, vulnerable, without protective shields and armor, without shells and carapaces of souls, of personal spaces, of homes, and increasingly of our cities and countries.
  
  We Europeans allowed for us, in Europe, the trap encoded in our democratic principles to be triggered suddenly, but also logically, and we inevitably, predestinedly got caught in it. We have come to think that a value is either there or it is not. Either it is in full measure or it is no value at all. In other words, tolerance, freedom, liberalism, democracy, human rights and other similar values are either followed and professed to the fullest extent, or else we surrender and sell them, turn our backs on them and depersonalize them. And in fact, for these values, there are no two opposite options, two extremes – zero or infinity, nothing or everything, absolute lack or an infinite amount. There is only „how much“. The question is how „much“ to be this „much“ – how much tolerance, how much freedom, how much liberalism, how much democracy, how much human rights, etc., in order to be modern, real, entered into XXI century society, without becoming easy prey for the barbarians, for whom tolerance, freedom, liberalism, democracy, human rights, etc. are sacrilege, baseness, debauchery, illusion, caprice, luxury. This is how the different from us, the ones who are far behind us, have found another of our weak points here and are beating us severely because we absolutize our values. And our values can only be absolute if they are shared by everyone. Are there any enemies, and too many bad enemies, lurking, crawling like noxious insects from the dungeons and crevices, from the swamps and dumps of hatred and hatred, radicalism and extremism, fascism and nazism, of ignorance and value blindness, these values, if they are absolutized, they begin to become our Achilles' heel, our critical vulnerability, our present – but even more future! – curse.
  And in order for this not to happen, in order not to allow their collapse, these values of ours must be realized by us not as absolute, but only as RELATIVE values. Of course, not as superficial, imitative, simulation and double-standard, but as subordinate and consistent with the search for an answer: yes, much, there is no dispute that much, of course that much, no doubt that much, but still HOW MUCH let it be that much – how much of them we shall have, stand by them, fight for them, without turning them from the most humane and most effective medicine for any reasonable society into a deadly poison to it.
  
  Bulgaria is part of the West (USA – Europe), of the Euro-Atlantic (NATO) and European (EU) community of democratic states. Anything that affects this community undoubtedly affects us. The unipolar geopolitical model is in a permanent, intensifying crisis with different dimensions: both a crisis of leadership, a crisis of trust, and a crisis of relations within the West, as well as a crisis of the accompanying it ultra-liberal geopolitical model.
  • The crisis of leadership is the result of a growing sense that the West is primarily and mainly doing what is profitable for it, for its benefit, without offering sustainable solutions to the world's pressing problems and where it intervenes, then chaos ensues.
  • The crisis of trust is a consequence of the double standards that the West still (often, let's face it, aggressively) applies; from relapses into self-interested ideologies in politics and economics, and from his will to isolate key global players who disagreed with him.
  • The crisis of relations within the West arises from the strengthening of extreme Atlanticism to the detriment of moderate Europeanism; from the growing asymmetry in US and European military power; from the increasingly frequent lack of a common European position and common European action.
  • The crisis of the ultra-liberal geo-economic model is due to the fact that this model „eats“ the strategic raw materials; that it deepens the contradictions between North and South, between West and East; that it benefits above all the so-called „golden billion“.
  
  Explanation:
   „Golden billion“ – an established and widespread concept of the conspiracy theory, according to which certain secret forces („Western elite“) in various ways seek to redistribute the lion's share of goods in favor of a relatively small rich share of the world's population („golden billion“) meaning the population of „Western countries“. At the same time, this concept has established itself in geopolitics and geoeconomics as a general quantitative dimension of the qualitative characteristic of the richest (North) and the most democratic (West) countries.
  
  If it is not ideological and fanatical, the criticism of the West is born from the feeling that today there is no one else capable of carrying the strategic responsibility for the world and offering (imposing) a working alternative for development, but alas the West does not cope so far with this mission .
  The objective analysis suggests that because of the behavior of the West on the global stage, and rather in spite of this behavior, the world is experiencing constant stresses and destabilizations, moving from one crisis to another. In the vast number of countries, the resources to mitigate the consequences of this permanent crisis are extremely insufficient and almost exhausted.
  This inevitably gives rise to temptations and attempts to export the crises from one's own countries to the orderly and rich Western societies through radical, most often religiously motivated ideologies; through legal and illegal migration, terrorism and organized crime.
  ‣ The Globalized society offers for this export an increasingly common space with increasingly open, permeable, superficially controlled, and practically absent borders.
  ‣ The Postmodern society offers disintegrating consensuses, self-sufficient communities that are, respectively, „for“, „against“, „agree with everything“ and „disagree with everything“ on refugees and democracy, nationalism and religion, morality and sexual orientation.
  ‣ The Network society offers its intertwining horizontal, web and network structures for conveyance and carriage, traffic and transfer of people and information, fears and hatreds.
  ‣ The Risk Society offers chain nuclear (cascade) reactions of uncertainties and insecurities, of poorly managed or unmanaged risks, igniting both along the spiral „As the societies are, so are the risks they encounter“ and along the spiral „As are the risks they encounter, so are the societies“.
  
