Hello from Sydney,
Today, rather than the usual Week Signals essay, we are sharing with all our readers a transcript of one of the monthly roundtable discussions we held yesterday.
You will find below a wide-ranging conversation covering our interpretation of the rather heady geopolitical developments of the past month, including:
the US midterm election results and what they mean for American domestic politics and foreign policy;
the geopolitics of the Middle East in view of Israel’s inconclusive elections, fighting between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia, and the latest developments in the Iran war;
Lula’s victory in Brazil’s presidential election, Canada bringing realpolitik back into its national security and foreign policy, Rubio’s eyes on Cuba, and what all that portends for the Western Hemisphere and the future of the “Donroe Doctrine”;
widening protest movements across the Old Continent and the challenges facing European governments and societies that are, in many places, short of cash and long on political polarisation and deadlock; and
Indonesia at a crossroads.
Hope you enjoy.
Damien
Transcript: 6 November Roundtable Discussion
Damien Bruckard: Good morning from both of us on the east coast of Australia. Welcome to a conversation about some pretty tumultuous events in geopolitics over not just the last month, but really the last week, with serious consequences that Michael and I will explore in the first half hour together, then open up for questions. So Michael, welcome.
Michael Feller: Great to be here, as always, on this auspicious day.
Damien Bruckard: Yes, and there have been lots of auspicious days over the last couple of years since we’ve been doing this, but this week feels particularly big.
Just by way of an agenda, what we’ll be covering is, surprise, surprise, the US midterms, what that means for the United States itself, its foreign policy, and therefore the rest of the world. After that, we will do a deep dive on Iran, in light of both the midterms and other events in the region, including the Israeli elections and escalations between the Houthis and the Saudis. We’ll take a look at the Brazilian elections as well, and European protests, most obviously in France, but also in other parts of the world, and how these figure as part of broader Gen Z disaffection. And then we’ll take a look at Indonesia.
So let’s start with the midterms, Michael. A Democratic blue wave, winning both the House and the Senate, in line with polling and your own predictions and Polymarket and most expert commentary, but probably a little bit more comprehensive than some people were expecting. What’s your read on the implications of this for US domestic politics and policy? And then we’ll turn to the foreign policy dimensions.
US midterms and the Trump presidency
Michael Feller: So you’re right, a wave in the House and the Senate. Perhaps what people weren’t expecting was the down-ballot wave that happened as well. And by that I mean flipping governors’ races and so forth. Whilst everyone’s focused on James Talarico winning the Senate seat in Texas, to me just as consequential was the Democratic governor now elected in Texas.
I think that explains most of today’s market crash, or the one that’s just happened overnight in the United States. It’s the sense that a blue Democratic state is not going to be as welcoming to data centres, to companies like Tesla and SpaceX. And really, where do these hyperscalers now go? Where do these data centres go?
It’s now fairly obvious that most Americans hate the pace of the data centre build-out. That’s inviting overdue questions about not only the political sustainability of this business model, but what these data centres are for, whether we even need them all, whether these companies will ever turn a profit, and whether any of it really makes financial sense. That’s the first domestic implication, at least in the very short term.
The second thing people aren’t really thinking about yet is what happens when states like Mississippi and South Carolina flip. A first reaction might be, jeez, this is great for the Democrats. But now they’ve got a real problem on their hands, because how do they keep these states?
There’s a phenomenon in politics that once you’ve got something, you want to hold on to it, even if it’s only going to be there for a short time. I’m reminded of Boris Johnson’s victory and the so-called red wall seats that he picked up in northern England, traditional Labour working-class seats. He spent the next couple of years upending his policies and contorting himself to keep those seats, which were never really Tory seats.
I wonder if the Democrats are going to contort themselves to keep what are essentially protest votes. At the end of the day, if it wasn’t for Donald Trump and the chaos in how the Republicans have governed in the last two years, they would still be red states. It’s not that everyone’s decided to get behind DEI.
