Post by account_disabled on Mar 6, 2024 1:19:18 GMT -5
It's easy to forget that early in Joe Biden's presidency he made a bridge-building proposal to Vladimir Putin. During the 2020 campaign, Biden barely mentioned Russia as a geopolitical rival to the United States. China stole all the attention. At the Geneva summit with his Russian counterpart in June 2021, the US president went out of his way to massage Putin's ego, even calling Russia a great power. A few weeks later, Biden withdrew remaining US forces from Afghanistan in a debacle that threatened to define his presidency. In retrospect, it is clear that the two seemingly unrelated events—Biden's positive mood music toward Russia and his withdrawal from Afghanistan—reinforced Putin's decision to invade Ukraine. In Putin's view, the West is unlikely to react more decisively to its planned annexation of Ukraine than to Crimea in 2014. These misunderstandings have characterized geopolitics throughout the centuries.
In this case, the consequences of Russia's blunder in Ukraine—and the West's unexpectedly unified response—are likely to reverberate for years, if not decades. Sixteen months after Russia's “special military operation,” the Job Function Email Database world is at greater risk of great power conflict than it has been since the most dangerous points of the Cold War. Recommended Talk of reviving the liberal international order, a global state of being that was never exactly what its nostalgists say it had been, sounds increasingly quixotic. The world is moving toward a new type of great power rivalry. But comparisons with its 19th-century precursor are misleading at best. That long period of the so-called Pax Britannica ended in the tragedy of the First World War. Today's world cannot afford a direct conflict between the US and China, its two giant competitors.
The challenge facing the US and its Western allies is threefold. The first is to maintain Western unity against Putin. This is highlighted by next year's US elections. Rarely has a US presidential election had such divergent possible outcomes for the state of the world. If Biden were re-elected, the world could expect some continuity in US foreign policy until 2028. If Donald Trump, the likely Republican nominee, were to return to power in 2025, he could destroy Western unity. Trump has promised to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of resuming office. That prospect, and that alone, is motivation enough for Putin to sustain his war against Ukraine for the next 18 months in the hope that Trump will bail him out. It is nearly impossible for America's European allies to protect themselves against that specter. Its fate, and that of Ukraine, is in the hands of American voters. The second challenge for the West is to forge a common front in China without turning it into direct confrontation.
In this case, the consequences of Russia's blunder in Ukraine—and the West's unexpectedly unified response—are likely to reverberate for years, if not decades. Sixteen months after Russia's “special military operation,” the Job Function Email Database world is at greater risk of great power conflict than it has been since the most dangerous points of the Cold War. Recommended Talk of reviving the liberal international order, a global state of being that was never exactly what its nostalgists say it had been, sounds increasingly quixotic. The world is moving toward a new type of great power rivalry. But comparisons with its 19th-century precursor are misleading at best. That long period of the so-called Pax Britannica ended in the tragedy of the First World War. Today's world cannot afford a direct conflict between the US and China, its two giant competitors.
The challenge facing the US and its Western allies is threefold. The first is to maintain Western unity against Putin. This is highlighted by next year's US elections. Rarely has a US presidential election had such divergent possible outcomes for the state of the world. If Biden were re-elected, the world could expect some continuity in US foreign policy until 2028. If Donald Trump, the likely Republican nominee, were to return to power in 2025, he could destroy Western unity. Trump has promised to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of resuming office. That prospect, and that alone, is motivation enough for Putin to sustain his war against Ukraine for the next 18 months in the hope that Trump will bail him out. It is nearly impossible for America's European allies to protect themselves against that specter. Its fate, and that of Ukraine, is in the hands of American voters. The second challenge for the West is to forge a common front in China without turning it into direct confrontation.