In februay 1946 George Kennan sent a remarkable cable to Washington

On paper, George Kennan’s “Long Telegram” was a reply to a query about the Soviet worldview. In reality, Kennan was proposing a strategy for managing superpower competition—an approach that he later called “containment”.

This article marks the launch of “The Telegram”, The Economist’s new weekly column on geopolitics.

It says a lot that in 2024 it is not hard to meet foreign-policy types nostalgic for the original cold war. 

The USSR was a potent ideological and military rival, but a commercial irrelevance. 

No Western democracy asked the Soviet Union to build its telephone exchanges. Drivers in capitalist countries did not covet Soviet cars. No multinational corporations depended on Soviet supply chains. 

It is an exaggeration to claim that globalisation is dying. But... 

Faced with angry populations, political leaders of all stripes are pledging to put the national interest first.

This columnist suspects the pendulum is swinging too far. 

Rich-world politicians are missing the diplomatic costs of overt selfishness, and discounting the value of magnanimity and respect for individual freedoms and rights.

The Economist 31 October 2024

https://www.economist.com/international/2024/10/31/the-telegram-our-new-guide-to-a-dangerous-world


”Det långa telegrammet” George Kennan

Carl Rudbeck SvD 5 januari 2024

https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2024/01/det-langa-telegrammet-george-kennan.html


In 1946 George Kennan wrote his 5,400-word “Long Telegram”

Thomas L. Friedman NYT

https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2022/02/in-1946-george-kennan-wrote-his-5400.html

Thomas L. Friedman - The New York Times






Kommentarer

Populära inlägg i den här bloggen

Det svänger fort på räntemarknaden

Fjolåret blev strålande för flera av de största fondbolagen

Börsen i Stockholm och New York 4-5 augusti 2024