Indian Strategic Studies: 06/13/25

13 June 2025

How to Reset the US-India Partnership

Ambuj Sahu, and Arun Sahgal

To be a more effective partner, the United States should recognize India’s sphere of influence in South Asia.

Recent remarks by the Trump administration on Operation Sindoor—India’s military response to a ghastly state-sponsored terrorist attack on Hindu tourists in the Kashmir valley—have struck a raw nerve in New Delhi. President Trump has repeatedly claimed credit for facilitating a ceasefire between India and Pakistan, even offering to mediate in Kashmir. He hinted at using trade as a coercive lever to resolve the crisis. At the same time, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick accused India of “rubb[ing] America the wrong way” by purchasing Russian defense equipment and implicitly backing de-dollarization through its membership in BRICS.

Trump’s repeated remarks have revived old anxieties in India being equated with a China-aligned Pakistan. What began as an Indian counter-terror operation escalated into retaliation on Pakistani airbases after Pakistan struck India’s military and civilian assets—yet the White House framed it as a Kashmir crisis. Lutnick’s comments reflect the outdated frameworks through which US policymakers often view India.

For the record, India has incrementally reduced its dependence on Russian arms over the past decade, and its external affairs minister has openly dismissed the idea of de-dollarization. Furthermore, the involvement of the Trump family in a cryptocurrency deal in Pakistan suggests that vested interests supersede strategic rationale in America’s dealings in the region.

Trump or Lutnick is not the issue here. The Biden administration has also spent considerable energy lecturing India on religious freedom and democracy while giving Pakistan a free pass on its persecution of Hindu minorities. Washington was critical of India’s purchases of Russian oil even when Europe continued to do the same. Differences between any two countries are inevitable, but in the case of the United States and India, they have played out in public, creating ugly optics and overshadowing progress in ties.

US-China: what’s really at stake in London

Nigel Green

A high-stakes showdown is unfolding this week in London—far from the manufacturing plants of Shenzhen or the trading floors of Wall Street, yet central to the global economic order.

Senior US and Chinese officials will hold a second day of talks today (Tuesday) aimed at de-escalating the most consequential economic rivalry of our time.

After Monday’s first day of talks, US President Donald Trump said, “We are doing well with China. China’s not easy…I’m only getting good reports.” China is negotiating for looser US tech controls while the US wants China to ease limits on rare earth mineral exports.

But for investors watching from Singapore to Silicon Valley, these meetings aren’t just about tariffs. They’re about who writes the rules of the 21st-century global economy.

Both sides are seeking to revive the Geneva framework established last month—an agreement that temporarily eased a volatile tariff standoff by rolling back US import duties on Chinese goods from 145% to 30%, and slashing Chinese tariffs from 125% to 10%.

The compromise was a ceasefire, not a peace treaty. Since then, fiery accusations of non-compliance have resumed.

Washington says Beijing is dragging its feet on critical mineral exports. Beijing accuses the US of doubling down on tech restrictions, particularly on semiconductors and AI.

The talks in London are significant because the stakes have never been higher. China and the US are no longer just competing powers—they are operating two fundamentally divergent systems, each trying to shape the global economic architecture in its own image.

This is a full-spectrum competition that spans data flows, digital currencies, energy policy, national security, and ideology. Investors ignore this at their peril.

To understand the gravity of this week’s negotiations, you have to look beyond the tariff tables and see the wider trajectory.

The New Balance of Power in the Middle East

Vali Nasr

During his visit to the Middle East in May, U.S. President Donald Trump did several things that few would have predicted months or even weeks earlier. One was his surprise meeting with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Shara, and the subsequent lifting of U.S. sanctions on Syria, notwithstanding Shara’s history as a leader of a militant Islamist group. Another was his decision not to include Israel on the itinerary, despite his administration’s ongoing efforts to end the war in Gaza. The trip followed the administration’s decision in early May to sign a bilateral cease-fire with the Houthis in Yemen, without consulting or including Israel. Along with Trump’s initiation of direct talks with Iran—a step that Israel adamantly opposes but Arab leaders in the Persian Gulf welcomed and even helped facilitate—these developments suggest how much the regional balance of power has changed since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

The war in Gaza has altered the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East. In the years before the October 7 attack, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and other Gulf states shared with Israel the perception that Iran and its alliance of proxy forces were the region’s overriding threat. They supported the first Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign on Tehran, and they began to normalize relations with Israel. Today, the situation has dramatically shifted. Twenty months into the war, Tehran appears far less of a threat to the Arab world. Meanwhile, Israel looks increasingly like a regional hegemon.

