Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Chris Good Seeing this newsletter as a forward? Subscribe here. July 11, 2021 On GPS, at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET: First, Fareed gives his take on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and public criticism that it's best to stay, given the possibility of a Taliban takeover.
While that outcome would be unfortunate, Fareed argues, the US presence has been motivated by "an imperial aversion to any instability," akin to Britain's occupation of Sudan out of fear that instability there would endanger British control of the Suez Canal. Empires and superpowers overreach when they try to prevent instability in far-flung places, Fareed says.
As it prepares to withdraw, Fareed argues, the US must keep the realist perspective that efforts to stop international terrorism have been broadly successful, and "Afghanistan is not central to America's position as a global power."
With a full US exit looming at the end of August, Fareed asks retired Gen. David Petraeus, who commanded US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, what will happen when the withdrawal is complete.
The private space race is on, with mogul Richard Branson planning a ride to space today via his company Virgin Galactic, while Jeff Bezos gears up for a similar trip later this month. Fareed asks renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson about this new era of human space exploration.
Tokyo has declared a state of emergency just two weeks before the Olympics, as concerns mount over the Delta variant. Fareed discusses the new dynamics of Covid-19 with University of Edinburgh global public-health chair Devi Sridhar and former CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden.
As the Western US faces a heat wave that could approach a world record temperature, Fareed asks climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe if this is merely a taste of what's to come.
Finally, after the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse, Fareed examines the country's troubled history. Where the US Leaves Afghanistan The US-led war in Afghanistan has fit well within historical precedent, Hal Brands writes for Bloomberg: It addressed limited aims in a far-flung place, and superpowers often find mixed results in such missions.
But "[a]t best, America will leave behind a mess; at worst, withdrawal may precipitate strategic setbacks and a humanitarian disaster," Brands writes, while The Economist gives a similarly grim report, as the Taliban seizes rural territory and as Afghans line up for immigration papers to leave.
"America and its NATO allies have spent billions of dollars training and equipping Afghan security forces in the hope that they would one day be able to stand alone," the magazine writes. "Instead, they started buckling even before America left. Many districts are being taken not by force, but are simply handed over. Soldiers and policemen have surrendered in droves, leaving piles of American-purchased arms and ammunition and fleets of vehicles. Even as the last American troops were leaving Bagram over the weekend of July 3rd, more than 1,000 Afghan soldiers were busy fleeing across the border into neighbouring Tajikistan as they sought to escape a Taliban assault."
Worries persist over the fate of Afghan interpreters and others who worked with US forces: The Financial Times editorial board joins others in warning that unless the US expedites their resettlement in America or their exit to safe locations, it will be guilty of a moral failure. As terrible as the pandemic has been, it has also demonstrated the potential of mRNA's use in medicine, Jörg Blech and Claus Hecking write for Der Spiegel, as small teams of researchers explore a wide range of uses.
"The new high-tech medicine has the potential to cure a number of maladies afflicting us humans," Blech and Hecking write. "MRNA researchers have developed therapeutic approaches to AIDS, the flu, tuberculosis, multiple sclerosis, rheumatism, all kinds of allergies, Alzheimer's, cystic fibrosis, knee arthritis, slipped discs, and many different kinds of cancer, including of the breast, colon, skin, lung and prostate. … More than 150 different mRNA-based treatments and vaccines are currently in development worldwide, with small teams often driving the innovation. Meanwhile, pharmaceutical companies are on the lookout for partners." Vaccine Debacles Draw Criticism The world is now divided between "the jabs from the jab-nots," as The Economist puts it. For countries in the latter category, problematic vaccine rollouts are drawing criticism. At Foreign Policy, Alexey Kovalev decries a lack of public messaging by the Russian government, which he says allowed vaccine skepticism to linger there; at The Conversation, five authors affiliated with the University of the Witwatersrand write that South Africa—which has returned to lockdown amid a devastating viral wave—has suffered from slow procurement, hesitation to accept doses over concerns about their effectiveness against the Beta variant, and a shipment that became contaminated and had to be replaced. What's Behind the Baby Bust? As Fareed recently detailed, a global baby bust could spell trouble for the world economy, as working populations age out of productivity and require care. In a New Statesman cover story, Sophie McBain explores some of the factors behind it: pandemic anxiety; women in advanced economies choosing to have fewer children—and more economies advancing to this point; economic precarity; and fears surrounding what it means to bring a child into a world heading toward climate catastrophe.
Having a baby is an optimistic act, McBain writes, but "[t]his is no consolation if you want so much to have a child but do not see how you could support one, with the economy in tatters and your finances on the brink; if you are single and have spent one of your final reproductive years alone, desperate to meet someone; if your IVF has been delayed so long that it probably will no longer work; if you despair about the planet's future. You don't have to be worried about declining fertility itself to be worried by this widespread sense of precarity. You might find yourself believing that declining fertility is ultimately a good thing for this planet, and still feel some sadness for the unknowable, unacknowledged loss this might represent, all those serious, hushed bedroom discussions that end in similar ways: it would be wonderful to have a child—just not now, not yet." |