Damien Bruckard: The median voter hasn’t shifted left.
Michael Feller: No, that’s right. In one sense, this will be a moderating influence in terms of whom the Democrats select as their presidential nominee, or at least who gets through the primaries. I suspect people like Jon Ossoff, who’s from the South and is pretty moderate by all accounts, will do well. But the AOC / El-Sayed wing of the Democratic Party probably won’t be able to get their candidate up yet.
They’re going to be increasingly angry as people like Jeffries, who’s the presumed Speaker of the House, and Schumer, who’s the presumed President of the Senate, try to satisfy Texas and South Carolina. The risk for the Democrats is how to do that without really pissing off the progressives.
And as much as everyone’s focused on the RINOs in the Republican Party, I wouldn’t be surprised if in a month or two we’re talking about the DINOs within the Democratic Party, because they’re very divided. The dog’s caught the car. What does it do with the car?
Damien Bruckard: Well, one thing the dogs will probably do is start some investigations. There are a whole range that could be launched in Congress, whether into the war in Iran and Pete Hegseth’s role in particular, or into graft, including the Trump family and its associates.
Those associates aren’t just players on the sidelines. In some cases, they’re the lead negotiators on the most important files in foreign policy. Witkoff and Kushner have been involved in negotiations with Russia and Ukraine, as well as talks over Iran and the Middle East more broadly. I imagine there will be investigations beyond that too. My overall sense is that the knives will be out, and this will be a big domestic preoccupation for Trump and Washington more generally.
In that context, one question I wanted to put to you is this: ordinarily, when a second-term president loses the midterms, which is a very common experience, probably the default, we talk about the president becoming a lame duck. That ordinarily means they can’t pass legislation, so they focus their efforts on foreign policy.
But Trump is exceptional in almost every sense. He hasn’t really been prosecuting his domestic agenda through legislation. It’s largely been through executive decree, and he’s already had a pretty big focus on foreign policy. So what’s your interpretation of Trump as a lame duck?
Michael Feller: On impeachments and investigations, I expect those to happen. They might not seek to impeach the president directly, although if they don’t, the progressives are going to get really narky with the moderates in the Democratic Party. But at least it’s going to put a lot of heat on him.
That in turn could spur him to be even more dramatic on the foreign policy file, whether to flood the zone and distract, or because he’s feeling humiliated, angry and vengeful, as is the theory around Iran at the moment. It could open a real Pandora’s box.
It’s hard to think that the Democrats can ignore what appears to be, prima facie, corruption. Not to mention the things that might not be related to Trump himself but are pretty fishy, such as the fact that his lead negotiators on Iran and Russia are also morally flexible businessmen who like to do deals with interesting characters on a good day. There will be developments not driven by the president that nonetheless appear in a situation like this. When the cat’s away, the mice will play.
When you’ve got an eventual lame duck, it can create a moment when rogue regimes around the world do rogue things: someone launching a coup d’état, invading a neighbour, or otherwise acting against what was once considered the international rules-based order. I know we’ll get to Indonesia later, but I’m unofficially putting that on coup watch. There are a few other countries I’ve got on coup watch too.
In terms of countries invading their neighbours, I’m not suggesting China is about to invade Taiwan. But I expect we could see more misadventure in the South China Sea, more aggressive envelope-pushing against the Philippines, which is undergoing its own domestic dramas. There you’ve got essentially a lame-duck president with the additional complication that he’s at war with his vice president. Although that could happen here soon, judging by JD Vance’s extraordinary tweet the other day.
There’s all sorts of scope for misadventure, and we haven’t even talked about Iran. The Iranians will be gaming out scenarios for how Trump may react.
The Democrats can moderate foreign policy insofar as they control the purse, but that only matters in the longer term. Trump’s still got scope to shuffle money around within the Pentagon, which has already been happening to fund the war in Iran. He doesn’t really need to apply to Congress, at least in the short term.