  With the escalating uncertainty, growing insecurity, deepening chaos and spreading anarchy in the post-Cold War timelessness, the losers are mounting:
  ∙ those who were candidates for a central world role find it difficult to humble themselves with being pushed aside;
  ∙ those who were until yesterday in the semi-periphery of the developed world, not only can take the cherished step forward, but also with all their strength resist their fall to the periphery;
  ∙ those for whom being stuck in the periphery was almost the „bottom“ of gloomy expectations, suddenly found themselves threatened by the irreversible transformation into disintegrating or disintegrated states and their inevitable assignment to the so-called rogue states.
  In this unstable, fuzzy environment at the various levels of the world system, „upper“ and „lower“ associations of purpose will arise (are already arising): opportunistic alliances and communities of destructive interests, „tribal alliances“ and „mafia clans“ of dissidents; the means by which they will generate uncertainty, anarchy and chaos will multiply.
  → That is why we are faced with ever more frequent and increasingly cruel acts of violence, which we only instinctively call terrorism, but rather these are forms and means of a new type of hybrid, asymmetric, total war, which is waged including through terrorism.
  → That is why in our counteraction against the current and already destabilized status quo there are more and more elements of illogicality and abnormality, non-standard and non-traditional.
  The new situation gives rise to its new ways and means of resistance, of struggle, of war, but we push them into the mold of tradition, inertia, habit and statute.
  The dissenters, the losers, the warriors of hybridity, the fighters of asymmetry are the ones who dictate fashion; which change more quickly and are much more inventive, less static, far more adaptive and more creative. They are one step ahead of us, they point the TV and web cameras, they write the headlines in the media and the streams, they are pro-active while we follow them, we adapt to their actions and are re-active.
  If we don't rethink how we counteract and struggle, we will be like Achilles who will never catch up with the tortoise – by the time he is half the distance to it, it will have gone further; and by the time he has gone half the distance to it again, it will have gone ahead again. And so we will continually remain captive to a new Catch-22: „The more we struggle, the more we make mistakes; and the more mistakes we make, the more we struggle“.
  
  Explanation:
  Catch-22 – a hopeless situation, a vicious circle. The origin of the phrase is from the title of the famous novel „Catch-22“ (1961) by the American writer Joseph Heller (1923 – 1999). This novel deals with the following situation, defined as Catch-22: in order not to take part in a combat flight, a pilot must be insane, but „anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn’t really crazy“, because „a concern for one’s own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind“. Cf. Heller, Joseph. Catch-22. https://libgen.li/ads.php?md5=0A3BC5B6B27954504F7A75CA765E0634, р. 30.
  
  Europe (and the West in general) is facing a reality that is quite different from what European leaders imagine and would like it to be. The clash has civilizational dimensions, although it is not Huntington's clash of civilizations.
  Europe has irreversibly and irreversibly entered Postmodernity, where Man, as a complex system of eternal ideals, values and principles, is replaced by the Individual, focused mostly on his individual, personal ambitions, aspirations and desires, therefore he begins to alienate himself from the „big narratives“ and from the great Ideas – State, Society, Security; he does not want to fight for them, to die for them, and he does not even want to suffer for them. But Europe is confronted by societies that are still in Modernity, and quite a few of them – even in Pre-Modernity. And there people (it was already discussed above) can be mobilized with ideology or forced by power to give their lives for these „big narratives“, for these big Ideas.
  Europe is in a state of stress and stupor, realizing that it is surrounded by states or pseudo-states that mobilize or force their peoples to fight on the battlefield, give and take human sacrifices, sow destruction and create zones of controlled chaos and imported anarchy.
  The question is how to live in the comfort of Postmodernity, focused on the individual, on the small quickly created and easily disintegrated communities with a flexible (multi-value, multi-purpose, multi-role) geometry, and at the same time effectively manage the risks coming from pre-modernity and modernity and focusing mainly on the State and the Security of the State, for which man is only a means to achieve the Great Goals?
  The most treacherous example here is Russia – for Putin and for the elite grouped closely around him due to their own group interests, today Russia must at all costs have a key role, and this can only be achieved by forging a new Ideology based on Great Russian nationalism, on the Idea of the exclusivity of Russia as a leading state, as a civilization state, as a messiah state, as a state with a mission, as a guardian of Orthodoxy, in particular and of the Third Rome in general. For this key role, Putin is betting on a confrontation with the West and especially with Europe, on insulting European values, on using the army and irregular units to take territories around Russia or on supporting pro-Russian and Russian-speaking fifth columns in them, on destabilizing the neighboring countries, on creating in them archipelagos of zones of controlled chaos and imported anarchy. The war in Ukraine, a nightmarish, irreparable fall of Putin's Russia, is not an isolated case, not an accident, but a natural step in the moral and value degradation of Russia of Putin.
  
