US intelligence study warns of growing risk of conflict

The risk of conflicts between and within nations will increase over the next five years to levels not seen since the Cold War as global growth slows, the post-World War Two order erodes and anti-globalisation fuels nationalism, a US intelligence report warned today.

“These trends will converge at an unprecedented pace to make governing and cooperation harder and to change the nature of power – fundamentally altering the global landscape,” said “Global Trends: Paradox of Progress”, the sixth in a series of quadrennial studies by the US National Intelligence Council.

The findings, published less than two weeks before US President-elect Donald Trump takes office on 20 January, outlined factors shaping a “dark and difficult near future”, including a more assertive Russia and China, regional conflicts, terrorism, rising income inequality, climate change and sluggish economic growth.

The report underscored the complex difficulties Trump must address in order to fulfil his vows to improve relations with Russia, level the economic playing field with China, return jobs to the United States and defeat terrorism.

The National Intelligence Council comprises the senior US regional and subject-matter intelligence analysts. It oversees the drafting of National Intelligence Estimates, which often synthesise work by all 17 intelligence agencies and are the most comprehensive analytic products of US intelligence.

The study, which included interviews with academic experts as well as financial and political leaders worldwide, examined political, social, economic and technological trends that the authors project will shape the world from the present to 2035, and their potential impact.

‘Inward-looking West’

It said the threat of terrorism would grow in coming decades as small groups and individuals harnessed “new technologies, ideas and relationships”.

Uncertainty about the United States, coupled with an “inward-looking West” and the weakening of international human rights and conflict prevention standards, will encourage China and Russia to challenge American influence, the study added.

Those challenges “will stay below the threshold of hot war but bring profound risks of miscalculation,” the study warned. “Overconfidence that material strength can manage escalation will increase the risks of interstate conflict to levels not seen since the Cold War.”

While “hot war” may be avoided, differences in values and interests among states and drives for regional dominance “are leading to a spheres of influence world,” it said,

The latest Global Trends, the subject of a Washington conference, added that the situation also offered opportunities to governments, societies, groups and individuals to make choices that could bring “more hopeful, secure futures”.

It warned that governance will become more difficult as issues, including global climate change, environmental degradation and health threats demand collective action while such cooperation becomes harder.