Israel, Iran and the Red Sea
Damien Bruckard: And it doesn’t work the other way. He’s also got a veto over what Congress may put forward on foreign policy, as it does occasionally, and can push that back.
So let’s focus on the Middle East. Obviously, the dynamics in the United States are changing. The other big development is the election in Israel, which seems likely to lead to a minority government of some sort. It’s unclear whether Netanyahu will be appointed prime minister by the president, or whether Eisenkot might end up leading what would probably be a pretty unusual coalition, including the Arab parties that did much better than they have in previous elections.
Given the uncertainty over both the time frame for appointing a government and the potentially unusual coalitions that could form, what’s your base case? Who ends up as prime minister, what will that domestic political configuration look like, and will it lead to any changes in Israel’s approach to the region?
Just by way of background, the alternative prime minister is hardly a dove. Eisenkot is extremely hawkish, prosecuted the war in Gaza in large part as a military leader, advocated some of its harshest treatment, and seems quite aligned with Netanyahu on Iran.
So there’s the US, there’s Israel, and the other development is the uptick of violence in Yemen itself, as well as quite successful Houthi attacks in Saudi Arabia, including against prime real estate such as Riyadh Airport. That’s fundamentally attacking the business model of that particular Gulf state.
You could draw a longer bow and include the escalation of tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea on the other side of the Red Sea. It all seems a pretty potent combination, more uncertain than in the past. In that context, what’s your view?
Michael Feller: I’ll start with Israel. My base case is Netanyahu getting back into power because I think his coalition is less likely to fracture and join Eisenkot’s than Eisenkot’s coalition is to fracture and join his.
There are already members of the opposition bloc who have essentially said, we support Eisenkot as prime minister, but we are never going to govern in coalition with the Arab parties. So will they support Netanyahu if Eisenkot can’t get there? Whilst in theory Eisenkot can create a majority with the Arab parties, that would mean losing at least one of the major parties in his bloc, presumably to Netanyahu. Then it’s checkmate in Netanyahu’s favour.
Eisenkot is a very storied military commander, but he’s not a politician. I think Netanyahu, from a skills perspective, is going to be better. He thrives on this sort of thing, if you look at his political career.
Damien Bruckard: Skills, yes, he’s undoubtedly a skilled politician.
Michael Feller: He’s been written off so many times, but he’s able to do the dirty work of favours and coalition-building that a straight shooter like a military commander probably isn’t. Don’t rule Eisenkot out, but I’d put my money on Netanyahu.
Either way, as you say, both are hawkish, so the foreign policy approach isn’t likely to change much. Although if Eisenkot got into power, there’s a face-saving reason to change policy on Iran. That’s a war they can’t win without essentially going to a nuclear phase. I don’t know how you conventionally defeat Iran any other way, unless you want hundreds of thousands of US troops in Iran.
Damien Bruckard: Well, Iran seems to have got regime change in Washington without having to do that.
Michael Feller: Exactly. So good luck getting Congress to approve another trillion dollars for that sort of campaign. The writing’s on the wall for that strategy.
Assuming Netanyahu gets in, I think things will continue as they have. We’ll probably see escalation within the next two months. I’m talking about conventional escalation, not a tactical nuclear weapon: attacks on Kharg Island and other facilities, reciprocal strikes on more Gulf airports and oil facilities, and oil prices going back up. Interestingly, on a day when the market crashed, oil was up again as markets digested these sorts of scenarios. Not great news.
I think the Iranians, as we’ve said before, are incentivised to hold on until 2028 or 2029, when Trump’s successor takes office: a repeat of the Jimmy Carter-to-Ronald Reagan hostage crisis situation. Iran already has a war economy. They can handle isolation and hyperinflation better than—
Damien Bruckard: Handled it for 40 years.
Michael Feller: That’s right, better than just about anyone.
