This, my inaugural Substack piece, will be one of many I write trying to make sense of what’s happening today, both geopolitically and culturally. I do not intend to tether myself to any particular set of topics in the coming years, but this article will give the reader a sense, at least, of what I’m thinking about right now.
Like most conservatives, I was elated when Donald Trump returned to the US presidency. I thought he’d been a pretty good president the first time round, at least until the pandemic struck; and that, second time, he’d be more thoughtful and more considered having learnt from experience.
In fact, Trump 2.0 has been Trump unleashed. I still think it’s better to have Donald Trump than Kamala Harris as “leader of the free world”; but, if anything, this Trump presidency is even more transactional and unpredictable than the first.
I’m not saying he’d emulate them (and even if he wanted to, the American system is proof against it) but Donald Trump does seem genuinely fascinated by dictators who can murder their opponents, invade their enemies, and stay in office forever. He wants to exercise power, usually for good ends – like building a wall, “drill, baby, drill”, ending woke, declaring there are only two genders, making government more efficient, restoring America’s industrial base, and getting allies to do more for their own defence – but he’s not bothering with the usual courtesies about shared values, common interests, historical ties, and how America has no better friend than, well, pick a country…
This is an administration largely without sentiment, keen to be seen as providing global leadership, but nearly always on America’s terms and certainly not to exert itself on behalf of others, unless it’s to seal a victory someone else has pretty much already won, as in Israel’s 12 Day War against Iran. As Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky has routinely found, Trump’s America is the polar opposite of the one that JFK declared would “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty”.
The problem with pursuing interests rather than values is that they can’t readily be separated. Even though it might be correct to say that America has no vital interest in a fight in Eastern Europe, it certainly does have a vital interest in the successful defence of democracy against dictatorship. Senior members of the Trump administration reportedly think that Ukraine is not “America’s war” and that Europe should step up so that America can focus on its main geo-strategic rival, namely China under the CCP. The problem with this approach is that everything is connected to everything else and an eventual Russian victory won’t be any less consequential just because it’s blamed on the feckless Europeans.
Revisionist powers are always studying status quo powers looking for weaknesses that they can exploit if the upside of aggression outweighs the downside risk. Prior to the current Ukraine war, the Russian dictator had met little pushback to his aggressions over two decades against countries that were once part of old Soviet Union. Even his 2014 invasion and annexation of Crimea and incursion into the Donbas hardly disturbed the West’s “business as usual” approach to Russia. The scuttle from Kabul would have further convinced Putin that he could swiftly subdue the rest of Ukraine and present this as done deal that the West would simply have to accept.
What’s so far thwarted Putin is Ukraine’s extraordinarily brave and creative defence, helped by a West that doesn’t want Ukraine to lose but, thusfar, under neither Biden nor Trump has enabled a win by supplying the long range weapons that could disrupt Russian supply lines and vital infrastructure. The best Ukraine can now realistically hope for is a Korean-peninsula-style stalemate; and even that will only happen if Ukraine can inflict so much damage on Russia itself that a vulnerable Putin feels that he has to declare “mission accomplished” with rump Ukraine unsubdued. Otherwise, Ukraine’s people will find themselves under an intensifying – and perhaps ultimately will-to-resist-sapping – bombardment while the Russian steamroller grinds towards Kyiv.
The outcome of the Ukraine war matters far beyond its immediate impact on the current combatants because a Russia victory will mean, at the very least, a new iron curtain in Europe as all Russia’s neighbours re-arm themselves against military pressure. But it will also embolden China to intensify its current campaign of intimidation and isolation against Taiwan. No less than Putin’s messianic quest to recreate the Russia of Peter the Great, and the ayatollahs’ apocalyptic mission to establish a global caliphate, the commissars in Beijing are committed to making China the global hegemon by 2049, with the seizure of Taiwan the urgent next step towards their oft-declared goal.
Any Chinese attempt to coerce Taiwan, given the economic sanctions that would doubtless be imposed, plus the closure of the world’s busiest sea lanes, would be a seismic disruption many orders of magnitude greater than that caused by the Ukraine convulsion; even if it did not produce a major war in East Asia with the potential for escalation between two nuclear superpowers. A successful Chinese seizure of Taiwan would upend the existing global order, as countries concluded that American security guarantees are worthless, and either armed themselves to the teeth or made the best accommodation they could with Beijing. It would be a very different world – a world with Chinese characteristics – rather than the one we’ve enjoyed until-just-recently, with the steadily advancing freedom, safety, prosperity and fairness that’s accompanied the long Anglo-American ascendancy and the post-war Pax Americana.
