The Geopolitical Risks Coming Up with a Trump Election
The Upcoming US Elections give us a taste of what the world could look like under a Harris administration or a Trump administration. Today in this episode with David Dunn we dive into the five geopolitical risks of a Trump administration.
1. Russian Invasion?
Firstly, the ongoing war in Ukraine is a real security risk would Trump win the upcoming presidential election. Having mentioned several times that he would ‘fix the war in a day’ and ensure peace swiftly, it can only hint at one thing: the undermining of Ukrainian independence with Russia gaining access to the territories it wants. Not only would it be undermining Ukrainian independence it would also ensure great risk regarding European security. Sweden has started to hand out pamphlets to its citizens urging them to be prepared for an upcoming war, showing the real risk of Russia willing to expand its borders.
And this risk is realistic, as Putin has demanded more Ukrainian land before he claims is willing to end the war in Ukraine. It has been claimed by the Foreign Minister of Estonia, Margus Tsahkn, that essentially Putin is aiming to get the USSR back, which would mean invading independent NATO countries. This would have tremendous consequences regarding an all out war with NATO being involved, as well as Russia trying to get involved into foreign politics. Think of the recent referendum in Moldova regarding EU accession for example.
2. Outright war in the Middle East
Secondly, the expansion of the conflict between Israel and Hamas. With Israel now bombing Lebanon, as well as the Syrian border, it seems to be aiming at an all out war with Iran. Hezbollah has been helping Hamas, which is not a secret, however, the plans of Netanyahu to ‘decimate’ Palestine cannot be justified in attacking Lebanon. In this article we discuss the probability of peace in the Middle East more deeply, but it is pretty unlikely, especially with Netanyahu showing a map without the West-bank proving that the aim is to fully colonise it.
It seems therefore that Israel is willing to eliminate its enemies. Which includes Iran, as Netanyahu has specifically mentioned the freedom of the Iranian people arriving more swiftly than they could hope. With the US backing Israel, would Israel attack Iran, it would mean a US involved war. Iran is sponsored by Russia, which would entail a war between the US and Russia. Feels like the Cold War again!
3. China eyeing up Taiwan
Thirdly, the Chinese geopolitical threat. We have discussed the international risks of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) on this podcast before. You find the podcast episode here. Nonetheless, that is not the only risk China is posing to geopolitical risk. Depending on what a Trump administration would do with ensuring ‘peace’ between Ukraine and Russia, and how much Putin gets away with annexation and invasion, China could seize the moment to invade and annex Taiwan. Currently the message China is getting, is that Russia has gotten away with invading Ukraine, which would mean China could potentially get away with invading Taiwan. China has previously mentioned that the US is goading it to invade Taiwan and has recently upscaled its military exercises around Taiwan. Again, this would mean that the US gets involved in a war, would China invade Taiwan, as the US is a Taiwanese ally. The US arms Taiwan and has helped in the past.
4. African Expansion of Population
Fourthly, the population expansion of Africa has expanded massively. It has expanded from 283 million in 1960 to more than 1.5 billion in 2024 and is projected to increase by 950 million and touch 2.5 billion by 2050. This gives a lot of opportunity and growth to Africa, but combined with our point five, it can have devastating consequences as well. Climate change will lead to massive migration as more and more of Africa becomes unliveable. More and more resources become more scarce, which leads to food crises and conflict, often violent conflict. This in turn will also lead to massive migration. It will be interesting to see what China’s influence will be regarding the BRI as well as how African countries will deal with the upcoming geopolitical and climate issues.
5. Climate Change
Finally, climate change might be the biggest global risk of all. With climate change deniers on the rise, and with a Trump being one, the risk of irreversible damage gets bigger every day. Making the earth a liveable place for all seems to be so logical. However, with the climate changing there is more and more chance of hurricanes and therefore damage to people’s living spaces. However, with Western countries, like the US willing to stop their aim to keep below the +2C, what incentive do less well faring countries have? Why would you bend backwards if the main polluters are unwilling to adhere to the rules they themselves made up? Why bother if the West doesn’t bother?
The risks are immense, with climate change leading to more Sahara’s and unliveable zones. These unliveable zones lead to less food cultivation and food crises, like the one in Sudan currently. The unliveable zones and food crises in turn lead to mass immigration. Finally, these mass immigrations lead to more tensions and more geopolitical issues like the ones mentioned above and here.
