Trump’s ‘America First’ philosophy has created a less stable world

by Dr.Fareed Zakaria

https://fareedzakaria.com/columns/2019/5/16/trumps-america-first-philosophy-has-created-a-less-stable-world

President Trump has seemed largely uninterested in foreign policy. He got excited briefly when he thought he could win a Nobel Peace Prize and hyped the danger of an imminent North Korean attack — so that he could play the peacemaker. When it became clear that a deal was not to be had easily, Trump lost interest and scarcely mentions the subject anymore.

Beyond North Korea, his foreign policy has largely been one of subcontracting (a familiar style for a real estate developer). Middle East policy is farmed out to Israel and Saudi Arabia. The administration simply backs whatever those nations want. Policy toward left-wing regimes in Latin America — Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua — has been delegated to saber-rattlers such as national security adviser John Bolton and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). The rest of Latin America is dealt with solely through the lens of immigration —  in other words, subcontracted to senior policy adviser Stephen Miller.

 

The one common aspect of Trump’s foreign policy, however, has been that it has provoked a vigorous nationalist response abroad. Take China, where the government has gone on the offensive and denounced what it sees as the United States’ aggressive trade demands. Beijing’s state-controlled television network recently featured a commentary that tied U.S. tactics to previous foreign efforts to subjugate China. “If you want a trade war,” the anchor said, “we’ll fight you until the end. After 5,000 years of wind and rain, what hasn’t the Chinese nation weathered?” That clip, in addition to being aired on China’s main TV news channel, has been watched online more than 99 million times.

In Iran, the Islamic Republic has been able to withstand the economic storms caused by U.S. sanctions because it has been able to pin the blame on Trump’s anti-Iran strategy, not the regime’s economic mismanagement. Washington has always underestimated nationalism, especially in the case of Iran. Many of Iran’s foreign policy moves stem from its geopolitical position, not some fundamentalist Shiite ideology. Last year, Ardeshir Zahedi, who served as foreign minister under the shah, published an open letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, essentially defending the Islamic Republic’s foreign policy. Iran’s nuclear program, it is worth recalling, began under the shah.

 

The manner in which the Trump administration deals with almost every country provokes a nationalist, anti-American response. One of the great achievements of U.S. foreign policy over the past 30 years was that Mexico had gone from being an anti-American, revolutionary country to a pro-American partner. In 2015, before Trump’s election, 66 percent of Mexicans had a favorable view of the United States, according to a Pew Research Center survey. By last year, that number had dropped to 32 percent. Confidence in the U.S. president plummeted in that same period from 49 to 6 percent.

The pattern recurs almost everywhere. In Canada, confidence in the U.S. president went from 76 percent in 2015 to 25 percent in 2018. In France it’s worse, from 83 percent under President Barack Obama to single digits under Trump. In fact, in the Pew report, which surveyed 25 countries, only two places expressed greater confidence in Trump than his predecessor: Russia and Israel.

Countries around the globe are becoming more assertive and anti-American, even ones that embrace Trump’s ideology. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban proudly says that he is building an “illiberal democracy” in his country. In recent years, he has destroyed democratic checks and balances, demonized immigrants (of whom there are few in Hungary) and mouthed anti-Islamic rhetoric. Shunned by Obama, Orban was warmly welcomed this week at the White House by Trump. And yet, Orban has rebuffed U.S. overtures and aligned with China and Russia when it has suited his purposes.

It makes perfect sense. In his 2017 speech to the U.N. General Assembly, Trump called for “a great reawakening of nations,” urging countries to use patriotism and self-interest as their guides in foreign policy. Trump’s north star has been a narrow conception of national interest, rejecting the idea that there are larger international interests and, by implication, denigrating the idea of cooperative, win-win solutions.

Well, Orban is simply doing what Trump urged, as are the Chinese, the Iranians and so many others. And since the United States is still the world’s leading power, and Trump’s style has been to be aggressive and undiplomatic, the easiest response is a nationalist, anti-American one, feeding public anger, stoking bad historical memories and locking countries into a win-lose mindset.

