{"id":40971,"date":"2018-07-27T06:00:29","date_gmt":"2018-07-26T20:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=40971"},"modified":"2018-07-26T17:21:24","modified_gmt":"2018-07-26T07:21:24","slug":"riders-on-the-storm-what-the-tour-de-france-tells-us-about-global-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/riders-on-the-storm-what-the-tour-de-france-tells-us-about-global-security\/","title":{"rendered":"Riders on the storm: what the Tour de France tells us about global security"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

Warning: This post contains specialist language. For a glossary of terms, see here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Tour de France might be one of the best ways of understanding shifts in global security and the implications of those shifts. It gives insights into American leadership under President Donald Trump, into how US allies and partners are beginning to work together, and into how China is using a historic opportunity.<\/p>\n

Someone wins the Tour every year, but it\u2019s never an individual victory. To win, you need to be part of a team. Individual champions can win individual stages, but without the backing of other riders they fall back to the pack.<\/p>\n

You can guess who I\u2019m thinking of here: the flamboyant rider Trump and his new team, America First. Trump saw his old team, Team Ally\u2014an international hodgepodge of like-minded riders of varying abilities\u2014as costs, even though they\u2019d had a dominant record on the Tour for years. In his mind, if not on the track, he\u2019s the fastest rider on the Tour. His team was just holding him back. Trump inherited Team Ally when he got selected in 2016 over previous Tour winner Barack Obama, and he didn\u2019t like it. So he founded his own team in time to start this year. Unfortunately, he\u2019s its only rider.<\/p>\n

He now pedals alone, occasionally throwing bidons at the wheels of his previous team members Angela Merkel, Theresa May and the reliable and pretty quick support rider Shinzo Abe. Even Malcolm Turnbull, a rock-solid rouleur in every race he\u2019s ridden with Team Ally, who faithfully did the grunt work of bringing Trump water bottles and energy bars, doesn\u2019t quite know what to make of his old mate\u2019s change of heart. Emmanuel Macron rode some early stages with Trump, but they\u2019ve not been seen together in recent days.<\/p>\n

The fact that Team Ally keeps following him and helping him stay ahead of the peloton is just making Trump crankier. That they\u2019re riding a lot of US bikes\u2014some borrowed, some purchased\u2014has provoked loud recriminations and demands for money that have played out in public on most nights of this year\u2019s Tour.<\/p>\n

Trump sees China\u2019s Xi Jinping and Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin as formidable competitors and worthy adversaries. In his vanishingly few introspective moments, he may even worry that they\u2019re faster than America First. He admires their rule-breaking and seems to want to copy it, but has been held back to date by the team lawyers. He loves the plucky North Korean grimpeur Kim Jong-un, despite knowing he gets his speed from the concealed mini nuclear engine buried deep in the bike frame\u2014which he says he won\u2019t use on some future Tour, in the 2030s maybe.<\/p>\n

Trump hasn\u2019t yet noticed that the European riders on Team Ally are forming their own breakaway group and having late-night after-stage chats over doughnuts with Turnbull, Abe and Team India\u2019s Narendra Modi.<\/p>\n

In previous Tours, Team China has had a pretty lonely ride. Under lead rider Hu Jintao, the team was known as a strong competitor mainly interested in corporate sponsorships, with fourth-place stage positions and no podiums. In recent years, the flood of money that Xi has used to re-equip other teams\u2019 riders and help out with their lavish hotel bills before and after the race has bought him a lot of help on the ride. Xi\u2019s shift to rebrand it Team Xi with himself as the lead rider in perpetuity, along with his aggressive riding and no-holds-barred tactics, has also changed things. He\u2019s offered to rebuild sections of road in time for next year\u2019s Tour.<\/p>\n

Some riders are starting to wear Xi\u2019s colours in a loose acknowledgement of their work together. Xi knows they don\u2019t love him, but he\u2019s clear-headed in understanding that if he keeps splashing the cash he might just be on the podium in Paris wearing the maillot jaune. He\u2019s thinking of a decade of Tour dominance. He knows people eventually learn to like winners.<\/p>\n

Xi worries about holding his team back home together so that the money keeps flowing. He knows that continued corruption scandals there could bring him undone, and he\u2019s also worried that Team Xi is getting known for its rough-house tactics with other riders, allegations of bike sabotage, payoffs and rumours of violence at home. Lance Armstrong is not far from his thoughts. None of that shows on the Tour.<\/p>\n

With almost 30 years since its last Tour victory, Team Russia is in every stage to win, and if not, then to make damn sure its archrivals don\u2019t. This has led to nasty claims and counterclaims of bike meddling and substance abuse. Team Russia tends to blame the victims and keep riding. Bashar al-Assad is helping as a domestique, and mercurial Hungarian Viktor Orb\u00e1n and Greek rider Alexis Tsipras are providing informal back-up. But Putin\u2019s courting of the charismatic and notoriously tough-riding Turk, Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan, may cause trouble in the group. It\u2019s already a case of too many individuals, not enough team.<\/p>\n

As with every Tour, there\u2019s human drama outside the leading group. The spectacular mid-week crashout off the Col de Portet by UK rider Boris Johnson caused a media frenzy. Holding his twisted bike, Johnson swore at helpful spectators and jeered at local farmers. His post-stage remarks didn\u2019t clear much up. He claimed that his exit from the Tour was a planned manoeuvre that modelling showed would make him stronger in future races, while also accusing a European race official of teargassing the corner where he left the track.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s exciting to pick this year\u2019s Tour winner from this pack of riders. It\u2019s unlikely to be Trump, and it\u2019s hard to see Putin on the podium (but if does get there, the Union Cycliste Internationale might launch an agonisingly slow, obstructed inquiry). Next year looks even harder for America First, whose corporate affairs look likely to be dogged by disputes with sponsors. Xi might win this Tour. To come out on top in future years, though, he\u2019ll need a team, not a bunch of riders with split loyalties, held together by cash and favours. That\u2019s a tough transition, and Xi will stay distracted by issues at home.<\/p>\n

We also shouldn\u2019t forget the strengths that have made Team Ally so dominant for decades\u2014strengths that are still there in training, fitness, equipment and teamwork. So, the smart money\u2019s already looking at the chances of a revitalised Team Ally winning next year\u2019s Tour after they develop a new strategy that doesn\u2019t rely so heavily on a single champion rider. Rumour is they\u2019ll keep their US bikes, but there\u2019ll be no more \u2018loaners\u2019 without ready money put down.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Warning: This post contains specialist language. For a glossary of terms, see here. 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