Digest 29: Vulnerable America
Today’s digest is not predominantly about Israel-Gaza. If you’re looking for something of note there, I would direct you to this tweet from Naftali Bennett (former Israeli Prime Minister), laying out the ‘unexpected’ intended elements of the ground invasion – and a strategy more of ‘siege’ and ‘suffocation’ than committing mass forces. (Just hit ‘translate’ at the bottom of the tweet.)
Most interesting highlights from the past two weeks…
1. Elon on Ukraine
From a X Space this week:
This is actually the best outcome for the people of Ukraine.
We should push for a ceasefire… From a civilisational-risk standpoint, we should restore normal relations with Russia.
I see only bad things in prolonging the Ukraine-Russia conflict.
2. Chamath on Trump
For 2 minutes:
I am left, yet again, despite the messenger, with an appreciation of the message of the Trump administration. What those guys did was pretty incredible in hindsight… Those guys did a lot of really good work.
Is one’s Trump derangement syndrome causing more damage than anything Trump actually could have done? I think the answer is yes, as it’s causing us not to see that good work and embrace and extend it. So much of the work in that administration turns out to have been right.
When are we going to stop shooting ourselves in the foot?
This continues here (2 minutes):
I had already underwritten him as a F. As I get a little bit of distance away, I realise, no, hold on a second, this guy was actually a B+… I voted for Hilliary Clinton. I voted for Joe Biden. But Trump did a pretty good job.
I was saying the same (at least in foreign policy terms) back in April.
Chamath and Jason (both with Democratic-leaning voting histories) being able to say this increases my suspected probability of a Trump victory.
Trump would restore some deterrent credibility/international peacemaking. His slated foreign policy is quite sensible.
But I am under no illusions as to how polarising Trump is domestically in the U.S.
3. Kotkin: ‘Another definition of victory’
2 minutes:
Those were attainable goals, if you took Moscow. If you’re not going to take Moscow, you need another definition of what victory might be.
My definition: Ukraine inside the EU. Some sort of security guarantee which is not likely to be NATO in the short-term. And then a rebuilding of Ukraine South Korea-style on the other side of a demilitarised zone with an armistice.
The GoodFellows appear to me just to be skipping over one crucial detail (see item #4 below): it’s Zelensky who presently has a block on diplomatic dialogue, not Putin. I have contacted Professor Kotkin to try and point this out.
Professor Kotkin continues here (1 minute): what Ukraine would actually need if it were to have any chance of prevailing:
This is clearly not palatable to anyone, and thus, we need an armistice.
4. Mr. Zelensky, lift this decree
Last Monday, I released a video showing, with extremely scrupulous sourcing, that it’s in fact Zelensky who has put a block on all diplomatic dialogue, and that Putin is regularly publicly welcoming talks.
If you haven’t seen it yet, please check it out here:
https://twitter.com/EdwardMDruce/status/1717558476191203471
I have received feedback from some world-leading academics saying: ‘I was not aware of this.’
This should be mainstream knowledge. It’s remarkable that it’s not.
I don’t think it’s too strong to say: we have been gas-lit by our government and media on this.
Even if you are supremely pro-Ukraine, I do not understand how you can be anti-dialogue. You would need an immense level of historical ignorance to think not speaking with an adversary can improve a situation – especially with the degree to which all other burgeoning conflicts are inter-linked. Please help share this so it’s more widely known.
Mr Zelensky, lift this decree.
5. Why anything I’m writing about here matters…
A moving clip here with Professor Jeffrey Sachs:
Sustainable development cannot work in the context of war.
To achieve anything we want on the planet, we need cooperation.
We are not going to succeed in any of our objectives in a deeply divided world – much less a world in open war.
We need real diplomats.
Whatever your ‘thing’ – climate targets, AI safety… – these will all go out the window, if these diplomatic issues cannot be reconciled. Peace is the core issue for sustainable development.
6. Vulnerable America
All told, America appears to be in an extremely vulnerable position right now.
Debt to GDP at ~110%, with a deficit of ~7%, and entitlement programmes (that are bankrupting the country) about the only thing which have cross-party support.
Running dangerously low on key types of ammo and weaponry.
Ukraine, which it has backed, is running out of soldiers.
Seemingly no uniting U.S. Presidential successor on the horizon.
It appears there’s no great international appetite for U.S. bonds right now and issuance of more debt.
The U.S. needs to prepare for the possibility of war in two more theatres (Iran and Taiwan – potentially North Korea as a fourth).
Military enlistment numbers are at record lows (the military having to lower entry standards, due to obesity in America’s young).
And a President who seems to think the U.S. is still at the height of its power in the early 1990s, and that it can manage all this and more, no problem.
The U.S. still has a superpower of innovation. But I grow less confident by the day this malaise can be innovated out of in the immediate term.
7. Polling continues to deteriorate for support in Ukraine
This was echoed by Vivek’s on the ground experience:
I will tell you on the ground, that is not what I see when it’s presented in a different form than what the poll questions serve up.
Once you explain to people, look, this is not that we’re anti-Ukraine – it’s a pro-American, or pro-civilisational view, that will keep us out of WW3 – I see more heads nodding than not.
I’ve never worked on a political campaign. I don’t write on polling from a place of authority. But, this shift appears to be happening fast enough, I consider (with energy prices what they are; coupled with the death toll in Ukraine and lack of any territorial advance) this will have swung radically by the time the next British general election is held.
I consider British politicians until now have been fixated on present-day polling, not realising where momentum is heading. Skating to where the puck is going (and when UK and U.S. elections will actually take place), it seems to me it would be politically smart to start arguing for an armistice now. Only Trump seems to be capitalising on this.
8. A sane to-do list for Jake Sullivan/Blinken/No.10 equivalents:
I) Negotiate an immediate armistice in Ukraine.
This is uncomfortable, but doable. It does not diminish deterrent credibility in other theatres. What does erode deterrent credibility is: getting continually more depleted in weaponry, into an increasingly losing conflict, and further alienating neutral countries like India.
One good paragraph from Jake Sullivan’s Foreign Affairs cover piece:
We should also remember that not everything competitors do is incompatible with U.S. interests. The deal that China brokered this year between Iran and Saudi Arabia partially reduced tensions between those two countries, a development that the United States also wants to see. Washington could not have tried to broker that deal, given the lack of U.S. diplomatic relations with Iran, and it should not try to undermine it.
As Ray Dalio has suggested, an armistice in Ukraine should be jointly brokered by the U.S. and China.
II) Figure out a creative solution in the Middle East that achieves:
a) Israel’s security ensured (which might involve precision taking out of Hamas)
b) A better life for the Palestinian people
c) A stop on Iran’s ability to acquire nukes.
I don’t pretend that this is easy. And I don’t purport to know exactly how to do it. But it’s a more sensible set of objectives than ‘destroy Hamas’ – without considering second-order consequences.
Starting a war against Iran would surely be a recipe for disaster. Jake Sullivan has (perhaps rightly in way of deterrence) not ruled it out:
We are committed to ensuring that Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon. And while military force must never be a tool of first resort, we stand ready and prepared to use it when necessary to protect U.S. personnel and interests in this important region.
III) A more creative solution for China and Taiwan – that at least assuredly defers this problem so it doesn’t go hot and compound conflicts in the next six months. Could this be achieved with some loosening of sanctions on chips?
IV) North Korea – keep an eye on.
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