South Korea's Park Geun-hye won the dubious honor last night of becoming the second G-20 president to be removed from office by impeachment in the past seven months, after Brazil. Park's removal, which sends the country directly into new elections, heightens uncertainty around the interlocking security dilemmas centered on North Korea.
From a political science perspective, the dynamic is straightforward enough. In contrast to Nikki Haley, America's new U.N. ambassador, who said this week that Kim Jong Un is “not a rational person,” the best explanation for North Korea's race for nuclear-armed missiles is that Pyongyang isn't insane but insecure. Still, the North's bellicosity is driving the U.S. to install the THAAD missile defense system in South Korea, to which China is loudly objecting. The Seoul-based system wouldn't itself be able to shoot down Chinese missiles (here's a helpful chart). But China seems to believe that THAAD could provide intelligence on Chinese missile designs or would help act as a kind of early-warning system against Chinese nuclear attacks against the U.S. In other words, ostensibly defensive actions from each party unnerves the others. Now South Korea's new president will get a say. Given the intensity of the dispute about THAAD, even among South Korean politicians, expect it to stay at the center of regional politics.
Back in the U.S., the rollout of the Republican health care plan is a test of Trump's ability as salesman-in-chief. Trump is largely letting Congress run the show on domestic policy. If Republicans are able to get a version of the current plan through — early signs are not great — then additional portions of the GOP's agenda, like tax reform and infrastructure investment, start looking more likely. But if Trump proves unable to channel his inner LBJ and crack congressional heads, then he and congressional Republicans will both face blowback from their base, and could fracture. This, more than anything Trump does abroad, will set the tone for his administration. Just ask Barack Obama.
Finally, Turkey continues to act as a spoiler with the countries that would otherwise be its closest allies. Germany's Angela Merkel is again defending what she sees as universal values, in this case, rejecting explicit comparisons to Nazism by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his foreign minister. Erdogan has seized on limits placed on rallies for expatriates within Germany ahead of the upcoming Turkish referendum on his executive powers, and his strategy has been to use the issue as a wedge between himself and the German government. Meanwhile, the U.S. has physically inserted itself into a potential dispute in Syria, directing U.S. special operations forces on the ground to fly the American flag to keep Turkish forces from coming to blows with Syrian Kurds. Turkey's allies better gird themselves for the long fight. If the referendum Erdogan is campaigning for passes next month, he's going to be in control for a good while longer.
Ranked: Bizarre Explanations for Celebrities' Meetings with Julian Assange
5. Writing a book. Google's Eric Schmidt paid Assange a visit in 2011 to conduct an interview that would inform a book. Fittingly, WikiLeaks proceeded to leak a transcript of the interview.
4. Peer pressure. In 2012, the singer and Assange pal MIA sent an unusual tweet to Lady Gaga: “if ur at harrods today , come visit Assange at the Ecuador embassy across the st.” Lo and behold, it worked. Gaga proceeded to spend several hours at the embassy.
3. Working out. In 2014, WikiLeaks released an image of French football star and actor Eric Cantona in the Ecuadorian embassy exercising on a treadmill. The rationale? Cross-training.
2. Dating Julian? Actress Pamela Anderson has visited Assange repeatedly over the past few months, leading tabloids to suggest the two might be dating. Assange denies it, but that explanation is better than the alternative theory floated for Anderson's visits: she was trying to poison him with Vegan food.
1. I can't recall. Nigel Farage visited Assange's embassy hideout yesterday. When questioned by a reporter from Buzzfeed, “Farage said he couldn't remember what he had been doing in the building.” Maybe Theresa May can try that excuse for Brexit.
Your Weekly Bremmer
“What you have been hitting us with is coming back to hit you.”– Rwandan President Paul Kagame, calling out Western leaders for double-standards in advocating for particular political systems. The populist wave makes it harder to criticize African governance.
