Despite Donald Trump’s return, complete US disengagement from Europe is not inevitable. America will continue to have strategic interests in Europe. Building a separate European nuclear deterrent is not yet necessary. But it is clear that the Trump administration will devalue transatlantic relations and turn its strategic attention to the Indo-Pacific. Dutch, Nordic and Polish analysts agree with their British, French and German colleagues that firming up European nuclear and conventional deterrence, in particular vis-à-vis Russia, calls for better coordination between Berlin, London and Paris, and deeper and more systematic consultation with other capitals. Europe needs to invest in conventional deterrence assets and increase nuclear arsenals. France and Britain could share more information about their nuclear capabilities and plans with their European allies, and Paris should drop its aversion to participating in NATO’s internal nuclear deliberations and join the Nuclear Planning Group. Joint exercises could be enhanced. Europe also needs a long-term political strategy for stabilising its relationship with Russia.

Sixty years of nuclear-arms-control efforts have been successful in many respects, with one notable exception: it has proven difficult to transition from a bilateral (US–Soviet Union/Russia) to a multilateral format in seeking to limit and reduce existing nuclear weapons. This is principally because of a mistaken approach to multilateral disarmament that does not take into account the nature of multilateral deterrence among nuclear states. Yet a transition to a multilateral format is becoming an indispensable condition for the rescue of the non-proliferation and disarmament system in the emerging polycentric world order. Assuming that the Russia–Ukraine war can first be settled, a new approach to multilateral arms control is needed that takes into account the security interests of all the participating states.

Since Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack, Israel has engaged in expanding societal conflict, which involves directly impacting and indirectly engineering the emotions and behaviour of entire societies. Israel’s military has dealt its adversaries severe operational blows, but has failed to translate them into enduring strategic gains. Extensively harming or immiserating civilians is unlikely to yield such gains unless the perpetrator is willing to engage in conquest by annihilation. The militarily stronger party can rationalise societal war as an effort to deter as well as avenge, but international condemnation and the target population’s enduring humiliation and fervent desire for retribution are likely to frustrate both goals. Accordingly, Israel should complement its threat to apply military power with the promise of a political path to possible statehood that many Palestinians desire and see Hamas as blocking.

How the World Ran Out of Everything: Inside the Global Supply Chain Peter S. Goodman. London and New York: Mariner Books, 2024. £25.00/$30.00. 416 pp. The Assault on the State: How the Global Attack on Modern Government Endangers Our Future Stephen E. Hanson and Jeffrey S. Kopstein. Cambridge: Polity, 2024. £20.00. 182 pp. How a Ledger Became a Central Bank: A Monetary History of the Bank of Amsterdam Stephen Quinn and William Roberds. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023. £25.99. 400 pp. Seven Crashes: The Economic Crises That Shaped Globalization Harold James. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2023. $32.50/£20.00. 376 pp. The Future of the Factory: How Megatrends Are Changing Industrialization Jostein Hauge. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2023. £35.00/$45.00. 240 pp.

The United States' partnership with Syrian Kurdish groups has greatly complicated its interactions with Turkiye. While the US and Turkiye initially worked together to dislodge Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime, their interests diverged when countering the Islamic State (ISIS) became the main US concern and countering Kurdish autonomy Turkiye's chief aim. Over Turkish objections, the US trained and equipped Syrian Kurdish forces, which became the principal element of the Syrian Democratic Forces - the US-engineered umbrella group that was instrumental in ousting ISIS from its Syrian strongholds and continues to function as a deterrent, backstopped by a light US presence. The Turkish government would now prefer that the Assad regime re-establish its authority in northern Syria and extinguish Kurdish aspirations for autonomy. The US military presence in Syria prevents such an eventuality. If Syrian Kurds see an opportunity to advance Kurdish autonomy, tensions between the US and Turkiye in the region could significantly increase.

Owing to the far-right Rassemblement National’s (RN) strong showing in the European Parliament elections in May, French President Emmanuel Macron abruptly dissolved the French National Assembly and called for elections three weeks later. He hoped centre-right and centre-left voters would decisively coalesce behind him and against the RN. Ultimately, due to the emergence of a ‘Republican Front’ and its tactical voting, the left-wing Nouveau Front Populaire alliance finished first, Macron’s centrist bloc second and the RN third. No group gained an absolute majority, leaving a hung parliament. This could have tectonic consequences for the French political landscape and European politics. If efforts to forge a centrist coalition fail, a provisional government – possibly a ‘technocratic’ one – would probably materialise. This would mean a much less audible France on the European stage; minimum spending that would drain material support for Ukraine; and new elections in a year.

How Data Happened: A History of the Age of Reason to the Age of Algorithms Chris Wiggins and Matthew L. Jones. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2023. $30.00. 367 pp. Guardrails: Guiding Human Decisions in the Age of AI Urs Gasser and Viktor Mayer-Schönberger. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2024. £22.00/$27.95. 240 pp. The Will to Predict: Orchestrating the Future Through Science Eglė Rindzevičiūtė. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2023. £54.00/$59.95. 306 pp. The Gutenberg Parenthesis: The Age of Print and Its Lessons for the Age of the Internet Jeff Jarvis. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023. £20.00/$27.00. 328 pp. A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought This Through? Kelly Weinersmith and Zach Weinersmith. London: Particular Books, 2023. £25.00/$32.00. 448 pp.

Globalisation and related mutual dependencies have challenged the historical and strategic assumptions of both the United States and China, and reshaped traditional paradigms in international relations. Furthermore, in an increasingly multipolar world, hegemony is not a guaranteed outcome. Neither the US nor China has prepared itself for the limitations imposed by the changing structure of global networks, under which the ability of any single actor to influence linkages within the system has been greatly reduced and peripheral players are beginning to enjoy greater freedom of action.