Deep Dive with Shawn C. Fettig

America Alone: The Costs of Isolationism (w/ Dr. Charles Kupchan)

• Sea Tree Media

Share episode

Could America’s political polarization be paving the way for a return to a multipolar world? Dr. Charles Kupchan, Professor of International Affairs at Georgetown University and Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, joins us to explore this provocative question. With the possibility of Trump reelection looming, we discuss the repercussions of an isolationist America retreating from its leadership role on the global stage. Dr. Kupchan explains the historical context of America's foreign policy, drawing fascinating parallels with the early reluctance to form alliances and the modern-day 'America First' stance.

As the United States grapples with a diminished ability to single-handedly dictate global outcomes, we consider the necessity of partnering with both democratic and non-democratic nations. How does this shift alter the global balance of power, and can new alliances successfully tackle pressing issues like climate change and nuclear proliferation? Through the lens of Dr. Kupchan's experience, we discuss the complexities of a world where no single nation dominates, and consider whether this transition might not be as destabilizing as it seems.

Our converation also tackles the dual threats of political dysfunction and socioeconomic changes reshaping Western democracies. With liberal populism on the rise and traditional influences waning, this episode offers a piercing examination of the precarious international landscape. We reflect on the fate of countries like Ukraine and Israel amidst these shifting dynamics, while contemplating the future of American foreign policy and the potential for a renewed national dialogue. 

Counterpoint Podcast

-------------------------
Follow Deep Dive:
Instagram
YouTube

Email: deepdivewithshawn@gmail.com

Music:
Majestic Earth - Joystock



Dr. Kupchan:

Well, I completely agree, and by saying that there's a good bit to like in America first, I don't want to sound like I'm endorsing Trump. I think Trump's reelection would be disastrous at home and abroad and that in many respects, he would dismantle the world that America built. But I also think that Trump is a wake-up call right His election. The fact that he is now polling, even with Kamala Harris, says that the consensus behind a strong, robust internationalism has cracked. Americans are asking good questions about American foreign policy.

Shawn:

Welcome to Deep Dive with me, Shawn C Fettig. The global order is changing. The dynamics of power are rapidly evolving and new alliances are forming that could reshape the world. Russia has emerged as an aggressive power on the world stage, forging increasingly close ties with authoritarian and pariah regimes like North Korea and Iran, amplifying threats across multiple regions as it continues its war on Ukraine. Its non-aggressive neighbor, China, continues its steady rise as a superpower, extending its influence into Asia, Africa, South America and even Europe, challenging Western dominance in trade, technology and diplomacy. And as all of this is happening, the United States is paralyzed, experiencing intense political polarization, demonstrating an inability to project a unified front on the world stage and weakening our traditional role as a stabilizing force. Europe, seeing all of this unfold, is now grappling with the need for total self-reliance for the first time since the end of World War II. Faced with an unpredictable US ally and growing security threats from both East and South, European nations are beginning to bolster their own defenses, reconsidering long-held dependencies on American support. Against this backdrop, former and possibly future President Trump's isolationist and protectionist stance could further unsettle the global order. His America First approach, characterized by tariff wars, weakened alliances and a resistance to multilateralism, challenges long-standing partnerships and signals an America more withdrawn from global leadership. This turn inward risks leaving critical alliances vulnerable, chipping away at the cooperation needed to confront complex issues like nuclear proliferation, cybersecurity and climate change. But Trump's vision is perhaps just a return to a pre-World War II position for the United States, and a lot of people don't really see the downside to that for the United States, and a lot of people don't really see the downside to that.

Shawn:

My guest today is Dr Charles Kupchan, Professor of International Affairs at Georgetown University and Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr Kupchan has advised the Clinton and Obama administrations on national security and foreign policy, and he's also the author of several influential books, including no One's World, the West, the Rising Rest. And he's also the author of several influential books, including no One's World, the West, the Rising Rest and the Coming Global Turn and how Enemies Become Friends, the Sources of Stable Peace, both of which provide valuable perspectives on the history and impact of US isolationism and role on the global stage. How would America's retreat impact global security? How would it impact all of us here inside the country? And what if, God forbid, Trump is on to something? Dr Kupchan and I discuss all of this and more.

Shawn:

All right, if you like this episode or any episode, please give it a like, share and follow on your favorite podcast platform and or subscribe to the podcast on YouTube. And, as always, if you have any thoughts, questions or comments, feel free to email me at deepdivewithshawn at gmailcom. Let's do a deep dive, Dr Kupchan. Thanks for being here. How are you Good to be with you, Shawn?

