Latest / Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps / What Trump & Xi are Really Up To! with fmr White House Official Tom Wright

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What Trump & Xi are Really Up To! with fmr White House Official Tom Wright · Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

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  Get a Humans! Welcome to the Safe Space for Dangerous Ideas.
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  And it will be a dangerous world, a world ruled by Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, and Donald
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  Trump, a world that no longer relies on the alliances that were carefully built up.
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  Since the end of the Second World War, Donald Trump has just been in Beijing, meeting
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  with Xi Jinping, and today's guest argues that Xi and Trump and Putin have completely
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  remade the world order. Where then does that leave? Medium-sized countries and allies
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  of the United States, in terms of our security, in terms of how we deal with each other,
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  in terms of trade, industrial policy, and all the rest.
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  Tom Wright served in the Biden administration. He was the special assistant to the president
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  and the Senior Director for Strategic Planning at the National Security Council, which basically
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  means that he was right there in the room during the Chinese spy satellite kerfuffle, the
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  invasion of Ukraine by Russia, and the attempts by the United States to try to shore up some
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  of the alliances that Donald Trump had done damage to in his first term.
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  Tom has had a fellowship at Harvard University, at Princeton University. He's a contributing
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  writer to the Atlantic. He's a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a non-resident
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  fellow at the Lowell Institute, and it's the Lowell Institute, which has brought Tom
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  out to Australia. Now, thanks to the Lowell Institute for facilitating this conversation.
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  A big thanks also to everyone who subscribes on the sub-stack, a reminder. It's the way that
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  we keep the lights on. And if you're a free listener, if you subscribe, you get an additional
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  episode each week. You get nothing pay-walled and you will never hear an ad. It was absolutely
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  fascinating sitting down with Tom. We talk about Russia and Ukraine, China and Taiwan,
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  family conductors, submarines, Kamala Harris' campaign, Joe Biden's mental health, and
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  why you should not buy a Chinese car. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. The one
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  the only, Tom Wright.
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  From the summer of 2023 through to the end of the administration, this is the moment
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  at which you start getting op-eds in the New York Times about Biden should Biden run
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  again and comes clear that Tom is going to be the nominee on the Republican side. What
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  was your sense of President Biden's kind of acuity during that period where everyone
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  was bringing their hands?
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  Yeah. I mean, you know, my views on that are a little complicated and that I think he
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  is able to do the job. What I saw was that he had strong opinions on the policy that
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  he would obviously weigh in on that, whether that is on Israel-Gaza, obviously one of the
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  most controversial, I think, very much reflected his desire to try to put some of the myths
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  in Israel, but he did not want to condition aid to them. I think that was deeply felt. By
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  him, obviously most people disagree with that, but I think in a way that almost reflects
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  yes that he was in charge and involved, because it's recognizably his policy. I think the
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  same thing on Ukraine, where he was strongly supportive of sending assistance to Ukraine,
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  but did our reservations about the long-range missiles and the like and again that very
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  much reflected his position. So I think he was not just cognitively on it and aware
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  and engaged, but I think he was sort of shaping the policy. Having said that, I think that
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  it was also clear that I think he wouldn't be able to do formal years. He was going to
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  be 82 years old going into a second term. I think he was slowing down in the sense of
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  just as anyone, what sort of in the ratings in terms of the calendar and being able to
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  do that in a sustained way over time, right? I think it's very challenging. So my personal
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  view, not that I had any wrote in it whatsoever, was that of course he shouldn't have run for
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  a second term. I think he should have after the midterms basically said, I've done my
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  part. I beat Donald Trump. I've had a successful term in that passing it off to the next generation.
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  We'll have an open primary. We'll see what happens. Had Democrats lost in that case. I don't
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  think anybody would blame him. He said he did the right thing. He won the election. The first
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  time round, obviously he couldn't run again. So he passed it. I think the fact that he didn't do
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  that, I'm so committed, was a reflection just that politicians in that position, all I think
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  they should just stay on. But B, I think it was very unfortunate, because I think it led then
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  later on to debate and then he sort of clung on after that. We are still in the administration.
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  Yeah, obviously. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What do you remember watching it? Yeah. I mean, it was
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  shocking, obviously. I don't think any of us had seen anything like that. I was at home watching
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  it. I thought after that, I thought, obviously, he should have stepped down and met you. But we're
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  all in a very awkward position because we're not in the political side. We've no involvement in
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  that whatsoever. We work for him and you're rooting for him to best job possible.