The Houthis and the Saudis are a different kettle of fish. I see the Houthis as aligned with Iran rather than as a proxy. If they got diplomatic recognition from the Saudis and/or this apparent request for $51 billion, which I think was reported in The Wall Street Journal overnight, they might stop their campaign. That would let a lot more oil through the Red Sea and probably take some pressure off other conflicts in the region.
You mentioned Eritrea and Ethiopia. That seems to have fizzled out for now, although things are picking up on the other side of Ethiopia, along the border with Somalia, where the same proxy dynamics are playing out: Egypt versus Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia versus the UAE.
You’ve also got the breakaway territory of Somaliland, which only Israel recognises as an independent state, although de facto Ethiopia and the UAE also recognise it. That could still keep the Red Sea region potentially dangerous, but not as dangerous as it’s been with the Houthi conflict.
Brazilian elections
Damien Bruckard: A bit of a hard pivot to South America, and Brazil in particular. With the elections there, there’s probably a temptation to see a global trend away from an authoritarian, Trump-like right towards more moderate or leftist policies. I’ve seen people drawing connections between what’s been going on in Europe, the US midterms, some of the resistance to Netanyahu, and now Brazil, where Lula has done much better than most polls and analysts expected.
What’s your read on the particularities of Brazil? Can a broader trend be inferred, or is this really about Brazil’s circumstances?
Michael Feller: I’d be hesitant to draw a broader conclusion from Brazil because Bolsonaro came first in the first round. I think a couple of things happened. Lula, or at least his machine, was able to get more voters out for the second round. And Bolsonaro was just a really crap candidate. He’s a crap guy. He fled to Florida straight after. They probably dodged a bullet there.
I don’t think Lula was an amazing president either. He’s also really corrupt, don’t forget. Brazil perennially punches below its weight. It should be doing a lot better, and crime is bad. Bolsonaro should have lost the election. Lula is also 81 years old. Not that I’m ageist, but Bolsonaro Junior? The idiots running that guy.
If a broader trend can be inferred, it’s that people hate crony, kleptocratic, nepotistic dynastic systems. And a memo to those in MAGA who think one of Trump’s sons would make a great future Republican president: Americans didn’t even like the idea of Hillary Clinton being president.
I don’t think it was a left-right thing. People chose the lesser evil, the lesser form of corruption in electing Lula. Maybe there was a bit of anti-MAGA sentiment, with Bolsonaro seen as licking Trump’s boots while Lula was presenting himself as standing alone against American dominance. But I think it was mostly the lesser of two evils. I doubt too many Brazilians are thrilled.
Don’t forget Congress, particularly the Senate, which is powerful in Brazil and could remove some of the more pro-Lula judges on the Supreme Court. Bolsonaro’s allies did quite well in the first round. Michelle Bolsonaro, Bolsonaro Senior’s wife, is in the Senate, along with a whole bunch of his allies.
It’s the inverse of what’s happened in the United States. There you’ve got a right-wing president and a left-wing Congress; in Brazil, you’ve got a right-wing Congress and a left-wing president. It’ll be interesting to see how Lula manages that.
Political unrest in Europe
Damien Bruckard: Speaking of left and right, there seems to be an increasing cleavage in Europe along those lines. Some quite extraordinary scenes from Paris in particular, where on the one hand I’m sad I’m not there when I ordinarily am, but on the other I’m quite glad because most of my neighbourhood is being trashed.
It’s not confined to Paris, or even France. There have been protests across the country and in Italy, Albania, Germany and elsewhere. What’s your sense of the root causes and what they could mean for upcoming elections? France, in particular, has a presidential election coming up in around six months. So across the continent, to the extent possible.
Michael Feller: In France there are lots of different protest movements using the broader chaos to drive home their agendas. We’re essentially in an election campaign, so there’s a rationality to it: they’re trying to shape the agenda for their respective causes.
The problem is that the more left-leaning demonstrators, who make up the majority, are digging their own grave. I think they’re making their ostensible representative, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, even less attractive to the median French voter, and making the election of Marine Le Pen more likely. That’s the outcome I see.