Amid these developments, Washington’s Arab allies and Israel are now in opposite camps on the merits of a new nuclear deal. Israel still sees a deal as a lifeline for the Islamic Republic and has been urging the Trump administration instead to take military action to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities. The Gulf states, by contrast, dread a new and potentially uncontainable war on their doorsteps and view a diplomatic resolution with Tehran as vital to regional security and stability. They are also wary of creating a Middle East in which Israel has free rein—even in a future in which normalization with Israel can move forward. In their effort to achieve a new balance between Israel and Iran, the Gulf states have become primary players in Trump’s push for a new nuclear deal. Together, they aim to become the fulcrum of a reconfigured regional order.

AI Without Borders: Why US Diplomacy Can’t Afford to Ignore Tech Sovereignty

Steven Hendrix

US diplomacy must urgently adapt to shape global AI norms or risk ceding digital governance to authoritarian powers.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the global order—not just economically or militarily, but diplomatically. As algorithms govern more decisions, from trade routes to refugee vetting, the question of who sets the rules is no longer theoretical. It’s geopolitical. The US is now locked in a high-stakes competition with China to shape global AI norms, governance models, and infrastructure. But while American technologists surge ahead, American diplomacy is lagging behind.

AI Is Now a Geopolitical Issue, Not Just a Technological One

For decades, foreign policy has centered on weapons, treaties, and territorial disputes. But in this century, diplomacy must also contend with predictive policing software in Africa, Chinese surveillance systems in Latin America, and generative AI tools used by authoritarian regimes to spread disinformation.

The State Department’s Emerging Technology primers, co-developed with the Foreign Service Institute and the Cyberspace and Digital Policy Bureau, reflect a growing awareness of this challenge.

China Is Actively Exporting Its Model of Digital Governance

China has understood this for years. Through initiatives like the Global Initiative on Data Security and the Digital Silk Road, Beijing is exporting its tech governance model across Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Huawei and ZTE offer affordable surveillance and communications infrastructure with few questions asked. These tools are bundled with training, cloud services, and soft power. In many places, the Chinese model is now the default.

How to Stop America’s Coming Financial Crisis

Mathew Burrows, and Josef Braml

A financial crisis triggered by the ever-compounding national debt could be closer than you think.

Big vessels, such as the US government, are difficult to change course. This is the reason why the Treasury Department’s RMS Titanic may soon crash. With the national debt surpassing $36 trillion and significant refinancing risks looming in 2025, immediate policy interventions are essential to avert a financial catastrophe. Faith in Trump’s TACO (“Trump Always Chickens Out”) brinkmanship may not been enough to stem investors’ growing disenchantment with American profligacy.

The Debt and Deficit Iceberg

The United States is structurally committed to high spending and low taxation, with both parties reluctant to enact meaningful reform. The fiscal system is unsustainable, with both the state and its citizens living well beyond their means, borrowing to sustain consumption and ego-driven expectations.

Since 1970, the budget deficit has persisted, except for a four-year period between 1998 and 2001. But the 2007–2008 financial crisis—when the government bailed out banks and expanded the money supply—saw the budget deficit jump. Then, it took another hit during the COVID-19 pandemic when most Americans received cash payments to help them survive the economic downturn.

Similarly, the US national debt has nearly doubled in a decade, from under $24 trillion in 2014 to nearly $36 trillion in 2024, exceeding its historical peak following World War II. The debt-to-GDP ratio will reach 122 percent by 2034. The United States has had five consecutive years of budget deficits exceeding $1 trillion, and in the last six months, its deficit has grown to more than $1.3 trillion.

Trump’s budget for 2025–26 has not been finalized. Still, despite his proposed sharp cut in discretionary spending, the boost of defense expenditures and extension of current tax cuts are estimated to add around $5 trillion over 10 years to the existing budget deficit.

Ukraine’s Daring Drone Victory Is a Win for the US, Too

Mark Voyger, and Yuliya Shtaltovna

In global affairs, perception can be more dangerous than reality, especially when the stakes involve war, deterrence, and the balance of power. President Donald Trump’s remarks about the Russian war in Ukraine as “senseless,” and “madness” went viral across social media platforms. True enough, the number and level of cruelty of war crimes the Russian army commits are beyond comprehension.

This war is not a random shuffle of tragic events. It is a litmus test for twenty-first-century deterrence—a high-stakes hand in the long-running, multidimensional game of geopolitical poker, where decisionmaking unfolds under conditions of incomplete information.