  Explanation:
   „Third Rome“ – the first Rome is ... Rome itself, and the second Rome is Constantinople.
  
  Putin's Great-Russian chauvinism and great-state megalomania have been the only possible way of thinking and writing in science, education, media, culture, education of children and adolescents for ten years – and of course, in security. Leading institutions: Intelligence, Diplomacy, Military Education, Moscow State University, MGIMO – are headed by orthodox Putinists who, in order to prove themselves to Putin, present themselves as extreme nationalists (Russian Nazis), Europhobes, geopolitical reactionaries. If until recently Russian science reached the level of Western science, now there reigns censorship and frank, reactionary ideological service to the only correct, only possible Kremlin line, and even more precisely the Pro-Putin line, the suffocation of anything even microscopically different, more objective, more liberal thinking. The academic literature on Russian security begins and ends with Putin quotes; it instills in the public the image of Russia as a fortress aggressively besieged by the West, it inculcates militaristic and expansionist thinking, which passes into militaristic and expansionist action. The Russian Science of Security is suffering from this, as are the Bulgarian scientists, who for many years found in it both very valuable ideas and indisputable intellectual power.
  
  Explanation:
  Moscow State University named after Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosov, the largest university in Russia.
  MGIMO, Moscow State Institute of International Relations – the most prestigious higher education institution in Russia.
  
  Here is coded the drama of Putin and the oligarchic superstition grouped around him. And this drama lies in the fact that as a culture and identity (anthropological, value, ideological) the people of Russia and rather its most enlightened strata are in no way different from Europeans – they also have one foot in postmodernity, in the age of the Individual and high communication, information, genetic, medical and space technologies and quantum computers. If there is a difference in anything, it is in the advance with which Europe entered this Age. When Putin conducts a brutal, often obscurantist campaign about European values, he is in effect giving Russia and Russians the fate that befell tourists taking pictures of the waves washing people off the coast in the terrible Asian tsunami. And while they were taking pictures and video, the waves also swept them away. Unfortunately for them, the only difference between them and the first victims was that the first victims were closer to the disaster, to the Ninth Waves of this cataclysm, of the onslaught of natural force, of the unprecedented trial. Only a little later, the tsunami with a terrifying and merciless force reached the photographers and video makers themselves.
  
  The qualitatively new reality shows and proves that military challenges, risks, dangers and threats, hybrid and asymmetric wars, the use of armed force and unsanctioned violence once again, after the illusion of a world of the power of law over the law of power, are the first and main means, to which developed or collapsing states, countries sick with militarism or criminal networks use in pursuit of goals. The vast majority of analysts did not believe that Russia would barbarically invade Ukraine. But for us it was not a question of Whether?, but only a question of When? The entire logic of Russia's behavior, where such a geostrategic maniac and geopolitical thug as Putin reigns without limits, led inevitably and catastrophically to February 24, 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine with its troops, starting this unprovoked war.
  