It is a world with more instability, less cooperation and fewer opportunities for the United States. And it is a direct, logical consequence of Trump’s philosophy of “America First.”

(c) 2019, Washington Post Writers Group

Trump’s Foreign Policy wreckage in Asia

February 20, 2019

Author: by Editorial Board, ANU

http://www.eastasiaforum.org/2019/02/11/trumps-foreign-policy-wreckage-in-asia/

Right now, he is the most dangerous man in the Free World

The real worry is that beyond Trump’s Presidency all the signs suggest that both the impulse of the United States to engage multilaterally will be very difficult to repair and that Mr Trump has fractured trust in multilateral endeavours around the world.–Editorial Board, ANU

When the Trump administration came to power two years ago, the response by policymakers with a huge stake in the relationship — from the leadership of China to that of rusted on allies like Japan or Australia — was that Trump’s team would settle back after the election and that business would resume with the new administration more or less as usual.

 

Burney Sanders– Will he do the BURN in 2020?

The United States was the crux of the economic and political security system on which the world has relied for more than three-quarters of a century. The global economic architecture which the United States and its allies put in place after World War II is now absent US leadership and care. Mr Trump and his team have trashed it. Trump’s trade war with China and his trade actions against others, including US allies like Japan, Europe and Canada, show utter disrespect for its core rules. This system is the international system of rules, whatever its weaknesses, on which Asia’s political security also vitally depends.

The wreckage of Mr Trump’s approach to foreign policy continues to pile up across Asia and around the world.

Joe Biden must make up his mind soon

The immediate outlook, over the next year or two, promises rising economic and political uncertainty. The real estate market bargaining style that Mr Trump has brought to dealing with these issues undervalues the complex interdependence between the economic and political security interests that are at stake. It undervalues the damaging multilateral consequences of bilateral dealing. That’s what is so risky about the bilateralisation of the US trade negotiations with China, which as the largest trading nation in the world is wisely bound into the multilateral global trading regime. Japan too is under pressure to do a bilateral trade deal with Mr Trump — a deal that goes beyond the multilateral commitments it has made to members of the so-called TPP-11. On the US trade conflict with China, there’s a deepening perception gap with Washington, and diplomatic realignment despite the deep security undertow in some countries.

Asian policy leaders are still coming to terms with the reality that Mr Trump is different and that the United States which delivered his electoral success is never likely to be quite the same. But there’s a growing understanding in Tokyo, Jakarta and even Canberra of what’s at stake in dealing with Mr Trump’s administration and the more proactive response that will be needed to defend core Asian economic and political interests that transcend the anxieties that exist between a rising China and the rest of Asia.

In this week’s lead essay Sheila Smith argues that based on the past performance of the Trump administration, US policy in Asia will ‘be erratic and self-serving’ in the coming year as the Trump administration continues ‘to work out its issues with countries in the region bilaterally and sporadically’. The ‘more openly pugilistic US relationship with China’, she says, ‘unsettles nerves’ across the region.

But the main problem for US foreign policy makers, Smith reckons, is not the behaviour of other global actors, including those in Asia or elsewhere. The main problem is the ‘crippling divisions within the Trump administration itself, and between the administration and the legislative and judicial branches of the US government, [that] could make any attempt to marshal US resources into foreign relations almost impossible’.

The coming year, as Smith says, will likely be a year of domestic political entanglement for the President and his administration. The effect of the political turbulence surrounding the White House and the extent to which it dominates US foreign policy is one dimension. But the lack of focus and consistency in the direction of foreign policy strategy is an altogether higher order concern. Diminished expertise and experience at all levels of the Trump administration undermine the trust that allies, partners and even adversaries can put in the reliability of US posturing.

In the short term, these worries are focused on Mr Trump and his administration. Some think that Trump will have more freedom to pursue his ambitions for ‘America First’ around the world. The immediate issue is how to respond to the ‘America First’ momentum in all its dimensions. But even if there are fewer experts in the government to challenge Mr Trump’s vision, implementation of his goals remains a challenge, especially against what now appears to be comprehensive pushback by the US security community in almost every theatre.