Even professional players lack full knowledge of the game’s structure or other players’ payoffs, creating uncertainty and forcing strategic choices based on belief systems and probabilities. At the poker table, calling a situation “senseless” often means losing track of the knowns—and losing a strategic edge. The audacious brilliance of the Ukrainian drone attack on Russian airbases last week demonstrates that Ukraine can and should win the war.

If Ukraine plays this hand right, the outcome can reinforce a rules-based order and reassert American strategic leadership. Ukraine’s daring drone attacks changed twenty-first-century warfare for the foreseeable future by redefining both deterrence and offensive operations. However, if the United States folds too early, the table—and the entire game—may never look the same again.

Congress’s Unwitting Death Blow to U.S. Critical Materials

Jeff Green

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act is a cornerstone of President Trump’s legislative agenda. Unfortunately, in the form recently passed by the House of Representatives, it threatens to undercut the president’s priorities on critical minerals and the defense industrial base. The House passed bill includes a little-noticed phase out of a key tax credit designed to reshore domestic critical minerals production from adversary nations.

The House bill repeals clean energy tax credits from the Biden era Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) to generate revenue for other priorities. Those repeals included phasing out the IRA’s Section 45X Advanced Manufacturing Production Credit — a 10% credit applied to the domestic production of critical minerals vital to our economy and military, and one of the only incentives America has ever implemented to rebuild its critical mineral supply chains.

President Trump’s March 20 Executive Order on Critical Minerals states, “transportation, infrastructure, defense capabilities, and the next generation of technology rely upon a secure, predictable, and affordable supply of minerals.” Moreover, “our national and economic security are now acutely threatened by our reliance upon hostile foreign powers’ mineral production. It is imperative for our national security that the United States take immediate action to facilitate domestic mineral production to the maximum possible extent.” The 45X phase-out directly opposes the president’s mandate, a move surely no Republican in the House of Representatives intended.

Critical minerals like rare earths empower the magnets in missile guidance systems, the propulsion of nuclear submarines, and the sensors and control surfaces that allow aircraft and radars to function. These materials are not optional. They are essential — and today, they are overwhelmingly processed in China.

The threat of global supply chain interruption is not theoretical. In 2024, China banned the export of gallium and germanium, materials critical to semiconductors and advanced optics. In April, China banned the export of rare earth elements, citing retaliation for tariffs as their justification. Unlike an embargo in 2010 limited to Japan, today’s ban includes all countries and expands from rare earth oxides and metals to include the most vital application -- magnets. This chokes off supply of a key material needed by the aerospace, consumer electronics, robotics, and automotive industries, among others.

Macron must lead the EU push to end Israel’s war on Gaza

Jo-Ann Mort

Emmanuel Macron has become enemy No 1 for the Benjamin Netanyahu government. That’s because the French president aims to create momentum for a Palestinian state beside Israel encompassing the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) and the Gaza Strip, reviving what is fast becoming an out-of-reach possibility – a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians.

That’s why Macron has earned the fury of an increasingly unhinged Israeli prime minister. France is expected to co-chair an organizing conference at the United Nations in New York in mid-June, taking advantage of heads of state already in North America for the Canadian-based G7 summit a few days earlier. He hopes this conference will include the all-important Saudi Arabia, and other Arab states.

Right now, it’s anyone’s guess whether the Saudis show up, as they calculate whether there is enough maneuverability on the Palestinian issue for them to expose themselves. I hope they show up – either at the foreign ministry level or, dramatically, with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman himself as co-chair, as Macron initially envisioned. The reality is that with a far-right Israeli government and prime minister in the clutches of its most extreme elements, it’s urgently important for world leaders who want to maintain a two-state option to turn up and shout out. There is no more important figure right now for Macron to have by his side than Prince Mohammed, who could also help influence a US president who presently appears to have no consistent diplomatic strategy for Israel-Palestine.

When an organizing group of Arab states that included the Saudi foreign minister tried to meet with the Palestinian Authority leadership in what has essentially become their city-state of Ramallah about a week ago, the Netanyahu government refused them entry in a rather unprecedented move. For the Saudis, showing up by Macron’s side would be an impactful response. It’s time to call Netanyahu’s bluff, go above his head and speak directly to the Israeli people. Macron should do the same.

In decades past, negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians were behind the scenes, out of media range. But now, after decades of an established peace process that has collapsed, it’s time to be bold, and visibly to engage global power to change the situation on the ground.