  It has long been relentlessly clear, and we have often written about it, that the countries of the European and Euro-Atlantic communities are called upon and urged to multiply their capabilities to use force and assert with ARMED FORCES their interests and security, sovereignty and independence (yes, sovereignty and independence as well!). Even today, in the comfort of the postmodern age, one must fight on the battlefield, and once one must fight, one must be prepared to do so in the most professional manner and with the best weapons possible.
  The West (Europe and USA, EU and NATO) is no longer the recognized leader of this world. The West may want to insist that its leadership be recognized and accepted as unconditional, i.e. one way or another, the West continues to walk the path of DOMINANCE, but it is the wrong path that can lead it to a dead end and an explosive road.
  The West must take a different path – look for partners, forge working coalitions and through them „attack“ the urgent, leading challenges and risks, dangers and threats facing the world and the West, i.e. let the West begin to walk the path of LEADERSHIP.
  But in order for this to happen, it is first necessary for the West to wake up, to recover, to stand up and to take control. Because the world is at a crossroads these days, because the world is slowly (is it slowly?) starting to go mad. The lid of Pandora's Box is not just lifted, it is broken, it is destroyed and Pandora's box is lidless. That is why all kinds of troubles, disasters, pandemics, catastrophes jump out, slide, spread from it. In such conditions of high uncertainty, unpredictability, vagueness, obscurity and uncertainty, the West will either find the strength within itself to lead humanity to better days, or it will remain a mute and passive witness to its sunset. And this time its sunset will not be a metaphor, but a self-fulfilling prophecy. When this sunset of the West occurs, the world will be ruled by putins, hamases, ayatollahs, fanatics, extremists, fascists and nazis.
  
  Explanation:
  Pandora – a heroine from ancient Greek mythology, an artificially created mortal woman. The curious Pandora secretly removed the lid of a large vessel, tightly closed with a heavy lid, in which no one knew what was, and no one ventured to open it, for it was known to all that it brought misfortune. Then the miseries, the evils and the diseases that were confined in him spread over the whole earth. It is interesting that Hope was also in this vessel, but it did not fly away, but remained at the bottom of it at the will of Zeus himself. And the people, who until then had lived happily without knowing evil, were now beset by innumerable evils. Hence the meaning of the expression „Pandora's box“ as a source of troubles.
  
  We are cast out of post-bipolar timelessness. Countries are becoming open systems, and the question is not whether human, financial, terrorist, information and other flows will pass through them, but how these flows will be managed, how we will minimize their damage. The good old world, governed by traditional, proven policies and means, is gone, and there is no way to close the countries, to turn them into fortified fortresses, on the high walls of which the army, gendarmerie and police stand armed to the teeth. Everything has changed, the world is already different. And there's no turning back. Change cannot be tamed, forced into familiar ruts and schemes, sciences and practices. All of us – politicians, experts, scientists, teachers, students – must first catch up and make sense of the Change and then adapt to it. We also shouldn't let change overtake us drastically. We must strive to develop senses for its timely detection, studying and analyzing not what we want, but what we need.
  
  The picture outlined above sounds both alarming and realistic. And yet, in order to be at least partly optimistic, let's think about the direction in which humanity COULD GO and more importantly – in which accelerated, irreversible – humanity MUST GO!
  More and more, and probably for the first time so comprehensively and unifyingly in human history, we have reason to speak of the world as one, integrating, holistic. The world in which we all live is becoming more and more our COMMON world. And the world, just like our COMMON world, is really in a key period of its development, at a point of bifurcation, at a point of dramatically important choice – TO BE OR NOT TO BE and WHERE TO GO, while the alternatives (variants) are not at all many, and maybe not even a few, but only two.
  
  ♦ The first alternative is for the world, our COMMON world, to go on a relatively stable path of sustainable development, where challenges and risks, dangers and threats will be reasonably and at the same time effectively manageable and under control, the strategy and policy towards these challenges and risks, dangers and threats will be based on a collective (COMMON) system of early warning and proactive actions, and action planning will be implemented with a satisfactorily high PROBABILITY of avoiding long-term crises (at least 60-70%) and preventing catastrophes (nearly 80 – 90%) – political, military, economic, financial, informational, social, environmental, etc. so that its development and consequences will be largely in our hands.
  
  ♦ The second alternative is for the world, our COMMON world, to go down a path filled with many dramatic, destabilizing, potentially destructive and even catastrophic upheavals and with ever-changing failures, where the challenges and risks, dangers and threats will be too weak and with almost conditional management and control, strategy and policy to these challenges and risks, dangers and threats will be reactive or practically absent, and action planning will be realized with an alarmingly low probability of avoiding the long-term crises (15-20% maximum) and the prevention of catastrophes (no more than 5-10%) – political, military, economic, financial, informational, social, ecological, etc., so that the development and its consequences will depend to an extremely large extent on chance.
  In the second alternative, we will try not to reverse the course of negative processes, but to slow down their development and adapt to them without fear, stress, panic and feeling of doom. But as Albert (Al) Gore (1948, US Vice President 1993 – 2001) wrote: „It's time to change the nature of the way we live together on this planet“ [1].
  