The turmoil at home, Smith warns, could produce more brittle and reactive decisions. This could bedevil meaningful dealings with others around the globe because of the instinct to seek settlement prematurely, in the trade war with China or denuclearisation in North Korea, for example, instead of pursuing stable, long-lasting agreements that serve the interests of the United States as well as its partners.

The crrizeises Mr Trump proudly proclaims that he alone could have dealt with are largely of his own making ( and for he arrogantly thinks he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize). It’s hardly surprising that Asian allies and partners alike should worry about how Mr Trump might deal with a real crisis when there’s a significant move within the US Congress to put limits on the President’s use of nuclear weapons.

The chances that the Trump administration, in this mode, will succeed in mitigating global-system destabilising trade and other tensions with China or, alone, secure an agreement on denuclearisation with North Korea appear remote.

Only multilateral engagement on both these and other issues such as climate change is likely to deliver stable, mutually advantageous outcomes to the United States and all its partners in any of these areas. That’s not on Mr Trump’s agenda.

The real worry is that beyond Trump’s presidency all the signs suggest that both the impulse of the United States to engage multilaterally will be very difficult to repair and that Mr Trump has fractured trust in multilateral endeavours around the world.

The EAF Editorial Board is located in the Crawford School of Public Policy, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University.

Climate Change and Governance

November 2, 2018

Lecture: Climate Change and Governance

 

Lecture: MALAYSIA: From Kleptocracy to Democracy

May 30, 2018

Public Lecture Announcement

MALAYSIA: From Kleptocracy to Democracy

 

The Techo Sen School of Government and International Relations at The  University of Cambodia is pleased to announce that there will be a public lecture on June 2, 2018 at UC Main Campus by Prof. Din Merican. Prof Din’s lecture is titled Malaysia: From Kleptocracy to Democracy. He will discuss the May 9 Malaysian General Elections (GE-14) and its impact on his country; and he will also touch on Cambodia-Malaysia relations in the new Mahathir Administration.

Prof. Chhea Keo, Dean, Techo Sen School of Government and International Relations, The University of Cambodia, Phnom Penh

Biographical Sketch of Prof. Din Merican

Prof. Din Merican has had a long-standing history with Cambodia, and the experience he has brought to the study of International Relations in Cambodia is part of a career which encompasses a wide diversity of achievement in both the diplomatic and corporate world. He has connected Malaysians, Cambodians, and millions of others through his personal blog. which is devoured by those who share his passion for International Relations; it has received over 25 million hits.

In 2000-2002, he was consultant to the Asia-Europe Institute, University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur. In 2017 he was awarded the Dean’s Letter of Commendation for his contributions to the George Washington School of Business at George Washington University, and since 2015 he is  Associate Dean at the Techo Sen School of Government and International Relations.

Prof. Merican has Bachelor of Arts Degree with Honours in Economic from The University of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In 1970, he graduated from The George Washington School of Business, The George Washington University, Washington D.C., USA with Master’s  Degree in Business Administration in Finance and International Business (with distinction). He was the Best Graduate Student in International Business for the Graduating Class of 1970. In 1989 he attended the well-known Advanced Management Program at INSEAD (The European Business School), Fontainebleau, France.

Over the years, Prof. Merican served in many positions in both the public and private sectors. He began his career in 1963 at the Malaysian Foreign Ministry as Assistant Secretary (Political) in charge of Southeast Asia (covering Indonesia,  Cambodia, Laos, Philippines, Thailand and Burma) and military intelligence. This is where he established his relationship with Cambodia, and quickly realized that Cambodia captured his attention and imagination. For his outstanding contributions to teaching and research on Cambodia and ASEAN, he awarded a Doctorate (h.c) in International Relations in 2016 by The Board of Trustees, The University of Cambodia.

