America is having a code red moment. Which of its enemies is likely to strike first?
US presidential elections and the uncertain transition periods that follow have traditionally been viewed by military, intelligence and security officials as moments of maximum national vulnerability. They will be especially worried now.
The fact that Donald Trump is ill in hospital, presidential advisers and Republican senators are also unwell, or self-isolating, and the election campaign is in chaos will intensify a sense of dangerous exposure at the Pentagon, CIA and state department.
“This is a code red moment for the US government on multiple levels,” said Samantha Vinograd, a former member of Obama’s national security council. “It weakens any credibility that the US has in terms of being a competent global leader prepared to confront threats.”
The risks are twofold. One is the fear that foreign enemies or hostile forces – North Korea and Islamic State terrorists are two possible candidates – may choose this fraught moment to take unspecified actions against the US or its allies.
“With the president’s illness amid a divisive campaign, we should not discount the possibility that China will step up pressure on Taiwan or Russia [will] seek to take advantage in eastern Europe,” warned Nicholas Burns, a former senior US diplomat.
There is also a risk that US military chiefs, on edge and lacking clear direction from the White House, could overreact to real or imagined foreign threats and take pre-emptive action to neutralise them.
One example is the ongoing tension with Iran in the Gulf region. Since Trump ordered the assassination of a top Iranian general in Iraq in January, there have been frequent, repeat rocket attacks on US and western interests in Baghdad by pro-Iranian militias. Iraq is the sort of flashpoint that could escalate rapidly if militants try to take advantage of a perceived power vacuum in Washington.
Other possible flashpoints include Taiwan and the South China Sea, where tensions between the US and China have risen sharply. Trump has deployed powerful naval forces in the region. In response, Beijing has mounted intrusive military operations amid heightened talk of imposing a “solution” on Taipei.
Part of the problem is how the turmoil in Washington appears to a watching world. “The perception of a president stricken by Covid-19, perhaps in part because of his own lax protocols, doesn’t inspire confidence,” Vinograd said. “This is a major downside risk for the US position on the world stage.”
Another difficulty compounding the US sense of vulnerability is that Trump has sidelined the national security decision-making apparatus created after 1945 to stop presidents acting on a whim, as Franklin Roosevelt is said to