U.S. Tariffs Hit Japan Inc. Hard

Rupakjyoti Borah

Since the beginning of the Trump Administration’s second term, there has been a lot of turmoil in the U.S.’ international relations as well, including in the U.S.-Japan relationship.

While in the earlier term of President Trump (between January 2017 and January 2021), there was great camaraderie between President Trump and the former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, this seems to be missing in the second Trump Administration as Japanese PM Shigeru Ishiba was not among the first to meet President Trump, though Japan is the closest U.S. ally in East Asia.

Under Trump, there is no denying that Japan’s automotive sector, is reeling from a 25 percent tariff on finished automobiles and car parts. In addition, Japan has also been slapped with 24% reciprocal tariffs, though they have been paused for a while (along with those on many other countries). In the light of these tariffs on the automotive sector, leading Japanese auto manufacturers have projected a fall in revenues.

Teething Troubles

PM Shigeru Ishiba did visit Washington DC, in February this year, but that visit could not break the ice as far as the Trump-unleashed tariff war is concerned. During the final weeks of his term, the then U.S. President, Joe Biden, had blocked the proposed $15 billion acquisition bid by Japan’s largest steel producer, Nippon Steel, of U.S. Steel citing “national security concerns”. Though now President Trump has indicated that he also “opposes the deal” but at the same time, he has also indicated that he is “open to negotiation.”

There could be other problems in the bilateral ties as in Trump’s approach towards the security provided by the U.S. forces to Japan. Earlier in March 2016, Trump (as the then Republican frontrunner) had remarked that “the U.S. spends too much money protecting countries like Japan and Saudi Arabia and that they may need to go nuclear”

What is the state for, welfare or defence? It is no longer possible to have both

While the entire world has been enthralled by the public feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, the world has also continued to move on. It remains incredibly difficult to separate the signal from the noise, especially when the world’s richest and the world’s most powerful man are the ones making the noise. That these two would eventually end up in conflict was inevitable, as the only things they share in common are anti-wokeness and being in relationships with several women (sometimes, apparently, even simultaneously).

Musk’s ambitions to reduce waste and increase efficiency in the US government via DOGE (the Department for Government Efficiency) were laudable and not at all a useless endeavour. The cuts at USAID, a development agency that was funding lobby groups in Washington DC, at least as much as actual development projects (why, for example, was anti-Trump activist Bill Kristol getting millions from the US government?), were both needed and justified.

That being said, the truly big-ticket items remained beyond Musk’s reach. As in Europe, reforming and cutting the welfare state components of modern governments has become almost impossible. Over 45 per cent of the federal budget is spent on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Now add about 13 per cent that goes to defence spending, and over half of the federal budget is— for political reasons—beyond any meaningful reform. People mock Musk for only having been able to create savings amounting to 1 to 2 per cent of the federal budget, but given the headwinds he encountered, this is not bad for just 160 days.

Trump got this one right: A smaller National Security Council staff is actually a good thin

Dov S. Zakheim

President Trump’s decision to downsize the National Security Council staff has evoked howls of protest from members of the media and from former NSC staffers under President Joe Biden — at times they are one and the same. These critics argue that Trump is “removing part of his government’s brain” and increasing the risk of America being unable to address and respond to a developing crisis.

Their case would be much stronger if the NSC had, for example, understood the risks of a hurried withdrawal from Afghanistan and planned a more deliberate departure from that country.

Biden had reduced the size of the National Security Council staff, which at its apogee under President Barack Obama stood at 400. Yet the Obama administration failed to stop Bashar Assad’s chemical attacks on Syrian rebels and negotiated an agreement with Iran that Tehran began to violate before its ink had even dried.

Nor did a 200-person NSC staff under President George W. Bush successfully coordinate the warring State and Defense Departments — a contributing factor to U.S. failures in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

It is noteworthy that President George H.W. Bush — who managed a highly successful foreign and national security policy, including an outright victory over Saddam Hussein — relied upon no more than 60 NSC professionals. Their leader, Brent Scowcroft, is widely acknowledged to have been the most capable of all post-World War II national security advisors.

Bill Clinton’s NSC staff coordinated a relatively successful national security policy that included the expansion of NATO and the successful defenestration of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic and the end of the Balkan Wars. Clinton had increased the NSC staff by 50 percent from the previous administration, but it still numbered less than 100 officials and was half the size of Biden’s NSC cohort.

