The Strategy Sessions is a limited-run podcast hosted by Emma Ashford, a senior fellow with the Reimagining US Grand Strategy Program at the Stimson Center. Today, Emma talks with Sumantra Maitra, a senior writer and director of research at the American Conservative Magazine. They discuss what the future of burden sharing looks like for Europeans, what might be in store for American alliances writ-large, and how the United States should view its interests in Europe. Emma and Sumantra’s discussion is part of the New Visions for Grand Strategy Project, a collection of essays, videos, and podcasts in which out-of-the box thinkers discuss the future of U.S. foreign policy. *The Strategy Sessions Podcast is hosted by the Stimson Center and produced by University FM.
The Strategy Sessions is a limited-run podcast hosted by Emma Ashford, a senior fellow with the Reimagining US Grand Strategy Program at the Stimson Center. Today, Emma talks with Sumantra Maitra, a senior writer and director of research at the American Conservative Magazine. They discuss what the future of burden sharing looks like for Europeans, what might be in store for American alliances writ-large, and how the United States should view its interests in Europe.
Emma and Sumantra’s discussion is part of the New Visions for Grand Strategy Project, a collection of essays, videos, and podcasts in which out-of-the box thinkers discuss the future of U.S. foreign policy.
*The Strategy Sessions Podcast is hosted by the Stimson Center and produced by University FM.
(Transcripts may contain a few typographical errors due to audio quality during the podcast recording.)
[00:00:00] Emma Ashford: The 2020s are likely to be a pivotal decade in determining the future of America’s role in the world. Global dynamics are changing. The era of unchallenged U.S. global dominance is ending. And China and other states are rising. At home, the United States is also going through a period of transition and change in foreign policy — from bipartisan consensus, to debate and division. The only thing certain is that change in U.S. foreign policy is inevitable.
In these discussions, our guests engage with some of the most challenging questions facing U.S. policymakers, bring distinct perspectives to bear on these questions, and offer their own vision for the future of U.S. grand strategy. These are the strategy sessions.
Hello, I'm Emma Ashford. I'm a senior fellow in the Reimagining US Grand Strategy Program at the Stimson Center. Welcome to The Strategy Sessions, a series of discussions with forward-looking out-of-the-box thinkers about the future of U.S. foreign policy and brand strategy. Joining me today is Sumantra Maitra, who's a senior writer and director of research at the American Conservative Magazine.
Welcome!
[00:01:18] Sumantra Maitra: Thank you very much.
[00:01:20] Emma Ashford: So, you've done a lot of writing and thinking about U.S. foreign policy. Your essay for this series is specifically on the future of the transatlantic relationship, U.S.-European relations. But I want to start out a little more generally. We've asked all of our authors to talk a little bit about how they see the emerging world or world order. Some people say it's multipolar, bipolar. Others talk about, you know, is it similar to the Cold War? Is it similar to other previous eras? And I'm curious how you think about it.
[00:01:53] Sumantra Maitra: Yeah, I think the world order that we are currently heading on towards is a lopsided or, as you coined, an unbalanced multipolarity. I think there are quite a few polar powers, even though they are not in the exact same amount of, you know, relative power gap in between them.
Bipolarity is usually considered to be the most balanced system, but it's also one that is very difficult to achieve and, often, is like a historical accident. We had a Cold War, mostly, even though there were other powers. But relatively, other power poles, Soviet Union and the United States were the two strongest ones, and they had an enormous amount of influence to influence the people in the countries that gravitated towards them.
That is not the case anymore. I think the historical example that one might think of that we are probably heading into is an order where the United States is similar, or at least not dissimilar, to the British Empire immediately after the Napoleonic War where there were lots of great powers in Europe and they had their colonial possessions, but mostly, there was a primary center power, in a way, where one power had a little bit of extra power to influence the other powers around, as an offshore balancer. I think that is the kind of system that we are heading into.