As long as France remains in the EU and the EU has rules around fiscal rectitude, it has to fix its budget. It can’t just do what the United States does and let the dollar do its magic. It’s going to be a tough few years for the French.
Damien Bruckard: It’s a very tricky position for whoever ultimately leads France. There’s a generational dimension, as well as the debt and fiscal position. There’s simply not enough money to go around. The pension state has ballooned enormously and it’s been impossible to get increases in the retirement age and other reforms that might provide a little more room to respond to the demands of students and ameliorate their grievances.
There’s very little fiscal room for the state, and it’s hard to balance those interests, particularly with a National Assembly that’s completely divided and unable to get anything done.
Michael Feller: I think the days of balancing interests and trying to please everyone are rapidly coming to a close. I suspect the only way Le Pen, or whoever takes charge, gets out of this is with a sort of French Margaret Thatcher impersonation.
Damien Bruckard: Cut the Gordian knot.
Michael Feller: Absolutely. And I think she would probably relish that, because you can get some of your other ideas through under the cloak of fiscal repair work.
What’s less straightforward is what’s happening in Germany. Those protests are far smaller in aggregate, and Germany’s fiscal position is much better. I’ve written about Germany’s demographics, which present a completely different situation on the other side of the river. But they’re also in a real funk.
They’ve got this guy running the country who said the other day that his job was not to be the darling of the German people. Well, what are you for? You’re a politician. You’re meant to be popular. Our friends in the political analyst community sometimes forget that politics is a popularity contest. In a democracy, people need to like you and support you. It’s not just business management.
Merz comes from that business background and seems to think he can be the tough CEO and please the shareholders. But dude, the shareholders are your voters.
I would hate to see the AfD come to power because, unlike Le Pen, they’re not just hard conservatives. Some of their members are genuinely hard right. We bandy around terms like fascist or neo-Nazi, but there are people in that party who lean that way. That’s quite frightening.
A couple of months ago, I thought there was no way we’d end up in that situation. The CDU would fix itself or appoint a new leader; Merz would see the writing on the wall. But I don’t think he sees it. I wonder now whether the drift in German politics will lead to a situation where only a far-right government breaks the Gordian knot.
That’s such a shame because Germany didn’t need that. Maybe France needs a real disruption. But it’s extraordinary how hopeless the CDU and SPD have been.
New Zealand, Europe and US politics
Damien Bruckard: Let’s move to some of the questions coming through.
I’ll start with one that seems to be from across the ditch, as the questioner puts it: any thoughts on the New Zealand elections? And a second question, on Bloomberg’s reporting that Marco Rubio is weighing whether to leave the Trump administration. What would it mean if one of the few grown-ups in the room left?
Michael Feller: On New Zealand, I haven’t been following it as closely as I should. I’m intending to write something about it today. But I think it’s going to be a pretty even split between Labour and National, with the balance going to the smaller parties.
At least in the pundit sphere, the centrist Opportunities Party seems favoured to be kingmaker, as opposed to the traditional kingmaker, Winston Peters, who’s on the populist right. On the balance of probabilities, I’d expect an Opportunities–Labour government, because the leader of the Opportunities Party seems more inclined that way than towards National, let alone National and some of the other right-wing parties like Peters and ACT.
The Greens also seem to be doing quite well in the polls. So my tip would be a Labour–Opportunities–Greens coalition. Back to Ardern-style niceness and economic catastrophe.
Damien Bruckard: And Rubio?
Michael Feller: Rubio. From the sublime to the ridiculous. If I were him, I’d be leaving the administration soon. However, every man has his white whale, and Rubio has Cuba.
Right now, as Secretary of State, National Security Advisor and viceroy of Venezuela, there’s no better chair to sit in if you want to achieve regime change in Cuba. So I suspect we’ll see at least an attempt, perhaps a failed attempt, before he leaves to campaign. I think Rubio will leave the administration to campaign at some point, but it might not be for another few months.