Ukraine’s Narrow Path to Victory Without Trum

Paul Hockenos

Ukraine’s battlefield prospects against Russia clearly dimmed when the Trump administration took office. Trump has consistently signaled that, at the very least, military aid resembling anything close to that the Biden administration bankrolled would not be forthcoming. Ukraine’s route to a secure and sovereign future thus became much narrower—so much so that a dark pessimism descended on many European observers.

But the excessive gloom is uncalled for—and counterproductive. Ukraine already produces the world’s most advanced front-line weaponry and innovates with cunning on the battlefield. It has already routed Russia in the Black Sea theater and, recently, pulled off another bombastic coup in Operation Spider Web, targeting 41 aircraft with drone strikes deep into Russia and likely destroying at least 10 of them. As long as the Ukrainians’ determination to fight on is undiminished, there are strategies available to help them win—even without U.S. support at the levels to which they have become accustomed.

Ukraine’s Drone Attack Doesn’t Matter

Stephen M. Walt

Operation Spider's Web—Ukraine’s dramatic and stunning drone attack on air bases deep inside Russia—illustrates several themes that have characterized the war ever since Russia launched its illegal invasion in 2022. It is an example of Ukraine’s resilience, creativity, and audacity, which are qualities that have surprised Moscow on more than one occasion. It showed the incompetence and complacency of the Russian national security and intelligence establishment, which failed to anticipate or detect Ukraine’s successful effort to smuggle more than 100 lethal drones and remote operators deep into Russian territory and close to air bases where strategic bombers were deployed. Russia’s battlefield performance has improved since the war’s early days, but its national security apparatus remains vulnerable.

However, the understandable satisfaction that many observers felt upon learning of Spider's Web also reflects some of the errors that have undermined efforts to develop an effective response to the Russian invasion. Brilliant tactical innovations cannot make up for asymmetries in forces or resolve and the absence of an effective overall strategy. Three years into the war, Kyiv and its backers still lack a convincing plan to thwart Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war aims and convince him to end the fighting. Putin’s resolve does not appear to have been shaken by this latest incident, and he was true to his word when he told U.S. President Donald Trump that his country was determined to retaliate.

Tariffs and Distrust Hit Critical Minerals

Geopolitical Futures

Base metals, battery metals and rare earth elements play major roles in the production of industrial and consumer goods used daily. Price volatility in these markets has eased in recent years, suggesting that producers have successfully scaled up new supply, particularly for base metals. Although overall demand for critical minerals remains strong, the return to pre-pandemic price levels has discouraged some investors from launching new projects related to nickel, cobalt and zinc. In contrast, materials like lithium, uranium and copper have not yet seen a comparable price decline.

Refining capacity and tariff uncertainty are also shaping the trajectory of the critical minerals industry. Refining operations are concentrated in a small number of countries. While the dominant player varies by material, China remains the world’s leading refiner across most metals. Current projections by the International Energy Agency suggest little change in the global refining landscape, despite widespread concern over the risks of overreliance on China. Both China and the United States have imposed export restrictions and tariffs as part of their ongoing trade conflict, which has already begun to affect market availability. This uncertainty has created a chilling effect on new supply development. Many investors prefer to wait for more stable conditions before committing capital to new ventures.

Ukraine’s Drone Attack on Russia’s Strategic Aviation Has Broader Implications

Maxim Starchak

Carnegie Politika is a digital publication that features unmatched analysis and insight on Russia, Ukraine and the wider region. For nearly a decade, Carnegie Politika has published contributions from members of Carnegie’s global network of scholars and well-known outside contributors and has helped drive important strategic conversations and policy debates.Learn More

The unprecedented attack on Russian military airfields by Ukrainian drones on June 1 is not only significant because it destroyed several strategic aviation aircraft. Operation Spiderweb also showed the world just how vulnerable Russia’s strategic nuclear forces are.

At the same time, it demonstrated that within a local conventional conflict, such attacks will not provoke a nuclear response from Moscow. The Russian nuclear doctrine was and remains aimed at the United States, and its goal is to prevent the threat of a global war.

The exact losses sustained by the Russian Aerospace Forces as a result of the Ukrainian drone attack have yet to be established, but they include at least seven Tu-95MS heavy strategic bombers, which are capable of carrying nuclear weapons. Several Tu-22M3 long-range bombers and at least one A-50 airborne early warning and control aircraft were also destroyed. According to the Financial Times, the drones destroyed or damaged about 20 percent of Russia’s operationally ready long-range aviation.

