“Wir schaffen das.” Former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s 2015 declaration of faith in Germany’s capacity to cope with unprecedented waves of unsought asylum seekers is best translated as “we’ve got this”. (The more staid version in her autobiography is “we can do this”.)
Merkel’s confidence, however misplaced and exaggerated, was evidence of a remarkable bond – the former research scientist might have thought, a symbiosis – between the Chancellor and her compatriots. Merkel spoke about “we”, not the government, not any political party, no one State, but all of Germany in this together. Her statement referred to no institutions, no traditions, no processes, no abstractions, no intermediaries. “We” were going to manage this: “if anything stands in our way, it has to be overcome”.
Perhaps trust is a quite parochial commodity, one requiring empathy and intimacy, and therefore confined within national borders.
Does any other single leader in the world possess the requisite political capital and reservoirs of trust to echo Merkel’s claim? Trust is conventionally described as the glue or cement that holds politics, economies and societies together. Those metaphors seriously understate what really matters. Trust entails a judgment on most of the qualities that merge into leadership: competence; consistency; reliability; honesty; stamina; commitment.
Just because the word is mischievously abused by cynics, every working day does not diminish its moral force and weight. The currency of trust is universal. People everywhere know what they want. In his second Inaugural, Donald Trump recognised the need to insist that “our government confronts a crisis of trust” – albeit one he perversely blamed on “a radical and corrupt establishment”. Rather more graciously and generously, one of his most under-rated predecessors sought a compact of trust with the American people in a form that was “not an inaugural address, not a fireside chat, not a campaign speech – just a little straight talk among friends”. Sadly, Gerald Ford failed.
How, though, can trust be established between nations in foreign policy or strategic plans? Perhaps trust is a quite parochial commodity, one requiring empathy and intimacy, and therefore confined within national borders. In Australia, for instance, trusting Bunnings, the ABC or Ricky Ponting might be more natural and logical than relying on foreigners.
Should we then agree with Shakespeare that, in foreign policy, nations should “let every eye negotiate for itself, and trust no agent”? That would be an uncomfortable wake-up call for States relying on the security blanket of alliances or the pretence that the world is run by sincere folk imbued with good will.
Now, in a world with Trump, Xi and Putin, leaders need to recalibrate how much trust can be placed in ententes cordiales, Article 5 of NATO, the United Nations and all its works, the consultation clause in ANZUS, relationships “without limits”, ties “as close as lips and teeth”, a rules-based order, like-minded countries, or comprehensive strategic partnerships (two adjectives and a noun buttressing a delusion).
Were we to abandon those safety nets, we could be left clinging to bare-knuckle Hobbesian Darwinism. An American General told me he worried about what advice to give his son before the boy’s first deployment to Iraq. The counsel he decided on was brisk and concise. “Always keep your face to the fight. Never cut any corners.” A leader adrift in a Trump-dominated world might consider those two rudimentary points a beginner’s guide to diplomacy. They offer marginally more promise than denial, despondency or doom-scrolling through the news.
Trust entails a judgment on most of the qualities that merge into leadership: competence; consistency; reliability; honesty; stamina; commitment.
Foreign policy realists, from Thucydides’ Melian dialogue to Henry Kissinger’s memoirs, may well have regarded the current crop of authoritarian leaders as brutal, simplistic and crude. Nonetheless, they would have understood the primordial importance of force and would not have expected better from the world. Metternich might have admired Putin’s strength of will. Talleyrand would have been charmed by Xi’s long game. Machiavelli could have offered Trump a few tips on blending with more finesse the roles of lion and fox.
There realism lies, but it is also the path to resignation and defeatism. Any number of armchair strategists will now opine about the need to increase defence budgets, as though some of that money would not be wasted, new weapons superseded and adversaries possibly making shrewder investments. Others might hark back to the notion of the nation in arms, as though every country could turn itself into Israel. Others still will suggest revamping or rejigging alliance systems.
None of those stratagems offers much hope for coping with a power/force-driven world. If trust begins at home, then ordinary folk should begin by picking and backing leaders in whom they can repose their trust. Where to start? One pick would be the exceptional Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte. Elsewhere, the former Governor of two central banks, Mark Carney, is running to lead Canada. In a couple of years, French voters will have a chance to elect Edouard Philippe as their President. All the rest of us should be out beating the bushes.