Shawn:

So we're on the cusp of a presidential election, and one of the candidates, at least Trump is leaning pretty heavily into isolationism and protectionist policy in a way that could, if implemented, have a very real impact on the current global structure, the global order.

Shawn:

I'm not entirely sure what that looks like, but it doesn't feel good Like it'll all just work out really well for the United States and, I suppose, for that matter, for the rest of the world, but I don't know, and I think you might be the guy that can help me wrap my head around this. So no pressure, I'll do my best, Okay, great, let's start here, though. I want to draw from some of your work, so, and I'm drawing. I mean, this is a theme across all of your work, but I'm drawing from no one's world. So in this book you discuss the shifting global order, you discuss the rise of non Western powers, but this was written over 10 years ago, so I guess I'm wondering if you could explain the theory underpinning the argument you're making here and then how you assess the situation now, given some of the things that have changed.

Dr. Kupchan:

Well, the argument that I put forward in that book no One's World was that as the 21st century advances, it won't be an American century, it won't be a Chinese century, it will be no one's world. And that's because we are in the midst of a transformational shift in the global balance of power of the sort that we had. A real, big, fundamental tectonic shift was over the course of the 1700s. If you go back, to say, the year 1700, the two biggest countries in the world in terms of wealth were China and India. They represented about half of global output. If you were to take a snapshot, 100 years later, 150 years later, say the mid-19th century, power had dramatically swung from east to west and from south to north, and Europe had pulled ahead of everyone else. And then that industrialization, the rise of the middle class, capitalism, spread across the Atlantic, and the US and Europe were really at the front edge of history ever since. But what we're looking at now is a world in which the pendulum is swinging again and it's going from west to east and from north to south in many respects the opposite of what we saw in the last big turn. And you know if you say who are the top powers in the world in 2060? Only one of them is a Western country and that's the United States. Number one, probably China. Number two, india, number three, the US. Number four, indonesia. That's a brave new world and it's one that is unstoppable in the sense that it is about the march forward of history and the diffusion of power across the international system. I think one of the key questions is what is the United States going to do about that shift? How is it going to respond to that shift?

Dr. Kupchan:

And here we are, a few weeks before one of the most important elections in American history, and really for the first time in decades, we have a choice between Kamala Harris, who is a traditional American internationalist, what we tend to call a liberal internationalist, and Donald Trump, who adheres to what he calls an America first foreign policy, much more unilateralist, much more neo-isolationist, wants protective tariffs, wants to deport immigrants rather than keep the United States an immigrant nation.

Dr. Kupchan:

We've been here before. Most Americans don't realize this, but from roughly 1789, when the Constitution was ratified and we began life as a unitary country until really Pearl Harbor, america first ruled the roost. We were generally isolationist, we often were anti-immigrant, we were highly protectionist, and then that all changed with Pearl Harbor, world War II, the onset of the Cold War. That's when we discovered global leadership. And now we're in some ways going back and witnessing a tug of war between two different versions of America's role in the world one that harkens back to the Cold War and the pre-Trump era, one that in many respects harkens back to the pre-World War II era, a much more stiff-necked, unilateralist, isolationist America. We're going to see which version prevails in a few short weeks.

Shawn:

So I mean, we are having this conversation, I think, at an interesting time, because a conversation about what the world could look like, uh, you know, having that conversation today, that conversation itself could be very different in three weeks.

Shawn:

Right, it feels like we're going to, it's going to start to take some form in a way that we don't quite know right now. Uh, and not to give rumsfeld a lot of uh credit here, but you know there are some known unknowns and there are some known knowns here. But if we were to consider in this moment the things that we do know and setting aside the election and the potential, you know, implications of the election results the things that we do know about the current state of the world, the role of the United States and you know the role that it plays on the global stage and has played and the influence it's had in shaping the current global order and considering what you've said about what might change between now and 2060, what do you think the world could look like if the US were to pull back from its global leadership role?

Dr. Kupchan:

could look like if the US were to pull back from its global leadership role. Well, you know, I think that neither party really has it right, in the sense that I think the Biden administration has been operating in the world that was not the world that is, and what I mean by that is it's. It is still kind of America, the indispensable nation, america, the defender of the liberal democratic order, which all countries will sooner or later buy into, and a continuation, really, of the brand of internationalism that started with Franklin Roosevelt under World War II and continued until Donald Trump's inauguration or coronation, we might say I think he'd probably prefer that word and then you have Trump, who really wants to pull the United States back from its commitments as a team player. He pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal. He pulled out of the Paris climate agreement. He announced the United States was withdrawing from the World Health Organization in the middle of the worst pandemic since the flu pandemic of 1918.