Russia currently produces one strategic bomber per year, so it will take at least seven years to make up for the losses. The Tu-95MSs and Tu-22M3s were designed back in the Soviet era and are no longer in production, so as a carrier of cruise missiles, their destruction is a major blow to Russian long-range aviation. The loss of the A-50, meanwhile, will reduce the effectiveness of fighter and strike aircraft.

Israel is accused of the gravest war crimes - how governments respond could haunt them for years to come

Jeremy Bowen

Even wars have rules. They don't stop soldiers killing each other but they're intended to make sure that civilians caught up in the fighting are treated humanely and protected from as much danger as possible. The rules apply equally to all sides.

If one side has suffered a brutal surprise attack that killed hundreds of civilians, as Israel did on 7 October 2023, it does not get an exemption from the law. The protection of civilians is a legal requirement in a battle plan.

That, at least, is the theory behind the Geneva Conventions. The latest version, the fourth, was formulated and adopted after World War Two to stop such slaughter and cruelty to civilians from ever happening again.

At the headquarters of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva (ICRC) the words "Even Wars Have Rules" are emblazoned in huge letters on a glass rotunda.

The reminder is timely because the rules are being broken.

Getting information from Gaza is difficult. It is a lethal warzone. At least 181 journalists and media workers have been killed since the war started, almost all Palestinians in Gaza, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Israel won't let international news teams into Gaza.

Since the best way to check controversial and difficult stories is first hand, that means the fog of war, always hard to penetrate, is as thick as I have ever experienced in a lifetime of war reporting.

It is clear that Israel wants it to be that way. A few days into the war I was part of a convoy of journalists escorted by the army into the border communities that Hamas had attacked, while rescue workers were recovering the bodies of Israelis from smoking ruins of their homes, and Israeli paratroopers were still clearing buildings with bursts of gunfire.

Israel wanted us to see what Hamas had done. The conclusion has to be that it does not want foreign reporters to see what it is doing in Gaza.

Elon Musk Just Picked a Fight He Cannot Win

James Crabtree

The widely predicted breakup of Elon Musk and U.S. President Donald Trump has finally and inevitably come to pass. Having recently departed his role as de facto head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the tech billionaire began to criticize Trump’s subsidy-filled budget bill, kicking off a war of words on social media and a resulting political firestorm.

What follows is likely to be a messy and vengeful separation that will do damage to the reputations of both men and the United States as a whole. But ultimately, this will be a lopsided fight in which the billionaire and his business empire, not Trump’s administration, will suffer most.

Tell Me How This Trade War Ends

Emily Kilcrease and Geoffrey Gertz

On April 2, a day he dubbed “Liberation Day,” President Donald Trump stood in the White House Rose Garden and announced a sweeping new program of tariffs intended to rebalance U.S. trade. Trump’s tariff rates were shockingly high, triggering a stock market selloff and a flight away from U.S. assets, rare rebukes from some Republicans in Congress, and diplomatic outrage around the world. After a week of mounting backlash, the president announced a 90-day pause on most of the country-specific tariffs, leading foreign counterparts to scramble for deals that would allow them to escape the levies before the clock ran out. U.S. court rulings questioning the legality of the president’s tariffs have added further uncertainty.

The Trump administration’s trade policy chaos has already caused harm, slowing growth, raising prices, and sparking dire predictions about the fate of the world economy. Yet there is a kernel of truth in the president’s insistence that the international trade system needs a reset. Distrust of free trade has been rising in both political parties in the United States. Governments around the world are more and more willing to intervene in their economies to safeguard national interests. The U.S.-led global trading order, constructed over eight decades following World War II, has frayed.

What comes next is uncertain. But there is no going back to a time when the United States championed ever freer trade. Although many of the targets of Trump’s tariffs, including businesses and foreign states, may pine for such a world, structural geopolitical changes have made it untenable. Instead of trying to turn back time, these actors should push the administration to usher in the needed transformation of the global trading order.

Disruptive tariffs, then, can create an opportunity. And despite the president’s erratic behavior, the United States retains deep-rooted structural advantages that give it the power to lead a new trade effort. Many countries are dependent on the U.S. market, and few see China as a viable alternative. Most major economies will seek accommodation with the United States, even after being beaten up by heavy U.S. tariffs. Washington can therefore leverage its trade wars to achieve a productive restructuring of the international economic system.

The mystery rise of lung cancer in non-smokers

Theres Lüthi

The number of lung cancer cases in people who have never smoked is increasing. The disease is different from lung cancer caused by smoking, so what causes it?