[00:03:10] Emma Ashford: Yeah. And that's a really good example, actually, because again, Britain, in its historic relations with the European continent, is not dissimilar from the way the United States stands apart. Now, the U.S. is a continent. Britain was an island. But that slight room for maneuver that that space gives you, you can see the parallel there pretty strongly.
[00:03:29] Sumantra Maitra: Right. I think, as Canning, I think it was who mentioned, that, you know, Europe's domains end at the Atlantic and Britain begins from there, because in order to perpetuate that system, you need to have, like, a relative balance of power in Europe, but you’d also need to interfere. Like, he had this sentence which he used, that God for us all, balance of power, no European police system. And you are interested in treaties, but you have to be cautious in giving them to other countries.
So, I think that is a pretty good balancing strategy for a country, which seems to look at itself as a little bit different than the others. There are, obviously, differences between the British Empire and the United States. Most importantly, one is an actual empire, and the other is a republic which acts as an empire. So, the different governing systems influence the behavior of two powers. But mostly, if you are a maritime great power, which is bigger and more powerful than all the other powers around the globe and you have an interest in various parts of the globe, you might want to act as an offshore balancer. And that is the guiding strategy that one would imagine the United States would follow.
[00:04:32] Emma Ashford: Yeah. So, that was actually going to be my next question, is, what role do you see for the United States to play in this world order? And I mean, I think, again, you've laid it out there pretty clearly — being more offshore, more flexible, more able to pivot to different areas. But you also mentioned maritime, right? Because I think, for those who've studied British grand strategy, the maritime angle is very obvious, right?
[00:04:57] Sumantra Maitra: Yeah.
[00:04:57] Emma Ashford: The U.S. has not necessarily prioritized the maritime angle in recent years. Do you think that's something we should be focusing on more?
[00:05:03] Sumantra Maitra: Yeah. In recent years is the key, in that statement, the U.S. was, and throughout its history, prided itself to be a maritime power. And if you read the literature from the 1890s to even around the 1940s, that was the primary guiding principle of the United States. Like, we built a huge navy, we're going to take over British possessions in the Middle East.
I think unipolarity in the last 25 years was like a hard drug. You know, you get to act and do stuff that you don't get to see the results immediately. And in 25 years’ time, you see how your relative powers declined, because you've taken some of the burdens that you are not supposed to take. But also, unipolarity, again, its hegemony in history, as Kenneth Waltz wrote, was unsustainable by its very design. On one hand, you are taking a lot of burden which you're not supposed to take. On the other hand, the other powers, which are your rival powers, are getting that time to build up their own strength.
So, unipolarity is now gone. That is a historic fact, whether we want it or not, whether we like it or not. But some of those unipolar instincts are still there. In Washington, D.C., we have three generations of people who are working in the capitol, for example. They grew up. They have studied the exact same things of, you know, democratic peace in the universities. That's all they believe in. You know, they've been trained in their internships to believe in those kinds of stuff.
So, it's going to take a little bit of time to readjust in a new order. But fundamentally, a nation’s strategic interests and threats are decided by power balance and power dynamics in the globe. And the United States has realized that there are rising powers in the East, for example, in China. There are revanchist powers in Europe like Russia. There are even trade rivals in the European Union. So, there are other poles which are opposed, if not adversarial, but at least nominally opposed to the United States. And in order to do that, the U.S. needs to prioritize its theaters, its interests. And offshore balancing is a classic grand strategy that would fit purposely.
[00:06:57] Emma Ashford: It's, kind of, funny in this context to think about the debates in the 2000s that are focusing on soft balancing. And this was scholars trying to be like, “Well, why are people balancing U.S. power in unipolarity?” And I think the answer at the end of the day was time, right?
[00:07:10] Sumantra Maitra: Right.
[00:07:10] Emma Ashford: It's that it took longer. But the way you're describing it there, you're basically talking about powers, not just China and Russia, but maybe the European Union, other powers that you would see as starting to chart a more independent course in this world.
[00:07:24] Sumantra Maitra: Yes. Yeah.
[00:07:24] Emma Ashford: I mean, who are the most important actors? Is it just those three? Are there others you would throw in there?