Dr. Kupchan:

He wants to go back to a world of isolated individual countries, each fending for itself.

Dr. Kupchan:

Neither of those visions is really going to happen, in part because the United States can't run the world anymore.

Dr. Kupchan:

It doesn't have the wherewithal, nor does it have the domestic consensus to do so.

Dr. Kupchan:

Trump's approach would be a disaster, because we live in a globalized and interdependent world in which the US has to work with not just allies like Germany, japan, france, uk, but we're going to have to learn how to collaborate across ideological dividing lines.

Dr. Kupchan:

We're going to have to learn how to work with China, even if they are not a democracy, because if we don't do that, we're never going to tackle climate change, we're never going to deal with global health, we're never going to get a handle on nuclear proliferation, and so there is a premium that is inevitable on cooperation, on building a world in which the United States is probably still number one for the long future but needs to be the catalyst of collective action with democracies and non-democracies alike.

Dr. Kupchan:

So in many respects, I think where we're headed, or at least where we should be headed, is the sort of Trumpian America first meets the Joe Biden Pax Americana in the middle and we stay deeply engaged in international politics. But we realize that the world is becoming multipolar, that power is diffusing, that the United States doesn't have the same oomph that it used to have. We see that, Shawn, as we speak. We have been pushing the Israelis to make a deal with Hamas and get a ceasefire. Not attack Lebanon, not attack Iran. They're going to do what they believe is in their interests. We've been pushing hard to end the war in Ukraine, not that successful in doing so.

Dr. Kupchan:

Yes we've ensured that Ukraine is still standing. But we're living in a world in which the United States just can't get its way as often as it used to, and many countries out there are playing the field, especially in what we call the global south, the developing world India, turkey, brazil, indonesia, uae, the United Arab Emirates, saudi Arabia. They're now one day siding with China, the next day siding with the United States. That's the world that we're headed toward. I mean, in some ways, I think the poster boy of this new world is the prime minister of India, mr Modi. One day he's in Washington, he's getting a state dinner, the highest honor that any foreign leader can have. And where is he A bit later, in Moscow, hugging Vladimir Putin? No-transcript.

Shawn:

So I want to circle back to Israel and Ukraine, because I do have a question there, or maybe it's an observation, but before I do so, there is, if we take historical context into consideration and the ebb and flow of the balance of power, it's contemporary this idea that the United States and, I suppose, to some degree, by extension, the Western world, have played an immense role in establishing the global order.

Shawn:

And then, perhaps by just dint of being an American, you know, we tend to think of the United States as being good guys on the global stage and those that are adversaries as being bad guys, and that if the United States or the Western world were to take a back seat, that bad things would happen as a result of that. But if we consider this in the context of history, I think there is and this might be to some degree how I don't want to give too much credit here, but the Trumpian world thinks about this is that like who cares? Why does the United States need to be, you know? So what if the balance of power shifts a little bit and the United States isn't so engaged? And I guess I wonder about that myself. Not that I advocate for it, but could we just say that this is just as time passes. You know there's an evolution and so maybe we're heading into another one, and what's so bad about that?

Dr. Kupchan:

Well, you know, there's a lot to like in Trump's America First, and the traditional version of isolationism that emerged really at the very beginning with the founders. And it was George Washington, in his farewell address of 1796, who said the great rule of conduct for the United States should be commercial connections with everyone, political connections with no one or, in Thomas Jefferson's words, no entangling alliances. And you know, most Americans don't know this story because we don't tend to get taught it in high school or elementary school. But you know, were Trump to withdraw from NATO or renege on an alliance, he would have a pretty good historical precedent because, going back to this founding era, the United States didn't want alliances, didn't want foreign commitments, but was losing the Revolutionary War and, as a consequence, formed an alliance with France in 1778. And the French sent troops and money and ships and gunpowder and they turned the war around. Were it not for the French, the United States may still be a British colony. So we owe a lot to the French.

