James Jay Carafano
When Elon Musk looks back at Earth on his travels to Mars, the big blue beachball may look the same, but here is to bet the future geopolitics of homeland Earth will be different. Expect this new world map to come not from the puffing chests of great power politics but rewired more by mundane paths of trade and commerce, the free and open spaces that connect the planet together. In part, this change will be stewarded by entrepreneurial visionaries like space captain Musk but also earthbound global leaders like his pals Trump (US), Meloni (Italy), Melei (Argentina), and Modi (India).
A New Old
It would be a bad bet to believe that the US, as well as friends and allies, will stop skirmishing with the likes of China, Russia, and Iran anytime soon (unless the three collapse from the internal rot plaguing each adversary in its own way). That said, the great power struggle doesn’t answer the question of what the rest of the world does while the great powers are struggling.
For sure, the odds of the planet splitting into a complex sphere of influence, despite the dire predictions of pearl-clutching strategic pundits, dim every day. Like the polar bear plunge, America and its enemies might plummet into another Cold War. Still, they don’t have the power and influence to divide the world among themselves into private playgrounds—no East and West, no neutral zones or Global Souths distinguished from Global Norths, no poles with nations circling great powers like little planets.
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