  Together with the study of these two alternatives to the dynamics of human development, different future geopolitical constructions (possible worlds) can be outlined. When analyzing them, the approach is the same and it is implemented on the basis of scenario planning, in accordance with the achievements of modern Science of Security. In fact, no matter how much the global palette tempts us to use large-scale geopolitical paints, for us the guiding principle is the understanding that it is increasingly vital to develop a long-term, reasonable and commensurate with Bulgaria's capabilities behavior in the global situation and global dynamics. That is why in order to work out long-term behavior for our country, it is necessary to build an idea (that is, to predict) what the world will look like tomorrow. The extrapolation of developing processes, looking at possible Black Swan events, applying, as just said, modern methods of scenario planning can give us various possible alternative models of tomorrow's world.
  
  Explanation:
  Nassim Taleb (1960) introduced the term „Black Swan“ [2]. In short, and to bring further clarity, we can say that a "black swan" is an event that: (1) occurs extremely rarely; (2) its occurrence does not follow from the normal logic of the process; and (3) if it happens, its effect is enormous.
  
  Here are two such models that have a high degree of probability of realization:
  
  ⁕ „US“-WORLD model – deepening the current unipolar model and preserving and strengthening American dominance (leadership, dominance, governance, power, might).
  Under this model, each country would be faced with the dilemma of cooperating with or opposing the United States. The main conflicts will arise from the resistance to the model and will be on a very different basis – ethnic, religious, social, political, economic, demographic, environmental, etc. Every problem will be refracted mainly through the prism of the global status of the USA. There will be many groups that disagree with this model, and they will unite in an alliance of the dissatisfied and the losers of the unipolar model, and the United States will be for them an invariable irritant and an unconditional reason for unification. This will naturally make the US vulnerable. But vulnerable, and even more so, will be any closer satellite of the US – lest it be a direct object of retaliation. Bulgaria, if it follows a pro-American foreign policy orientation, may also enter a time and space of strong vulnerability.
  This model, in addition to its other strategic deficits, is contrary to the principles of the Network society. Networks „prefer“ horizontality, for them increasing verticality is a step backwards, or at least in the wrong direction. Networking is so structured that it seeks to minimize hierarchy, to entangle it in its webs as Gulliver is entangled in ropes by the Lilliputians. The „resistance“ to the model that will come „from above“ (although the networks do not recognize the concept of „from above“ and are highly allergic to it), or rather the legitimate „resistance“ (in quotation marks, because „resistance“ implies violence and action, which aim to cause unacceptable damage to the one against whom it is directed) will be organized through networks – networks of countries, networks of societies, networks of communities, networks of institutions. The US will have no choice but to join these networks, to produce in them goals and values to which the respective networks respond with understanding and support. But it is not clear how a superpower like the US can feel comfortable, entangled in networks.
  Furthermore, there can be no doubt that the resistance (without quotation marks) to US dominance that will come „from below“ will also take place and manifest itself networked – through asymmetric violence spreading across network structures whose various levels, nests, clusters and nuts will intertwine. In such a world of spreading, overlapping and mutating network structures (which are practically indestructible), terrorism will be a daily occurrence and the fight against it will be much more difficult. Inevitably, in this struggle, the first victim will be most of the democratic freedoms. We will live in instability and unpredictability. Violence will be met with more violence, and ferocity will grow, and a ruthless eradication of terror will be sought, which will breed more terror.
  
  Explanation:
   „Gulliver's Travels“ (Gulliver's Travels, 1726) is a work by the English-Irish writer Jonathan Swift (1667 – 1745). Gulliver finds himself in the land of the Lilliputians, where he is like a giant among them. After being shipwrecked on land, he falls asleep, and when he wakes up, he sees that he is very tightly tied with ropes.
  Lilliput – a person of very small stature, used analogously to a dwarf.
  