[00:07:30] Sumantra Maitra: I mean, there are lots of important actors, but in pecking order, it would clearly be China, which is the rival of the United States. Chinese manpower and production capacity is more than the combined manpower and production capacity of European Union, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, UK, all of them combined. Their GDP is almost 74%, currently, of the U.S. GDP. And their force structure is concentrated in their own region, which is an advantage in these kinds of situations. Like, when we talk about fleet carriers going all around the globe, the Chinese fleet carriers are concentrated in the Asia Pacific. So, that itself makes a lot of difference.
So, China is clearly the peer rival in this situation. Of all the peer rivals that the U.S. has faced in history, from the Spanish Empire to Nazi, Imperial Germany, Japan, Soviet Union, China is the far, far bigger one, compared to the previous ones in all the previous times.
Second, I'd imagine Russia. Russia is not a great power, technically, in the classic sense of the term, but it is a very strange sort of power where they don't really have much capacity of hegemony in Europe but they have enough capacity to wreak havoc in their own region. And given that they have got 6,000 nuclear warheads that clearly creates a difficult kind of situation. But that being said, the U.S. doesn't really face any direct challenge from Russian hegemony in Europe, but Europeans do. And some of the European states are treaty allies of the United States. So, there's a risk of the U.S. being pulled in there.
A far bigger challenge to the United States is, kind of a vicarious empire, which is the European Union. The European Union, traditionally, is not a great power. You talk to any European Union member states, they're all weaker than the United States. But given that it's an institution, partly because of Pax Americana, they are a trade rival. They are trying to create carve outs for their industries. They are, for example, fining American companies based on their free speech rights and all that kind of stuff. And that's creating a system. I mean, there are some politicians in the European Union who tend to think and normalize the idea that the European Union could be an empire in the future, you know, one flag and one army. I don't really see it that way. I don't see that that's the direction they're going to go, purely because if the United States moves away, what might happen is the European Union might collapse because of its internal contradictions. But nevertheless, as we currently stand, it is a trade rival. So, that's a big power center.
And then we have minor powers like Japan and India and Germany. They are extremely important economic powers, which means, if they so choose, they can transform their economic power to military power. That doesn't mean that they're doing it right now, but there is a possibility. And then there are very much regional powers like Turkey and Israel. Some of them are allies. Some of them are treaty allies. Some of them are technically protectorates, but they are powerful enough to, if not destabilize, but at least influence American foreign policy.
[00:10:21] Emma Ashford: Well, you know, this is actually a great segue into the broader topic that I wanted to talk to you about, which is, U.S. alliances. And so, I want to know how you think about the ways in which the U.S. relates to these other powers. Right? Because you've just described the European Union as something that doesn't sound entirely friendly to the United States or entirely benign down the road. But it's often cited as one of the major achievements of U.S. alliance policies, that we gave the European Union space to grow in the post-war period. You know, I'd be interested to know your broad thoughts on U.S. alliances first, and then we can dig into the Europe question a little more.
[00:11:01] Sumantra Maitra: Again, if you're a realist, you don't really believe in permanent alliances. Historically, there is no such thing as permanent alliances and you try and avoid any kind of permanent adversarial relationship with any power or any kind of permanent friendship with any power, just because your interests change over time. Time and geography are two important variables when it comes to grand strategy.
That being said, I think that the difference between the United States and the British Empire in the European continent is, first of all, the United States is a republic, as we mentioned, nominally. But given that it's a republic, it has things like public emotions and public passions and democracy to think about, which the British Empire didn’t really have a problem with in the 1890s, for example. The decision-making process was far more streamlined in the United Kingdom compared to the United States.
Second, the United Kingdom actually maintained a balance of power in Europe by frankly interfering on the side of the weaker power, but otherwise, not really, doing anything in Europe. Like, it doesn't really matter how the Europeans are leading their own countries. We don't really care. But if there is a hegemonic threat, we are going to go inside with the weaker power just to balance it off.
