Would a China War Scenario Break the Insiders’ Hold?

Elizabeth Saunders has written a chilling book, The Insiders’ Game, showing that the “facts on the ground” or the nation’s longer-term interests have often taken a back seat to partisan political exigencies when it comes to foreign policy. After a string of disastrous wars in recent decades, the public’s trust in policymakers’ capacity to make the right decision has taken a beating. Unless China attacks first, a decision to intervene against it over Taiwan is unlikely to be left up to the foreign policy elite. Not only would any military action threaten a potentially ruinous escalation, but a war between the two largest economic powers would ensure the downfall of the global economy no matter who won militarily. Recent presidents Biden and Trump have sensed that the public has grown increasingly opposed to taking any major military risks.