Damien Bruckard: Another question, and I like the way it’s framed: with all the rolling unrest in Western Europe and increased pressure from manufacturing lost to China, is there a world in which the EU disintegrates and the monetary union ends, so that nation states can swim their own races?
Michael Feller: People have been asking that almost since Europe was created. I think it’s unlikely because the net benefit to everyone is greater than the costs. The countries that would do best swimming on their own, like Germany, are probably also the most afraid of that prospect. Even the AfD is moving away from Euroscepticism, and Britain is a cautionary tale for most Europeans of what can happen when you leave the bloc.
Everything dies eventually. At some point the EU will turn into something else, or it will go. But I don’t see that happening in the next decade or two.
If anything, look at the problems in the United States and China. If you believe, as the AI bears do, that this has all been a waste of money and we’re heading into another mega-recession because of AI overbuild, Europe, which has built less, might actually turn out to be the cleanest dirty shirt.
So whilst Paris is burning, perhaps it’s a Lord Rothschild, buy-when-the-cannons-fire kind of moment, because things can’t get much worse.
Damien Bruckard: Another question: if the midterm elections can be viewed as a repudiation of Trump, fuelled by a highly engaged Democratic base and a disengaged non-MAGA Republican base, does this imply that Trump’s win in 2024 was due to Harris being a poor candidate? And what would it mean should she be the nominee in 2028?
Michael Feller: Very much so. I think that’s an astute observation. People vote for people as much as parties, particularly in presidential elections. Enough people were a bit meh on Kamala Harris not to turn out for her. The pro-Trump people got Trump in.
It entirely depends on whom she’d run against. If it were JD Vance, I think she’d win. If it were Marco Rubio or Ron DeSantis, I’m less sure. It would depend on what other disasters happen in the next two years that can be attributed to Trump and the Republicans.
But I don’t think Harris will be the candidate. Looking at all the seats the Democrats have picked up, I expect the DNC and the big cheeses in the party, like Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, will want someone who appeals to those otherwise non-Democratic voters. My money would be on more of a Jon Ossoff-type character who, assuming he’s not a disaster over the next two years, would have appeal to those voters. I don’t think Harris, being from San Francisco if nothing else, has much appeal in the Deep South.
Damien Bruckard: Same for Gavin Newsom. I’d put them in a very similar category, and not just because they’re from San Francisco.
Another thing that bears reflection is the concern over the last few years about authoritarian creep in the United States, and whether its system has sufficiently robust checks and balances to prevent it. It took a while for the Supreme Court to reject some of the legislation and executive orders pushing the envelope, but it has appeared to be something of a bulwark.
Now, with these midterms, presumably the system will look a little more stable over the next few years, even if all these fights continue. Do you agree that the checks have worked better than we might have thought a year or two ago? And is the election significant for that reason, irrespective of whether you’re Democrat- or Republican-leaning?
Michael Feller: I think the checks and balances have shown themselves to work. The vote was so emphatic that Trump didn’t even try to say it was rigged.
Damien Bruckard: As has happened in Israel and other places, for instance.
Michael Feller: I think the fears of authoritarianism in the USA may not come to pass. But other effects of Trump will remain: isolationism, protectionism on trade and belligerence overseas. We could see some of that carried on by a Democratic president, certainly on trade.
Joe Biden was protectionist in a sense, just not as voluble as Trump. He certainly wasn’t a free trader. I think American free trade died before Trump was elected, when the internal polling Hillary Clinton was reading led her to repudiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. Ever since, outside the business chambers, there’s been no constituency for global free trade in the United States. Perhaps free trade with Canada has had a bit of a fillip recently, as we’ve seen with swings in places like Maine and Ohio.
That, I think, will be a more durable legacy of Trump than authoritarianism. Globally, though, authoritarianism is still very much on the rise. Democracies have done a bad job in recent years of delivering on promises, providing stability and giving people predictability.
