Current History - First Newsletter
Let's do this thing
A Prelude
Hi everyone, thanks for your support by subscribing. This is my first go-round with a newsletter and excited to see how this goes!
As many of you know, I love history and policy, but have a professional background in engineering. Due to life circumstances (a long story that I will talk about in a future newsletter), I’ve moved on to a path where I can talk about the things I love to talk about while providing interesting perspectives and analysis that some might find helpful.
Life is a continuously evolving journey, and the only sustainable way to navigate it is to learn to enjoy the process. This is our reality. Some view this as intolerable, some love the constant state of flux, and still others just make do. Either way, we’re all in this together.
And that brings me to history and foreign policy. History is that same evolving process observed over much longer timescales, and foreign policy is the application of those observations at greater scale: nations and peoples. It is life seen at grander scale, and I think that is what drives me to it.
Trouble on the Horizon
We appear to be on the verge of living in interesting times. Russia has substantially increased its bombing of Ukraine in recent weeks. American aid has dried up for 6 months, and the Russians appear to be on the counterattack. Ukraine now is resorting to using makeshift drones in a campaign of asymmetrical warfare, attacking Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and its refinery infrastructure.
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-sea-drones-explosives-1b0974b77e32d6b5e9409ba3451716c6
The United States, unfortunately, is taking a backseat. Not only has Speaker of the House Mike Johnson stopped aid to Ukraine, but the Biden Administration appears determined to tie Ukrainian hands more.
They insist on Ukraine not launching direct attacks on Russian refineries to prevent escalation (and to preempt a gas price increase going into 2024). Of course, Ukraine is facing an existential crisis AND America is not helping anyway. Why would they listen to us?
Europe is starting to take a similar course. France has been taking the lead, pledging to send all future military exports to Ukraine, and French president Emmanuel Macron has been rallying a coalition to increase European defense capacity. Macron has adopted a policy of strategic ambiguity with respect to Russia, refusing to even rule out French troops on Ukrainian soil.
Some America-firsters are about to get a rude awakening about an isolationist policy. The United States has essentially lost all leverage in controlling the outcome of the Ukraine war and restraining Russia and the rest of Europe, while we still have an obligation to defend the NATO members in Europe. This war won’t end if America packs up and leaves; it will likely get substantially worse.
Where is This Heading?
Stepping back and taking a look at the big picture, I think we are seeing an emerging coalition of authoritarian states attempting to overturn the existing American-led international system and replace it with one that is in their favor.
This coalition now includes Russia, Iran, North Korea, and China. Iran and North Korea are currently Russia’s main military suppliers, and China is providing a valuable economic lifeline, including markets for oil.
Israel, ostensibly an American ally, is fighting a proxy war against Iran via Hamas. The Houthis are also an Iranian proxy, and they have successfully choked off a major trade route for Europe, the Red Sea. And China still maintains its claim to Taiwan.
Maybe things will settle down soon, but I think that will require defeating the Russians in Ukraine and ending Iran’s use of terrorist proxies. Otherwise, the authoritarian coalition will feel emboldened and we might be dealing with something much worse.
What does this mean for 2024?
The matchup has been decided, and unless you have completely ignored politics somehow for the last 8 years, the issues at play are known quantities. Biden is old and past his prime yet has still managed to pull off a productive presidency with an economy on the upswing but otherwise a mixed record. Trump is old and past his prime and wants to appoint an army of sycophants that will use him as a blunt instrument to implement right-wing policies.
A Dem trifecta controlling the House, Senate, and presidency could reverse some of the damage being done by the America-firsters and their insistence on serving up Ukraine to the Russians on a platter. In any other scenario, we probably see the status quo continue, which is the declining strategic significance of the United States.
Personally, I think the former scenario is increasingly more likely. Polling is trending the presidents way, and the results of elections since Roe was overturned indicate polls are oversampling Republicans. If a significant chunk of the GOP does not turn out to vote for Trump, it’s a landslide for Biden.
Let’s Talk About History
I’m working on a research essay about the Texas frontier during the Civil War, and how the Comanche and the frontier settlers fought over land for nearly a century. I’ve written a piece previously about this topic and it’s personally very interesting to me. My 3x great-grandfather was one of the original settlers of Coleman County, TX and was among those who fought the Comanche.
For Your Reading Pleasure
In the future, this section will feature a pretty long list of interesting pieces I ran across each week. For now, here are two nerdy foreign policy and history pieces.
It's Not Too Late for Restrained U.S. Foreign Policy: Stephen M. Walt
We All Fall Down: The Dismantling of the Warsaw Pact and the End of the Cold War in Eastern Europe: International Security
That’s it! Stay tuned for more. This Sunday update will remain free for the foreseeable future. In the meantime, if you find this content valuable, please consider a paid subscription.