Diplomacy and International Politics

Foreign Affairs has recently published a number of articles on how the United States should engage with the Taliban government in Afghanistan, extremist forces within the regime, how the West can help ordinary Afghans, and the fate of the country’s women. To complement these essays, Foreign Affairs asked a broad pool of experts for their take. As with previous surveys, Foreign Affairs approached dozens of authorities with expertise relevant to the question at hand, along with leading generalists in the field. Participants were asked to state whether they agreed or disagreed with a proposition and to rate their confidence level in their opinion. Two Belfer Center experts participated, International Security Executive Editor Jacqueline L. Hazelton and Future of Diplomacy Project Senior Fellow Paula Dobriansky.

The following is an event write-up about the recent Future of Diplomacy Project (FDP) seminar on “The Geopolitics of Latin America amid the War in Ukraine and China-U.S. Tensions” moderated by Negah Angha, Fellow at the Institute of Politics, on March 29, 2023.

Most public discussion this winter reflects a conviction that Ukraine must — and can — win a decisive victory. But what constitutes a win against a country such as Russia? As we consider the road ahead, we cannot escape the brute fact that Putin commands an arsenal of roughly 6,000 nuclear weapons that could kill us all.

On April 6, 2022,  the Belfer Center's Future of Diplomacy Project and Indo-Pacific Security Project as well as the Center for Public Leadership hosted a hybrid seminar with Ambassador Shivshankar Menon, former National Security Advisor of India and former Foreign Secretary in India’s Ministry of External Affairs, and Ambassador Richard Verma, former U.S. Ambassador to India and Belfer Center Senior Fellow, on India’s foreign policy and U.S.-India relations in a changing world order. The discussion explored why India abstained from recent U.N. votes deploring Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, what that means for U.S.-India relations, both bilateral and through the Quad, and how the war in Ukraine will affect geopolitics in Eurasia and the Indo-Pacific. Gopal Nadadur, MPA/ID candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School moderated this conversation.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is warning the West. In his State of the Union address, he announced that he would react swiftly and harshly if provoked by other countries. Relations between Russia, the US, and the EU are strained, and there are several points of contention: the conflict in Eastern Ukraine and Putin's actions against his imprisoned critic, Alexei Navalny. 

How can the so-called East-West conflict be defused? What hope is there for normalization of the US-Russia relationship under President Joe Biden? [translated from German; interview in German]

The United States has enjoyed decades-long military treaty alliances with Japan and Australia. The fact that India has joined to form the Quad, not as a formal ally but major strategic partner, is advantageous for Washington and its strategy to limit China’s military push for power in the region. The time has come for the U.S. and India to think more ambitiously about the future strategic partnership between the world’s two most important democracies. 

Few nations elicit such fatalism among American policymakers and analysts as Vladimir Putin’s Russia. For some, the country is an irredeemable pariah state, responsive only to harsh punishment and containment. Others see a wronged and resurgent great power that deserves more accommodation. Perspectives vary by the day, the issue, and the political party. Across the board, however, resignation has set in about the state of U.S.-Russian relations, and Americans have lost confidence in their own ability to change the game.

The evolving strategic dynamics in the Indo-Pacific are of paramount importance for the future of the rules-based international order. While the United States is redirecting strategic focus to the region as part of its Free and Open Indo-Pacific strategy, Europe is also stepping up its role—leveraging a strong economic profile, long-standing bilateral ties, and active engagement in various regional multilateral forums. The European Union (EU) and its member states can make distinct contributions to an open, transparent, inclusive, and rules-based regional order, though not necessarily always in lockstep with Washington.

Nick Burns, former U.S. Ambassador to NATO during the Bush administration, joins Chris Jansing after President Trump announced the possibility that he could attend May Day celebrations in Russia next year to mark the 75th anniversary of World War II. Burns tells Chris that it's "something the President has to consider," noting that "we were allied with the Soviets to defeat Hitler."

Former U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered his take on global leaders and hotspots, from Iran and Saudi Arabia to North Korea and Syria. He was joined by Professor Nicholas Burns, Professor James Sebenius and Professor Robert Mnookin.