Thursday 20 September 2018

A Gamble Team Trump Should Back

Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Jason Miks.

September 20, 2018

A Gamble Team Trump Should Back

South Korean President Moon Jae-in risks a serious rift with the United States if he moves too quickly with his latest round of talks with Kim Jong Un's regime, suggests Michael Fuchs in The Guardian. But the Trump administration should still try to ride this "wave of North-South diplomacy."

"The South Korean government may very well be unrealistic about what diplomacy can achieve (the agreement to seek a joint bid for the 2032 Summer Olympics seems Pollyannaish at best). North Korea's asking price for progress may be too high. And the US administration may not be equipped to succeed in this round of diplomacy. But these diplomatic opportunities are rare, and without a strong US-South Korea alliance there will be no way to address the threats that North Korea poses," Fuchs says.

"The United States must give peace a chance, and that means giving Moon a chance."

De facto peace? A deal at the Kim-Moon summit this week can "be viewed as a de facto end-of-war declaration by both leaders," Lee Je-hun writes for The Hankyoreh.

"The two heads of state promised to swiftly implement the military agreement, which states that a joint military committee will be set up to put an end to hostile military relations, with the goal of 'eliminating any practical threat of war across the entire territory of the Korean Peninsula and fundamentally alleviating hostile relations.'"

The Danger of Fort Trump

Polish President Andrzej Duda's suggestion this week of a "Fort Trump" in Poland could prove to be a win for the transactional approach to foreign policy being pursued by President Trump, argues Leonid Bershidsky in Bloomberg. It could also set a dangerous precedent.

If it took up an apparent Polish offer to pay for such a military base, "the US could hope to cut spending in future: A precedent for more burden-sharing would be set.

"By framing the matter as plainly as he did — 'You come, we pay,' in the words of [security analyst Marek Swierczynski] — Duda took the risk of displeasing fellow NATO allies, who may be asked to follow suit or face a wilting US commitment. But they may have little choice but to adopt this transactional approach."

Why Trump's Encore Will Upset the Allies

Donald Trump makes his second appearance as US president at the UN General Assembly next week. Expect him to talk tough on Iran – and rub US allies the wrong way in the process, Nahal Toosi, David Herszenhorn and Matthew Karnitschnig write for Politico EU.

"Trump's expected barbs against Iran in New York…come with political risk — and potential rewards: Talking tough on Tehran will please Trump's Republican base, as well as Israel and some Arab states. But the broader reaction could expose how isolated Trump is on the world stage, especially after he unilaterally quit the Iran nuclear deal this spring," they write.

"European leaders are sympathetic to many of Trump's complaints about Iran. They worry about Iranian aid to terrorist groups implicated in attacks across Europe."

"But these same allies believe Trump should have built on the nuclear deal instead of walking away from it…They [also] fear the US is doing what it can to collapse the regime without a long-term strategy, meaning more political chaos and human suffering in an already volatile Middle East."

The Real Reason Migrants Are Fleeing Latin America

Being a repeated victim of crime is more likely to predict whether someone flees some Latin American nations than their age or economic circumstances, notes David Luhnow in The Wall Street Journal.

What's behind the soaring violent crime rates pushing so many people to leave?

"Demographics play a role: Latin America has more young people than most other regions, making for too many young men chasing too few quality jobs. And it has weak educational systems. Only 27% of Brazilians aged 25 or older have completed high school, according to government figures," Luhnow notes.

"Much of Latin America also urbanized rapidly without services such as schooling and policing, creating belts of excluded groups around cities."

"Latin America is also awash in guns, most of them held illegally. Nearly 78% of murders in Central America between 2000 and 2015 were caused by guns, compared with a global average of 32%, according to the Igarapé Institute."

The "Disquieting" Truth About Trump's Foreign Policy

Set aside the shock value and President Trump's foreign policy isn't really about upending America's historic place in the world, suggests Janan Ganesh in the Financial Times. Instead, the administration's approach marks "the restoration of the US as a selfish state among selfish states, not an over-worked governess with the entire free world as her mewling wards."

"Trump's infidelity to the postwar system is disquieting, but perhaps he is doing through choice what future presidents will have to do through necessity," Ganesh says.

"Pax Americana is not the natural order of things. It is a phase born of the most extreme circumstances. The US accounted for a third of the world's output when it set up the Bretton Woods institutions, revived Japan and secured Europe…It now accounts for about 20 percent of global output. It does not have the wherewithal to underwrite the democratic world forever."

What a Difference a Year Makes

Less than a year ago, Chinese President Xi Jinping towered over his country's political landscape as the country abandoned presidential term limits. But as US tariffs start to bite and investment growth falls, expect growing doubts about his leadership style, suggests George Magnus for the Nikkei Asian Review.

"Xi does not look to be under any immediate threat. But he seems to have been wrong-footed recently by Trump's resolve in prosecuting the trade war. Criticism by intellectuals about Xi's leadership has emerged in widely circulated essays…Meanwhile, the pressures on the economy, stock market and yuan continue," Magnus writes.

"If anything does go wrong in China, there is really only one person who will have to shoulder the blame."

Forward

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