  ⁕ „EU“-WORLD model – gradual implementation of a transition to a multipolar world in which the USA will be first among equals (and why not – to some extent – only one of the equals).
  This is „EU“-world because the European Union is a convincing example of how states harness their goals, resources, will, energy, reason and power in a pluralistic, solidary and collective structure to build a community that fights together for the prosperity of each individual member through the prosperity of the community; which resolves its disputes amicably. The quotation marks for „EU“ are extremely important because this is, of course, a metaphor.
  In this different world, the US will be willing or forced to co-engage in joint collective efforts, to commit to work for the common (global) good. They will act together with developed countries, they will help to solve the real problems of humanity, they will „attack“ not only the s of terrorism, but also their deep causes. Thus, conditions will gradually be created to identify the real conflicts. Resources will not only be invested in armies, police, special operations units and other force and repressive structures, but also in the modernization of backward societies, which will be offered strategies for catching up and advanced development. The opponents of the USA, of the West, of the developed countries will find themselves deprived of serious reasons to focus their anger against the USA and to wrap their destructive actions with anti-Americanism; will be left with no reasoned justification for their violence, and the fact that efforts are being made to heal the real ills of the world will deprive those dissatisfied with the presence of those ills of many motives for resistance and rebellion and make it difficult for them to find mass support, in recruiting more and more disaffected to fill their ranks.
  This scenario of development is closer and more acceptable for the Network society. Such a model of our world is an urgent invitation to networks – to fill it, to structure it, to make sense of it and to symbolize it. Without it being pointed out, and without even being foreshadowed, the very idea of the European community is networked in essence. Here, we are not tendentiously opposing the USA to the EU, because in addition to network considerations, others, including geopolitical and civilizational ones, can always „pop out“, so that it cannot be considered that we are looking for a confrontation of two basic priorities of Bulgarian foreign policy, and we are secretly opposed to NATO. No – we only want to emphasize that structures in which the guiding principle is „1 DOLLAR (more precisely, 1 BILLION DOLLARS) – 1 VOTE“ are verticalized, hierarchical, if not anti-network, then at least a-network. At the same time, structures in which the leading principle is „1 COUNTRY – 1 VOTE“ are networked or at least close to networked, striving to become networked, and for a country with limited resources for influence such as Bulgaria, such structures are preferable, because they are more democratic, more flexible and provide more opportunities to protect national interests without excessive politicization and re-ideologization. In such structures, the temptation to have another Big Brother, to suffer from harem syndrome, is much weaker, when the important thing is to be in someone's harem, and whose harem is a second, far less important question.
  
  Regardless of its possibly somewhat idealized description, the „EU“-world contains within itself constructive elements with a fully achievable practical implementation. It could be accomplished by the US adopting a collective action approach. In such a world, it will be difficult to find a base for rallying the disaffected, it will be difficult to weave network structures of violence, because the irritant „imperial behavior of the United States“ is missing, which unites all sorts of nests, nuclei, kernels of extremists. Their consolidation will encounter reliable barriers, their incentives for cohesion and mutual support will decrease. Because different regions have different problems; different interlayers have different problems; different religions have different problems. And at the same time, the leading problems are not allowed to fester, but are „attacked“ or at least the will to solve them is shown.
  The sky above the world will not be cloudless. Clusters of rage, cells of resistance, and foci of rebellion will continue to arise in many places. But they will be atomized, more limited and more vulnerable, their leaders will be more easily identified and eliminated, the destructive acts will be isolated and more preventable. These communities will be able to be fought – lair after lair; terrorist groups will be destroyed one by one.
  
  Here we have to share something else as a natural consequence of our analysis and predictions.
  We believe that the West had an alternative scenario for adapting to the post-bipolar time – namely – to become the North (or at least the supporting structure of the North).
  Let's clarify – the directions of the geopolitical compass are as follows:
  West – these are the democratic countries.
  East – these are the non-democratic countries.
  North – these are the rich countries.
  South – these are the poor countries.
  The great problem, the main cause of the world's woes, the wellsprings and sources of chaos and anarchy in the world today is the floundering, marginalized and growing South.
  And the depressed, stagnant, disorientated and constantly failing East – this is to no small extent a logical consequence and inevitable result of the processes in today's world.
  The growing South cannot help but become – sooner or later – also a failing East.
  Unfortunately, the West has no chance and capacity to maintain a sustainable balance with the South.
  The West invariably wins and the South consistently loses from the global West vs. South asymmetry.
  This asymmetry may become a self-fulfilling prophecy of the sunset of the West. THE RICH GETS MORE model inevitably degenerates into THE WINNER TAKES IT ALL MODEL.
  The sunset of the West has already been discussed above. For us, if it happens, the sunset of the West will be analogous geopolitically to the Big Bang, except it took place as the Big Collapse…
  At the same time as the North (or at least as the supporting structure of the North), the West can achieve the realization of its civilizational mission as the leader of human civilization.
  Let's admit with a hand on the heart and with anxiety in the heart – today asymmetry is explosive.
  The West is developing quantum computers and introducing mind-blowing ultra-modern technologies.
  The South accumulates more and more hatreds and disagreements and sinks into more and more misery and despair.
  These are absurd civilizational distances. Greater than the distance between Future and Past. They herald clashes of civilizations – not in Space, but in Time.
  The West-South asymmetry not only harms the West, it not only makes it the culprit – in the eyes of the South – for all the ills and dramatic differences in the world today, but also deprives the West of credibility and tools to transform the world into a more manageable, more predictable and more acceptable.
  The West-South confrontation injects a huge amount of uncertainty into global, continental, regional and national processes. Uncertainty is the Mother of poorly managed and unmanageable risks. It is a prerequisite for shocking instability.
  West-South is an apocalyptic and catastrophic opposition. With it, there are only, or at least mainly, conflicts of ultra-high intensity that can destroy the world.
  West-South interaction is practically unattainable, good solutions are difficult to find in it, there are only confrontations in it, and mainly escalations of tension arise.
  The West and the South speak fundamentally incompatible languages, they see the causes of what is happening and the solutions to problems in an incompatible way, in mutually exclusive planes.
  For the West, the way and salvation of the South lies in its democratization. For the South, democratization is a luxury, something that is not a priority at all, because for poor people, democracy is not at all the first and immediate priority.
  
