Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Jason Miks.

May 22, 2018

Team Trump and Kim's Great Big (Mutual) Illusion

President Trump cast doubt on the timing of his scheduled meeting with Kim Jong Un during talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Washington on Tuesday. That could reflect an awkward paradox the US and North Korea find themselves facing, suggests Peter Apps for Reuters: Talking about talks is better than actually talking.

"All sides have a vested interest in keeping the diplomatic process going, but none really want to give up much while they do so. Anything that allows delay, therefore, can almost be seen as a positive — providing it doesn't cause such great anger on any side that matters start to escalate dramatically again," Apps says.

"That makes it possible neither side would lose much sleep should the Singapore talks have to be delayed. The most likely scenario, however, remains the status quo continuing on the peninsula, even as all sides pull out all the stops to maintain the illusion of a forward-moving diplomatic process."

What counts as a win? North Korean denuclearization doesn't appear to be on the table, at least in the short term, writes Motoko Rich for The New York Times. That doesn't mean Team Trump won't be able to find a way to declare any summit a win.

"Experts — many of whom have sharply criticized Mr. Trump's improvisational approach to diplomacy and apparent lack of knowledge about the history of prior, failed deals with North Korea — said one realistic outcome could be a simple declaration stating that denuclearization is an eventual goal," Rich writes.

"Coupled with a North Korean agreement to extend its moratorium on nuclear and long-range missile tests, and a promise not to export nuclear arms, analysts said such a deal would be an important starting point for future negotiations."

About the "New" Saudi Arabia…

Don't be fooled by the warm and fuzzy headlines about Saudi Arabia opening cinemas and allowing women to drive. The arrests of several rights activists suggests that conservative forces still hold sway – and that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman might not be as committed to reform as first thought, suggests Simon Henderson for The Atlantic.

"What is happening in the kingdom? MbS may want to discourage any popular protests seeking additional social or political changes," Henderson writes. "His reforms were always likely to provoke opposition from within Saudi Arabia's male-dominated, hierarchical society, which follows a strict interpretation of Islam. The apparent need to arrest women activists suggests that MbS is having to rethink his grand plans."

"In 1990, several dozen women were arrested for driving through Riyadh. But today's Saudi Arabia is meant to be different, and MbS is supposed to be a different kind of royal. The world's hopes are on him to create a modern Saudi Arabia, able to detach itself from its conservative theocratic underpinnings. After these latest arrests, his ability to satisfy those hopes is in doubt."

Get Ready for the Cold Soup War

A US-China trade war may have been averted for the time being, but the reality is that the underlying issues aren't going away, argues Nathaniel Taplin in the Wall Street Journal. Why? Because China's future economic success rests on NOT doing what the US is demanding.

"Headlines on trade these days are like leftover pea soup—sometimes hot, sometimes chilly, always unsatisfying," Taplin writes.

"China's leaders are well aware their best hope of joining the ranks of wealthy nations is the continued absorption—some might say stealing—of developed-world technology. Leveraging low-cost labor and advanced foreign technology is, after all, one of the main ways developing countries experience so-called catch-up growth. The US itself once pursued a similar strategy: the 19th century New England textile juggernaut was launched with stolen British intellectual property."

"China will therefore be open to tinkering but unlikely to cease large-scale state support for its high-tech industries—the key complaint of US hard-liners."

China's Giant-Sized Baby Problem

China appears poised to completely abandon restrictions on the number of children that families can have, after loosening the rules in 2015, Bloomberg reports. The problem? It probably won't work – and that bodes ill for the country's economy, writes Justin Fox.

"Fertility rates were falling in China even before the policy was imposed in 1979, and they have fallen even further since 1960 in nearby countries and territories without such rules," Fox notes.

"When birth rates fall sharply from high levels, a country can for decades enjoy what has come to be called a demographic dividend, with the ratio of those too old or too young to work to the working-age population (known as the age-dependency ratio) dropping below 50 percent and growth accelerating. China's great growth spurt of the past four decades has in fact coincided with a steep drop in its age-dependency ratio. Those days are over; China hit peak demographic dividend in 2010, and its age-dependency ratio is expected to cross 50 percent in 2032."

It's not just China – America's birthrate is at its lowest in 30 years, write John Rowe, Dana Goldman and S. Jay Olshansky for The Hill. That is imperiling Social Security and Medicare.

"Both programs impose heavy fiscal burdens on society. Much of this cost is workforce related and paid through taxes tied to earnings and income," they write.

Sweden Gets Ready for Total Defense

Sweden's government isn't naming names. But the distribution of a new leaflet explaining to its citizens how they can prepare for "total defense" is obviously being done with Russia in mind, writes Rick Noack for the Washington Post.

"Sweden has 20,000 active military members while Russia has over a million, and the Swedes would be unlikely to win any confrontation with Moscow. Stockholm also isn't a member of NATO, the military alliance that obliges members to help defend member states in case of an attack," Noack writes.

"Instead, Sweden is circling back to its Cold War-era strategy of total defense, which relies on all citizens resisting an invasion and refusing to cooperate with any foreign powers."

The leaflet "comes with illustrations showing Swedes fending off foreign powers or responding to catastrophes, as well as lists of essential food or advice on how to deal with a broken toilet."

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