Dr. Kupchan:

Fast forward a bit more than a decade and war breaks out again between France and Britain. And the French reach across the Atlantic to George Washington and they say, george, we helped you fashion victory, we formed an alliance. That alliance still exists. Help us fight France. How many troops, ships are you sending across the Atlantic? What does George Washington do? He issues the Proclamation of Neutrality in which he says to the French good night and good luck, you're on your own. And actually the Jefferson and Madison and others wanted to impeach George Washington because they said only the Senate can ratify a treaty, only the Senate can break a treaty. That case did not move forward, but George Washington did pull out of that treaty and he did it in part because there was this kind of sense of non-entanglement we don't want to get dragged into other people's wars.

Dr. Kupchan:

And whereas the traditional isolationist isolationism in a geographic sense doesn't apply today because the world is a serious contender to be reelected is that the United States has lost that sense of Of overreach In Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Libya, in Syria. I think many Americans said what are we doing? Right? We've spent trillions of dollars and we don't have a whole lot to show for it. Now we're spending billions, hundreds of billions of dollars in Ukraine to help Ukraine defend itself, and Trump is saying it's enough already. We need that money here. We need to invest in American schools and in American manufacturing plants, and I'm a supporter of Ukraine. I think we should continue to aid Ukraine, but Trump is speaking directly to this question of how much internationalism is too much and how can we get right the balance between helping other people when Americans themselves need help.

Shawn:

Yeah, so one of the things that makes me nervous is that I don't know that Trump int intends to strike a balance. Maybe, maybe, in the deep recesses of his mind, he has some capacity to envision what this all looks like after the game is over, right, but I just I personally don't believe it, and so what I feel like he's doing is upending the entire game board, and that feels chaotic to me.

Dr. Kupchan:

Well, I completely agree, and by saying that there's a good bit to like in America first, I don't want to sound like I'm endorsing Trump.

Dr. Kupchan:

I think Trump's reelection would be disastrous at home and abroad, and that in many respects, he would dismantle the world that America built.

Dr. Kupchan:

But I also think that Trump is a wake-up call right His election, the fact that he is now polling, even with Kamala Harris, says that the consensus behind a strong, robust internationalism has cracked. Americans are asking good questions about American foreign policy. When Biden says that Ukraine must win and Vance and Trump say, well, how's that going to work? They're not making progress on the battlefield. You know Trump and Vance are asking the questions that need to be out there, they need to be debated, and so I am not a Trump supporter, but I do think that he has shown the light on the degree to which we need to rebuild a consensus around a new brand of American foreign policy, and that that brand of foreign policy will probably need to be more circum ground between doing too much and overstepping the domestic means that are available to support American foreign policy and doing too little, which I do think would leave the world in a lurch, and that, I think is exactly where Donald Trump, in a very dangerous way, would take us.

Shawn:

There's a I'm sorry this is just coming to me as you're speaking, I'm thinking about Europe, and you know, when we talk about the Western world, we're primarily talking about the alliance and the relationship between the United States and European nations both, you know, I suppose, East and West.

Shawn:

But in the last handful of years, Europe has watched the United States become what it is as it relates to isolationism, or at least this kind of increased fervor around it, and it feels as if, to some degree, they're trying to find some equilibrium here too, or do some predictive analysis as to what this is going to look like, and it almost feels like they might be experiencing some of their own division and cleavage as a result. So you see France under Macron arguing that you know Europe really needs to start considering its own potential isolationist approach or different relationships that don't necessarily include such a heavy hand from the United States, and then you see Germany, on the other hand, really investing itself in some domestic politics, you know, taking a stand in a position as it relates to supporting Harris and Biden's policies, but those seem in opposition to each other, and I just wonder if there's some like reverberating effects as to what's happening in the United States that could be detrimental to Europe in their own internal kind of politics and future. You know, casting.

Dr. Kupchan:

Interesting question. Let me unpack it just a bit. I think there are two separate issues at play here. One is that Europe is experiencing the same internal threat that the United States is, and I would call it the threat of a liberal populism Leaders, demagogues who threaten the functioning of liberal democratic institutions, and this, in my mind, is all about the hollowing out of our middle class and the hollowing out of our political centers, and the same thing is happening in Europe.

Dr. Kupchan:

I would have said a few years ago, were we talking, Shawn, thank God for continental Europe, because the political center here has eroded. The political center in the United Kingdom has eroded, but it's holding steady on the continent. And I can't say that anymore because if you look at recent elections in France and Germany, it's not possible to say the center is in good shape. It's holding, but it's holding by a thread. And so the European and North American democracies are in the same soup. We are all living through the processes of deindustrialization, digitalization, automation, and it is causing a socioeconomic dislocation that is threatening liberal democracy and, frankly, for me it is the number one threat of our time.