  At the same time, for the North-South relations there are far more opportunities to „attack“ not only and not so much the consequences of colossal problems, but the problems themselves.
  The North and the South are separated by a chasm, but in the great and effective politics even the deepest and widest chasm could be crossed in two or more leaps.
  In the North-South interaction, stabilizing solutions can be sought, the systemic and structural preconditions for chaos and anarchy in today's world can be treated.
  The North and the South can find a common language because they are in the same conceptual space, they talk about the social dimensions of security, about social security.
  
  The law of life is the following – in a stabilized and humane world that manages its risks:
  The West strives to become more and more the North; the South strives to become less and less the East.
  
  In an increasingly unstable, inhumane and failing to manage risks world:
  The North is transforming less and less into the West; The East is transforming more and more into the South.
  
  The West is an exclusive association – it automatically excludes those who do not meet its initial conditions and categorical criteria for democracy.
  This unexpectedly and unfortunately inexplicably easily consolidated everyone else against him. Because the West is perceived as a closed and elitist, complacent and selfish club.
  
  The North is an inclusive association – it automatically includes those who manage to significantly raise their living standards, achieve a respectable quality of life, become attractive places to live and an object of pride for their citizens.
  
  It is very easy and „natural“ for poverty to become undemocratic, i.e. the South to become the East.
  
  It is not difficult and it is logical for a democratic country to become rich, i.e. the West to become the North.
  
  The great drama of the world was that after 1945 it was structured along the West-East axis.
  And that means it was divided along this axis. Divided confrontationally, implacably and bitterly.
  Such division is a road to nowhere, a dead end. The West-East axis opposes, it divides. It ignores a number of countries for which democracy is precisely too expensive a luxury.
  
  It is time for global processes to be re-transformed and re-formatted along the North-South axis.
  Along this axis, the North will help the South get closer to the North. Approaching the North, the South will become the West. Every South wants to become the North. Becoming the North, the South will become West.
  
  The alternative is for the South to become the East. Becoming the East, the South will want to destroy the West. This is starting to happen today. And there is a huge danger that it might actually happen.
  
  To remain the West, the West must become the North. Or at least a supporting structure of the North.
  
  In conclusion, risk according to our value system and life path is a good sign, a positive symptom, a bright symbol. When a person is not afraid to take risks, he believes in himself and in the future. Nothing significant can be achieved by man if he does not believe in himself. Nothing significant can be achieved by a community of people if it does not believe in the future.
  Today, the individual, the community of people, from the smallest community, the family, to the largest community, the world, need faith in themselves and in the future. Because the individual, and every community of people, and the state, and the world as a whole are at an unclear and dangerous crossroads. They face complex decisions, difficult choices, the need to take risks.
  We also have written more than once about the need for a new Revival, a new Enlightenment. The Canadian-American cognitive psychologist, linguist and writer Steven Pinker (1954) published a book precisely titled „Enlightenment Now“ [3]. See also its amazing subtitle: „The Case for Reason Science Humanism and Progress“! In this clear and vivid, unique and beautiful work of his, Stephen Pinker asserts with fervent conviction that the dreams, ideals, values and principles of the Enlightenment are alive, exciting, inspiring, noble, timeless, never more so relevant from today, that they must be defended and protected because they have no alternative with their deep humanism, reason and trust in science. Along with this, deeply disturbed, he shares his concern that:
   „Now it’s time to defend them [the ideas of the Enlightenment] against some surprising enemies – not just angry populists and religious fundamentalists, but factions of mainstream intellectual culture. It may sound quixotic to offer a defense of the Enlightenment against professors, critics, pundits, and their readers, because if they were asked about these ideals point-blank, few would disavow them. But intellectuals’ commitment to those ideals is squirrely. The hearts of many of them lie elsewhere, and few are willing to proffer a positive defense. Enlightenment ideals, thus unchampioned, fade into the background as a bland default, and become a catch basin for every unsolved societal problem (of which there will always be many). Illiberal ideas like authoritarianism, tribalism, and magical thinking easily get the blood pumping, and have no shortage of champions. It’s hardly a fair fight“ [4].
  
