The danger zone between two presidents
The world’s bad actors will relish any power vacuum
JUST HOURS after polling stations closed in California on November 5th, a Minuteman III missile thundered out of the Vandenberg military base on the Pacific coast. Half an hour later and 4,200 miles away, three mock warheads struck Kwajalein atoll in the Marshall Islands. The timing of the test—announced to both Russia and China—was probably no coincidence: America was sending a message. Whoever was elected, its armed forces were ready to respond to any threat.
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This article appeared in the International section of the print edition under the headline “Lost in transition”
From the November 16th 2024 edition
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America’s self-isolating president
No, Donald Trump’s Putin-wooing is not like Nixon going to China
Can Europe confront Vladimir Putin’s Russia on its own?
An independent army, air force and nuclear bomb would come at a high price
Australia prepares for a lonelier, harsher world
The country has long relied on America for security and China for its prosperity. Those two pillars are wobbling
Will it be Ukraine today, Taiwan tomorrow?
How Donald Trump’s about-turn in Europe will affect Asia
Donald Trump is junking the transatlantic alliance
Europe has been left scrambling after an attack on the partnership that kept the peace for nearly 80 years
China’s stunning new campaign to turn the world against Taiwan
Seventy countries have recently backed “all Chinese efforts” to take the island