That's a pretty good strategy and that worked pretty well up until the moment that it stopped working. And then what happened is the United States tried to achieve a balance of power in Europe, but instead of a classic balance of power, it tried to institutionalize the peace. Now, institutionalizing the peace, theoretically, had its merits. You have this one institution which creates this supranational organization for a forum for debate and all that kind of stuff.
But what happened in reality is, given that, at the end of the day, Europe is a disjointed mass of various different countries, each of those countries have got their different interests. Because of the institutionalization of peace in the European continent, the Western European powers, which were traditional balancers in European peace, like Germany and France and the United Kingdom, they realized that they don't really have to spend that much amount of money or cash or their social capital to balance in Europe. Eastern European powers, on the other hand, saw it the exact opposite way. They never really trusted the Western powers because the Western powers caused a lot of warfare in the continent. But they also thought that the United States is the ultimate guarantor of their peace. If you see, like, the national security strategies of Estonia and Latvia and, you know, the Baltic states and Poland, every single one of them mentions that one of the first things that they need to do is ensure that the U.S. remains in the European continent.
So, we created this situation where there is this gigantic institution in the European continent, which is a trade rival to us, which has a different set of values and interests to us in some ways. I mean, most of the Europeans, at least in Eastern Europe, don't really care about free speech that much as the Americans do. For example, they would pay lip service to that. But on the other hand, the actual material reality didn't change in the continent, which means the Western powers essentially buck-passed their security of the continent of the United States and the Eastern Powers risked chain-ganging the United States to their own ethnic rivalries.
So, I don't think that the institutionalization actually worked well when it comes to an alliance system. I think a much better option would've been to, for example, encourage a genuine negative balance in the continent where every single country balances each other, but they're all allied to the United States very nominally, unless there is a hegemonic threat where we go and help them. But that is clearly not where we are now. Hopefully, it's going to be reversed. But we're going to see.
[00:14:32] Emma Ashford: Yeah. I mean, it strikes me that that is the biggest problem with what you're suggesting, right? That's a problem that I've talked about, others talked about as well, is getting from here to there when we're in an era where now admittedly in the Trump administration, alliances do seem to be viewed a little more transactionally. But, you know, just six months ago we had Joe Biden talking about alliances as a sacred obligation, right? And I think the notion that alliances are an end in and of themselves is perhaps quite a widespread belief in Washington. Do you think it's possible to shift from that very institutionalized, socialized, alliance structure, you know, transatlantic relationship, right, to something that is more U.S.-European relations?
[00:15:20] Sumantra Maitra: Right. Yeah. I mean I do think there's a good way of doing it. You have to essentially deinstitutionalize the continent, in a way. It's going to take time, but it's not something that's unheard of. You stop funding some of the things that's there, like USAID. You stop focusing on some of the stuff that they do when it comes to social security and all that kind of stuff in the European continent. I didn't really like the way we told the Europeans that free speech is like a be-all and end-all. I don't really think that that needs to be done when it comes to having a good alliance. But technically, we don't even follow that rule. I mean, Saudi Arabia doesn't really have free speech and they're our allies. So, I don't think that we need to lecture the Europeans. I don't think the Europeans need to lecture the Americans, because that also looks very sanctimonious.
I think the best way to do it is to encourage individual European states, which were the bigger states and with whom we already have good tech transfer or intelligence sharing and all that kind of stuff to encourage them to take more burden. I think one of the things that the Trump administration has tried to do, I don't know if that's going to be long term, but it's a good thing, is essentially sidelining the European Union from questions of shared burden in the European continent.
Now, what this current administration's aim is to encourage the Europeans to spend a certain amount of money for their own defense. It has got plus and minus. On one hand, yes, if you have Germany spending 5% on their defense, that's around $280 billion. It's dwarfing everyone else other than the U.S. and China. Naturally, if a country spends that much amount of money, they would have more voice and they would take more burden. It's natural inertia and momentum.