Dr. Kupchan:

I am much more worried about political dysfunction and polarization in the United States than I am about Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping. We get our lights back on. We will deal with external threats. We don't get our lights back on. We in a heap of trouble. Back on, we in a heap of trouble.

Dr. Kupchan:

Coming directly to your point about Europe and standing more on its own two feet, yeah, there is a push, particularly coming from France, but also from elsewhere, that Europe needs to become more independent, and I think that's a good thing if it happens, as long as it happens in partnership with the United States and Trump and Biden and Obama. Before, both of them have been pushing Europeans to spend more on defense. They've been pushing Germany to reinvest in its military after decades of letting its military establishment atrophy, but the bottom line is still that there's too little Europe, not too much Europe, and I think, looking ahead, we need our partners, whether they are in Europe or whether in Asia, japan, south Korea, taiwan to do more Because, as I said, the United States is still the world's number one power, but the international system is changing. Power is flowing away from the West, and that means that we need our partners to begin to punch above their weight and instead they've been punching below their weight.

Shawn:

So this next question comes kind of deep into our conversation.

Shawn:

I intended it to be a bit earlier, but I do want to circle back to.

Shawn:

You know you had mentioned the situation in Ukraine, in the Middle East, particularly as it relates to Gaza and some other conflicts in the region. But one of the things that I've had a difficult time wrapping my head around and I guess I have to put this in the context of my own life I grew up in a world in which the United States was very influential in these arenas, and while the United States couldn't necessarily suppress any conflagration, it did have a lot of influence. So to my eyes, then, the fact that the United States has not been able to play a bigger, more decisive role in Ukraine and that Israel seems to not really care, at least what's coming out of the Biden administration and the pressure from the Biden administration feels like a fundamental shift in the influence of the United States on the global stage. And I wonder if you feel like that's a fair characterization and then could help me understand. I don't believe this is just that Trump came out of nowhere, you know, and that all of this came out of a vacuum.

Dr. Kupchan:

I do feel like things have happened, but I don't know what those are that have brought us to this point. Yeah, I mean on the first point, the United States, as I said, remains the world's leading economic power. Its primacy is even more pronounced in the military realm. But the world is becoming a more difficult place to govern and I think that is very much a function of the ongoing diffusion of power, as well as what appears to be simply a kind of political awakening in many parts of the world that they want more agency, that they're going to listen to the United States and want to work with the United States, but they're going to make their own decisions. And I think we're seeing that with Israel and the Middle East, where I think there have been some pretty tough conversations between Netanyahu and Biden pretty tough conversations between Netanyahu and Biden and Netanyahu has done what he believes is in his own political interest and in Israel's strategic interests, and we'll have to wait and see how the conflict plays out. Ukraine is in a somewhat more dependent situation and Ukrainians know that they need the United States to stay alive in a war against a much bigger aggressor. But the bottom line here is the world is just becoming a more difficult place, and it's going to increase in difficulty over time. How did we get here? Part of it has nothing to do with American policy and everything to do with the fact that there is simply a transition taking place in the global balance of power. We've seen it hundreds of times over history Nobody stays at the top forever, right, various empires come and go, and that's going to be the course of history until the end of time.

Dr. Kupchan:

But I do think that what's new here, and what is in some ways more worrying than the forward march of history, is that those countries that have long anchored the international system, both when it was divided during the Cold War and since, are not in good political shape.

Dr. Kupchan:

They are not in fine political health and, as I said, are not in fine political health. And, as I said, for me the main answer to the question is ones and zeros. Right, why is it that our political center has eroded? It's because American workers have seen their income stagnate now, really since the 1980s, and a lot of the workforce that used to be in the manufacturing plants they're now in the service sector and they're making maybe half or even a third of what they were when they were on a production line. And then you add to that social media. You add to that the whipping up, both through disinformation as well as through people being driven by algorithms on their social media feeds. We live in a country now that is deeply divided, very much tribal, and, as I said, we're not alone. You see this happening in many, many parts of the world today.

Shawn:

Let's talk about domestic politics as it relates to isolationism, because there is some there's a tension here. Politics as it relates to isolationism, because there is some there's a tension here. It's almost like a cognitive dissonance that that I can't wrap my head around, and it might be that I'm not an economist or it might be that I'm missing something or I'm oversimplifying, but I absolutely understand this argument about the gutting of the middle class and also tangible impact of inflation and stagnation, of increases in wages right, and that impact that that has on people's lives. But it seems to me like the worst thing that the United States could do is withdraw itself from some of the global connections that we have, not just as it relates to geopolitical security, but specific to trade and economic policy. But I could be missing something and I guess I'm wondering. The bigger question here is what do you think that tangible impact is of increased isolationism on the United States, and maybe specifically economically and related to the workforce? I mean.

