Asia & the Pacific

Joseph Nye analyzes Trump's misguided approach to China  and concludes that it could lead the United States to discard its aces of alliances and global institutions or to severely restrict immigration. He advises that since the United States cannot solve problems like pandemics and climate change alone, Americans and its leaders must learn to distinguish power with others from power over others.

Joseph Nye advises skepticism toward claims that the pandemic changes everything. China won't benefit, and the United States will remain preeminent.

Joseph Nye writes that Trump's strategy of great power competition and trade wars is inadequate because the information revolution and globalization are changing world politics. Even if the United States prevails over China as a military power,  the country cannot protect its security by acting alone.

It seems unlikely that Russia will again possess the resources to balance U.S. power in the same way that the Soviet Union did during the four decades after World War II. But declining powers merit as much diplomatic attention as rising ones do. Joseph S. Nye worries that the United States lacks a strategy to prevent Russia from becoming an international spoiler.

Stephen Walt elaborates on five important lessons from the Cold War,  which should be guiding contemporary U.S. foreign policy. He also explains how President Donald Trump has been ignoring or violating every one of them.