That’s not always the politicians’ fault. There are structural trends, technological change, and uncertainty around China and the world order. But even if the US isn’t run by a dictator, I think there will be more dictators elsewhere in the years ahead.
Damien Bruckard: There’s another dimension to that, perhaps not leading to dictatorship but certainly contributing to disaffection. Just about every Western advanced industrialised democracy has struggled to achieve economic growth except through migration.
That creates a dilemma. The less growth there is, the fewer job opportunities there are, and the harder it is for younger generations to find work and eke out a living. That helps drive a backlash against migration. Governments are then in an invidious position: cut migration to satisfy voters, knowing that doing so could crimp growth even further, or maintain it against public opposition.
Michael Feller Totally.
The Donroe Doctrine
Damien Bruckard: Another question, again on the United States but also Brazil, relating to lame-duck foreign policy and Lula’s fourth term. What’s the outlook for the so-called Donroe Doctrine and US policy under Trump in Latin America?
Michael Feller: The Donroe Doctrine was probably never going to work in South America because the countries are too big and complicated. Javier Milei has been Trump all the way, but even other ostensibly right-wing governments, in places like Peru and Ecuador, are still doing deals with China. Nothing’s fundamentally changed.
Chile’s right-wing government is quite new but extremely unpopular. Paraguay, which I’m going to write about today, and Bolivia are going through convulsions.
Where the Donroe Doctrine might work is in Central America and the Caribbean, simply because the countries are smaller, less complicated and more susceptible to manipulation. They need the United States overwhelmingly and don’t have as many options for trading with Europe and China.
I can imagine that US sphere-of-influence posture continuing even under a Democrat. Perhaps they won’t invade countries or kidnap presidents, but they’ll maintain that approach. In many ways it’s been a feature of the last 200 years. America has always intervened in the so-called banana republics of Central America, and I don’t think that will ever really change, sadly for them.
Did that answer it?
Damien Bruckard: Maybe a follow-up to that is the other half of the Western Hemisphere, Canada in particular.
Michael Feller: Greenland.
Damien Bruckard: And Greenland too. But Canada is in a pretty interesting position. Mark Carney is now famous worldwide for standing up to Donald Trump, rather like Hugh Grant versus Billy Bob Thornton in Love Actually, protesting the special relationship and how it has changed.
Canada has also recently released some significant bureaucratic papers, including foreign policy and defence white papers, with more coming over the next few months. They’re questioning the long-held assumption, embedded in almost everything about Canada, that the US will be a benevolent neighbour. They’re having to rethink their entire foreign policy.
With trade negotiations going on right now, how do you see the longer-term consequences of this Donroe Doctrine for Canada and for the middle powers of the world?
Michael Feller: Trump has really been a gift to the Canadian federation. Canadians are famously, well, I wouldn’t call them unpatriotic, but they’re a bit like us Australians: patriotic when playing sport, but not terribly over the top about it. This has been a gift for their sense of national unity.
I think the vote in Alberta the other day on holding a referendum would have gone differently if not for Trump. In Quebec, there will always be a large constituency for independence. But the lingering memory of Trump may keep Quebec tied to Canada even after he goes, when the provincial government intends to hold yet another independence referendum. They’ve had a few and they’ve never worked.
The question is what Canada can do beyond integrating more within itself. Geographically and economically, it can never escape the orbit of the United States. It can’t just join the EU and declare the problem solved. The British have struggled with Brexit; Canada can’t Brexit from the US, even if the US is pushing it away.
Canada might build a pipeline to the Pacific coast. It might have the most comprehensive free trade agreement Europe ever signs under some future association arrangement. But the US is right there, and it’s hard not to prioritise your biggest neighbour if you’re a business.
Damien Bruckard: The geo in geopolitics.
Michael Feller: Exactly. At best, Canada might diversify its trade so that it’s reliant on the US for, say, 70 per cent of it. But it will struggle to push the US share much lower without causing great harm to its economy.