Dr. Kupchan:

I completely agree with you that protective tariffs, cutting the United States off from international trade, would be disastrous for the US and for the global economy and it would not solve the problem. In fact, it would make the problem worse because it would drive up prices and it's not going to lead to the sudden rebuilding of America's working class because the United States has again become the manufacturing capital of the world. I'm all for selective repatriation of supply chains on semiconductors, on solar panels, on green technology. There may be a select tariff here or there, for example on electric batteries for cars, that we may want to implement to try to give some relief to the EV builders here in the United States, but the bottom line is that the core issue that is driving the hollowing out of America's middle class is automation.

Dr. Kupchan:

It is not free trade and, as a consequence, we can slap selective tariffs on various imports from Europe or China or somewhere else, and it may lead to 5,000 jobs here, 6,000 jobs there, 10,000 jobs somewhere else, but it is not the answer to a world in which most Americans are going to be working in the service economy, not in the manufacturing world, and that's just a reality and we're going to have to figure out what it is that average Americans are going to be doing to work, are going to do to earn a living wage, and we haven't really answered that question. Right now, trump is talking about imposing 60% tariffs on goods from China or higher. That reminds me of the Smoot-Hawley tariff that Congress imposed after the depression in the interwar era, and it really was the beginning of the unraveling of the global economy, economic nationalism, the slide to World War II. You know, if Trump implements all the tariffs that he is talking about, we're talking about effective geoeconomic rupture globally and that would be terrible for American workers and terrible for the global economy.

Shawn:

Earlier you mentioned that, as it relates to global engagement and the current global order, that Biden represents to some degree, the old guard, I mean I don't want to put words in your mouth, but maybe an outdated approach to a changing order or a changing world. And then, on the other hand, you have someone like Trump who just wants to upend the game board and doesn't seem to have a lot of coherence around how he's getting from A to Z or how he's getting the United States from one point to the next. But that begs the question, then, who is doing a good job of mapping the lay of the land and tentatively drawing up some type of a plan to navigate this changing world?

Dr. Kupchan:

You know, we're not there yet, unfortunately. I think we will get there after this upcoming election, because I do think that, whether Trump wins or Kamala Harris wins, the kind of reigning foreign policy paradigm of the past will be broken. And that's because I think that, even though Harris has had Biden as her mentor, she's the next generation, she comes from a very different background. She, unlike Joe Biden, did not cut her teeth on foreign policy during the Cold War. I don't think she's going to bring to the table the same template, the same paradigm that Biden did. I don't know what we'll get from her, but I think it will be something different.

Dr. Kupchan:

But I do think that in some respects this upcoming election will clear the way for the searching national conversation that we have to have about America's role in the world. And that's important for the world because right now American statecraft is very unsteady. Every time power changes hands in the White House, the world gets whiplash right. We go from Clinton to George W Bush, to Obama, to Trump, to Biden, and the pendulum just swings all over the place. And that's a reflection of the fact that what was once a steady bipartisan consensus on statecraft, that consensus, is gone. The bottom has fallen out of the American bipartisan consensus, and so we need a serious national conversation, and I think we're going to get it during the next presidency.

Shawn:

I want to pivot a little bit to talk about something else that you've studied and you've written about, particularly in how Enemies Become Friends, and that is it feels as if we're experiencing kind of the rise of the great powers in a confrontational way in the world, in a way that we perhaps haven't since the end of the Cold War, and by here I mean Russia exerting not just influence but military influence and aggression on the global stage.

Shawn:

You see Iran becoming a bit more aggressive, china while I don't know that we're seeing China become more aggressive, but it certainly seems to be more sympathetic to what we would consider to be our adversaries. And as its economy has grown, although it seems to be flattening a tiny bit as its economy has grown, you know that raises a little bit of, I think, defensive posturing as to what its intentions are moving forward. But, as you've written about how peace can be obtained between rivals in perhaps the past world order, when you consider the state of play now, how do you think we get there and what is the United States role, or what should it be doing to maybe be bringing the temperature down or, you know, trying to find some type of stability in what seems like a very unstable situation?