On the other hand, I just simply don't think that telling European countries to spend 5% is the end game or should be the end game of the United States. I don't think raw numbers of defense budget matters that much. It doesn't really matter how much. If Estonia pays 10%, it doesn't really help the Americans anyway, because in raw terms it's not really much. But I think we should encourage the bigger countries, which are allied to the United States, like France and the UK and Germany, to take more burden, divide the European continent in theaters and regions, which where they can take more burden, for example. The German brigades in Lithuania is a good start in that direction. And I think, if I was guiding the U.S. grand strategy, I think I’d tell them to focus on those things more.
[00:17:36] Emma Ashford: So, to play devil's advocate first, right, because I agree with you in at least some of those respects. But I think you could argue that the opposite might be true, right? And that the burden-shifting to Europe creates this paradox for a realist, right? Which is that, perhaps, the unintended consequence of us doing this is that we actually do end up with a Europe that is more united, more streamlined where the European Union does play a significant role, right? Because I think they are playing a major role on the financing side. And so, are we unintentionally creating some future competitor for ourselves here?
[00:18:18] Sumantra Maitra: Yeah, I have heard that thing. I don't buy the idea that the European Union, absent the United States, would be a consolidated unitary actor which would be a rival. I think it misunderstands how the European Union was or has been an actor. Part of the reason is Europe's interests are not similar. You know, they have different interests in different countries. You'll see that coming out when it comes to budgeting, when it comes to their defense budgets, when it comes to migration, when it comes to LGBT rights. And there are various other things.
Part of the reason why the European Union has been, you know, they find themselves in every forum and, you know, every table and have a G7 meeting and there's the European Union person standing there, which doesn't make any sense whatsoever, but nevertheless, is because the United States is there. I mean, absent the United States, the two directions that Europe can go is one consolidation and the other disintegration. I tend to believe that it's going to be the latter one. The trends and the directions of Europe are all in that direction. I don't think there is… the centrifugal forces within the European continent are far, far bigger. And historically, Europe was only united by force. You know, there hasn't been a situation where Europe was united, no matter how small or how much, for a shorter period of time without force, from the Romans to Charlemagne, you know, Napoleon, Hitler, to the post-Cold War United States, putting NATO in pretty much the entirety of Europe.
The question of any hegemony is what happens when push comes to shove. Like, who is going to take the charge, you know? At this point of time, currently, as we see in the European continent, there is no single individual power, which has got the amount of relative power that would be required to provide the security and deterrence of the entire continent. What might happen if the U.S. completely retrenches? Again, I don't think that's happening. I don't think that's going to happen anytime in my lifetime. But if, all else being equal, the U.S. moves out of the continent totally, there will be a clash. The greater chance of a political dynamic in Europe would be more of an internal bloodbath compared to a consolidation of an empire. And even if there is a consolidation of an empire, even if there is a European Union, what happens when you have a hegemonic consolidation, according to realist theory, you'll have balancing powers around. The United Kingdom already moved out of the European Union. Will they tolerate a European Union, which is a massive superpower? Will Russians tolerate that? Are eastern European countries going to accept German hegemony over Europe? I don't think that's happening. The United States is not going to tolerate that, either. I mean, if that is a situation which is there, we would probably see more efforts from the U.S. government essentially push for countries to break out of the European Union rather than stay inside.
So, I'm not much worried about the European Union being a hegemon. I'm far more concerned about it being a trade rival than an actual military power. But yeah, I don't see the European Union consolidating anytime soon.
[00:21:12] Emma Ashford: So, in your essay you talked about Germany as the linchpin of, sort of, U.S. strategy in Europe. And it's funny, because as you alluded to there, I mean, one of the other theories about how this would play out is the old fear about the European Union that many European states had, that it was just a vehicle for German hegemony through peace instead of through military force. But you are arguing that Germany, really, is very important, that the U.S. should focus in on the German element. Can you talk a little bit about that?