  The report on the 50th anniversary of the Club of Rome speaks in the same lofty but alarmist spirit of the need to „dramatically change the direction of progress and to work hard on the creation of the new Enlightenment“. The New Enlightenment must strike several critically important balances: between humans and nature; between short term and long term; between speed and stability; between private and public; between women and men; between equity and awards for achievements; between state and religion [5].
  
  Explanation:
  Club of Rome (Club of Rome) – an international public organization (analytical center), established on 06–07.04.1968, uniting representatives of the world's political, financial, cultural and scientific elite.
  
  We really need a New Enlightenment. The accents here are on both words making up the concept. It must also be ENLIGHTENMENT, to preserve and multiply the dreams and ideals, values and principles of the Enlightenment; and NEW, i.e. to fill with quality new content the essence of the Enlightenment, so as to respond to the challenges, risks, dangers and threats that are associated with the epochal and epic transformation, in entering the globalized, postmodern, networked and risky society! And from the point of view of security, the main thing is that all of us – as people and communities, from the family through the society and to the whole world – are at the level of the complexities and opportunities that the Risk Society meets us with and gives us.
  
  In order for Bulgaria to survive and prosper, we, in addition to be Bulgarians, must also be Europeans! The more Bulgarians we are, the more Europeans we will be. And the more Europeans we are, the more Bulgarians we will be. Bulgaria has no other option and no other alternative, no other chance and no other perspective, except to be a truly European country in Europe. To think that Bulgaria can win if Bulgaria distances itself from Europe and can develop if Europe falls apart is a dangerous illusion and a path to disaster and failure.
  Let us hope that the Bulgarian people's instinct for self-preservation will allow us to realize this truth and keep our belonging to Europe like the apple of eye. This is the necessary condition for the better future of Bulgaria and for the maximally high level of our national security. The necessary but not the sufficient condition! The sufficient condition is for Europe to continue on the path of integration and unification of states and peoples, societies and citizens – which at this moment is by no means certain. In order for this sufficient condition to be realized, Bulgaria can also help by working for it.
  This is how, with primary care for Bulgaria and for Bulgaria's national security, we understand the vital and most important task before the Bulgarian society:
  To be able to say with sincere and true self-confidence: We, the Bulgarians, we, the Europeans!
  
  
  References:
  1. Gore, Al. The Assault on Reason. London: Bloomsbury, 2017, p. 148.
  2. Taleb, Nassim Nicholas. The Black Swan. The Impact of the highly improbable. New York: Random House, 2007, p. XVII – XVIII.
  3. Pinker, Steven. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason Science Humanism and Progress. New York: Viking, An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC Penguin, 2018.
  4. Pinker, Steven. ibid., p. 362.
  5. Von Weizsäcker Ernst Ulrich, Anders Wijkman. Come On! : Capitalism, Short-termism, Population and the Destruction of the Planet. A Report to the Club of Rome by Ernst von Weizsäcker and Anders Wijkman, co-authors in cooperation with 34 more Members of the Club of Rome prepared for the Club of Rome’s 50th Anniversary in 2018. Springer Science+Business Media LLC 2018, p. 11, 95 – 96.
  
  
  11/08/2023
  
  
  Brief explanation:
  The texts of my Studies have been translated into English by me. They have not been read and edited by a native English speaker, nor by a professional translator. Therefore, all errors and ambiguities caused by the quality of the translation are solely mine. But I have been guided by the thought that the purpose of these Studies is to give information about my contributions to the Science of Security by presenting them in a brief exposition, and not to demonstrate excellent English, which, unfortunately, I cannot boast of.