Even a perfect response won’t end the pandemic. As long as the virus persists somewhere, there’s a chance that one infected traveler will reignite fresh sparks in countries that have already extinguished their fires…Under these conditions, there are three possible endgames: one that’s very unlikely, one that’s very dangerous, and one that’s very long.
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Sooner or later, the world will bend the curve on the coronavirus, and the great power competition will pick up where it left off. The time to start assessing what that means for U.S. foreign and security policy in a post-pandemic world starts now. Washington ought to turn its attention first to those parts of the world most vital to U.S. interests.
Global orders have a tendency to change gradually at first and then all at once. In 1956, a botched intervention in the Suez laid bare the decay in British power and marked the end of the United Kingdom’s reign as a global power. Today, U.S. policymakers should recognize that if the United States does not rise to meet the moment, the coronavirus pandemic could mark another “Suez moment.”
President Donald Trump and his team are talking up the opportunity to finally achieve stricter border security, wider tax cuts and reduced reliance on Chinese manufacturing amid the spread of the coronavirus throughout the U.S. Some officials see it as a narrow opening to offset the political damage from the coronavirus outbreak and deliver — or at least, talk about — some of the president’s longstanding promises.
Policymakers and too many economic commentators fail to grasp how the next global recession may be unlike the last two. In contrast to recessions driven mainly by a demand shortfall, the challenge posed by a supply-side-driven downturn is that it can result in sharp drops in production, generalised shortages, and rapidly rising prices.
A foreign policy should be judged not only by specific actions, but also by how a pattern of actions shapes the environment of world politics. Leadership in supplying global public goods, for example, is consistent with “America First,” but it rests on a broader historical and institutional understanding than Donald Trump has shown.
It took the Trump administration 17 months to clinch a preliminary agreement with the Taliban – a first step toward ending more than 18 years of U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan. The deal is not so much a peace agreement as it is a way for Washington to manage conflict in the southwest Asian nation in the aftermath of the American withdrawal, which is supposed to be finalized by May 2020 (assuming the Taliban uphold their end of the bargain).
While China’s role in global trade is highly publicised and politically polarising, its growing influence in international finance has remained more obscure, mostly due to a lack of data and transparency. Over the past two decades, China has become a major global lender, with outstanding claims now exceeding more than 5% of global GDP. Almost all of this lending is official, coming from the government and state-controlled entities.
Despite all of Washington’s platitudes about the world’s oldest and largest democracies uniting in common cause to uphold a free and open Indo-Pacific region, rhetoric has failed to match reality. Pinning American hopes on India saving an outdated order is wishful thinking at its worst.
As China-India competition continues unabated, Afghanistan is somewhat insulated from their more sensitive security concerns. Unlike in Iran and other countries, where the competitive aspects of the relationship are emphasised due to geopolitical reasons, Afghanistan allows the two Asian giants to compartmentalise touchy issues and cooperate on common interests such as counterterrorism.