[00:21:43] Sumantra Maitra: Right. So, my strategy, for lack of better word, is quite simple. The United States has got, broadly, three interests in the European continent. One, to stop a rival hegemon in the European continent. Two, to have Europe, which is broadly aligned to the U.S., not completely aligned on every single question of humanity, but broadly aligned when it comes to trade and rivalry with China and all the stuff that we would need Europe on our side for. And three, to essentially stop nuclear proliferation because that has been a grand strategy of the United States for the last 80 years almost now.
In order to do that, Western Europe is the key. And of all the western European powers, Germany is the closest power who could share some of the burden that the United States might pass on. Why do I say that? One, because Germany is the biggest economic power of Europe. It's the biggest power when it comes to manpower. It's broadly, if you talk to Germans, both the elite and the people, they're broadly aligned to American culture, cultural hegemony. They like Hollywood. They might not agree with individual American presidents. And there have been, from Bush to Obama to Trump, there has been issues between Germany and the U.S. But broadly, they are very much aligned to the U.S.cultural hegemony. And most importantly, they are a power, which is a big economic power with an intact manufacturing base.
So, if we have to buck-pass, we need someone to catch the buck. And the only country which is currently there in the European continent, at least the broader European landmass is Germany. If you look a little more detached, it would be Germany and Turkey. But again, the same dynamic applies to both Turkey and Germany. They have an intact manufacturing base. They are countries of 80, 90 million people. These are very real structural variables that you would need for a country to be your ally in that region.
As for the question of German hegemony in the European continent, I don't think the Germans are capable of hegemony. I don't think they have either the intention or the capability of actually aspiring for a complete regional hegemony, because we also tend to forget one of the lessons of the interwar period between the first and the second world war when Germany was actually a hegemon. Part of the hegemony was by the consent of the governed. You know, a lot of countries in the East wanted Germany to be their hegemon, wanted Germany. We don't talk about the Nazis in Ukraine. We don't talk about the Nazis in Estonia. And the Baltic states, for example, they really wanted Germany to be their protector. Austria wanted to join Germany on its own. Those things, those dynamics are not currently present in Europe. And in fact, it's the exact reverse. There are other powers which are extremely opposed to Germany. Poland, for example, is a mid-level power right in the middle of Europe, which is not that powerful enough to be a hegemon, but powerful enough to stop Germany and such. So, I don't really see a military hegemony forming in the European continent.
What I suggest in my paper is to have, sort of a duopoly between the U.S. and Germany. In some ways we share with the Germans, we prop them up like the British prop the Americans in the interwar period with tech transfer when it comes to weapons and stuff. We do the same thing with Germany. We tell them that, “These are the regions you take care of. You don't have to send your navy to the South China Sea. You're not going to make any difference. But rather, you patrol the North Sea.” And, you know, those are the kind of things that we can actually have a good relationship with.
The problem, however, is, both the Germans and the Americans are fixated on some of the cultural issues. And I don't think that's beneficial for either of those two countries, nor is it logical. We constantly talk to the Germans about free speech. They constantly talk to us about Christian nationalism and all that kind of stuff. I get frustrated with both sides, technically, in some ways. Like, we don't really need to lecture the Germans on what they want to have in their social dynamic. They don't want to talk to us. And they have been, kind of, sanctimonious when it comes to the U.S. grand strategy and foreign policy. So, I think avoiding those things would be key, but I think there are the foundations of a good bipolar duopoly between Germany and the United States there.
[00:25:49] Emma Ashford: So, before we conclude, I do want to pull us back out to some broader questions, because I think, again, you've outlined very well in the European context what your vision for U.S. policy would be, but in this project we have folks taking a much broader range of perspectives, and we are asking everybody the same question here. So, if you were to design American foreign policy from scratch and you were to have, let's say, two or three guiding principles, what would you emphasize? You know, what would you emphasize, what would you throw away from what we have right now? I think it's easier usually to throw away than talk about what you would emphasize, but how would you structure that?