Martha first realised that something was wrong when her cough changed and the mucus in her airways became increasingly viscous. Her doctors put it down to a rare disorder she had that caused her lungs to become chronically inflamed. "No worry, it must be that," she was told.

When she finally had an X-ray, a shadow was detected on her lung. "That set the ball rolling," Martha recalls. "First, a CT scan was done, then a bronchoscopy [a procedure that involves using a long tube to inspect the airways in a person's lungs] to take tissue samples." After the tumour was removed, about four months after she'd first reported symptoms to her GP, she received the diagnosis: Stage IIIA lung cancer. The tumour had infiltrated the surrounding lymph nodes but had not yet spread to distant organs. Martha was 59 years old.

"It was a total shock," says Martha. Although she would occasionally light up a cigarette at a party, she never considered herself a smoker.

Lung cancer is the most common cancer worldwide and the leading cause of cancer death. In 2022, about 2.5 million people were diagnosed with the disease and more than 1.8 million died. Although tobacco-related lung cancers still account for the majority of diagnoses worldwide, smoking rates have been declining for several decades. As the number of smokers continues to fall in many countries around the world, the proportion of lung cancer occurring in people who have never smoked is on the rise. Between 10 and 20% of lung cancer diagnoses are now made in individuals who have never smoked.

"Lung cancer in never-smokers is emerging as a separate disease entity with distinct molecular characteristics that directly impact treatment decisions and outcomes," says Andreas Wicki, an oncologist at the University Hospital Zurich, Switzerland. While the average age at diagnosis is similar to that of smoking-related lung cancers, younger patients with lung cancer are more likely to have never smoked. "When we see 30- or 35-year-olds with lung cancer, they are usually never-smokers," he says.

Defending U.S. Military Bases Against Drones? A Recent Tabletop Exercise Explores How

Paul Lushenko, Russell McGuire, Christopher G. Pernin, Sean M. Zeigler

In 2016, during coalition operations against the Islamic State, defense leaders started characterizing drones, especially small-unmanned aircraft systems, as a threat to U.S. military personnel and installations. Since then, drones have proliferated and increasingly threaten military personnel and bases, both at home and abroad.

In March 2025, more than 100 participants from more than two dozen federal agencies participated in a tabletop exercise exploring aspects of counter-drone operations. This was the sixth event in a series of tabletop exercises exploring various aspects of counter-drone operations, capabilities, authorities, and threats. The most recent event was designed to explore a key research question in the homeland—how can the Joint Force and Interagency support Northern Command's synchronization of counter-drone operations to defend military bases in the homeland?

The Joint Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office (JCO) partnered with RAND in designing hypothetical but realistic drone incursion scenarios that attempted to fulfill stakeholders' interests without priming them to think and respond in certain ways. The scenarios drew insights from recent drone incursions at U.S. military installations. Two different sites, Fort Bliss in Texas and Joint Base Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, informed the tabletop exercise. This allowed the exercise team to vary conditions that, when considered in combination with one another, approximated the complexity of drone incursions at military bases. These included various drones flying at different bearings, altitudes, and ranges from military bases; multiple modes of transportation, from which participants could adjudicate the merits—and limits—of applying counterpositioning, navigation, and timing capabilities; and, a litany of federal, state, and local authorities, in addition to military units.

Will Musk's explosive row with Trump help or harm his businesses?

Lily Jamali

When Elon Musk recently announced that he was stepping back from politics, investors hoped that would mean he would step up his involvement in the many tech firms he runs.

His explosive row with US President Donald Trump - and the very public airing of his dirty White House laundry - suggests Musk's changing priorities might not quite be the salve they had been hoping for.

Instead of Musk retreating somewhat from the public eye and focusing on boosting the fortunes of Tesla and his other enterprises, he now finds himself being threatened with a boycott from one of his main customers - Trump's federal government.

Tesla shares were sent into freefall on Thursday - falling 14% - as he sounded off about Trump on social media.

They rebounded a little on Friday following some indications tempers were cooling.

Even so, for the investors and analysts who, for months, had made clear they wanted Musk off his phone and back at work, the situation is far from ideal.

How the United States Can Win the Global Tech Race

Vivek Chilukuri

The Trump administration has scrapped its predecessor’s sweeping export controls for advanced artificial intelligence chips, known as the AI diffusion rule.