Dr. Kupchan:

Well, I think, unfortunately, with Russia. The relationship with the US and the West more generally is going to be fraught for the foreseeable future. Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the constant bombardment of Russian cities and infrastructure, apartment buildings, restaurants it's going to be very difficult for Russia to recover from that. I think with China, from that. I think with China, the Biden administration has too quickly jumped to the conclusion that China is the great threat of the 21st century and that it is seeking to displace the United States as the key player in global affairs. It may come to that. Maybe that's where we'll end up, but I don't think we're there yet.

Dr. Kupchan:

And it's with China that I think the United States should at least explore the possibility of complementing competition, because there will be competition with an element of collaboration. Doing that in East Asia, doing it on Taiwan, doing it on North Korea, health issues there are opportunities for the United States and China to be working together. Climate change is another area. The initial steps toward moving from conflict to cooperation always require signals of benign intent, always require both sides to exercise restraint, and I don't think it's too late to run that play with China, to try to exercise restraint and push the relationship in a more cooperative direction. The Chinese may say no, the Chinese may say we have no interest, but it certainly strikes me as probably the most important missing element in American foreign policy right now, given that the United States and China will be the two preeminent powers of the coming decades.

Shawn:

So you've worked in presidential administrations, you've done research during periods of time in which there have been significant shifts in global relationships, and it's probably not wrong to say that the state of play in the mid-1990s was very different than it is today. And you've been studying this and you've and, like I said, you've worked in administrations while all of this was changing. And I want to kind of focus on Russia a little bit. I want to get your perspective on this, being much closer to this and having been involved or in the room at the time that this was happening. But Russia to me feels like a tragic loss and I'm not sure exactly how that happened. I think part of me wants to say that this is this. Chalk this all up to Putin, but I wonder if there's something else that was happening that brought Russia to where it is, and Putin's not young. So when Putin's left the stage, do you see some hope here? Or is there something endemic to Russia that just suggests it's lost to the West or it's lost to global security?

Dr. Kupchan:

development and an unprovoked act of aggression that's going to hurt Russia for generations to come. That having been said, I do think that the United States back in the 1990s and I was working in the White House at the time did make some mistakes and did not work hard enough to pull Russia into the post-Cold War order, and it instead began to expand NATO successive rounds of NATO expansion, bringing the border of NATO closer and closer to the Russian border, and then, in 2008, set its course to integrate Ukraine and Georgia into NATO. And I think that was a bridge too far. Great powers don't like it when other great powers come into their neighborhood. The United States spent most of the 19th century pushing France, spain, russia and, finally, great Britain out of the Western Hemisphere, and then we tell the Russians that we're going to bring Ukraine into NATO. Russia has a thousand mile border with Ukraine and we tell the Russians hey, chill out, this is no threat, Don't worry about it.

Dr. Kupchan:

I think that was geopolitically naive. I'm not saying it justified Putin's invasion. I'm simply saying I think we were not mindful enough of the need to anchor Russia into a post-Cold War European order. Now you know, I think we're stuck with this Russia as long as Putin is around, he may well be at the helm for, you know, the better part of another decade. What comes after Putin, we don't know, but I do think that, for now, the relationship is is going to be extremely conflictual, conflictual, and we can only hope that when Putin leaves the scene, russia finds its way to a government that is much more sensible and much more inclined to cooperate with its European and Western partners.

Shawn:

Just really quickly. I want to pick your brain on this In this conversation. Like I said, we're recording this right before the election. The answer to this question might look very different after the election, but I would like to know, from your perspective and given your experience and the work that you've done, what worries you most right now.

Dr. Kupchan:

Now is us.

Dr. Kupchan:

You know, as I said, I'm much more worried about the internal threat to the West than the external threat, and I find it Let me put it this way I understand why there are a lot of angry Americans out there that have it out for the, for the establishment, have it out for the establishment, and that Trump is good at being the poster boy of this anti-establishment movement. I don't really understand why an individual who attempted to overthrow American democracy, who still has yet to accept that he lost the 2020 election, that he lost the 2020 election, why someone who is so fundamentally a threat to American democracy, why he is as popular as he is and that mere fact worries me and I'm concerned about political instability, I'm concerned about political violence, I'm concerned about the potential erosion of tolerance and ethnic, communal, religious, racial integration in this country. There's a lot at stake. This is one of the most important moments in American history. There's a lot at stake. This is one of the most important moments in American history, and I hope we emerge at the other end in better shape.

Shawn:

Cheers to that. Okay, final question you ready for that? Yep no-transcript.