[00:26:28] Sumantra Maitra: I think there is a tendency on our side who call ourselves realists to ignore the domestic politics and focus more on the structural dynamics of foreign policy. I think that is a mistake. The fundamental issue with the United States is what we discussed in the very first question, what is the identity of this great power? What kind of power are we currently residing in? Is it an empire? I don't think so. Empires are usually very smart. You know, they understand when it comes to prioritizing their regions. But it has got imperial characteristics. It has got bases all over the country, all over the world. It has got an enormous amount of surplus elites who are coming out. Some people on the right say, like, “Yeah, we need to revert back the United States to a manufacturing power,” who is going to be doing the manufacturing? Your entire higher education system is designed to create bureaucrats. You know, that is something which is, it's like a late Habsburg situation where you have a whole bunch of second-generation kids going to universities who are moderately well-educated, but also they don't have an empire to actually govern and they are being very much radicalized against their own country. This is not a sustainable situation.
So, I think one of the things that I would probably try to do is figure out how to change the higher education system, focus more on trade and manufacturing and all that kind of dynamic, figure out which regions of the world are important for your trade, which regions of the world are important for your manufacturing, what kind of rare minerals you need, what kind of places you need to go, avoid defending protectorates where you don't get anything in return. We don't need anything from Ukraine. We don't need anything in the Middle East, for example. None of those things actually matter to us, and it's draining our resources in some ways. Retrench from Europe a lot. There was already a model of retrenchment from Europe between ‘93 to ‘96, where we cut down on, like, 300,000 troops. It could be done again. I think, understand what the threats are when it comes to China and Russia. But mostly, focus inside. The American system, currently, that we are running now has got an enormous amount of problems when it comes to manufacturing and trade and surplus elites. And I think that is where we should probably start with.
[00:28:33] Emma Ashford: That may be the only place where you and, perhaps, former national security advisor Jake Sullivan agree — foreign policy begins at home.
[00:28:41] Sumantra Maitra: Yes. Absolutely.
[00:28:43] Emma Ashford: Last question, and then we will let you get going. Here at the Reimagining US Grand Strategy Program, we believe in testing assumptions, right? Asking ourselves, what are the commonly held assumptions or common wisdoms about U.S. foreign policy that should be challenged? And so, what is your top assumption or common wisdom about US foreign policy that you think needs to be re-examined?
[00:29:04] Sumantra Maitra: A friend of mine in the UK once told me that the biggest, not a problem, but the biggest characteristic of Americans is they hate to be hated. Sometimes, you have to be hated. So, you can't please everyone in the world. You might want to not please anyone in some ways.
One of the benefits of the 19th century — which your book is fantastic. I want everyone to read the book on multipolarity that you wrote — one of the advantages that they had was they didn't really need to please anyone. Their system of government was very determined to actually focus on national interest. The American system is, they don't want to be, you know, you see President Trump for example, and Ukrainian journalists come and say, “Yeah, my husband is dying.” “Sorry, we're going to send Patriot.” That is not a way of, you know, running foreign policy in this country. If you are... people say that the U.S. is an empire. Well, then, first of all, I don't think the U.S. is an empire, but it certainly has imperial characteristics. And one of the things that you need to do is you should be more confident or comfortable in being hated in parts of the globe where you don't really have an interest. It doesn't really matter to us if the Ukrainians and the Russians both hate us. We've got nothing to do there. So, it's easy for us to retrench that way.
[00:30:16] Emma Ashford: I, kind of, like that, the assumption that foreign policy is being liked is not a good one.
[00:30:20] Sumantra Maitra: Yeah, you can't please anyone.
[00:30:21] Emma Ashford: Yeah. Well, thank you so much. That's all we have time for today, but I really appreciate you coming over, Sumantra, and helping us think through the implications of the trans-Atlantic relationship. And we will see you all next time.
That’s all for this episode of The Strategy Sessions. You can find the full set of episodes, along with the accompanying essays, at stimson.org or by searching for us on your favorite podcast app.
A big thanks to Stimson’s communications team for their assistance with the taping and to University FM for providing audio editing services. I’m Emma Ashford. Thanks for listening!