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  And to succeed on the other hand, I think it was sort of clear at that point. There's,
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  you know, it wasn't, there would need to be a change. And I think it was, you know, I also think
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  it was just to me like the idea that someone could in their sort of mid 80s be president of the
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  United States, you know, like from 82 to 86. I just think that that's not really possible,
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  you know, just given the nature of the job. And so, and were you, do were you and other
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  staff is talking about it? I mean, was there an extent to which there was a general sense of
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  worry or frustration over the winter of I mean, I think people would chat about it just in private,
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  you know, about Willy run again or like he is running again, will, you know, how how's the
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  election going to go? And then how is he going to do in the debate? Or, you know, I think of course,
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  you know, but, but, but in a way that had no, sorry, I had no material effect and anything,
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  because it's just like our job is something else entirely. So, it's more sort of water
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  building a whole bunch of things that you don't want to get destroyed. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  And I think, I think, you know, I think Harris ran a very good campaign. I think,
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  in some ways, you know, I think she surprised people to some extent by how strong the
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  campaign started out, but, you know, obviously, you know, she didn't sort of, it wasn't enough,
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  right? And I think get into all the different reasons for that. I think part of, you know,
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  part of it to me was if we had an open primary, you know, you could have people who could be
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  offering a vision that sort of was different to President Biden's, right? And would sort of suggest
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  that there was sort of change in office that Trump wasn't the only change candidate. I think
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  you know, good to have that option. And then maybe Harris would have won that primary,
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  that might have left her in a stronger position afterwards, but that wasn't all the C-Pod
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  happened. And it probably wasn't enough time, ultimately, to do that, given how late it was
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  when he dropped out. And she couldn't differentiate herself from the administration. Yeah,
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  enough, obviously, because you want to be this loyal either. Yeah, yeah, I think it's hard,
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  you know, because I think she was loyal to him, you know, and he was loyal to her. And I think it's
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  you know, it's difficult. I think fans might find this too, you know, it's difficult when you're
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  trying to run from vice president. I don't think that's what people are. Personally, who I will try.
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  Yeah, yeah, yeah, I can't see it. And if he is, then I think they'll lose. That's by the
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  by your expertise is elsewhere. So now we have this new, you know, not new, but new administration
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  in the form of Trump, trying to stitch together this alternative worldview about the way that
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  big powers should interact. And as we mentioned at the start, being much more sympathetic to the
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  kind of attitude towards global politics that Xi and Putin exemplify rather than countries like
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  the UK and European countries in Australia, what should we understand about the transition
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  out of the post war order that is being ushered in by the US's new sympathy for the way that
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  China and Russia say the world in terms of where we're headed. Yes. I mean, what are we going into
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  and how destabilized is the is what we have all grown up? Yeah. Yeah. I think, so I think the
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  international order as we've known it has been effectively unraveled, you know, and I think it's
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  been unraveled by three people by Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in different ways.
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  I think Xi is the trade bit we spoke about earlier. And the way we must have broke, I think the
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  trading system internationally, Putin, it's the full scale invasion of Ukraine and really the
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  re-emergence of major war in Europe with the view to annexing additional territory. And I think
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  with Donald Trump, it's really seeing allies more as problems and targets to be exploited,
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  right, rather than true partners. And I think those have all sort of undermined key
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  restraints that were vital part of the post war order. And I think what we are trying to understand
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  is what does this unraveling look like and where does it go? And we don't really know. But
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  I would just say a few things. One, I think in many ways, the conditions that we see around the
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  world are consistent with sort of a pre-war environment, right? So that's not to say that
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  major war is inevitable. I don't think it is. But I think if it happened, future historians would
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  not be puzzled about why it happened. They wouldn't be like, boy, that came out of nowhere.
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  Everything was so great. And then all of a sudden it just all fell apart, right? They would have
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  lots of things to point to to say that the old system had broken down. There's this technological
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  revolution that was created deep uncertainty about the balance of power. You know, you'd arms
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  racist and arms built up around the world. You had lots of, not minor, lots of mid-level conflicts
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  break out that were sort of indirect between the major powers. So, you know, China's back in Russia
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  and Ukraine, you know, the US is back in Ukraine, like we've seen China work with Iran,
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  Russia work with Iran, and this war in the Middle East. So they'd point to what of that. And then
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  I think they would point to the fact that many of the world leaders, you know, are sort of
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  temperamentally and psychologically like a little unstable, quite ambitious. Some of them are
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  pretty old and they believe in this sort of narrowing window of opportunity to accomplish
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  their objectives. I think that drove Putin and Ukraine that may or may not drive she and Taiwan.
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  I think Trump in his own way has legacy issues going on. And so I think those characters are not
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  like unfamiliar from history either. And so I think it's a dangerous moment, you know, and I think
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  we have to try to manage that. I think what Australia and other countries have done about preserving
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  as much of the alliance with the US as possible is really important because one of the most
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  destabilizing things that could happen is to have doubt about what the US would defend
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  and not because that would mean that, you know, other powers might think maybe now is our chance
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  to make a move. So I think it is, you know, pretty risky. I think the other thing is that, you know,
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  we have sort of two Americans now, right? There's sort of an America first America
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  and that's sceptical of alliances, pro tariffs and favor sort of assertive unilateral
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  action. And there's a more internationalist America is more committed on competition with China,
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  committed to alliances, you know, has this different approach to the global economy, but it's a bit
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  more positive some like working with others. And I think for the rest of the world, the challenge is
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  to deal with both of those because if you look at all US elections in 1944, Republicans are currently
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  in their 42nd year and the White House and Democrats have had 40, right? So basically spits
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  down the middle. And so we're likely to see that fluctuation continue and so how countries
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  sort of deal with that, I think, is one of the, you know, great challenges of the next decade.
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