Indonesia
Damien Bruckard: Well, as a millennial, what I will say is, poor Canada, all the way down there, per Homer Simpson. And I’ll use another Simpsons quote to pivot to Indonesia at a crossroads, Homer there reading The Economist.
So Indonesia is at a crossroads, Michael.
Michael Feller: Sure is. Always at a crossroads, always will be. Its latest economic growth has been okay, but its share market is in a terrible state and people are quite upset with their government by Indonesian standards. Prabowo, the president, has just brought 21,000 troops into Jakarta. They say it’s a routine deployment, because of course that’s what you routinely do, right?
I wonder whether, if there are protests next week and they turn violent as they did last year, he’ll crack down aggressively. I think that could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. If you had soldiers shooting, a massacre of students, something like that, it would be reminiscent of allegations against him when he was a military commander, including accusations of massacres in Timor and elsewhere.
It could become volatile, not just for the Indonesian share market but for Indonesia more broadly.
I don’t think he’ll implement martial law because I don’t think it would work. Indonesia isn’t Thailand. You can’t just have a coup. It’s too complicated and too spread out. I think the days of Indonesian coups are long gone. I could be wrong; maybe he’ll have a crack.
But they’re on coup watch, as I said. I think he has that authoritarian bent, and some of the other ingredients that could lead to such an outcome are present.
Cuba
Damien Bruckard: Another question, perhaps not coup watch but intervention watch. The US seems to be trying to strangle Cuba into collapse, though we don’t hear about it much outside the American press. What’s the most likely pathway to resolution?
Michael Feller: Rubio will want to keep strangling Cuba so that there’s regime change he can declare was due to him, and then campaign on that. He’ll be incentivised to continue the policy. And Trump likes regime change in other countries, so he’ll be incentivised too.
It’s fairly low-cost for the United States. It isn’t costing them much beyond upsetting liberals and drawing condemnation from the United Nations, which I think they welcome. Sadly, I see that policy continuing.
But I don’t see Cuba snapping. Like the Iranians, they’re very good at dealing with bad economies and surviving. They went through worse after the collapse of the Soviet Union, before they were able to pivot to other things. It was a complete basket case. I don’t think they’re at that level yet. If they only have to hang on for another two years, they probably can.
The next question is whether the US goes from a policy of strangulation to one of armed intervention. That’s the wild card. I can see reasons for it and reasons against it. But if Rubio wants to roll the dice, he has a president who’d probably roll the dice with him.
The month ahead: the good, the bad and the ugly
Damien Bruckard: One final question, and then we’ll let you all free. I’ll frame it in the way we’re thinking about structuring a potential podcast next year. Tell me whether this is a good theme: the month ahead, Michael, the good, the bad and the ugly.
Michael Feller: The good. I wish you’d told me you were going to ask this question. The good is that geopolitics has never been more interesting. No, I—
Damien Bruckard: Sorry. That’s the hardest one. A bit of moderation in the US, perhaps?
Michael Feller: Not until January, when the new Congress comes in. So within this one-month period, perhaps we’ll actually see progress at this year’s COP climate summit because the US is missing in action. For that reason alone, others can create new rules, whether or not they’re followed. At least it creates a new benchmark.
The bad is Indonesia. As I was saying, that could become a really horrible situation.
Damien Bruckard: All right. And the ugly?
Michael Feller: The ugly is that perennial risk of Trump’s knee-jerk escalation on Iran. That’s still very much in view over the next month.
Damien Bruckard: What a horrible way to finish a conversation. We’ll have to think about that structure. Thanks very much, Michael, and thanks everyone for joining us. I hope you’re enjoying reading Geopolitical Dispatch. I was glad to see one comment very appreciative of both the art and the puns. As you all know, it’s one of the places on the internet where you can read some non-AI writing. We hope you continue to read that. Forever human.
Michael Feller: Always, always. Forever human. See you next time, guys.
Damien Bruckard: Thanks very much, everyone. Have a great day.