Dr. Kupchan:

And then you pass a Catholic church and then an Orthodox church and then an Ashkenazi synagogue and then a Sephardi synagogue, and all of these different communities used to live together peacefully and now all but the mosques are museums. Because Bosnia experienced a terrible war in which ethnicity and communal religion, communal dividing lines, essentially exploded and there are still bullet holes everywhere and mortar holes everywhere. So I kind of it was a wonderful trip, but also a sad trip and a warning, and the warning I came away with was don't go there.

Dr. Kupchan:

Really I was going to ask is it worth going there? No, no, no. By don't go there, I mean go to Sarajevo, but don't go down the rabbit hole that Yugoslavia went down.

Shawn:

This is very different. But I went to my family's from Germany. I finally went last month and I went to Berlin and Berlin has you know, I mean, if you're interested in anything that happened in the 1900s, berlin has somehow got its foot in it. Yeah, and while the outcome and the way that the city developed post-world war one, two and the berlin wall and cold war is very different from sarajevo, there was a certain there's like fog that kind of hangs over, uh, the history of that city too that you can kind of feel and tangibly see, you know.

Dr. Kupchan:

Well, that's another perfect example. I mean, berlin in the 1930s was probably one of the most sophisticated, educated, multi-ethnic cities on planet earth, and it turned into ground zero for one of the darkest eras in human history. We can't let those kinds of things happen again.

Shawn:

On that note, Dr Kupchan, thanks for taking the time. Don't forget to vote.

Dr. Kupchan:

Good to be with you, Shawn, and I agree with you Don't forget to vote. It's your obligation as a citizen as a citizen.

Shawn:

The shifting global landscape is precarious, with new alliances and rising powers testing the stability that has long underpinned the international order. A second Trump presidency, marked by isolationism and protectionism, could accelerate these changes in ways that are hard to reverse. By withdrawing from NATO and weakening transatlantic partnerships, trump's policies could leave Europe vulnerable to Russian aggression, with devastating consequences for democratic values in the region and the security of Europe as a whole and then the rest of the world. Remember Hitler didn't stop at Poland. A rise of authoritarianism in Europe would influence the ability of the US to maintain strategic partnerships across the Atlantic that ensure that conflicts remain far from our shores. In Asia, a diminished American presence could embolden China's ambitions, escalating tensions in places like Taiwan and the South China Sea. Without the deterrent of US involvement, critical maritime routes would come under Chinese control, giving China influence over global shipping traffic and also potentially influencing the alliances that the US has with South Korea, the Philippines and Japan, which could mean that these countries will be pressured to build new alliances that better advantage them, alliances that could no longer include the United States. This could lead to a buildup of military presences in the Pacific by a number of countries, destabilizing the entire hemisphere and threatening the security of the United States itself. Trump's continued support for tariffs and trade wars could also disrupt global supply chains, raising prices and isolating American industries, while also empowering other countries to form independent trade blocs. This turn inward could weaken the multilateral response needed to address crises like climate change and nuclear proliferation, leaving global challenges unresolved.

Shawn:

Alliances and agreements military, economic and ideological do not and should not just benefit one party. They serve a larger purpose to maintain stability and security. Sometimes the United States will benefit more than its partners, and sometimes its partners will benefit more than the United States, but we're all safer for it. Trump's argument that the United States should unilaterally benefit at the expense of partners in all situations weakens the country and threatens the future of global security. So the stakes are high. A weakened, isolated United States could lose its influence as a global leader, allowing authoritarian regimes to set the rules and threaten global peace. Such shifts wouldn't be easily undone. The trust and partnerships eroded could take generations to rebuild, with lasting impacts on global stability, economic security and democratic values.

Shawn:

In the end, the path of isolationism this path that Donald Trump has promised to commit us to is a dangerous one. It leaves America vulnerable to economic stagnation, it strains international partnerships and it risks a world where the forces of authoritarianism grow unchecked. And once that bell is rung, it can't just be unrung, the damage will be done. It is true that we in the United States have dropped the ball when it comes to taking care of our own, of ensuring prosperity and the well-being of our citizens in a way that makes it difficult to maintain a strong commitment to the prosperity and well-being of people in distant lands. It's a balance we've not mastered and there is a price to be paid. Let's just hope that price doesn't break us. We are truly at a pivotal crossroads, with the tremendous consequences of this election hanging over us. In a way, on November 5th we're deciding not just the fate of our own country but the fate of the world. Choose wisely. All right, check back next week for another episode of Deep Dive Chat soon, folks. Thank you, thank you.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Shawn C. Fettig

Host