Australians tend to assume we have an insiders’ understanding of America even if many Australians have never ventured beyond the major east and west coast cities, such as New York and Los Angeles.
The Albanese government wanted Kamala Harris to win. Its angst and unpreparedness for a Republican victory became clear to me over the course of several months, in the lead-up to the US election, after holding conversations with political leaders, bureaucrats and experts from across Asia, Europe and India.
Let’s accept Trump is profoundly disruptive and Harris would’ve been less so. In foreign policy, disruption is a virtue or vice depending on whether we believe structural and geopolitical trends are in our favour, or else are declining or dire.
Take our collective troubles with China and Russia. Joe Biden and Harris pursued an approach of managed competition which elevated the avoidance of escalation and surprise.
Trump has personally expressed praise for Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, but has also demonstrated a willingness to impose far more severe and sudden economic costs on China and Russia during his first presidential term.
His personality and psychology are not just unpredictable but also at ease with escalation – and so too his likely cabinet choices, who speak about not just competing but changing the rules of the game in order to win.
One might dismiss the Trumpian rhetoric that insists the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza would have been averted under his watch. But if you speak to those tasked with managing affairs at the coalface of regional trouble, they’d likely think differently.
A common perspective in Northeast Asian and Eastern European countries is that restrained competition has failed to temper the actions and ambitions of authoritarian powers. Imposing real costs and choosing to escalate is essential and only America has the hard power to lead such efforts.
Doing so is disruptive because it goes against more than two decades of America prioritising predictability and stability in Asia and Europe since the 1990s. Trump has no sense of allegiance and loyalty to strategic history, which is unsettling. But that means he is more willing to change America’s approach if it doesn’t seem to be working. For allies on the frontlines against China, Russia and Iran, deterrence is failing.
Some prefer Harris because there will be less heat on countries to do or spend more to bulk up their own security. Unlike Trump, Harris spoke sentimentally about Asian and European allies. But sentiment doesn’t deter nor increase one’s national resilience. For those who believe their nations are unprepared for the darkness that could be approaching, Trump is a welcome circuit breaker. American military power will be greater under Trump.
He will conduct an audit of allies and exert considerable pressure on countries to bear a greater security burden by making American assistance and protection conditional on doing so. This is profoundly uncomfortable, including for Australia. But whether one believes it is necessary depends on how seriously one takes national assessments about the deteriorating external environment.
On trade and economics, Biden/Harris agree with Trump that China is the problem, and the global economic system and institutions such as the World Trade Organisation cannot function as they once did in the 1990s and 2000s given the scale and nature of market distortion and cheating that China engages in.
The Biden/Harris playbook is to achieve dominance over China in key sectors such as semiconductors. However, Trump’s approach will be much more brutal. He promises to use the extraordinary powers of executive orders to punish an extensive list of state-backed Chinese firms. He is far more prepared to circumvent, change or break institutions such as the WTO if they get in the way or prove ineffective in enforcing their own principles and rules. Tariffs will be imposed to compel firms to divest from China, and preferably invest in America if they seek to sell to American consumers.
As a commodities exporter, Australia benefits disproportionately from Chinese state policies that encourage excessive fixed investment and overcapacity. But other economies, such as Japan, Taiwan and South Korea, accept Chinese distortion and cheating needs to be confronted because the negative geopolitical and economic implications of not doing so becoming more severe. So long as friendly democratic and strategic partners are given reasonable concessions and access, the Trumpian willingness to defy conventions and break institutions that China is exploiting might well be worth the gamble.
This offers some critical context to comments made by Labor leaders several years ago about Trump being “scary”, “nuts” and “destructive”. Rooting for a Democratic administration is understandable for a centre-left party. But dismissing the reasons Trump and his unorthodox methods have considerable support within, and outside, America is arrogant, ignorant and dangerous.
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