This is the reality that an adminstration focussed on “deals” can’t quite grasp. There is no deal that Putin would accept that leaves Ukraine armed and independent. There is no deal that the CCP would accept that leaves Taiwan practically independent. Apocalyptic Islamism will never rest short of the destruction of the "little Satan” (Israel) and then the “great Satan” (The United States).
Hence the American-led West does need to empower the Ukrainians to fight the Russians to a standstill, by calling Putin’s customary nuclear bluff. Plus it needs to make it clear to Beijing that any assault on Taiwan, from blockade to bombardment to invasion, would be resisted, not just by 25 million Taiwanese but by a strong alliance of democracies. That means: working out how to break a blockade; helping Taiwan to develop an even-more-sophisticated version of Israel’s Iron Dome; and helping the Taiwanese armed forces to develop the undersea drones and mines needed to destroy any invasion force. It means America and its main allies consulting on their response to various contingencies, such that on no-one-day could Beijing reasonably conclude that its opportune moment had come.
Whether it’s to stop the fighting in Ukraine or to transform Gaza into something resembling the Florida beachfront, President Trump plainly wants to impose his will on the world’s trouble spots. But other than threatening massive tariffs, to what lengths is he prepared to go in order to succeed? The post-war global order has endured largely because of the assumption that America would fight for its allies and vice versa. What’s so currently unsettling is that this can no longer be taken for granted.
Sometimes, even the Trump administration seems more inclined to do a deal with China than pursue strategic competition. For some US allies, the difficulty is that their main strategic challenger is also their main trading partner. The West generally, and Australia especially, needs urgently to reduce and quickly to eliminate its exposure to China in critical supply chains and to diversify its trade. As China has repeatedly demonstrated, trade and investment will be weaponised to secure its strategic objectives; just as the Chinese diaspora is being recruited or pressured to become agents of influence. Despite this, many American allies, the Albanese government in Australia especially, have prioritised good relations and increased trade with Beijing over closer security cooperation with the US.
As well, the West’s armed forces have rarely been more decrepit; in Australia’s case, new frigates and nuclear powered submarines are perhaps a decade off delivery. And the Albanese government – that declined a US request to send a frigate to the Red Sea at the end of 2023, the first time since the 1951 ANZUS treaty that Australia has turned down an American request for military assistance – shows close-to-zero interest in making potentially hazardous military commitments.
Then there’s the impact of President Trump’s tariffs on America’s partners. It’s hard to expect military support from allies who feel they’re being economically coerced. Australians have traditionally regarded our main allies as “family” but even family members can fall out if they feel their vital interests are being threatened. As shock treatment, to shake allies our of their complacency, perhaps tariff threats make sense; but if they become settled policy the traditional view of America as history’s most benign hegemon will inevitably change.
For two decades, American diplomacy has sought to draw India into the democratic camp where it most naturally belongs. Imposing a 25 per cent tariff, on top of the 25 per cent general rate, to punish India for taking Russian oil (even though China has copped no such hit), has already jeopardised the Quad[1]. For an administration that usually says it’s prioritising China, to alienate India in an attempt to damage Russia seems somewhat perverse.
Finally, there’s the general malaise of the West. It’s been increasingly obvious, for at least two decades, that history had not ended, as was once imagined, with the permanent triumph of liberal capitalism. Yet rather than adjust to the unwelcome challenge of autocracies on the march, the general public of every Western country not-immediately-threatened has taken it for granted that nothing hard will ever be asked of them.
We know that Israelis and Ukrainians think their countries worth defending, even unto death. How many Britons or Australians or Americans would readily put themselves at risk for the safety of others, especially since their leaders have given up explaining that if freedom is diminished anywhere, it’s diminished everywhere.
Perhaps, at some point, President Trump will work out that he’s being “played” by Putin; and that he’s needlessly alienating those normally bound to America through common values and interests. But rather than assume the best, the more the world’s democracies can do for themselves, individually and collectively, without relying on American leadership or even help, the better for all of us.
[1] For those unaware, the “Quad” is the strategic alliance of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States.