“To win the AI race, the Biden AI diffusion rule must go,” posted David Sacks, U.S. President Donald Trump’s top AI advisor, on May 8. Sacks continued his criticism at the Saudi-U.S. Investment Forum a few days later, arguing that the rule “restricted the diffusion or proliferation of American technology all over the world.”

Toward a New Understanding of Air Dominance

Nolan Peterson

Back in the day when I was an Air Force Special Operations pilot flying missions over Afghanistan, I belonged to what we called a “stack” of aerial assets that orbited over a target location both prior to and during an operation. To support a raid on a terrorist hideout in the Hindu Kush, we might have fighters or strike aircraft orbiting overhead, as well as unmanned and manned ISR platforms. We’d also have tankers flying tracks somewhere nearby, offering aerial refueling options to those who needed it, as well as airborne battle management platforms monitoring the whole shebang.

With all this iron in the air, we could monitor a target location (typically a walled-in Taliban compound) for many hours prior to a special operations raid. Different aircraft would tag in and out of the stack, maintaining constant overwatch. We’d observe patterns of life and update the inbound American special operators about the enemy force they’d face.

Once combat began, we were the eyes in the sky for our teams on the ground. Using our advanced sensors, we called out play-by-play updates on what the enemy militants were doing, and where they might be hiding. If one fled the target compound, we’d label them a “squirter” and keep tabs. Sometimes, a clever “squirter” would bring along a wet blanket to use as a form of thermal concealment from our sensors — some ran to a nearby wadi where, if it had recently rained, they’d try to conceal their body heat with water or mud, like Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character in the movie Predator.

Years later, we now see Ukrainian and Russian soldiers attempting similar tactics to evade detection by small drones equipped with thermal sensors.

The stacks we flew over Afghanistan were impressive operations. Perhaps a bit overkill, at times, considering our enemies were often holed up in fortress compounds that Alexander the Great would have found familiar. But that kind of aerial overkill is the privilege of nations that enjoy air dominance, as America did in the skies of Iraq and Afghanistan during the GWOT era. This air dominance empowered and informed our ground forces to consistently outmatch our enemies. From my personal point of view as a former pilot, I take great pride in the fact that I played some role, however minor, in keeping American special operators safe.

AI agents could tip the cybersecurity balance towards defenders

Nataly Kremer

AI is becoming a powerful shield and a potential attack vector for cybersecurity.

AI presents an opportunity to resolve vulnerabilities before code is ever deployed.

Agentic AI has the potential to establish a new era of cyber resilience, but only if we seize this moment and shape the future of cybersecurity together.

AI is fast becoming one of the linchpins of modern business – and with it, modern IT and cybersecurity. In a few short years, our use of AI has shifted from experimental to essential, transforming the way we work and think about work. The overlap here is significant.

The emergence of AI-powered systems is reshaping the nature of cyber defence and the rise of Agentic AI introduces both unprecedented opportunities and complex new risks. As AI becomes a powerful cyber shield and a potential attack vector, security leaders must evolve their thinking and tooling to match.

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AI’s role in shifting the cybersecurity balance

Historically, cyber defence has always played catch-up. Threat actors have been able to innovate faster, coordinate better and exploit gaps before organizations can patch them. In the cat and mouse game of cybersecurity, the advantage has been on the attackers’ side; after all, they only need to be successful once, while defenders must successfully block threats every time to avoid a breach.

AI presents a unique opportunity to flip the script. Imagine a future where vulnerabilities are flagged and resolved before code is ever deployed, where systems can autonomously correct security flaws as they arise and where every endpoint and agent participates in a global, self-healing defence network.

If attackers are still leading the innovation curve a few years from now, we’ll have missed the moment. Agentic AI promises to play a leading role in this shift.

Operation Spider’s Web and the Future of War

Ravi Agrawal

Drones are changing the very nature of warfare. After playing a salient role in the recent conflict between India and Pakistan, unmanned aircraft stunned the world in Operation Spider’s Web on June 1, when Ukraine struck multiple sites deep in Russian territory. But are technological advances like drones and AI leveling the playing field or giving military powers an even greater advantage?

The answers to these questions are no longer theoretical. With conflicts playing out on multiple continents, the world has suddenly been thrust into the future of war. On the latest episode of FP Live, I spoke with military expert Mara Karlin, a professor at Johns Hopkins University who has advised six secretaries of defense. Karlin helped author and execute the National Defense Strategy in 2022, when she was deputy undersecretary of defense for policy in the Biden administration. Subscribers can watch the full discussion in the video box atop this page or follow the FP Live podcast. What follows here is a condensed and lightly edited transcript.

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