Lecture at The University of Cambodia: US Foreign Policy and Trends by Former United States Ambassador George Bruno

January 10, 2018

The University of Cambodia and The Techo Sen School of Government and International Relations in collaboration with The Embassy of The United States of America in Phnom Penh are pleased to announce that there will be a Lecture on “US Foreign Policy and Trends” on January 16th 2018 at 3:00pm – 5:00 pm by Former U.S Ambassador George Bruno in The United States of America Room , 9th Floor, The University of Cambodia.

 

The Dean Techo Sen School Prof. Keo Chhea will represent H.E Dr. Kao Kim Hourn, Founder, Chairman of Board of Trustee and President of The University of Cambodia. Prof. Dr. Din Merican, Associate Dean, The Techo Sen School will be a moderator for the Lecture.

All Students, Faculty, Staff and Members of The UC Community are cordially invited.

 

George Bruno

https://www.americanambassadors.org/members/george-bruno

George Bruno is a lawyer in private practice concentrating on business matters and immigration law. He is also the Managing Director of USA Group International, an international consulting firm serving businesses and governments, with offices in New Hampshire and Washington, DC.

He is under contract with the University of New Hampshire to manage its Partners for Peace Program dealing with civil-military emergency preparedness focusing this past year on Russia and Latvia. Ambassador Bruno is also an adjunct professor of International Affairs in the Graduate School of New England College and serves as an advisor to the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies at the National Defense University, Ft. McNair, Washington, DC.

Former US Ambassador George Bruno

Ambassador Bruno has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY, and a law degree from The George Washington University, Washington, DC. He was awarded a graduate fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

In 1998-1999, as a senior member of the US team, he made monthly visits to Panama to facilitate fulfillment of the 1977 Canal Treaty. In 1999-2000, he represented the US in Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania to promote civil protection and cooperation among the Balkan nations. In the spring of 2002, he traveled to Indonesia and Korea for the State Department to discuss democracy, foreign policy and 9/11 before government, student and business audiences.

He has served on election observation missions in Kosovo, Pakistan and Romania, and participated in world forums on trade, human rights, democracy, military affairs, and the administration of justice. In 2005, he served as an advisor to the Bosnia War Crimes Tribunal.

He was appointed Ambassador to Belize from 1994-1997 by President Bill Clinton where he worked to increase trade, strengthen Belize’s democratic traditions, stem the flow of illegal drugs and aliens and promote friendly relations between our countries.

South China Sea Dispute: No Solution any time soon

October 8, 2017

by Bunn Nagara

http://www.thestar.com.my

 

WHEN a problem clearly becomes hopeless, it may generate one of two opposite reactions – intellectual equivalents of fight or flight. One is to see tremendous hope in the depths of disappointment; the other is to surrender utterly to crushing despondency. Both extreme reactions are equally unrealistic.

The intractable South China Sea disputes with their multiple layers of challenges form one such example.

Bill Hayton of London’s Chatham House (Royal Institute of International Affairs) think tank became an authority on the subject with his 2014 book The South China Sea: The Struggle for Power in Asia.

As his talk at the Institute of China Studies, Universiti Malaya on Thursday showed, China’s current claim to most of the South China Sea is of quite recent origin, beginning after 1909.

China was more concerned about the Paracel Islands closer to home, not objecting to France’s claim to the Spratlys in 1933. For much of the time China even seemed unaware of the Spratly Islands.

Beijing began to claim the Spratlys only in 1946. This island group is now hotly contested by Brunei, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.

In 2009 China sent a letter to the UN Secretary-General asserting its sovereign rights and jurisdiction over the relevant waters and islands of the South China Sea. Beijing argues that its rights date back centuries if not millennia.

But disputed claims based on little more than assumptions in a hazy and distant past pose problems abroad. Nothing substantive or meaningful can be anchored in international law recognised by all claimants.

For any country to display old maps of questionable origin to support the claims as ancient and therefore legitimate is not enough. That only enlarges the disputes, which is what has happened.

But what have Chinese geographers and legal experts made of Hayton’s revelations? Apparently they have yet to respond, since a Chinese translation of his work is on the way.

Such findings can better inform the disputes, raise the level of debates and encourage more reasonable claims. But that is as far as they go.

