Trump’s Foreign-Policy Crisis Arrives
For two and a half years, the world has wondered how President Donald Trump would cope with a real international crisis. That crisis may have finally arrived in Hong Kong, as Beijing appears poised to execute a massive, violent crackdown against protesters. And how it’s resolved will matter not just for Trump’s political fortunes—it will determine whether the United States and China can find a basis for managing competition with each other, or whether they will be locked in a new and volatile Cold War.
Unrest in Hong Kong would pose a particularly difficult challenge for any American president, who would have to balance support for democracy, human rights, and peaceful protest against the need to avoid interfering in China’s domestic affairs.
The shadow of Budapest in 1956 looms large. Hungarians believed, with good reason,