New information does not enable anyone – not even Hayton, as he claims – to resolve the South China Sea disputes in a week. That is sheer delusion in full flight mode. Greater familiarity with such disputes would make the many challenges clear enough. But some false hopes still need to be exposed.

The issue of joint development is among them. China has offered to conduct joint exploration and development with other claimant countries, but that has been rejected.

Apart from the problems of who should pay how much of the costs and receive how much of the profits, any partnership in the spoils of a dispute is no answer. In law, it would already be an admission of another country’s rights over one’s national territory.

Another problem area is the nature of talks itself. Given the multiple claims, should negotiations be multilateral involving all the claimant countries or just bilateral?

 

China insists on bilateral negotiations only, probably in series as it deals with one country at a time. The general perception however is that only inclusive multilateral talks can be worthwhile.

However, bilateral talks have also been seen as more realistic since the overlapping nature of the claims would get nowhere multilaterally. Too many conflicting disputes with far too many starting points may not see any progress.

But bilateral talks themselves may still go nowhere – each set of talks between two countries cannot proceed without recognising the prior arrangement made in the preceding set of talks involving other countries.

The fundamentally flawed nature of both bilateral and multilateral talks testifies to the surreal nature of ever resolving such disputes. The only realistic assessment of the prospect of successful talks may just be that success is unrealistic.

If all six parties claimed all of the Spratlys, then perhaps a settlement may be reached based on an equitable partitioning of the territory. Alternatively, if each of the claimant states staked a claim on only a part of the area, a settlement may also be reached through an agreed distribution of those parts.

But none of those situations applies. Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines each claims only part of the Spratlys, while China, Taiwan and Vietnam each claims all of the island group.

Complicating things further, there are overlapping claims by two or more countries. Worse, there are several areas of overlap by different sets of countries.

Besides the claims, claimant countries have also occupied various islands, outcrops and underwater features. Vietnam has some 30 military outposts on them, far outnumbering all the others which have 10 or fewer outposts each.

Backed by enormous resources, China has lately been the most ambitious in its scale of construction and land reclamation on the features it occupies. It has also rejected international legal hearings.

International law does not accept historical claims based on assertions, however vocal. Critics say that China avoids international hearings because it may lose by basing its claims on history alone. However, China says that such disputes centre on national sovereignty, and tribunals such as the Permanent Court of Arbitration that rejected its claims last year have no authority to decide on issues of national sovereignty.

To add still more colour and complexity, Taiwan’s claims have been subsumed by China. Since China already claims Taiwan as a province, Taiwan’s claims are also China’s.

This leaves Taiwan in an uneasy position. Even as it wants to assert its own individuality, it is comforted by China’s embrace in its claims to outlying territory.

The other player that is not actually in the game is the US. When the Philippines once relied on it for backing if not outright protection in staking its claims, there are now serious second thoughts.

Unlike claimant countries including China, the US has no claim to any territory in this region. In one sense that makes it neutral in overseeing order on the high seas.

However, in another sense it means an asymmetrical relationship where the US may not go very far in protecting a country’s disputed claims over another’s. At the same time, the US has a very large economic stake of its own in maintaining healthy relations with China.

That explains US actions being limited to “freedom of navigation operations” (Fonops), which see its vessels plying through waters that China has declared as its own.

These are only symbolic and temporary gestures challenging China’s own rhetorical assertions and presumptions. And that is just how they have been treated. Hayton argues that countries in South-East Asia should be more assertive in making their own historical claims as China does, since they have been using the South China Sea for millennia.

However, use of waterways by a country’s nationals in their passage (unlike occupation) may not equate to that country’s sovereignty over the waterways in international law.

Besides, sovereignty may be claimed only by nation states, and those of today’s South-East Asia did not exist centuries or even decades ago. Meanwhile state entities like Champa, Majapahit and Sri Vijaya are no longer with us .Such challenges make any resolution of the South China Sea disputes most unlikely even in a month of blue moons.

Bunn Nagara is a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia.