COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment—Overview of Issues and Further Reading for Congress

April 30, 2020 – January 10, 2024 R46336

COVID-19: Potential Implications for
January 10, 2024
International Security Environment—Overview Ronald O'Rourke
of Issues and Further Reading for Congress
Specialist in Naval Affairs

In the earlier months of the COVID-19 pandemic, some observers argued that the pandemic
could be a world-changing event with potentially profound and long-lasting implications for the

international security environment. Other observers were more skeptical that the pandemic would
have such effects.
In reports issued in March 2021, April 2021, February 2022, and February 2023, the U.S. intelligence community provided
assessments of potential or observed impacts of the pandemic on the international security environment.
Observers who discussed whether the pandemic would be world-changing for the international security environment focused
on several areas of potential change, including the following, which are listed here separately but overlap in some cases and
can interact with one another:
• world order, international institutions, and global governance;
• U.S. global leadership and the U.S. role in the world;
• China’s potential role as a global leader;
• U.S. relations and great power competition with China and Russia;
• the relative prevalence of democratic and authoritarian or autocratic forms of government;
• societal tension, reform, transformation, and governmental stability in various countries;
• the world economy, globalization, and U.S. trade policy;
• allied defense spending and U.S. alliances;
• the cohesion of the European Union;
• the definition of, and budgeting for, U.S. national security;
• U.S. defense strategy, defense budgets, and military operations ;
• U.S. foreign assistance programs, international debt relief, and refugee policy;
• activities of non-state actors;
• the amount of U.S. attention devoted to ongoing international issues other than the pandemic; and
• the role of Congress in setting and overseeing the execution of U.S. foreign and defense policy.
Issues for Congress include whether and how the pandemic has changed the international security environment and whether
the Biden Administration’s actions for responding to any such change are appropriate and sufficient. Congress’s decisions
regarding these issues could have significant implications for U.S. foreign and defense policy.
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Introduction
In the earlier months of the COVID-19 pandemic, some observers argued that the pandemic could
be a world-changing event with potentially profound and long-lasting implications for the
international security environment. Other observers were more skeptical that the pandemic would
have such effects. This report provides a brief overview of some potential implications the
pandemic might have for the international security environment, and appendices listing CRS
reports and other writings for further reading.
Issues for Congress include whether and how the pandemic has changed the international security
environment and whether the Biden Administration’s actions for responding to any such change
are appropriate and sufficient. Congress’s decisions regarding these issues could have significant
implications for U.S. foreign and defense policy.
Appendix A presents a list of CRS reports that provide more in-depth discussions of issues
presented in this report. Appendix B presents a list of additional writings reflecting various
perspectives on these issues.
Background
Assessments by U.S. Intelligence Community
In reports issued in March 2021, April 2021, February 2022, and February 2023, the U.S.
intelligence community provided assessments of potential or observed impacts of the pandemic
on the international security environment. Excerpts from these four reports are presented below.
March 2021 NIC Report on Global Trends
A March 2021 report of the National Intelligence Council (NIC)1 on global trends—the 2021
edition of a report that NIC publishes every four years to serve as an unclassified strategic
assessment on key trends that might shape the world over the next 20 years—includes a section
on the potential impact of the pandemic, which states
The COVID-19 pandemic emerged globally in 2020, wreaking havoc across the world,
killing more than 2.5 million people as of early 2021, devastating families and
communities, and disrupting economies and political dynamics within and between
countries. Previous global trends editions forecasted the potential for new diseases and
even imagined scenarios with a pandemic, but we lacked a full picture of the breadth and
depth of its disruptive potential. COVID-19 has shaken long-held assumptions about
resilience and adaptation and created new uncertainties about the economy, governance,
geopolitics, and technology.
To understand and assess the impact of this crisis, we examined and debated a broad range
of our assumptions and assessments related to key global trends. We asked a series of

1 The Office of the Director of National Intelligence states that the National Intelligence Council “supports the Director
of National Intelligence [DNI] in his role as head of the Intelligence Community (IC) and is the IC’s center for long-
term strategic analysis. Since its establishment in 1979, the NIC has served as a bridge between the intelligence and
policy communities, a source of deep substantive expertise on intelligence issues, and a facilitator of Intelligence
Community collaboration and outreach. The NIC’s National Intelligence Officers—drawn from government, academia,
and the private sector—are the Intelligence Community’s senior experts on a range of regional and functional issues.”
(Director of National Intelligence, “National Intelligence Council—Who We Are,” accessed July 9, 2021, at
https://www.dni.gov/index.php/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=393&Itemid=778.)
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questions: Which existing trends will endure, which trends are accelerating or decelerating
because of the pandemic, and where are we likely to experience fundamental, systemic
shifts? Are the disruptions temporary or could the pandemic unleash new forces to shape
the future? Much like the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, the COVID-19 pandemic
is likely to produce some changes that will be felt for years to come and change the way
we live, work, and govern domestically and internationally. How great these will be,
however, is very much in question.
ACCELERATING, SHARPENING SOME TRENDS
The pandemic and corresponding national responses appear to be honing and accelerating
several trends that were already underway before the outbreak. COVID-19 brought global
health and healthcare issues into sharp relief, exposed and in some cases widened social
fissures, underscored vast disparities in healthcare access and infrastructure, and
interrupted efforts to combat other diseases. The pandemic also highlighted weaknesses in
the international coordination on health crises and the mismatch between existing
institutions, funding levels, and future health challenges.
Catalyzing Economic Trends. Lockdowns, quarantines, and the closing of international
borders have catalyzed some pre-existing economic trends, including diversification in
global supply chains, increased national debt, and greater government intervention in
economies. Moving forward, the character of globalization may retain some of the changes
from this crisis period, and debt, particularly for developing economies, will strain national
capacities for many years.
Reinforcing Nationalism and Polarization. Nationalism and polarization have been on
the rise in many countries, especially exclusionary nationalism. Efforts to contain and
manage the virus have reinforced nationalist trends globally as some states turned inward
to protect their citizens and sometimes cast blame on marginalized groups. The response
to the pandemic has fueled partisanship and polarization in many countries as groups argue
over the best way to respond and seek scapegoats to blame for spreading the virus and for
slow responses.
Deepening Inequality. The disproportionate economic impact of COVID-19 on low-
income earners has caused them to fall further behind. When COVID-19 is finally
controlled, many families are likely to have experienced further setbacks, especially those
working in the service or informal sectors or who left the workforce to provide dependent
care—predominantly women. The pandemic has exposed the digital divide within and
between countries while spurring efforts to improve Internet access.
Straining Governance. The pandemic is straining government capacity for services and
contributing to already low levels of trust in institutions in countries that have not
effectively handled the response. The pandemic is exacerbating the confusing and
polarized information environment that is undermining public confidence in health
authorities, particularly in open societies. Illiberal regimes in some countries are using the
pandemic as a pretext to more severely crack down on dissent and restrict civic freedoms,
conditions that may outlive the disease.
Highlighting Failed International Cooperation. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the
weaknesses and political cleavages in international institutions, such as the World Health
Organization (WHO) and United Nations, and called into question countries’ ability and
willingness to cooperate multilaterally to address common challenges beyond infectious
disease, particularly climate change. The WHO, which has faced significant funding
difficulties and resistance to mandatory surveillance regimes, is facing its gravest shock in
nearly two decades. The crisis, however, may ultimately lead actors to make deeper
reforms, standardize data collection and sharing, and forge new public-private
partnerships.
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Elevating the Role of Nonstate Actors. Nonstate actors, ranging from the Gates
Foundation to private companies, have been crucial to vaccine research or retrofitting
equipment to mass produce medical supplies and personal protective equipment. Nonstate
networks will complement national and intergovernmental action in future health crises,
including early warning, treatment, facilitation of data-sharing, and vaccine development.
WHILE OTHERS DECELERATE OR REVERSE
COVID-19 is slowing and possibly reversing some longstanding trends in human
development, especially the reduction of poverty and disease and closing gender inequality
gaps. The longest lasting reversals may be in poverty reduction across Africa, Latin
America, and South Asia, followed by losses in gender equality. The resources devoted to
fighting COVID-19 and social restrictions could reverse years of progress against malaria,
measles, polio, and other infectious diseases by consuming key financial, material, and
personnel resources.
The COVID-19 emergency may bring regions together in ways that previous crises have
not.
Although European countries early in the crisis imposed restrictions on border traffic and
exports of critical medical supplies, the European Union has rallied around an economic
rescue package and other emergency measures that could bolster the European integration
project going forward. COVID-19 could also lead to redirection of national budgets toward
pandemic response and economic recovery, diverting funds from defense expenditures,
foreign aid, and infrastructure programs in some countries, at least in the near term.
MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS
The unanticipated second- and third-order effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have
reminded us how uncertain the future is—both in the long and short term. As researchers
and analysts, we must be ever vigilant, asking better questions, frequently challenging our
assumptions, checking our biases, and looking for weak signals of change. We need to
expect the unexpected and apply the lessons of this pandemic to our craft in the future.2
April 2021 DNI Threat Assessment
An April 9, 2021, report from the Director of National Intelligence (DNI)—DNI’s annual threat
assessment for 2021—includes a section on the pandemic that states (emphasis as in the original):
The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted life worldwide, with far-reaching effects that
extend well beyond global health to the economic, political, and security spheres. We
expect COVID-19 to remain a threat to populations worldwide until vaccines and
therapeutics are widely distributed. The economic and political implications of the
pandemic will ripple through the world for years.
The pandemic is raising geopolitical tensions, and great powers are jockeying for
advantage and influence. States are struggling to cooperate—and in some cases are
undermining cooperation—to respond to the pandemic and its economic fallout,
particularly as some governments turn inward and question the merits of globalization and
interdependence. Some governments, such as China and Russia, are using offers of medical
supplies and vaccines to try to boost their geopolitical standing.
The economic fallout from the pandemic is likely to create or worsen instability in at
least a few—and perhaps many—countries, as people grow more desperate in the face
of interlocking pressures that include sustained economic downturns, job losses, and
disrupted supply chains. Some hard-hit developing countries are experiencing financial

2 National Intelligence Council, Global Trends 2040, A More Contested World, March 2021, pp. 11-13.
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and humanitarian crises, increasing the risk of surges in migration, collapsed governments,
or internal conflict.
◼ Although global trade shows signs of bouncing back from the COVID-19-induced
slump, economists caution that any recovery this year could be disrupted by ongoing
or expanding pandemic effects, keeping pressure on many governments to focus on
internal economic stability. In April, the International Monetary Fund estimated that
the global economy would grow 6 percent this year and 4.4 percent in 2022. This
year’s forecast is revised up 0.5 percentage points relative to the previous forecast,
reflecting expectations of vaccine-powered strengthening of activity later in the year
and additional policy support in a few large economies. The global growth contraction
for 2020 is estimated at 3.3 percent.
◼ The resurgence in COVID-19 infections early this year may have an even greater
economic impact as struggling businesses in hard-hit sectors such as tourism and
restaurants fold and governments face increasing budget strains.
◼ The effects on developing countries—especially those that rely heavily on remittances,
tourism, or oil exports—may be severe and longer lasting; many developing countries
already have sought debt relief.
◼ The economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, along with conflict and weather
extremes, has driven food insecurity worldwide to its highest point in more than a
decade, which increases the risk of instability. The number of people experiencing
high levels of acute food insecurity doubled from 135 million in 2019 to about 270
million last year, and is projected to rise to 330 million by yearend.
The COVID-19 pandemic is prompting shifts in security priorities for countries around
the world. As militaries face growing calls to cut budgets, gaps are emerging in UN
peacekeeping operations; military training and preparedness; counterterrorism operations;
and arms control monitoring, verification, and compliance. These gaps are likely to grow
without a quick end to the pandemic and a rapid recovery, making managing conflict more
difficult—particularly because the pandemic has not caused any diminution in the number
or intensity of conflicts.
COVID-19-related disruptions to essential health services—such as vaccinations, aid
delivery, and maternal and child health programs—will increase the likelihood of
additional health emergencies, especially among vulnerable populations in low-income
countries. As examples, the pandemic has disrupted HIV/AIDS treatments and
preventative measures in Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as measles and polio vaccination
campaigns in dozens of countries. World populations, including Americans, will remain
vulnerable to new outbreaks of infectious diseases as risk factors persist, such as rapid and
unplanned urbanization, protracted conflict and humanitarian crises, human incursions into
previously unsettled land, expansion of international travel and trade, and public mistrust
of government and health care workers.3
February 2022 DNI Threat Assessment
A February 7, 2022, report from DNI—DNI’s annual threat assessment for 20224—refers in its
foreword to “the continued global disruption resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic” and further
states in the foreword:

3 Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community, April 9,
2021, pp. 17-18.
4 Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community,
February 7, 2022, 30 pp.
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The lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic will continue to strain governments and
societies, fueling humanitarian and economic crises, political unrest, and geopolitical
competition as countries, such as China and Russia, seek advantage through such avenues
as “vaccine diplomacy.” No country has been completely spared, and even when a vaccine
is widely distributed globally, the economic and political aftershocks will be felt for years.
Low-income countries with high debts face particularly challenging recoveries and the
potential for cascading crises leading to regional instability, whereas others will turn
inward or be distracted by other challenges. The IC [U.S. intelligence community]
continues to investigate the concerning incidences of Anomalous Health Incidents and the
danger they pose to U.S. personnel. (Page 4)
The report includes a section focusing on the impacts of the pandemic that states (emphasis as in
the original):
INFECTIOUS DISEASES AND THE IMPACT OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
The COVID-19 pandemic has killed millions of people and disrupted life worldwide, with
far-reaching effects extending well beyond global health to the economic, political, and
societal spheres. Although the most severe health impacts of COVID-19 are lessening as
global vaccination coverage increases and natural immunity builds, countries worldwide
will continue to grapple with COVID-19 during the next year. The socioeconomic and
political implications of the pandemic will ripple through the world for years.
The economic fallout from the pandemic is likely to continue to challenge governments
and hold back human development and wellbeing, particularly in low-income countries.
Societal discontent resulting from these conditions could worsen instability in some
countries and fuel surges in international migration, as people grow more desperate in the
face of interlocking pressures that include sustained economic downturns.
— The COVID-19 pandemic will continue to increase debt burdens, constrain
government spending by poor countries, and cause persistent job insecurity, in turn
undermining economic and political stability, particularly in low-income countries.
Although global trade shows signs of bouncing back from the COVID-19-induced slump,
economists caution that any recovery this year could be disrupted by ongoing or expanding
pandemic effects, keeping pressure on many governments to focus on internal economic
stability.
— The economic fallout from COVID-19, combined with conflict and weather extremes,
has driven hunger worldwide to its highest point in more than a decade, which increases
the risk of instability. The number of people facing acute food insecurity doubled from 135
million in 2019 to more than 270 million in 2020, and is projected to continue rising.
COVID-19 is likely to continue to strain health systems and create conditions that could
facilitate the spread of other infectious diseases globally, including to the U.S. homeland.
— The pandemic has significantly disrupted essential health services—for example,
causing healthcare worker shortages, delays in non-emergency procedures, or avoidance
of healthcare facilities because of fears of becoming infected with COVID-19—which are
likely to worsen health outcomes and continue to hamper countries’ abilities to control
disease, particularly low and middle-income countries.
— Influenza and other seasonal respiratory diseases could surge to abnormally high levels
in 2022 with the reduction of COVID-19 mitigation measures, which have dampened
circulation of these diseases since early 2020, and in turn reduced the level of population
immunity to these infections.
Countries globally remain vulnerable to the emergence of a novel pathogen that could
cause a devastating new pandemic. Drivers for disease emergence persist and are on the
rise, including deforestation and other human encroachment into unsettled land, wildlife
harvesting and trade, livestock production, and climate change. These drivers are
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compounded by factors that facilitate global spread, such as international travel and trade,
inadequate global disease surveillance and control, distrust of public health authorities,
health disinformation, and health system strain brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Emerging agricultural diseases—even those that do not harm humans directly—threaten to
cause immense economic damage and disruption to food supplies if they spread globally
or into new regions. (Pages 18-19)
The report elsewhere includes additional statements that refer to the pandemic, including the
following (emphasis as in the original):
• “We will see continuing potential for surges in migration from Afghanistan, Latin
America, and other poor countries, which are reeling from conflict and the
economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic.” (Page 5)
• “China will continue spreading COVID-19 misinformation and downplaying its
early failures while casting blame on the West. Its misinformation includes
claims that the United States created COVID-19.” (Page 8)
• “Russia also uses its capabilities in COVID-19 vaccine development and civilian
nuclear reactor construction as a soft-power tool in its foreign policy.” (Page 11)
• “[North Korean leader Kim Jong Un] probably does not view the current level of
pressure on his regime, the economic hardships resulting from sanctions and his
domestic COVID-19 countermeasures as enough to require a fundamental
change in approach.” (Page 16)
• “The IC continues to investigate how SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes
COVID-19, first infected humans.... Beijing continues to hinder the global
investigation, resist sharing information, and blame other countries, including the
United States.” (Page 19)
• Global shortcomings in preparedness for the pandemic and questions
surrounding the origins of the COVID-19 virus and biosecurity may inspire
some adversaries to consider options related to biological weapons
developments.
— As China, Iran, and Russia continue to publicly tout individual or collaborative efforts
to improve biosecurity, they have pushed narratives that further drive threat perceptions,
including linking U.S. laboratories abroad to COVID-19 origins, breaches in biosafety,
untrustworthy vaccines, and biological weapons. This messaging probably will be
amplified in the lead up to the once-every-five-years Review Conference of the Biological
and Toxin Weapons Convention, tentatively slated to convene in mid-2022. (Page 19)
• “In the Western Hemisphere, factors such as longstanding poor socioeconomic
conditions, perceived changes in U.S. immigration policy, and employment
opportunities in the United States will continue to drive migration to the
Mexico-U.S. border; a growing number of people from around the world see
transiting Mexico as a way to reach the United States..... Eased COVID-19-
related travel restrictions and perceptions of greater job opportunities in a
recovering U.S. economy are contributing to a rise in migration. These dynamics,
along with perceptions of U.S. immigration policies, will determine the flow of
migrants this year.” (Pages 24-25)
• “Economic disparities and the effects of conflict and extreme weather will
encourage internal and international migration and refugee flows. Migration
and displacement will heighten humanitarian needs, increase the risk of
political upheaval, exacerbate the risk of other health crises, and aid
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recruitment and radicalization by militant groups—particularly as COVID-19
strains global humanitarian response mechanisms.” (Page 25)
• “A majority of Afghans are suffering food insecurity because of the effects of
conflict, drought, and COVID-19 disruptions, and further deterioration almost
certainly will increase internal displacement, which could lead to international
migration. Refugee flows could spike if the Taliban attempted to relieve pressure
by allowing larger populations to leave Afghanistan or conditions sharply
deteriorated.” (Page 28)
• “The Middle East will remain a region characterized by persistent conflict, with
active insurgencies in several countries, sparring between Iran and other
countries, and terrorism and protest movements sparking occasional violence.
Domestic volatility will persist as popular discontent and socioeconomic
grievances continue to rise, particularly as the region contends with the
economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing the risk of internal
or international conflict that would threaten U.S. persons and national security
interests.” (Page 29)
• “Burma’s security and economic conditions probably will continue to deteriorate
because both the regime and the opposition are relying on the use of force in an
attempt to break the ongoing political stalemate and advance their respective
positions. Both sides remain entrenched in their positions and neither are able to
decisively prevail. Economic deterioration and ongoing violence in addition to
the ongoing COVID-19-pandemic will amplify the country’s deteriorating
humanitarian conditions, such as population displacement, food insecurity, and a
poorly functioning health care system.” (Page 30)
• “Latin America and the Caribbean almost certainly will see hotspots of volatility
in the coming year, undermining or distracting reliable U.S. partners from
improving living conditions, tackling illicit flows, addressing climate change, and
warding off foreign influence. In many cases, the COVID-19 pandemic has
intensified high levels of public discontent with worsening longstanding poor
socioeconomic conditions and public services that manifested in large anti-
government protests. Elevated levels of U.S.-bound migration from Latin
America and the Caribbean region will persist into at least mid-2022 because the
underlying economic and insecurity drivers will remain unchanged, and migrants
view the U.S. labor market and immigration policies and enforcement as
favorable.” (Page 30)
• “Sub-Saharan African governments will exhibit clear agency in their foreign
affairs as the international community recognizes the importance of the region to
its economic and security interests. Large numbers of U.S. citizens will be at risk
from conflict in several countries. As the region seeks to reinvigorate its upward
trajectory following the social and economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic,
it will continue to face unstable commodities prices, poor service delivery and
endemic corruption, stresses of extreme weather events, and insecurity because
of terrorism, insurgency, sectarian violence, and political instability.” (Page 30)
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February 2023 DNI Threat Assessment
A February 6, 2023, report from DNI—DNI’s annual threat assessment for 20235— includes a
section focusing on the impacts of the pandemic that states (emphasis as in the original):
INFECTIOUS DISEASES AND THE IMPACT OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
Now entering its fourth year, the COVID-19 pandemic remains one of the most
significant threats to global public health, at a cost of more than 6.5 million lives lost
and trillions of dollars in lost economic output to date. Despite the gradual decline of the
most severe health effects of COVID-19 because of the greater availability of vaccines
globally, increased natural immunity, and better treatments, significant challenges remain
as countries now are responding to new variants, waning vaccine protection, gaps in
vaccine coverage, challenges in management of public health safety measures, and growing
misinformation campaigns aimed at sowing doubt and discrediting public health
institutions worldwide. In addition to direct effects of the pandemic, resultant economic,
human security, political, and national security implications of COVID-19 continue to
strain recovery efforts, presenting both known and unforeseen challenges that probably
will ripple through society and the global economy during the next year and for years to
come.
— During the next year, pandemic-related higher debt burdens, constrained government
spending, and ongoing employment disruptions and insecurity are expected to heighten the
risk of financial instability and poverty, particularly in low-income countries and those
recovering from the most severe economic effects of COVID-19.
— The combination of economic and human security challenges resulting from COVID-
19 probably will further strain capacities of governments to meet public demands during
the next year and for years to come, particularly when combined with the need to address
similar challenges arising from climate change. The potential for public discontent and
societal divisions will grow, and risks to democratic governance, political stability, and
migration fluctuations in some countries will increase.
— Despite some improvement during the last year, pandemic effects continue to
challenge the delivery of essential health services—in some cases because of healthcare
worker shortages, delays in non-emergency procedures, or avoidance to seek healthcare
because of misinformation or fears of becoming infected with COVID-19. The factors
probably will continue to contribute to poor health outcomes and hamper countries’
abilities to control disease, particularly low- and middle-income countries.
Countries globally remain vulnerable to the emergence or introduction of a novel
pathogen that could cause a devastating new pandemic. Drivers for disease emergence
persist and are on the rise, including climate change, deforestation, human encroachment
into previously undisturbed habitats, wildlife harvesting and trade, mass food production,
and lack of international consensus on biosafety norms. These drivers are compounded by
factors that facilitate global spread, such as international travel and trade, inadequate global
disease surveillance and control, distrust of public health authorities, health disinformation,
and health system strain brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Emerging agricultural
and livestock diseases and antimicrobial resistance—although not necessarily involving
pathogens of pandemic concern—threaten to cause immense economic damage and
disruption to food supplies if they spread globally or into new regions.
— A lack of global field biosafety standards and protective measures continues to raise
concerns of viral spillover worldwide. Increased interest in field sampling and advanced
biological research since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, poor training, and lack of

5 Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community,
February 6, 2023, 39 pp.
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international inspection and standardized regulatory requirements have all been implicated
in contributing to the risk of contamination and/or breaches in biocontainment.
Our Assessment of the Origins of COVID-19
The IC continues to investigate how SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, first
infected humans, maintaining a Community of Interest across agencies. All agencies
assess that two hypotheses are plausible explanations for the origin of COVID-19: natural
exposure to an infected animal and a laboratory-associated incident.
— Beijing continues to hinder the global investigation, resist sharing information, and
blame other countries, including the United States. (Pages 24-25)
The report elsewhere includes additional statements that refer to the pandemic, including the
following (emphasis as in the original):
• “Russia has used its capabilities in COVID-19 vaccine development and the
nuclear power export industry as foreign policy tools.” (Page 13)
• “North Korea’s COVID-19 restrictions and reliance on the Korean People’s
Army (KPA) to enforce and execute some pandemic countermeasures probably
have caused overall KPA combat readiness to decline in the near term, but key
units probably will remain capable of executing their wartime missions.” (Page
20)
• “Global shortcomings in preparedness for the COVID-19 pandemic and
concerns with biosecurity, fabricated public claims about U.S. biological
weapons development fueled by U.S. adversaries, as well as continued
questions surrounding the origins of the COVID-19 virus, may inspire some
adversaries to consider options related to the development of biological
weapons. China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia continue to publicly push false
narratives that may drive global threat perceptions of biological weapons,
including linking U.S. laboratories abroad to COVID-19 origins, breaches in
biosafety, untrustworthy vaccines, and biological weapons.” (Page 25)
• “Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has aggravated COVID-19-related
fragilities in the global economy, raised commodity prices, fueled market
volatility, and contributed to food insecurity and financial instability,
particularly in low-income countries.” (Page 28)
• “Russia’s war in Ukraine coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic has increased
poverty, hindered economic growth, and widened inequality, raising the
conditions that are ripe for domestic unrest, insurgencies, democratic backsliding,
and authoritarianism.” (Page 34)
• “Russia’s war in Ukraine coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic has increased
poverty, hindered economic growth, and widened inequality, raising the
conditions that are ripe for domestic unrest, insurgencies, democratic
backsliding, and authoritarianism.” (Page 38)
Overview of Areas of Potential Implications
Areas of potential change reflected in writings from observers who have discussed whether the
pandemic will be a world-changing event include but are not limited to those discussed below.
Although these areas of potential change are presented separately, they overlap in some cases and
can interact with one another.
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World Order, International Institutions, and Global Governance
Some observers focused on whether the pandemic could cause or accelerate changes to the U.S.-
led liberal international order that has operated since World War II, to the international institutions
and norms that contribute to it, and consequently to global governance.6 Changes to the
international order and its supporting institutions and norms could affect the international context
for addressing not only the pandemic, but other international issues as well.
U.S. Global Leadership and Role in the World
The pandemic could influence discussions over the costs and benefits to the United States of
acting as a global leader, not only with respect to global health but across a range of issues.
In the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on how the pandemic may have
illustrated the strengths or weaknesses of the Trump Administration’s “America First” approach
to the U.S. role in the world. Some observers argued that the pandemic demonstrated that the
United States was maintaining or reasserting its role as global leader, while others argued that the
pandemic demonstrated that the United States chose to withdraw from or was no longer capable
of performing that role, and that the pandemic was the first major international crisis since World
War II for which the United States did not serve as the leader for spearheading, organizing, or
implementing an international response.
Other observers argued that the U.S. response to the pandemic focused international attention on
what they view as a need for reform at the World Health Organization (WHO), demonstrated the
strength and innovativeness of the U.S. scientific and pharmaceutical establishments in terms of
developing and manufacturing vaccines, and demonstrated the flexibility and resiliency of the
U.S. federal system in terms of permitting states and localities to respond to the pandemic in ways
that were tailored to local conditions.
Some observers, including some foreign observers, argued that the U.S. domestic response to the
pandemic demonstrated weaknesses in U.S. democracy, governance, and public health,
particularly in comparison to how certain other countries responded to the pandemic within their
own borders, and that this could reduce the ability of the United States in the future to offer itself
or be accepted by other countries as a global leader on other international issues or as a model for
other countries to emulate. As vaccines became more widely available in the United States, some
observers argued that the United States should export larger numbers of vaccine doses to other
countries that need them so as to demonstrate U.S. global leadership and help protect U.S. public
health and the U.S. economy by helping to end the global pandemic more quickly.

6 The term international order or world order generally refers in foreign policy discussions to the collection of
organizations, institutions, treaties, rules, norms, and practices that are intended to organize, structure, and regulate
international relations during a given historical period.
Other terms used to refer to the U.S.-led liberal international order include postwar international order, rules-based
international order, and open international order. Observers sometimes substitute world for international, or omit
international or world and refer simply to the liberal order, the U.S.-led order, and so on. In the terms liberal
international order and liberal order, the word liberal does not refer to the conservative-liberal construct often used in
discussing contemporary politics in the United States or other countries. It is, instead, an older use of the term that
refers to an order based on the rule of law, as opposed to an order based on the arbitrary powers of hereditary
monarchs.
Though often referred to as if it is a fully developed or universally established situation, the liberal international order,
like other international orders that preceded it, is incomplete in geographic reach and in other ways; partly aspirational;
not fixed in stone, but rather subject to evolution over time; sometimes violated by its supporters; not entirely free of
might-makes-right behavior; resisted or rejected by certain states and non-state actors; and subject to various stresses
and challenges.
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China’s Potential Role as a Global Leader
Some observers focused on whether the pandemic provided insight into whether China desires
and is working to become a global leader on par with (or in the place of) the United States, to
what degree China has a capacity for doing so, and how other countries might view China acting
in such a role. China’s transparency, particularly regarding the origin of the COVID-19 virus,
China’s actions in the early days of its COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, trial data on the efficacy of
China’s vaccines, as well as China’s actions to send vaccines, other medical supplies, and medical
personnel to other countries, perhaps for political or diplomatic purposes, became elements of a
broader ongoing discussion regarding China’s capacity or suitability for acting as a global leader.
U.S. Relations and Great Power Competition with China and Russia
Some observers focused on how the pandemic became an element in U.S-China relations, and in
U.S. great power competition with China and Russia. For some observers, the pandemic
presented an opportunity for U.S.-China cooperation on an important international issue of
common interest. For other observers, the pandemic became a source of dispute and an arena of
competition between the two countries, and contributed to a hardening of U.S.-China relations
into a Cold War-like adversarial situation.
In the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on what they viewed as a
competition or race between the United States, China, Russia, and other countries to develop,
manufacture, and administer effective vaccines, and thus be able to restore their economies to full
operation sooner than other countries. Some observers focused on whether China and Russia were
attempting to use exports of their vaccines as levers to gain advantages in their relations with
recipient countries. The terms vaccine nationalism and vaccine diplomacy were used by some of
these observers to refer to such perceived activities. Some observers expressed concern that
decisions by countries to pursue vaccine development and deployment in a competitive,
individual manner rather than a cooperative, multilateral manner could reduce the overall
effectiveness of efforts to develop, manufacture, and administer effective vaccines and as a
consequence prolong the global pandemic.
Some observers focused on the pandemic as a factor in the discussion of whether the United
States should decouple its economy from China’s and reduce its dependence on China for key
materials and products, including hospital supplies and pharmaceuticals. Other observers focused
on whether the U.S. and Chinese responses to the pandemic will affect views around the world
regarding the relative merits of the U.S. and Chinese forms of government and economic models
as potential examples to emulate.
Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Autocracy
Related to the point above about forms of government, some observers focused on the potential
impact of the pandemic on discussions in various countries regarding the merits of democracy
compared to those of other forms of government. Other observers focused on whether the
pandemic provided national leaders with an opportunity or rationale for taking actions to seize
greater power and move their countries away from democracy and toward authoritarianism or
autocracy, or strengthen or consolidate their already-existing authoritarian or autocratic forms of
government.
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Societal Tension, Reform, and Transformation, and Governmental Stability
Beyond the specific point above about potential movement toward greater authoritarianism and
autocracy, some observers focused on the possibility that the pandemic more generally could
cause increased social tensions in certain countries, could lead to (or present opportunities for)
societal reforms and transformations, or could destabilize and perhaps cause the downfall of
governments, akin to the effects of certain past world-changing events, such as World War I.7
Such changes could alter the political orientations, national strategies, foreign policies, and
defense policies of the countries in which they occur, potentially inducing follow-on effects
among governments and other global actors that interact with those countries.
World Economy, Globalization, and U.S. Trade Policy
Some observers focused on how the pandemic could change the world economy, perhaps in ways
that could influence the international security environment. Noting that the pandemic affected
world trade volumes and disrupted and altered global supply chains, they focused on the question
of whether economic globalization would as a result be slowed, halted, reversed, or otherwise
changed. Some observers monitored or discussed how such effects could influence or be
influenced by U.S. trade policy.
Allied Defense Spending and U.S. Alliances
Particularly during the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on the possibility
that costs incurred by U.S. allies—particularly NATO allies in Europe—to support their
economies during stay-at-home/lockdown periods could lead to offsetting reductions in their
defense expenditures. More generally, some observers during the earlier months of the pandemic
asked whether reductions in economic growth caused by the pandemic could lead to reductions in
the defense budgets of U.S. allies in both Europe and Asia.
European Union
In the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on the question of whether the
pandemic was creating tensions—or, conversely, opportunities for greater coordination—among
the European Union member states, and what impact the pandemic might ultimately have on the
cohesion of the European Union and its ability to take effective actions on the international stage.
Definition of, and Budgeting for, U.S. National Security
Some observers focused on whether the pandemic would (or should) lead to a revised definition
of U.S. national security, particularly one that is less military-centric and more focused on what
are sometimes called human-security-oriented challenges or global issues, such as climate

7 For brief discussions of the impacts of World War I on societies and governments, see, for example, Robert Wilde,
“The Consequences of World War I, Political and Social Effects of the War to End All Wars,” ThoughtCo., July 10,
2019; John Horne, “The First World War: the Aftermath, The Years Following the End of the War Were Marked by
More Wars, Political Upheaval and Deep Social Change,” Irish Times, April 24, 2018; Steven Mintz, “Historical
Context: The Global Effect of World War I,” History Now (Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History), undated,
accessed April 16, 2020; Margaret MacMillan, “World War I: The War That Changed Everything,” Wall Street
Journal, June 20, 2014; Steven Erlanger, “The War to End All Wars? Hardly. But It Did Change Them Forever.” New
York Times, June 26, 2014; Jay Winter, “How the Great War Shaped the World,” Atlantic, World War I issue
(September 29, 2014); Kathleen Haley, “100 Years after WWI: The Lasting Impacts of the Great War,” Media, Law &
Policy (Syracuse University), July 28, 2014; “Aftermath of World War I,” Wikipedia, updated April 11, 2020, accessed
April 16, 2020.
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change, that have sometimes been more at the periphery of U.S. national security policy and
plans. Such a change in definition could lead to a changed allocation of funding between the
Department of Defense (DOD) and other government agencies that perform national-security-
related tasks, a realignment of resources within DOD between combat-oriented programs and
other programs (such as those related to DOD’s mission of providing defense support of civil
authorities), and perhaps a changed allocation of funding among the agencies other than DOD
that perform national-security-related tasks.
U.S. Defense Strategy, Defense Budget, and Military Operations
Particularly during the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on the question of
whether large federal expenditures made in response to the domestic U.S. economic effects of the
pandemic, and the impact of these expenditures on the federal budget deficit and federal debt,
could lead to greater constraints in coming years on U.S. defense spending levels. As a follow-on
matter, these observers additionally focused on the question of whether responding to such
increased constraints would (or should) lead to revisions in U.S. defense strategy, changes in U.S.
defense programs, and a reduction or termination of certain overseas U.S. military operations.
U.S. Foreign Assistance, International Debt Relief, and Refugee Policy
Some observers focused on the question of whether the pandemic provided a new lens through
which to measure the value of U.S. foreign assistance, international debt relief, and refugee policy
in promoting U.S. interests, particularly in connection with the previously mentioned issue of
whether to revise the definition of U.S. national security to make it less military-centric.
Non-state Actors
Some observers focused on how non-state actors such as international terrorist and criminal
organizations were reacting to the pandemic, and on how much priority should be given to
countering such actors in the future, particularly in a context of a changed definition of U.S.
national security.
U.S. Attention to International Issues Other than the Pandemic
Particularly during the earlier months of the pandemic, some observers focused on whether
responding to the pandemic was affecting the time and resources that U.S. leaders and agencies
could devote to addressing other international issues of concern to the United States that predated
but continued to exist in parallel with the pandemic. In the earlier months of the pandemic, U.S.
officials warned other countries to not take actions during the pandemic to challenge U.S.
interests around the world or otherwise test U.S. resolve or responsiveness on the thinking that
the pandemic was distracting the U.S. government from other concerns or reducing U.S. capacity
for responding to any such challenges.
Role of Congress
In the earlier months of the pandemic, a few observers focused on the issue of how the pandemic
had affected Congress’s activities for conducting oversight of the Administration’s foreign policy
actions.
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Appendices with CRS Reports and Additional Writings
For further reading on the topics outlined above, see the CRS reports presented in Appendix A
and the additional writings presented in Appendix B.
Potential Issues for Congress
Potential issues for Congress regarding implications of the pandemic for the international security
environment and the U.S. role in the world include but are not limited to the following:
• Has the pandemic change the international security environment, and if so, in
what ways? What insight into that question, if any, can be provided by past major
world events such as World Wars I and II and the 1918 influenza pandemic?
• How should the United States respond to changes in the international security
environment that may have been caused by the pandemic?
• What has the pandemic demonstrated about the role of the United States as a
global leader? What impact, if any, will the U.S. domestic response to the
pandemic have on the ability of the United States in the future to offer itself or be
accepted by other countries as a global leader on other international issues, or to
serve as a model for other countries to emulate in terms of their own political
systems, governance, and economic models?
• What actions did the Administration develop to respond to changes in the
international security environment that may have been caused by the pandemic?
Did Congress have sufficient visibility into these actions? Were these actions
appropriate and sufficient? What metrics should Congress use to assess them?
• What implications, if any, do changes in the international security environment
that may have been caused by the pandemic have for the role of Congress in
setting and overseeing the execution of U.S. foreign and defense policy, or for
congressional organization and operations?
• To what degree have the implications of the pandemic for the international
security environment been augmented, changed, or overtaken by the implications
for the international security environment of Russia’s invasion of multiple parts
of Ukraine starting on February 24, 2022, and by the responses of the United
States, its allies, China, other countries, and international institutions to the
invasion?8

8 For discussions regarding impacts of Russia’s invasion of multiple parts of Ukraine starting on February 24, 2022,
see, for example, CRS Insight IN12192, NATO’s 2023 Vilnius Summit, by Paul Belkin; CRS Insight IN11949, NATO:
Finland Joins as Sweden’s Accession Faces Delay, by Kristin Archick, Paul Belkin, and Andrew S. Bowen; CRS
Insight IN11897, Russia’s War Against Ukraine: European Union Responses and U.S.-EU Relations, by Kristin
Archick; CRS In Focus IF11138, Russia’s Nord Stream 2 Natural Gas Pipeline to Germany Halted, by Paul Belkin,
Michael Ratner, and Cory Welt; CRS Report R47160, Middle East and North Africa: Implications of the Russia-
Ukraine War, coordinated by Christopher M. Blanchard; CRS Report R47591, Central Asia: Implications of Russia’s
War in Ukraine, coordinated by Maria A. Blackwood; CRS Report R41153, Changes in the Arctic: Background and
Issues for Congress, coordinated by Ronald O'Rourke; CRS In Focus IF12104, Russia’s 2022 War Against Ukraine:
Global Economic Effects, by Andres B. Schwarzenberg; CRS In Focus IF12107, Ukraine and International Financial
Institutions, by Martin A. Weiss; CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10704, The Role of International Tribunals in the Response
to the Invasion of Ukraine, by Stephen P. Mulligan; and CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10710, The Law of War and the
Russian Invasion of Ukraine, by Stephen P. Mulligan. See also CRS Report R47054, Russia’s War Against Ukraine:
Related CRS Products, by Zoe Danon and David A. Blum.
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Appendix A. Related CRS Reports
CRS reports that provide more in-depth discussions of specific issues discussed in this report
include the following, which are presented in alphabetical order of their titles:9
• CRS Insight IN11198, Bolivia’s October 2020 General Elections, by Clare
Ribando Seelke.
• CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10525, Can the United States Sue China over COVID-19
in an International Court?, by Stephen P. Mulligan.
• CRS In Focus IF11532, Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19): Impact in
Africa, coordinated by Alexis Arieff.
• CRS Report R46209, Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Pandemic: CRS
Experts, by Matthew B. Barry. (Includes a section listing CRS experts on
international response activities relating to the COVD-19 pandemic.)
• CRS Report R46354, COVID-19 and China: A Chronology of Events (December
2019-January 2020), by Susan V. Lawrence.
• CRS Insight IN11496, COVID-19 and Emerging Global Patterns of Financial
Crime, by Liana W. Rosen.
• CRS In Focus IF11606, COVID-19 and Foreign Assistance: Congressional
Oversight Framework and Current Activities, by Nick M. Brown and Emily M.
Morgenstern.
• CRS In Focus IF11496, COVID-19 and Foreign Assistance: Issues for Congress,
by Nick M. Brown, Marian L. Lawson, and Emily M. Morgenstern.
• CRS In Focus IF11575, COVID-19 and Global Food Security: Issues for
Congress, by Alyssa R. Casey and Emily M. Morgenstern.
• CRS Insight IN11288, COVID-19 and the Defense Industrial Base: DOD
Response and Legislative Considerations, by Heidi M. Peters.
• CRS Insight IN11279, COVID-19 and U.S. Iran Policy, by Kenneth Katzman.
• CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10424, COVID-19: An Overview of Trade-Related
Measures to Address Access to Medical Goods, by Nina M. Hart.
• CRS Report R46633, COVID-19 Vaccines: Global Health Issues, coordinated by
Sara M. Tharakan.
• CRS Report R46304, COVID-19: China Medical Supply Chains and Broader
Trade Issues, coordinated by Karen M. Sutter.
• CRS Insight IN11387, COVID-19: Defense Production Act (DPA) Developments
and Issues for Congress, by Michael H. Cecire and Heidi M. Peters.
• CRS Insight IN11305, COVID-19: Defense Support of Civil Authorities, by
Lawrence Kapp and Alan Ott.
• CRS In Focus IF11421, COVID-19: Global Implications and Responses, by Sara
M. Tharakan et al.

9 Additional CRS reports that do not include COVID-19 in their titles and are not listed here may include discussions of
the international implications of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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• CRS Insight IN11280, COVID-19: Industrial Mobilization and Defense
Production Act (DPA) Implementation, by Michael H. Cecire and Heidi M.
Peters.
• CRS Insight IN11481, COVID-19 International Responses: Resources for
Comparison with U.S. Policies, by Hannah Fischer and Sara M. Tharakan.
• CRS Insight IN11583, COVID-19 International Responses: Resources for the
117th Congress, by Hannah Fischer and Sara M. Tharakan.
• CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10436, COVID-19: International Trade and Access to
Pharmaceutical Products, by Nina M. Hart.
• CRS In Focus IF11525, COVID-19: National Security and Defense Strategy, by
Kathleen J. McInnis.
• CRS Video WVB00330, COVID-19 Public Health Series: Global Health and
Development, by Sara M. Tharakan et al.
• CRS Insight IN11435, COVID-19-Related Suspension of Nonimmigrant Entry,
by Jill H. Wilson.
• CRS Report R46342, COVID-19: Role of the International Financial
Institutions, by Rebecca M. Nelson and Martin A. Weiss.
• CRS Insight IN11273, COVID-19: The Basics of Domestic Defense Response,
coordinated by Michael J. Vassalotti.
• CRS In Focus IF11434, COVID-19: U.S.-China Economic Considerations, by
Karen M. Sutter and Michael D. Sutherland.
• CRS Insight IN11470, Defense Production Act (DPA): Recent Developments in
Response to COVID-19, by Michael H. Cecire and Heidi M. Peters.
• CRS In Focus IF11635, Europe, COVID-19, and U.S. Relations, by Kristin
Archick et al.
• CRS In Focus IF11551, Export Restrictions in Response to the COVID-19
Pandemic, by Christopher A. Casey and Cathleen D. Cimino-Isaacs.
• CRS Legal Sidebar LSB10467, Foreign Sovereign Immunity and COVID-19
Lawsuits Against China, by Jennifer K. Elsea.
• CRS Insight IN11493, Global Economic Growth Forecasts: Impact of COVID-
19, by James K. Jackson.
• CRS Report R46430, Global Democracy and Human Rights Impacts of COVID-
19: In Brief, coordinated by Michael A. Weber.
• CRS In Focus IF11548, Helping U.S. Citizens Abroad During the COVID-19
Pandemic and Other International Crises: Role of the Department of State, by
Cory R. Gill.
• CRS In Focus IF11796, Global COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution, coordinated by
Sara M. Tharakan.
• CRS Report R46270, Global Economic Effects of COVID-19: Overview, by
James K. Jackson.
• CRS Video WVB00380, Impact of COVID-19 on Health Systems in Africa: A
Dialogue with Experts, by Tiaji Salaam-Blyther.
• CRS In Focus IF11537, Intelligence Community Support to Pandemic
Preparedness and Response, by Michael E. DeVine.
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• CRS Insight IN11732, International COVID-19 Data and Vaccine Distribution:
Selected Resources, by Hannah Fischer.
• CRS In Focus IF11581, Latin America and the Caribbean: Impact of COVID-19,
by Mark P. Sullivan et al.
• CRS Insight IN11535, Mexican Drug Trafficking and Cartel Operations amid
COVID-19, by June S. Beittel and Liana W. Rosen.
• CRS Insight IN11619, New COVID-19 Defense Production Act (DPA) Actions:
Implementation Considerations, by Michael H. Cecire, Nina M. Hart, and Heidi
M. Peters.
• CRS Insight IN11593, New Presidential Directives on the Defense Production
Act (DPA) and the COVID-19 Pandemic, by Michael H. Cecire and Heidi M.
Peters.
• CRS Report R46319, Novel Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19): Q&A on Global
Implications and Responses, coordinated by Tiaji Salaam-Blyther.
• CRS In Focus IF11822, Origins of the COVID-19 Pandemic, coordinated by Tiaji
Salaam-Blyther.
• CRS In Focus IF11480, Overview: The Department of Defense and COVID-19,
coordinated by Kathleen J. McInnis.
• CRS In Focus IF11858, Potential WTO TRIPS Waiver and COVID-19, by
Shayerah I. Akhtar and Ian F. Fergusson.
• CRS Insight IN11662, Potential WTO TRIPS Waiver and COVID-19, by
Shayerah I. Akhtar and Ian F. Fergusson.
• CRS Insight IN11365, President Trump Criticizes VOA Coverage of China’s
COVID-19 Response, by Thomas Lum and Matthew C. Weed.
• CRS In Focus IF11880, Sovereign Debt and the COVID-19 Pandemic, by Martin
A. Weiss.
• CRS Insight IN11231, The Defense Production Act (DPA) and COVID-19: Key
Authorities and Policy Considerations, by Michael H. Cecire and Heidi M.
Peters.
• CRS Insight IN11337, The Defense Production Act (DPA) and the COVID-19
Pandemic: Recent Developments and Policy Considerations, by Michael H.
Cecire and Heidi M. Peters.
• CRS In Focus IF12013, The U.S. Government’s Role in Domestic and Global
COVID-19 Vaccine Supply and Distribution: Frequently Asked Questions, by
Sara M. Tharakan and Taylor R. Wyatt.
• CRS In Focus IF11029, The Venezuela Regional Humanitarian Crisis and
COVID-19, by Rhoda Margesson and Clare Ribando Seelke.
• CRS Insight IN11369, U.S. Funding to the World Health Organization (WHO),
by Luisa Blanchfield and Tiaji Salaam-Blyther.
• CRS Insight IN11325, U.S. Travel and Tourism and COVID-19, by Michaela D.
Platzer.
• CRS In Focus IF11494, Wildlife Trade, COVID-19, and Other Zoonotic
Diseases, by Pervaze A. Sheikh and Katarina C. O'Regan.
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• CRS Report R47231, World Trade Organization: “TRIPS Waiver” for COVID-19
Vaccines, by Shayerah I. Akhtar.
• CRS In Focus IF11513, WTO: 12th Ministerial, COVID-19, and Ongoing Issues,
by Cathleen D. Cimino-Isaacs and Rachel F. Fefer.
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Appendix B. Additional Writings
In presenting sources of additional reading, this appendix includes some examples of writings
reflecting various perspectives on the potential implications of the pandemic on the international
security environment and the U.S. role in the world, organized by specific themes or topics.
Within each section, the items are presented in chronological order, with the most recent on top.
For most of the sections, additional citations with dates earlier than that of the last item listed in
the section can be found in previous versions of this CRS report.
General/Multitopic
David Engel and Dr Alex Bristow, “Covid-19: Implications for the Indo-Pacific,” Australian
Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), September 7, 2023.
Grant Johnson, Sean M. Zeigler, Marco Hafner, and Catherine Galley, Quantifying the Link
between COVID-19, Conflict Risk, and the Global Economy, RAND, 2023, 32 pp.
David A. Bell, “Does Putin’s War Mark a New Period in History? It Has Been Only Two Years
Since the Start of Another World Crisis Thought to Mark a New Era,” Foreign Policy, July 1,
2022.
Michael Kugelman, “How COVID-19 Has Shaped South Asia, The Region Has Become a
Pandemic Hot Spot,” Foreign Policy, July 15, 2021.
Anthony Faiola, “Pandemic-Driven Hunger Is Making the World More Unequal,” Washington
Post, July 12, 2021.
Alex Ward, “The Pandemic’s Impact on Our World Is Only Just Beginning, The US Intelligence
Community Says the Coronavirus Will Impact You for Years to Come, Even If You Didn’t Get
Sick,” Vox, April 14, 2021.
Dimitris Valatsas and Patrycja Koszykowska, “COVID-19’s Baby Bust, Disasters Usually Come
With Falling Birth Rates. But This Time, They Might Not Recover Unless Governments Take
Action Now,” Foreign Policy, April 9, 2021.
Julian E. Barnes, “U.S. Intelligence Report Warns of Global Consequences of Social
Fragmentation, The Coronavirus Pandemic Has Highlighted Weaknesses of the International
Order, Said the Report, Which Is Issued Every Four Years,” New York Times, April 8, 2021.
Warren P. Strobel and Dustin Volz, “Covid-19 Fuels Inequality, Political Divide, Authoritarianism
World-Wide, U.S. Intelligence Analysts Say, Quadrennial Global Trends Report Also Warns
Privacy Will ‘Effectively Disappear’ and Synthetic Media Will ‘Distort Truth and Reality,’” Wall
Street Journal, April 8, 2021.
Laurie Goering, “African Leaders Warn COVID-19 Crisis Harming Climate Adaptation Push,”
Reuters, April 6, 2021.
Meghan Benton, Jeanne Batalova, Samuel Davidoff-Gore, and Timo Schmidt, COVID-19 and the
State of Global Mobility in 2020, Migration Policy Institute, April 2021, 57 pp.
Michael Varnum, Cendri Hutcherson, and Igor Grossmann, “Everyone Was Wrong on the
Pandemic’s Societal Impact, In March 2020, a Study Asked Experts and Laypeople for Their
Predictions. Neither Group Came Close to Being Right,” Foreign Policy, March 18, 2021.
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Bastian Giegerich, Fenella McGerty, and Peter Round, The Geo-Economics and Geopolitics of
COVID-19: Implications for European Security, International Institute for Strategic Studies
(IISS), March 2021, 23 pp. (Posted online March 16, 2021.)
Fabio Teixeira, “Over 20 Countries Found Weakening Environmental Protection During
Pandemic,” Reuters, March 11, 2021.
Edward Alden, “The Human Cost of Endless Pandemic Border Closures, One Year after the
World Declared Borders Shut, There Is Still No Plan to Reduce the Toll on Millions of Lives,”
Foreign Policy, February 26, 2021.
Simon Lester Huan Zhu, “The Danger of Blindly Navigating Data Nationalism, Digital Trade and
the Flow of Digital Information Are Certain to Grow in Prominence in the Future. The
Coronavirus Pandemic Has Pushed Their Growth Curve Along,” National Interest, February 21,
2021.
Judd Devermont, A Post-Covid-19 Reset, The Future of Africa’s Foreign Partnerships, Center for
Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), February 2021, 14 pp.
John R. Allen et al., “The World After the Coronavirus, We Asked 12 Leading Thinkers to Predict
What Happens in 2021 and Beyond,” Foreign Policy, January 2, 2021.
IISS Manama Dialogue 2020 Special Publication: The Strategic and Geo-economic Implications
of the COVID-19 Pandemic, International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), December 2020,
54 pp.
Colum Lynch, “U.N. Peacemaking in the Age of Plague, United Nations Diplomats and Civil
Servants Fear Peace Efforts in Geneva May Aid the Spread of The Coronavirus,” Foreign Policy,
November 13, 2020.
Matthew Lavietes, “U.N. Says Pandemic Will Slow Already Miniscule Progress in Women’s
Rights,” Reuters, October 20, 2020.
Travis Bubenik, “Costlier Than War: Researchers Put Pandemic’s [U.S.] Price Tag at $16
Trillion,” Courthouse News Service, October 12, 2020.
Joseph S. Nye Jr., “COVID-19 Might Not Change the World, Pandemics Are Not Always
Transformative Events. While Some Worrying Preexisting Trends Could Accelerate, It’s Incorrect
to Assume that the Coronavirus Will End Globalization, Kill Liberal Democracy, or Enhance
China’s Soft Power,” Foreign Policy, October 9, 2020.
IGCC Experts, “Global Cooperation in the Time of COVID-19,” Institute on Global Conflict and
Cooperation, UC San Diego, October 5, 2020.
Vivek Wadhwa, “The Genetic Engineering Genie Is Out of the Bottle, the Next Pandemic Could
be Bioengineered in Someone’s Garage Using Cheap and Widely Available Technology,” Foreign
Policy, September 11, 2020.
Sohini Chatterjee and Mark P. Lagon, “The Cataclysmic Great Power Challenge Everyone Saw
Coming, Violent Extremism, Migration, Pandemics, and Climate Change Are Among the
Burgeoning List of Fundamental Challenges That Will Require Transnational Cooperation and
Collaboration,” National Interest, August 28, 2020.
Edward Alden, “The World Needs to Reopen Borders Before It’s Too Late, Even As They
Struggle to Control the Pandemic, Governments Should Move Quickly to Reopen Borders
Instead of Giving in to Xenophobia, Nationalism, and Illusions of Autarky,” Foreign Policy,
August 25, 2020.
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Daniel W. Drezner, “The Song Remains the Same: International Relations After COVID-19,”
Cambridge University Press, August 19, 2020.
Michael R. Kenwick and Beth A. Simmons, “Pandemic Response as Border Politics,” Cambridge
University Press, August 19, 2020.
Mohan Malik, “The Pandemic’s Geopolitical Aftershocks,” Strategist (Australian Strategic
Policy Institute), August 4, 2020.
Seth A. Johnston, “The Pandemic and the Limits of Realism, The Foundational International
Relations Theory Has Been Revealed to Be Far Less Realistic Than It Claims,” Foreign Policy,
June 24, 2020.
James Goldgeier and Carmen Iezzi Mezzera, “How to Rethink the Teaching of International
Relations, As Universities Struggle to Respond to the Ongoing Pandemic, Here’s What They
Should Focus On,” Foreign Policy, June 12, 2020.
Stephen M. Walt, “The Pandemic’s 5 Silver Linings, The Coronavirus Has Exacted a Terrible
Toll—But Some Good Things May Come of It Yet,” Foreign Policy, May 26, 2020.
Tom McTague, “The Pandemic’s Geopolitical Aftershocks Are Coming, Western Capitals Aren’t
Just Worried About the Risk of a Resurgence in Coronavirus Cases,” Atlantic, May 18, 2020.
Stephen M. Walt, “Will a Global Depression Trigger Another World War? The Coronavirus
Pandemic Has Already Devastated the International Economy. Its Military Fallout Remains to Be
Seen,” Foreign Policy, May 13, 2020.
Phillip Y. Lipscy, “It’s Too Soon to Call Coronavirus Winners and Losers, Given how much
remains unknown about the virus, talk of success may be premature,” Foreign Policy, May 12,
2020.
Alan Nicol, “The Pandemic Is Laying Bare a Global Water Crisis, Insufficient Water for Washing
Is Likely to Worsen the Coronavirus in the Poorest Nations. There’s a Better Way Forward,”
Foreign Policy, May 12, 2020.
George H. Nash, “The Coronavirus Pandemic of 2020 in Historical Perspective,” National
Review, May 11, 2020.
Edith M. Lederer, “UN Chief Says Pandemic Is Unleashing a ‘Tsunami of Hate,’” Associated
Press, May 8, 2020.
Nikolas K. Gvosdev, “Why the Coronavirus Won't Transform International Affairs Like 9/11
Did,” National Interest, May 5, 2020.
Deepanshu Mohan, “The Geopolitical Contours of a Post-COVID-19 World,” East Asia Forum,
May 2, 2020.
Andrew Ehrhardt, “Disease and Diplomacy in the 19th Century,” War on the Rocks, April 30,
2019.
Resilience in the Face of the Coronavirus Pandemic, World Politics Review report, May 2020, 47
pp. (Includes essays by various authors with the titles “Planning for the World After the
Coronavirus Pandemic,” “What It Will Take to Save Economies From the Coronavirus
Pandemic,” “Building Trust, Confidence and Collective Action in the Age of COVID-19,” “Why
Tackling Corruption Is Crucial to the Global Coronavirus Response,” and “The Geography of
COVID-19 and a Vulnerable Global Food System.”)
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Iain King, “How Covid-19 Will Change Us: Seven Lessons from the Most Consequential
Pandemics in History,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), April 29, 2020.
Dmitri K. Simes, “The Perfect Storm,” National Interest, April 24, 2020.
Fred Kaplan, “What Happens if Oil Doesn’t Recover? If Demand Doesn’t Pick Up This Summer,
We Could See Major Shifts in Global Power,” Slate, April 23, 2020.
Barry R. Posen, “Do Pandemics Promote Peace? Why Sickness Slows the March to War,”
Foreign Affairs, April 23, 2020.
Joseph Cirincione, “How to Prevent War During the Coronavirus Pandemic, How Will the
Coronavirus Threaten Global Peace?” National Interest, April 22, 2020.
Frank Hoffman, “An American Perspective on Post-Pandemic Geopolitics,” RUSI, April 20,
2020.
Gordon Bardos, “Will the Coronavirus Crisis Force America to Look in the Mirror and Reform?”
National Interest, April 18, 2020.
Nicholas Eberstadt, “The “New Normal”: Thoughts about the Shape of Things to Come in the
Post-Pandemic World,” National Bureau of Asian Research, April 18, 2020.
Steve Coll, “Woodrow Wilson’s Case of the Flu, and How Pandemics Change History,” New
Yorker, April 17, 2020.
Ravi Kant, “Coronavirus: An Ice-Nine Moment for the World,” Asia Times, April 15, 2020.
Jackson Diehl, “The Pandemic Is Killing Truth, Too,” Washington Post, April 12, 2020.
Edith M. Lederer, “UN Chief Warns COVID-19 Threatens Global Peace and Security,”
Associated Press, April 10, 2020.
Richard Haass, “The Pandemic Will Accelerate History Rather Than Reshape It, Not Every Crisis
Is a Turning Point, Foreign Affairs, April 7, 2020.
Stratfor Worldview, “How the Coronavirus Pandemic Is Changing the World—and the Future,”
National Interest, April 4, 2020.
Daniel W. Drezner, “The Most Counterintuitive Prediction about World Politics and the
Coronavirus, What If Nothing Changes?” Washington Post, March 30, 2020.
Ali Demirdas, “Western Values May Not Survive the Coronavirus. European Unity and American
Military Power Just Haven’t Held Up,” National Interest, March 28, 2020.
John Allen et al., “How the World Will Look after the Coronavirus Pandemic,” Foreign Policy,
March 20, 2020. (Includes short contributions from 12 authors.)
Maxine Whittaker, “How Infectious Diseases Have Shaped Our Culture, Habits and Language,”
The Conversation, July 12, 2017.
World Order, International Institutions, and Global Governance
Yanzhong Huang and Rebecca Katz, Negotiating Global Health Security, Priorities for U.S. and
Global Governance of Disease, Council on Foreign Relations, September 2023, 49 pp.
Belinda Archibong, Francis Annan, and Uche Ekhator-Mobayode, The Epidemic Effect:
Epidemics, Institutions, and Human Capital Development, Brookings Institution, Brookings
Institution, June 2023, 89 pp.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Erin Banco, Ashleigh Furlong, and Lennart Pfahler, “How Bill Gates and Partners Used Their
Clout To Control The Global Covid Response—With Little Oversight; Four Health
Organizations, Working Closely Together, Spent Almost $10 Billion On Responding to Covid
Across the World. But They Lacked the Scrutiny of Governments, and Fell Short of Their Own
Goals, a POLITICO and WELT Investigation Found,” Politico, September 14, 2022.
Angela Kane and Jaime Yassif, “A Better Way to Detect the Origins of a Pandemic,” Arms
Control Today (Arms Control Association), July/August 2022.
Andrew Ehrhardt, “International Order Through the Historian’s Eye,” War on the Rocks,
November 22, 2021. (Book review of Colin Kahl and Thomas Wright, Aftershocks: Pandemic
Politics and the End of the Old International Order, St. Martin’s Press; 464 pp.)
Economist, “Two New Books Assess the Geopolitical Lessons of Covid-19, They Are Bleak, Say
‘Aftershocks’ and ‘Geopolitics for the End Time,’” Economist, October 9, 2021. (Book review of
Colin Kahl and Thomas Wright, Aftershocks: Pandemic Politics and the End of the Old
International Order, St. Martin’s Press; 464 pp., and Bruno Maçães, Geopolitics for the End
Time, Hurst; 240 pp.)
Rosemary Flowers-Wanjie, “Rich Countries Are Ignoring the Global Vaccine System, Money
Isn’t the Problem. Power Is,” Foreign Policy, September 23, 2021.
Jeneen Interlandi, “The World Is at War With Covid. Covid Is Winning,” New York Times,
September 21, 2021.
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, and Lawrence H. Summers, “We Don’t Have
to Fly Blind into the Next Pandemic,” Washington Post, September 16, 2021.
Adam Tooze, “What if the Coronavirus Crisis Is Just a Trial Run?” New York Times, September 1,
2021.
Catherine Osborn, “COVAX Is Not Working, Will the Pandemic’s Delta Phase be More
Equitable?” Foreign Policy, August 6, 2021.
Simon Frankel Pratt and Jamie Levin, “Vaccines Will Shape the New Geopolitical Order, The
Gulf Between Haves and Have-Nots is Only Growing,” Foreign Policy, April 29, 2021.
Nina Schwalbe, “The World Should Treat Pandemics Like It Treats Chemical Weapons, Plans for
a Global Pandemic Treaty Don’t Solve the Problem of China’s Refusal to Cooperate,” Foreign
Policy, April 14, 2021.
Scott Neuman, “Many World Leaders Call For Treaty On Future Pandemics,” NPR, March 30,
2021.
Helen V. Milner, Susan Peterson, Ryan Powers, Michael J. Tierney, and Erik Voeten, “Trump,
COVID-19, and the Future of International Order, In a New Survey, International Relations
Experts Are Pessimistic About the Years to Come,” Foreign Policy, October 8, 2020.
Seth Center and Emma Bates, editors, After Disruption: Historical Perspectives on the Future of
International Order, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), September 2020, 65
pp.
Hung Tran, “One World, Two Systems” Takes Shape During the Pandemic, Atlantic Council,
September 2020, 10 pp.
Brett D. Schaefer and Danielle Pletka, “How the WHO Can Earn Back U.S. Support,” Heritage
Foundation, August 17, 2020.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Bobo Lo, “Global Order in the Shadow of the Coronavirus: China, Russia and the West, It’s Time
to Rethink Global Governance and its Priorities,” Lowy Institute, July 29, 2020.
Robert D. Blackwill Thomas Wright, “Why COVID-19 Presents a World Reordering Moment,”
National Interest, July 11, 2020.
Jeffrey Cimmino et al., A Global Strategy for Shaping the Post-COVID-19 World, Atlantic
Council, 2020 (released July 7, 2020), 52 pp.
Mary Robinson, “Multilateralism Offers Hope for a Sea-Change after COVID-19,” The Hill, June
26, 2020.
Aparna Pande, “India Could Emerge as the Global Power the World Has Been Waiting for After
COVID,” Hudson Institute, June 8, 2020.
James Crabtree, “Welcome to a World of Bubbles, Countries Across Europe and Asia Are
Exploring Special Bilateral Arrangements to Ease Border Restrictions. The Result Could Be a
Globe Fractured Along Epidemiological Lines,” Foreign Policy, June 1, 2020.
Jeffrey Cimmino, Matthew Kroenig, and Barry Pavel, Taking Stock: Where Are Geopolitics
Headed in the COVID-19 Era? Atlantic Council, June 2020, 20 pp.
U.S. Global Leadership and Role in World
Julian E. Barnes, “Report Chronicles U.S. Intelligence Shortcomings as Pandemic Emerged, The
Report by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee Raises Questions about How Well
Prepared Spy Agencies Are for Future Global Health Crises,” New York Times, December 15,
2022.
Emily Bass, “The U.S. Congress Is Missing the Boat on Global Health Reform,” Foreign Policy,
April 4, 2022.
Michael Gerson, “We Need a Global Response to Covid as Urgent as That Against Russian
Aggression,” Washington Post, March 7, 2022.
Dan Diamond and Emily Rauhala, “U.S. Will ‘Surge’ Vaccine Support to 11 African Countries,”
Washington Post, February 17, 2022.
Francesco Guarascio and Emma Farge, “Exclusive: U.S. Funding to WHO Fell by 25% During
Pandemic,” Reuters, January 25, 2022.
Krishna B. Kumar, “America Can Still Deliver on Global Vaccine Diplomacy,” National Interest,
December 28, 2021.
Eric Banco, “‘It’s a Sore Spot for a Lot of People’: Why Officials Are Raising Questions About
Biden’s Vaccine Donations,” Politico, December 8, 2021.
Carmen Paun, “Blinken Announces New Efforts to Speed Global Vaccination,” Politico Pro,
November 10, 2021.
Vidya Krishnan, “How to End Vaccine Apartheid, The United States Has Failed on Its Boast to
Be an ‘Arsenal Of Vaccines,’” Foreign Policy, November 9, 2021.
Andrea Shalal, “U.S., Indonesia Call for New G20 Forum to Prepare for Next Pandemic,”
Reuters, October 26, 2021.
David Brunnstrom, “U.S. Says Delivering on Vaccine Pledge to Asia Key to Quad Credibility,”
Reuters, October 20, 2021.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Jonah Blank, “Biden Can Bounce Back From Afghanistan—By Vaccinating the World, My
Former Boss Has a Rare Opportunity to Prove His Critics Wrong,” Foreign Policy, September 10,
2021.
Katherine Eban, “How ‘Micromanagement and Distrust’ Hobbled Biden’s Global Vaccination
Push, The White House Says It Is Donating More Doses Than ‘All Other Countries Combined,’
But Critics Inside and Outside the U.S. Government Warn of an Effort that Is ‘Wildly
Insufficient,’” Vanity Fair, September 9, 2021.
Isaac Chotiner, “Has the Biden Administration Failed on Global Vaccines? Krishna Udayakumar,
The Founding Director of Duke’s Global Health Innovation Center, Describes What the U.S.
Needs to Do Now to Support Vaccination Around the World,” New Yorker, August 31, 2021.
Eric A. Friedman and Lawrence O. Gostin, “The Whole World Needs Vaccines Before a Worse
Variant Than Delta Arrives, The United States Has to Put Global Health First Unless It Wants a
New Disaster,” Foreign Policy, August 24, 2021.
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), US Emergency Plan for Global COVID-19
Relief: Urgent Action to End the Pandemic Globally and Accelerate US Recovery and Security,
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), August 3, 2021, 9 pp.
Oluwatosin Adeshokan et al., “Africa Reacts to U.S. Vaccine Distribution at Home and Abroad,”
Cener for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), July 29, 2021.
CSIS Commission on Strengthening America’s Health Security, Time to Escalate U.S. Leadership
on Covid-19 and Beyond, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), July 2021, 16 pp.
(Posted online July 21, 2021.) (The report states on its final page that its authors are Julie
Gerberding, Susan Brooks, J. Stephen Morrison, Anna McCaffrey, and Katherine E. Bliss.)
Robbie Gramer, “Biden to Ship Millions of Vaccines to Africa, The United States Will Donate 25
Million Doses as African Countries Reel from a Third Wave of COVID-19,” Foreign Policy, July
16, 2021.
Michael Gerson, “Covid-19’s Global Spread is a Test for America,” Washington Post, July 15,
2021.
Robert Zoellick, “Liberal Democracies Are Running Out of Time to Save the rest of the Planet
from Covid,” Washington Post, July 9, 2021.
Derek Thompson, “World War II’s Lesson for After the Pandemic, The U.S. Needs Another
Innovation Dream Team,” Atlantic, June 28, 2021.
David Adesnik, “America’s Syrian Allies Deserve the COVID-19 Vaccine, They Vanquished the
Islamic State and Are Now in Desperate Need of Aid,” Foreign Policy, June 22, 2021.
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, “Biden Boosts Vaccine-Sharing, Says U.S. Soon Will Outpace
Donations By Russia, China,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, May 18, 2021.
Christian Paz, “America’s Vaccine Nationalism Isn’t Working, The Longer It Takes for the United
States to Lead a Global Response, the More the Risks Compound,” Atlantic, May 13, 2021.
Karen DeYoung, “Samantha Power Wants to Restore U.S. Prestige by Getting American-made
Vaccines ‘Into Arms’ Around the World,” Washington Post, May 11 (updated May 12), 2021.
Dan Diamond and Tyler Pager, “‘Where is the plan?’: Biden Pressed on Global Vaccine Strategy,
Critics Say the Administration Has Taken a Piecemeal Approach to the Worsening International
Crisis,” Washington Post, May 9, 2021.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Chelsea Clinton and Achal Prabhala, “Biden Has the Power to Vaccinate the World, He Should
Use It,” Atlantic, May 5, 2021.
Tom Frieden and Marine Buissonnière, “The U.S. Has the Power to Tamp Down Coronavirus
Variants—If We’re Willing to Use It,” Politico, March 2, 2021.
Gregory B. Poling, “Embracing a Pandemic-Centered Foreign Policy,” Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS), March 1, 2021.
Dan Diamond and Jeff Stein, “White House Is Split Over How to Vaccinate the World,”
Washington Post, April 30, 2021.
Michael Hirsh, “Health Experts Slam Biden’s ‘Massive’ Global Leadership Failure, Biden’s
Speech to Congress Ignores His Dithering on COVID-19 Vaccine Patents, Jeopardizing Millions
of Lives in Other Nations, Critics Say.,” Foreign Policy, April 29, 2021.
J. Stephen Morrison, Katherine E. Bliss, and Anna McCaffrey, The Time Is Now for U.S. Global
Leadership on Covid-19 Vaccines, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), April
2021, 11 pp. (Posted online April 14, 2021.)
Anne Applebaum, “What America’s Vaccination Campaign Proves to the World, The U.S.
Stumbled Early in the Pandemic, But the Vaccine Rollout Could Reboot the Country’s Image,”
Atlantic, April 10, 2021.
Azmi Haroun, “Global NGOs Call on the Biden Administration to Concoct a Plan for Sharing
Vaccine Surplus with Nations in Need,” Business Insider, March 30, 2021.
Justin Talbot Zorn and Mathias Alencastro, “In Brazil, Vaccine Diplomacy Can Help Save the
Climate, Washington Should Bypass Bolsonaro and Open a Direct Dialogue on Amazon
Deforestation with Local Leaders in Regions Hit Hard by COVID-19,” Foreign Policy, March
30, 2021.
John Oldfield, “We Need US Leadership on Water Security to Combat COVID-19 Globally,” The
Hill, March 29, 2021.
Thomas J. Bollyky, “Democracies Keep Vaccines for Themselves, President Biden’s Pledge to
Mexico Is an Exception from a Stark Pattern.,” Atlantic, March 27, 2021.
Dave Lawler, “Biden’s Next Challenge: Vaccine Diplomacy,” Axios, March 22, 2021.
Selam Gebrekidan and Matt Apuzzo, “Rich Countries Signed Away a Chance to Vaccinate the
World, Despite Warnings, American and European Officials Gave Up Leverage that Could Have
Guaranteed Access for Billions of People. That Risks Prolonging the Pandemic,” New York
Times, March 21 (updated May 7), 2021.
Jason Marczak and Cristina Guevara, COVID-19 Recovery in Latin America and the Caribbean:
A Partnership Strategy for the Biden Administration, Atlantic Council, March 2021, 37 pp.
(Posted online March 16, 2021.)
Colm Quinn, “G-7 Scrambles for Global Vaccine Plan, After Months of Warnings, the Group of
Wealthy Nations Has Begun to Put Forward Solutions to the Lopsided Distribution of
Coronavirus Vaccines,” Foreign Policy, February 19, 2021.
Emily Rauhala, Erin Cunningham, and Adam Taylor, “White House Announces $4 Billion in
Funding for Covax, the Global Vaccine Effort that Trump Spurned,” Washington Post, February
18, 2021.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Jan Tore Sanner, “Why the Rich World Cannot Afford to Leave the Poor Behind on Vaccines,”
Government.no (Government of Norway), February 16, 2021.
Alex Leary, “Biden to Join G-7 Leaders in Virtual Meeting to Discuss Pandemic Response,” Wall
Street Journal, February 14, 2021.
Ethan Guillén, “End the Pandemic Faster by Listening to Developing Countries, Biden Has a
Golden Opportunity to Help with Global Vaccines,” Foreign Policy, February 8, 2021.
Jonathan Tepperman, “The Global Vaccine Rollout Is Failing—and That Puts Everyone,
Everywhere, In Danger, The Selfish Reasons the United States and Europe Must Help Poor
Countries Deal with COVID-19,” Foreign Policy, January 28, 2021.
White House, “National Security Directive on United States Global Leadership to Strengthen the
International COVID-19 Response and to Advance Global Health Security and Biological
Preparedness,” National Security Directive 1, White House, January 21, 2021.
Kenneth C. Brill, “COVID-19 Vaccine Lessons for American Diplomacy after Trump,” The Hill,
January 14, 2021.
China’s Potential Role as a Global Leader
Thomas Hale, “Zero-Covid: China’s Year of Forgetting,” Financial Times, December 29, 2023.
Josephine Ma, “Transparency is China’s Best Chance of Overcoming International Suspicions
over Latest Outbreak of Respiratory Illness,” South China Morning Post, November 28, 2023.
Bernard Orr, “Nearly 2 Million Excess Deaths Followed China’s Sudden End of COVID Curbs,
Study Says,” Reuters, August 24, 2023.
Editorial Board, “In Wuhan, Doctors Knew the Truth. They Were Told to Keep Quiet,”
Washington Post, August 22, 2023.
Rebecca Feng, “China Probed Covid-19 Policy Leaks by Ex-Government Officials,” Wall Street
Journal, July 26, 2023.
Muyi Xiao, Mara Hvistendahl, and James Glanz, “Official Data Hinted at China’s Hidden Covid
Toll. Then It Vanished,” New York Times, July 19, 2023.
Tom Hancock, “Chinese Media Deletes Article on Surge in Cremations After Covid,” Bloomberg,
July 18, 2023.
Ryan McMorrow and Nian Liu, “China Deletes Covid-19 Death Data,” Financial Times, July 18,
2023.
Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Potential Links Between the Wuhan Institute of
Virology and the Origins of the COVID-19 Pandemic, June 2023, declassified by DNI Haines on
June 23, 2023, 9 pp.
Brian Spegele, “China, Once Pioneer of Zero Covid, Shrugs Off Looming Wave,” Wall Street
Journal, May 25, 2023.
Iori Kawate, “China’s Delayed Funeral Data Clouds Extent of December COVID Surge,” Nikkei
Asia, May 18, 2023.
Kanis Leung and Huizhong Wu, “Chinese Who Reported on COVID to Be Released After 3
Years,” Associated Press, April 30, 2023.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Aaron Sarin, “China’s Missing Million, The CCP’s Chronic Opacity Means We Will Never Know
the Country’s True Covid Death Toll,” Persuasion, April 28, 2023.
F. D. Flam, “China Owes Us All the Truth About When Covid Emerged,” Bloomberg, April 29,
2023.
Mara Hvistendahl and Benjamin Mueller, “Chinese Censorship Is Quietly Rewriting the Covid-
19 Story, Under Government Pressure, Chinese Scientists Have Retracted Studies and Withheld
or Deleted Data. The Censorship Has Stymied Efforts to Understand the Virus,” New York Times,
April 23, 2023.
Dake Kang, “Ignoring Experts, China’s Sudden Zero-COVID Exit Cost Lives,” Associated Press,
March 24, 2023.
Michael Schuman, “Can a Million Chinese People Die and Nobody Know? Official Statistics on
COVID Can’t Be Trusted, Because They Serve Beijing’s Political Interests. Making the Dead
Disappear Is Only Part of It,” Atlantic, February 24, 2023.
Yanzhong Huang, “China’s Hidden COVID Catastrophe, How Xi Obscured a Lethal Viral
Wave—and What It Means for the Future of His Regime,” Foreign Affairs, February 16, 2023.
James Glanz, Mara Hvistendahl, and Agnes Chang, “How Deadly Was China’s Covid Wave? Two
Months After China Ended “Zero Covid,” Rough Estimates Suggest that Between 1 and 1.5
Million People Died — Far More than the Official Count,” New York Times, February 15, 2023.
Peter Martin and Jenny Leonard, “The US Keeps Offering China Its Covid Vaccines. China
Keeps Saying No,” Bloomberg, January 6, 2023.
Andy Bounds, “EU Offers Free Covid-19 Vaccines to China to Help Curb Outbreak, Beijing
Rejects Brussels’ Offer, Citing Full Control of Situation,” Financial Times, January 3, 2023.
Isabel Hilton, “Xi Jinping’s Reputation in China and His Standing in the World May Not Survive
This Covid Disaster,” Guardian, January 1, 2023.
James Palmer, Michael Rowand, and Tracy Wen Liu, “How China Botched the End of Zero-
COVID, Other Countries Have Successfully Transitioned from Strict Lockdowns. Beijing Has
Wasted the Last Three Years,” Foreign Policy, December 22, 2022.
Chris Buckley, Alexandra Stevenson, and Keith Bradsher, “From Zero Covid to No Plan: Behind
China’s Pandemic U-Turn, After Micromanaging the Coronavirus Strategy for Nearly Three
Years, the Country’s Leader, Xi Jinping, Has Suddenly Left the Populace to Improvise,” New
York Times, December 19 (updated December 21), 2022.
Editorial Board, “China’s Botched Covid Reopening, Rushed Exit from Hardline Policy Shatters
Myth of Beijing’s Competence,” Financial Times, December 19, 2022.
Tara D. Sonenshine, “The Coming China Rebrand,” The Hill, December 5, 2022.
Yanzhong Huang, “China’s Struggle With Covid Is Just Beginning,” New York Times, December
4, 2022.
Vivan Wang, “The Chinese Dream, Denied, The World’s Harshest Covid Restrictions Exemplify
How Xi Jinping’s Authoritarian Excesses Have Rewritten Beijing’s Longstanding Social Contract
with Its People,” New York Times, December 4, 2022.
Coco Liu, “China’s Covid Zero Policy Is Putting Its Climate Action on Ice,” Bloomberg,
November 29, 2022.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Editorial Board, “‘Zero Covid’ Has Pummeled China into a Crisis. Xi Should React,” Washington
Post, November 28, 2022.
Gideon Rachman, “Xi Jinping’s Pandemic Triumphalism Returns to Haunt Him, The President’s
Hubris and Authoritarianism Have Trapped China in Endless Lockdowns,” Financial Times,
November 28, 2022.
Jamie Smyth and Eleanor Olcott, “Beijing’s Failure to Import mRNA Covid Jabs ‘Mind-
Boggling’, Says BeiGene Executive, Chinese Biotech’s Research Chief Calls Decision
‘Unfortunate’ as Zero-Covid Policy Strangles Economy,” Financial Times, October 13, 2022.
Editorial Board, “How Did the Pandemic Begin? China Must Help Find the Answer,” Washington
Post, June 9, 2022.
John R. Deni, et al., China, Europe, and the Pandemic Recession: Beijing’s Investments and
Transatlantic Security, Strategic Studies Institute (SSI), U.S. Army War College, May 2022, 266
pp.
Christian Shepherd, “Covid Pushed China Away from the World Stage. But Its Global Ambitions
Persist,” Washington Post, November 19, 2021.
Gideon Rachman, “China’s Self-Isolation Is a Global Concern, Beijing’s Zero-Covid Policy Is
Damaging International Business and Global Governance,” Financial Times, November 8, 2021.
James T. Areddy, “China Aims to Export 2 Billion Covid-19 Vaccines This Year, Commitment
Expands Chinese Diplomatic Effort to Help Developing Nations, as Delta Variant Spreads,” Wall
Street Journal, August 6, 2021.
Sui-Lee Wee, “They Relied on Chinese Vaccines. Now They’re Battling Outbreaks. More Than
90 Countries Are Using Covid Shots from China. Experts Say Recent Infections in Those Places
Should Serve As a Cautionary Tale in the Global Effort to Fight the Disease,” New York Times,
June 22 (updated June 28), 2021.
Raymond Zhong and Christopher F. Schuetze, “Taiwan Wants German Vaccines. China May Be
Standing in Its Way,” New York Times, June 16 (updated June 22), 2021.
Associated Press, “Taiwan Says China Exploiting Vaccines for Political Gain,” Associated Press,
June 3, 2021.
Adam Taylor and Paul Schemm, “China’s Great Vaccine Hope, Sinopharm, Sees Reputation
Darkened Amid Covid Spikes in Countries Using It,” Washington Post, June 3, 2021.
Uwagbale Edward-Ekpu, “China’s Vaccine Outreach in Africa is Falling Short of Beijing’s
Pledges,” Quartz Africa, May 21, 2021.
Ben Smith, “When Covid Hit, China Was Ready to Tell Its Version of the Story, The Government
Has Been Using Its Money and Power to Create an Alternative to a Global News Media
Dominated by Outlets like the BBC and CNN,” New York Times, May 9 (updated May 29), 2021.
Vincent Ni, “Border Dispute Casts Shadow over China’s Offers of Covid Help for India,”
Guardian, April 29, 2021.
Isabel Bernhard, “Latin America Believed in Chinese Vaccines. Now It May Have Reason to
Rethink, China’s Latest Disclosure Could Reconfigure Regional Politics and Promote Domestic
Development Across the Americas,” Diplomat, April 21, 2021.
Kareem Fahim and Karen DeYoung, “China Has Made Big Vaccine Promises. When They Come
Up Short, Nations Struggle,” Washington Post, April 7, 2021.
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James Palmer, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy Has Mixed Results, Concerns About the Efficacy of
Sinovac and Sinopharm Has Dented Their Reputation, Even Among Allies of Beijing,” Foreign
Policy, April 7, 2021.
Francisco Urdinez, China’s Improvised Mask Diplomacy in Chile, Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace, April 2021, 30 pp. (Posted online April 6, 2021.)
Richard Javad Heydarian, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy Stumbles in Southeast Asia, Delays and
Concerns About the Efficacy and Politics of China’s Vaccine Shipments Plague Its Vaccine Drive
in the Region,” Al Jazeera, April 5, 2021.
Eli Lake, “China’s Claims of Exoneration on Covid Ring Hollow, Even the Head of the World
Health Organization Found Its Report on the Pandemic’s Origins Insufficient,” Bloomberg, April,
2, 2021.
Emily Rauhala, “WHO Chief, U.S. and Other World Leaders Criticize China for Limiting Access
of Team Researching Coronavirus Origins,” Washington Post, March 30, 2021.
Rajni George, “At China’s Borders, “Vaccine Passports” Just Got Real, In Announcing It Would
Prioritize Travelers Who Had Received Chinese-Made Vaccines, Beijing Sparked Outrage in
Countries Where Those Aren’t Available,” Foreign Policy, March 25, 2021.
Elliot Hannon, “China’s Happy to Share Its COVID-19 Vaccines, but Not the Data Showing if
They Actually Work,” Slate, March 24, 2021.
Eva Dou and Shibani Mahtani, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy Stumbles as Clinical Trial Data
Remains Absent,” Washington Post, March 23, 2021.
Bret Schafer, Amber Frankland, Nathan Kohlenberg, and Etienne Soula, “Influence-enza: How
Russia, China, and Iran Have Shaped and Manipulated Coronavirus Vaccine Narratives,” Alliance
for Securing Democracy (German Marshall Fud of the United States), March 6, 2021.
Huizhong Wu and Kristen Gelineau, “Chinese Vaccines Sweep Much of the World, Despite
Concerns,” Associated Press, March 2, 2021.
Laura Pitel, “Turkey’s Uighurs Fear Betrayal over Chinese Vaccines and Trade, Erdogan Accused
of Toning down Rhetoric about Oppressed Muslims to Avoid Upsetting Beijing,” Financial
Times, February 24, 2021.
Mordechai Chaziza, “Chinese Health Diplomacy and the Maghreb in the COVID-19 Era,” Middle
East Institute, February 23, 2021.
Yang Lizhong and Chen Dingding, “Is China’s COVID-19 Diplomacy Working in Southeast
Asia? A Recent Poll Suggests a Mixed Picture for China,” Diplomat, February 20, 2021.
Jason Hung, “In China’s ‘Vaccine Diplomacy’ with the Philippines, Both Sides Are Taking Big
Risks,” East-West Center, February 19, 2021.
Lucien O. Chauvin, Anthony Faiola, and Eva Dou, “Squeezed Out of the Race for Western
Vaccines, Developing Countries Turn to China,” Washington Post, February 16, 2021.
Erika Kinetz, “Anatomy of a Conspiracy: With COVID, China Took leading Role,” Associated
Press, February 15, 2021.
Alex Leary, “U.S. Expresses ‘Deep Concerns’ Over China Withholding Data From Pandemic
Investigators,” Wall Street Journal, February 13, 2021.
Javier C. Hernández and James Gorman, “On W.H.O. Trip, China Refused to Hand Over
Important Data,” New York Times, February 12, 2021.
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U.S. Relations and Great Power Competition with China
and Russia
Joby Warrick and Cate Brown, “China’s Quest for Human Genetic Data Spurs Fears of a DNA
Arms Race, The Pandemic Helped China Scoop up DNA from Countries around the World,”
Washington Post, September 21 (updated October 19), 2023.
Bob Davis, “China’s COVID-19 Failure Isn’t a Win for Democracy, The Pandemic Years Strained
Every System of Government,” Foreign Policy, January 8, 2023.
Humeyra Pamuk, “U.S. State Dept Says Toll of COVID in China a Concern for the World,”
Associated Press, December 19, 2022.
Megan K. Stack, “A Contagion the U.S. and China Both Fear: Each Other,” New York Times,
December 10, 2022.
Caitlin Doornbos, “China Used COVID-19 to Win Global Favor with Propaganda, Aid:
Pentagon,” New York Post, November 30, 2022.
Paul Krugman, “How China Lost the Covid War,” New York Times, November 28, 2022.
Jason Douglas and Raffaele Huang, “China’s Central Bank Takes Action as Record Covid-19
Outbreak Hits Economy, People’s Bank of China Frees Up Billions of Yuan for New Loans, But
Economists Are Skeptical It Will Lift Growth,” Wall Street Journal, November 25, 2022.
Jason Douglas, “China Recovery Set Back by Record Covid Outbreak as Lockdowns Spread,
Economists See Pandemic Restrictions as a Brake on Growth in the World’s Second-Largest
Economy,” Wall Street Journal, November 24, 2022.
Ville Sinkkonen and Anu Ruokamo, Vaccines As Contentious Connectivity in the Indo-Pacific:
The Case of US-China Competition During the Covid-19 Pandemic, Finnish Institute of
International Affairs (FIIA), October 2022, 25 pp.
Andrei Iancu and David J. Kappos, “Team Biden Ready to Hand Russia and China Vaccine
Technology—Free of Charge,” New York Post, June 5, 2022.
Edward Lucas et al., “Post-Mortem: Russian and Chinese COVID-19 Information Operations,”
Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), May 26, 2022.
Huizhong Wu and Aniruddha Ghosal, “China’s Bet on Homegrown mRNA Vaccines Holds Back
Nation,” Associated Press, May 24, 2022.
Shin Watanabe and Kentaro Takeda, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy Spoiled by Omicron Variant,
Sinopharm, Sinovac and Cansino Biologics Exports Fall 97% on Poor Protection,” Nikkei Asia,
May 8, 2022.
Matthew T. Page and Paul Stronski, “How Russia’s Hollow Humanitarianism Hurt Its Vaccine
Diplomacy in Africa,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 28, 2022.
Kirsty Needham, “Australia’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Pacific Islands Wards Off Beijing, Prime
Minister Says,” Reuters, March 12, 2022.
María Eugenia Brizuela de Ávila, Riyad Insanally, Claudia Trevisan, and Bosco Marti, US-China
Vaccine Diplomacy: Lessons from Latin America and the Caribbean, Atlantic Council, February
2022, 12 pp. (Posted online February 23, 2022.)
Riyani Sidek and Nafisa Halim, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Brunei: Boon or Bane?”
Diplomat, January 28, 2022.
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Erin Banco, “Trump Plan Favored Giving Vaccines to Israel, Taiwan over Poorer Countries,”
Politico, January 27, 2022.
Amit Gupta, “COVID-19 and Superpower Competition: An Effective American Response,”
Prism (National Defense University Press), January 20, 2022.
Adam Taylor, “Beijing and Moscow Are Losing the Vaccine Diplomacy Battle,” Washington
Post, January 11, 2022.
Anna Nishino, “Pharmacy of the World: China’s Quest to be the No. 1 Drugmaker,” Nekkei Asia,
December 23, 2021.
Paul Stronski, “Russian COVID-19 Diplomacy in Africa: A Mixed Bag,” Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace, December 10, 2021.
Matthew Renda, “Covid-Related Social Media Disinformation Campaign by China Fell Flat,”
Courthouse News Service, December 1, 2021.
“China, Russia Used Pandemic Disinformation to Undermine U.S., Report Says,” Washington
Times, November 15, 2021.
Christian Johnson and William Marcellino, Bad Actors in News Reporting, Tracking News
Manipulation by State Actors, RAND, 2021, 19 pp.
Chao Deng and Joe Parkinson, “China’s Army Furnishes Foreign Militaries With Covid-19
Vaccines, The People’s Liberation Army Has Helped Further Beijing’s Global Interests During
the Pandemic, Bringing Doses Directly to Militaries,” Wall Street Journal, November 8, 2021.
China Power Team, “Is China Succeeding at Shaping Global Narratives about Covid-19?” China
Power (Center for Strategic and International Studies [CSIS]). October 22 (updated November 8),
2021.
Anna Nishino, “Production, Politics and Propaganda, How Beijing Has Shaped the International
COVID Immunization Drive,” Nikkei Asia, October 12, 2021.
Bonny Lin, Matthew P. Funaiole, Brian Hart, and Hannah Price, “China Is Exploiting the
Pandemic to Advance Its Interests, with Mixed Results,” Center for Strategic and International
Studies (CSIS), September 30, 2021.
China Power Team. “Is China’s Covid-19 Diplomacy Succeeding?” China Power (Center for
Strategic and International Studies [CSIS]), September 23 (updated September 30), 2021.
Bob Herman, “The U.S. Isn’t Vaccinating Most of the World—But China Might,” Axios,
September 13, 2021.
Asif Muztaba Hassan, “China Swoops Into Bangladesh With a Vaccine Deal, It Bided Its Time
and When India Halted Supply of Vaccines to Bangladesh, It Saw Opportunity and Struck,”
Diplomat, August 24, 2021.
Sui-Lee Wee and Steven Lee Myers, “As Chinese Vaccines Stumble, U.S. Finds New Opening in
Asia, Several Southeast Asian Nations Are Raising Doubts about the Efficacy of China’s
Vaccines. The Biden Administration Has Recently Offered to Provide Shots, ‘No Strings
Attached,’” New York Times, August 20 (updated September 30), 2021.
James Palmer, “Why China Keeps Spinning COVID-19 Conspiracies, A Fake Expert Is the Latest
Part of a State Media Push to Blame the United States for the Pandemic—at Great Diplomatic
Cost,” Foreign Policy, August 11, 2021.
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Shibani Mahtani, “Ravaged by Delta Outbreak, Southeast Asia Shifts Away from China’s
Vaccines,” Washington Post, August 10, 2021.
Bloomberg News, “China’s Covid-Zero Strategy Risks Leaving It Isolated for Years,” Bloomberg,
August 9, 2021.
Sui-Lee Wee, “China Says It Will Provide 2 Billion Vaccine Doses to the World. The Pledge,
Which Included a $100 Million Donation to Covax, Intensifies Competition with the U.S. over
Leadership in Ending the Pandemic,” New York Times, August 6 (updated August 9), 2021.
Julian E. Barnes, “Russian Disinformation Targets Vaccines and the Biden Administration, A New
Campaign Appears to be Spreading Falsehoods about the Potential for Forced Inoculations
Against Covid-19,” New York Times, August 5 (updated September 20), 2021.
Jonathan Barrett, “Biden Pledges ‘No Strings’ Pacific Pandemic Support,” Reuters, August 5,
2021.
Nick Baker, “China Has Accused Australia of Vaccine Sabotage in the Pacific. Here’s why, A Spat
Between China and Australia over Covid-19 Vaccines Highlights the Tense Geopolitics of the
Pacific Region,” NBC News, August 2, 2021.
Jake Rudnitsky, “Russia’s Global Vaccine Ambitions Stumble During Supply Shortage,”
Bloomberg, July 30, 2021.
Benjamin Ho, “Why China Will Not Cooperate with the West: The Pandemic Made Things
Worse, Beijing Sees Vaccine Diplomacy as a Crucial Means with Which to Convince Other
Countries of Its Goodwill and Friendship. It Wants to Seize the Moral High Ground to Claim that
It Is Superior to the West,” National Interest, July 25, 2021.
By Samuel Ramani, “Vaccines Are Japan’s New Tool to Counter China, Despite Its Worsening
Pandemic, Tokyo’s Vaccine Diplomacy Has Gained Traction,” Foreign Policy, July 23, 2021.
Julia Hollingsworth and Ben Westcott, “A Pacific Nation’s Covid-19 Crisis Has Become a
Political Power Play between China and Australia,” CNN, July 19, 2021.
Chloe Lim And Nile Bowie, “China’s Vaccine Diplomacy Falters in SE Asia, Regional Nations
Are Abandoning Chinese Vaccines for Western Ones as Evidence Mounts Sinovac Is Less Potent
Against the Delta Strain,” Asia Times, July 19, 2021.
Josh Rogin, “China’s Vaccine Profiteering at the U.N. Is Being Funded by U.S. Taxpayers,”
Washington Post, July 15, 2021.
R. Evan Ellis, “Vaccine Diplomacy in Latin America, Caribbean a PR Coup for China,” National
Defense, July 12, 2021.
Robbie Gramer, “U.S. Blunts China’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Latin America, The Biden
Administration Ships Millions of Vaccines to the Region As Its Public Health Crisis Worsens,”
Foreign Policy, July 9, 2021.
Alexey Kovalev, “The Shocking Enormity of Russia’s Botched Pandemic Response, A Massive
Third Wave Is Spreading Unchecked, Anti-vaxxers Are Rampant, and the Kremlin’s Vaccine
Diplomacy has failed,” Foreign Policy, July 5, 2021.
Tyler Durden, “How China Became The Big Winner Of The COVID Era,” ZeroHedge, July 3,
2021.
Sinikukka Saari, Russia’s Corona Diplomacy and Geoeconomic Competition, A Sputnik Moment?
Finnish Institute of International Affairs, July 2021, 8 pp.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Rintaro Hosokawa, “Vaccines and Rifts Dominate First G-20 Ministers Meeting in 2 Years
Chinese FM Calls on Countries to Stop ‘Export Restrictions and Excessive Hoarding,’” Nikkei
Asia, June 30, 2021.
Shaun Tandon and Gildas Le Roux (Agence France-Presse), “US Urges Covid Cooperation at
G20 as China Critical,” Yahoo News, June 29, 2021.
Koji Sugimoto and George Yin, “With Vaccine Diplomacy to Taiwan, U.S. and Japan Steal March
on China, Vaccine Diplomacy Is Not Just About Winning ‘Hearts and Minds’ but Also
Realpolitik,” National Interest, June 28, 2021.
Samuel Ramani, “With Sputnik V, Russia Shot Itself in the Foot, High Prices, Delayed Deliveries,
and Questions About Efficacy Raise Suspicions about Russia’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Africa,”
Foreign Policy, June 24, 2021.
Reuben Johnson, “COVID, Hacking, and Spying Helped China Develop a New Stealth Fighter in
Record Time, In the West, the Pandemic Put the Defense Industry on Hold. In China, the Military
Used the Time to Make Big Advances,” Bulwark, June 23, 2021.
Deborah Seligsohn, “Demands for a Lab Leak Investigation Are a Dangerous Distraction, U.S.-
China Cooperation Is Vital for Global Health Efforts,” Foreign Policy, June 18, 2021.
Josh Rogin, “To Push Back Against Chinese Aggression, Give Taiwan Vaccines,” Washington
Post, June 17 (updated June 25), 2021.
Niharika Mandhana and Sha Hua, “China Steps Into Covid-19 Vaccine Void in Asia’s Developing
Nations, Shots Developed by Chinese Companies Have Been a Conspicuous Part of the Rollouts
in the First Half of 2021, Helping Beijing Strengthen Regional Ties,” New York Times, June 16,
2021.
Oliver Stuenkel, “Vaccine Diplomacy Boosts China’s Standing in Latin America, Beijing Has
Increased Its Leverage in the Region—but Washington Can Still Stage a Comeback,” Foreign
Policy, June 11, 2021.
Jack Detsch, “U.S.-China Spat Over Taiwan Extends to Vaccine Diplomacy, The United States Is
Providing Hundreds of Thousands of Vaccines Right in China’s Front Yard,” Foreign Policy, June
11, 2021.
Matthew Dalton, “France Suspects Russian Role in Campaign to Discredit Pfizer Vaccine,
Several French Bloggers Said They Received Emails Offering to Pay for Social-Media Videos
Criticizing the Covid-19 Vaccine,” Wall Street Journal, May 25, 2021.
Dan De Luce, “China is Using Vaccines to Push Its Agenda in Latin America, and the U.S. Is
Behind the Curve, Experts Say, Latin American Officials Say China Has Pushed Their Countries
to Cut Ties with Taiwan in Return for Badly Needed Covid-19 Vaccines,” NBC News, May 23,
2021.
Michael Martina, “U.S. Says Condemns Political Use of Vaccines after China-Taiwan Tussle,”
Reuters, May 14, 2021.
Ben Westcott, “China and Russia Want to Vaccinate the Developing World Before the West. It’s
Brought Them Closer Than Ever,” CNN, May 11, 2021.
Meia Nouwens, The Evolving Nature of China’s Military Diplomacy: From Visits to Vaccines,
International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), May 2021, 15 pp. (Posted online May 10,
2021.)
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Iain Marlow, Sudhi Ranjan Sen, and James Paton, “World Turns to China for Vaccines After
India, U.S. Stumble,” Bloomberg, May 6 (updated May 7), 2021.
Nicholas G. Evans and Mark Eccleston-Turner, “COVID-19 Vaccine Nationalism Will Cost Lives
Worldwide,” Slate, May 3, 2021.
Krishna Kumar, “Why America Must Do More to Vaccinate the World’s Population,” National
Interest, May 3, 2021.
Andrew Higgins, “Russian Attempts to Expand Sputnik Vaccine Set Off Discord in Europe,” New
York Times, May 2 (updated May 5), 2021.
Miriam Matthews, Katya Migacheva, and Ryan Andrew Brown, Superspreaders of Malign and
Subversive Information on COVID-19, Russian and Chinese Efforts Targeting the United States,
RAND, 2021, 82 pp.
Euronews, “EU Slams Russia and China for Western Vaccines Disinformation Campaign,”
Euronews, April 29, 2021.
Robin Emmott, “Russia, China sow disinformation to undermine trust in Western vaccines: EU,”
Reuters, April 28, 2021.
Akhil Ramesh, “On Vaccines, Globalists Are Nationalists and Nationalists Are Gobalists,” The
Hill, April 27, 2021.
Josh Rogin, “The United States Can’t Ignore China’s Vaccine Diplomacy in Latin America,”
Washington Post, April 22, 2021.
Georgia Leatherdale-Gilholy, “Could India’s Vaccine Diplomacy Displace China?” National
Interest, April 20, 2021.
Harsh V. Pant and Premesha Saha, “India’s Vaccine Diplomacy Reaches Taiwan,” National
Interest, April 20, 2021.
Hal Brands, “America’s Come-From-Behind Pandemic Victory, China Was the Global Winner of
the Coronavirus Disaster—Until the United States Beat the Odds,” Foreign Policy, April 16,
2021.
Eckart Woertz and Roie Yellinek, “Vaccine Diplomacy in the MENA Region,” Middle East
Institute, April 14, 2021.
Dalibor Rohac, “Sputnik V’s Biggest Legacy May Be Political Turmoil, In Eastern European
Countries That Have Accepted the Russian Vaccine, Destabilization Has Followed,” Foreign
Policy, April 14, 2021.
Cecilia Yap and Andreo Calonzo, “Philippines Asks U.S. for Vaccine Help as China Tensions
Grow,” Bloomberg, April 11, 2021.
Reuters Staff, “Taiwan Says China Uses COVID-19 Vaccines to Press Paraguay to Break Ties,”
Reuters, April 7, 2021. (See also Bill Bostock, “Taiwan Accused China of Trying to Bribe
Paraguay with COVID-19 Vaccines to Make It Stop Recognizing Taiwan,” Business Insider,
April 7, 2021; Agence France-Presse, “Taiwan Accuses Beijing of Luring Paraguay with
‘Vaccine Diplomacy,” France 24, April 7, 2021; BBC, “Taiwan Accuses China of ‘Vaccine
Diplomacy’ in Paraguay,” BBC, April 7, 2021.)
Reuters Staff, “Taiwan Says India Helped Paraguay Get Vaccines After China Pressure,” Reuters,
April 7, 2021.
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Luke McGee, “Europe Is Torn Over Whether to Take Putin’s Help on Vaccines,” CNN, April 3,
2021.
Georgi Kantchev and Laurence Norman, “With EU’s Covid-19 Vaccine Drive in Disarray, Russia
Sees an Opening, Despite Tensions with Moscow, Some EU Leaders Back the Sputnik V Shot,
Which Could Offer Kremlin a Soft Power Coup,” Wall Street Journal, April 2, 2021.
Tim Gosling, “Russia and China Are Exploiting Europe’s Vaccine Shortfalls, Slovakia’s Prime
Minister Has Resigned Over a Secret Delivery of Moscow’s Sputnik V as Brussels Struggles to
Keep the EU United,” Foreign Policy, March 31, 2021.
Yasmeen Serhan, “Here’s How Russia and China Are Helping the U.S., Beijing and Moscow Are
Filling the Vaccine Gap That Wealthy Countries Helped Create,” Atlantic, March 30, 2021.
Hal Brands, “America Is Overtaking China in Vaccine Diplomacy, China Squandered Its Early
Advantages, and Now the U.S. Government and Drug Makers Are Leading a Second-Half
Comeback,” Bloomberg, March 23, 2021.
Erik Brattberg, “Middle Power Diplomacy in an Age of US-China Tensions,” Washington
Quarterly, Spring 202: 219-238. (Published online March 23, 2021.)
Otto Lanzavecchia, “Old Friends in Italy Join Russia’s Vaccine Offensive,” Center for European
Policy Analysis (CEPA), March 19, 2021.
Sadanand Dhume, “India Beats China at Vaccine Diplomacy, But New Delhi’s Massive Success
Is a Function of Collaboration with the West, Not ‘Self-Reliance,’” Wall Street Journal, March
18, 2021.
Austin Bay, “On Point: Russia Joins China’s Wuhan Virus Lie Campaign,” Strategy Page, March
17, 2021.
John Bowden, “Kremlin: Pressure on Countries to Refuse Russian COVID-19 Vaccine ‘Quite
Unprecedented,’” The Hill, March 16, 2021.
John Grady, “SOUTHCOM’s Faller: China Used Pandemic to Expand ‘Corrosive, Insidious
Influence’ in Central, South America, U.S. Influence ‘Eroding,’” USNI News, March 16 (updated
March 17), 2021.
Jeff Pao, “China, Quad Slug It Out in Vaccine Diplomacy Fight, Beijing and Washington Use
Low-Cost Vaccines to Win Hearts and Minds in Poor and Under-Developed Countries,” Asia
Times, March 16, 2021.
Daniele Carminati, “The Ups and Downs of Soft Power in the Asia-Pacific, The Coronavirus
Pandemic Has Shifted the Relative ‘Soft power’ Standing of Leading Powers,” Diplomat, March
15, 2021.
Ernesto Londoño and Letícia Casado, “Brazil Needs Vaccines. China Is Benefiting, China Is a
Major Supplier of Coronavirus Vaccine, Giving It Enormous Leverage in Pandemic-Ravaged
Nations. Brazil, Recently Hostile to the Chinese Company Huawei, Has Suddenly Changed Its
Stance,” New York Times, March 15, 2021.
Edward Lucas, Jake Morris, and Corina Rebegea, Information Bedlam: Russian and Chinese
Information Operations During Covid-19, Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), 2021, 20
pp. (Posted online March 15, 2021.)
Eric Bellman, “U.S. Taps Indian Covid-19 Vaccine Production Prowess to Inoculate Indo-
Pacific,” Wall Street Journal, March 14, 2021.
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Nathaniel Weixel, “US Comes under Pressure to Share Vaccines with Rest of World,” The Hill,
March 14, 2021.
David Brunnstrom, Michael Martina, and Jeff Mason, “U.S., India, Japan and Australia Counter
China with Billion-Dose Vaccine Pact,” Reuters, March 12, 2021.
Michael J. Green, “Quad Summit’s Vaccine Deal Is Biden’s Bold First Move in Asia, It’s a Smart
Step to Counter China, but the Next Ones Won’t Be as Easy,” Foreign Policy, March 12, 2021.
Demetri Sevastopulo, Amy Kazmin, and Jamie Smyth, “US and Asia Allies Launch Major
Vaccine Drive to Counter China, The 1bn Covid Jabs Will be Funded by US and Japan, Made in
India and Distributed by Australia,” Financial Times, March 12, 2021.
David Wainer and Patrick Gillespie, “It’s ‘America First’ on Vaccines as Russia, China Fill Gap,”
Bloomberg, March 12, 2021.
Anne Gearan and Miriam Berger, “Biden Faces Pressure to Distribute Vaccines Worldwide,
While Americans Still Need Them at Home,” Washington Post, March 11, 2021.
Yanzhong Huang, “Vaccine Diplomacy Is Paying Off for China, Beijing Hasn’t Won the Soft-
Power Stakes, but It Has an Early Lead,” Foreign Affairs, March 11, 2021.
Philip Blenkinsop, “Rich, Developing Nations Wrangle over COVID Vaccine Patents,” Reuters,
March 10, 2021.
Dinko Hanaan Dinko, “How ‘Mask Diplomacy’ Rescued China’s Image in Africa, While Beijing
Was Nimbly Pivoting, the U.S. Continued to Let Its Relationships Wither,” Defense One, March
10, 2021.
Joel Gehrke, “US Eager to Beat China at Vaccine Diplomacy Game,” Washington Examiner,
March 10, 2021.
Rafi Khetab, “How America Can Outcompete China in an Age of Global Pandemics, Managing
Pandemics Rightly Matters a Great Deal in This Era of Great Power Competition,” National
Interest, March 10, 2021.
Yomiuri Shimbun, “Quad to Create Framework for Providing Vaccines to Developing Countries,”
Japan News, March 10, 2021.
Henry Foy, “Covid Vaccine Diplomacy Is a Dilemma for Foreign Embassies in Russia, Sputnik V
Is One of the Most Effective Jabs but the UK And US Are Flying in Their Own Supplies,”
Financial Times, March 9, 2021.
Prabhjote Gill, “India Is Asking the QUAD for Money to Boost Vaccine Production and Counter
China’s Moves on the Global Stage,” Business Insider India, March 9, 2021.
Deirdre Shesgreen, “‘Russia Is Up to Its Old Tricks’: Biden Battling COVID-19 Vaccine
Disinformation Campaign,” USA Today, March 8, 2021.
Nikolas K. Gvosdev and Ray Takeyh, “Who Came Out On Top from the 2020 Coronavirus Year?
Predictions that Russia or China Would Take the Lead in the Fight against the Pandemic Have
Not Panned Out. Instead, Countries Around the World Are Clamoring for Forging New Trade,
Technological, and Health Alliances with the United States,” National Interest, March 7, 2021.
Parag Khanna, “The New ‘End of History,’ If There Is a Political System that Has Emerged
Victorious from the Coronavirus Pandemic, It Is Asian Democratic Technocracy,” National
Interest, March 6, 2021.
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Lillian Posner, “The Controversy Behind Russia’s Sputnik V Vaccine,” National Interest, March
6, 2021.
Josh Rogin, “How Covid Hastened the Decline and Fall of the U.S.-China Relationship,”
Washington Post, March 4, 2021.
Krishna N. Das, “Chinese Hackers Target Indian Vaccine Makers SII, Bharat Biotech, Says
Security Firm,” Reuters, March 1, 2021.
Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Autocracy
Garance Burke, Josef Federman, Huizhong Wu, Krutika Pathi, and Rod Mcguirk, “Police Seize
on COVID-19 Tech to Expand Global Surveillance,” Associated Press, December 21, 2022.
Rachel Liang and Brian Spegele, “China Covid Protesters Become Targets of Beijing’s
Surveillance State,” Wall Street Journal, November 29, 2022.
“‘How Dare They Peep into My Private Life?’ Children’s Rights Violations by Governments that
Endorsed Online Learning During the Covid-19 Pandemic,” Human Rights Watch, May 25, 2022.
Joel Simon and Robert Mahoney, “How China’s Response to COVID-19 Set the Stage for a
Worldwide Wave of Censorship, Authoritarian Governments in Eighty Nations Have Enacted
Restrictions on Free Speech and Political Expression that Were Falsely Described as Public-
Health Measures,” New Yorker, April 25, 2022.
Ellen Francis, “Global Freedoms Have Hit a ‘Dismal’ Record Low, with Pandemic Restrictions
Making Things Worse, Report Says,” Washington Post, February 10, 2022.
Chris Buckley, Vivian Wang, and Keith Bradsher, “Living by the Code: In China, Covid-Era
Controls May Outlast the Virus, The Country Has Instituted a Wide Range of High-Tech Controls
on Society as Part of a Mostly Successful Effort to Stop the Virus. The Consequences May
Endure,” New York Times, January 30, 2022.
Sandra Ahmadi and Aseem Prakash, “Autocrats Are Exploiting COVID-19 to Weaken Central
Bank Independence,” Foreign Policy, January 10, 2022.
Victoria Kim, “Who’s Watching? How Governments Used the Pandemic to Normalize
Surveillance,” Los Angeles Times, December 9, 2021.
Amnesty International, Silenced and Misinformed: Freedom of Expression in Danger During
Covid-19, Amnesty International, 2021, 38 pp. (Posted online October 19, 2021.)
Justin Esarey, “The Myth That Democracies Bungled the Pandemic, The Argument that
Authoritarian Governments Outperform Democracies in a Crisis Has Found New Life During the
Coronavirus Pandemic. The Data Tell a Different Story,” Atlantic, October 4, 2021.
Jill Lawless, “Authoritarianism Advances as World Battles the Pandemic,” Associated Press, July
15, 2021.
Parag Khanna, “The Pandemic Proves Only Technocrats Can Save Us, Populist Politicians Love
to Belittle Experts, but When It’s a Matter of Life and Death, the Precautionary Principle and
Expertise Are What Counts,” Foreign Policy, June 24, 2021.
Uri Friedman, “COVID-19 Lays Bare the Price of Populism, A Raging Outbreak in Brazil
Threatens Gains Against the Virus,” Atlantic, May 9, 2021.
Camille Elemia, “At Least 10 Asia Pacific Gov’ts Use COVID-19 for Censorship,
Disinformation,” Rappler, April 20, 2021.
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R. Evan Ellis, Populism, China, and Covid-19, Latin America’s New Perfect Storm, Center for
Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), April 2021, 6 pp. (Posted online April 20, 2021.)
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, “Governments In Europe, Central Asia Used Pandemic To
Clamp Down On Human Rights, Amnesty Says,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, April 7,
2021.
Elian Peltier, “Laws Used to Fight Pandemic Are in Some Cases Weakening Democracies, Report
Says,” New York Times, March 9, 2021.
Parag Khanna, “The New ‘End of History,’ If There Is a Political System that Has Emerged
Victorious from the Coronavirus Pandemic, It Is Asian Democratic Technocracy,” National
Interest, March 6, 2021.
Joshua Kurlantzick, COVID-19 and Its Effect on Inequality and Democracy, A Study of Five
Large Democracies, Council on Foreign Relations, March 2021, 36 pp.
“Covid-19 Triggers Wave of Free Speech Abuse, Scores of Countries Target Media, Activists,
Medics, Political Opponents,” Human Rights Watch, February 11, 2021.
Economist, “Global Democracy Has a Very Bad Year, The Pandemic Caused an Unprecedented
Rollback of Democratic Freedoms in 2020,” Economist, February 2, 2021.
Societal Tension, Reform, and Transformation, and
Governmental Stability
Lynette H. Ong, “China’s Epidemic of Mistrust, How Xi’s COVID-19 U-Turn Will Make the
Country Harder to Govern,” Foreign Affairs, January 11, 2023.
Yew Lun Tian and Martin Pollard, “China Protests Highlight Xi's COVID Policy Dilemma,”
Reuters, November 29, 2022.
Daisuke Wakabayashi, Olivia Wang, and Joy Dong, “Chinese Protests Over ‘Zero Covid’ Follow
Months of Economic Pain,” New York Times, November 29, 2022.
CNN's Beijing bureau and Nectar Gan, “Protests Erupt Across China in Unprecedented Challenge
to Xi Jinping’s Zero-Covid Policy,” CNN, November 28, 2022.
Dake Kang, “China’s Xi Faces Threat from Public Anger over ‘Zero COVID,’” Associated Press,
November 28, 2022.
Cao Li and Elaine Yu, “China Clamps Down on Protesters Against Zero-Covid Policies,” Wall
Street Journal, November 28, 2022.
Minxin Pei, “Xi Jinping Has a Tough Decision to Make on China's COVID Protests, Ending
Lockdowns and Cracking Down Would Both Have High Costs,” Nikkei Asia, November 28,
2022.
Lingling Wei, “Chinese Protests Put Xi Jinping in a Bind, Lifting Restrictions Would Risk a Wave
of Covid Infections, While Crushing Demonstrations Would Have Uncertain Consequences,”
New York Times, November 28, 2022.
Lingling Wei, Brian Spegele, and Wenxin Fan, “Chinese Protests Spread Over Government’s
Covid Restrictions, Demonstrations Erupt in Beijing, Shanghai and Other Major Cities,” Wall
Street Journal, November 28, 2022.
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Edward White, Thomas Hale, and Ryan McMorrow, “Xi Jinping Faces Stiffest Challenge to Rule
as Covid Outrage Sparks Mass Protests,” Financial Times, November 28, 2022.
Editorial Board, “China’s Revolt Against Zero-Covid, Protests across the Country Reveal Deep
Anger and Frustration at Three Years of Lockdowns and Social Control,” Wall Street Journal,
November 27, 2022.
Chris Buckley and Muyi Xiao, “Protests Erupt in Shanghai and Other Chinese Cities Over Covid
Controls,” New York Times, November 26, 2022.
Editorial Board, “China’s Zero-Covid Reckoning, Record Infections and New Lockdowns Lead
to Rising Public Frustration and Slower Economic Growth,” Wall Street Journal, November 24,
2022.
Christopher Chen, “Future-ready Humanitarian Action: Strategic Resilience in a Post-Covid
World,” S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), December 16, 2021.
Benoit Faucon, Summer Said, and Joe Parkinson, “Military Coups in Africa at Highest Level
Since End of Colonialism, Attempted or Successful Coups in Africa Are Occurring More
Frequently as Democratic States Buckle under Pressure from Covid-19,” Wall Street Journal,
November 4, 2021.
Carnegie Civic Research Network, Civil Society and the Global Pandemic: Building Back
Different? Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 2021, 19 pp. (Posted online
September 30, 2021.)
Peter Landers, Mike Cherney, and Jon Emont, “Covid-19 Delta Infections Trigger Political Side
Effects in Asia, Voters Are Directing Their Dissatisfaction at Leaders They Believe Responded
Too Slowly to the Variant’s Spread,” Wall Street Journal, August 26, 2021.
Joe Parkin Daniels, “The Pandemic’s Legacy Will Spur New Protests in Latin America, Increased
Economic Inequality Has Only Added to Widespread Discontent,” Foreign Policy, July 29, 2021.
Elise Labott, “Get Ready for a Spike in Global Unrest, COVID-19 Threatens to Accelerate
Longer-Term Rebellion, Violence, and Political Upheaval,” Foreign Policy, July 22, 2021.
Paolo Gerbaudo, “Big Government Is Back, The Pandemic Has Discredited Decades of Free
Market Orthodoxy—But Not All Visions of State Interventionism Are Progressive,” Foreign
Policy, February 13, 2021.
Emeline Wuilbercq, “Pandemic Woes Seen Swelling Global Ranks of Child Soldiers,” Reuters,
February 12, 2021.
Alexander Villegas, Anthony Faiola, and Lesley Wroughton, “As Spending Climbs and Revenue
Falls, the Coronavirus Forces a Global Reckoning, A Rising ‘Debt Tsunami’ Threatens Even
Stable, Peaceful Middle-Income Countries,” Washington Post, January 10, 2021.
Edoardo Campanella, “The Pandemic Remade the Chinese Economy, Other Countries Should
Prepare Now for Their Own Reformations,” Foreign Policy, January 4, 2021.
Philip Barrett and Sophia Chen, Social Repercussions of Pandemics, International Monetary
Fund, IMF Working Paper WP/21/21, January 2021, 24 pp.
Jarrett Blanc, Frances Z. Brown, and Benjamin Press, “Conflict Zones in the Time of
Coronavirus: War and War by Other Means,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
December 17, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Tahsin Saadi Sedik and Rui Xu, “When Inequality is High, Pandemics Can Fuel Social Unrest,”
IMF Blog (International Monetary Fund), December 11, 2020.
Joaquín Cottani, The Effects of Covid-19 on Latin America’s Economy, Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS), November 2020, 9 pp.
Tomasz Mickiewicz, Jun Du, and Oleksandr Shepotylo, “Coronavirus: Individualistic Societies
Might Be Doing Worse, the Individualism Hypothesis Is Worth Investigating Further,” National
Interest, October 14, 2020.
Clare Duffy, “The Pandemic Could Push 150 Million More People Worldwide into ‘Extreme
Poverty,’” CNN Business, October 7, 2020.
World Economy, Globalization, and U.S. Trade Policy
José F. Ursúa and Alejandro M. Werner, Rare Macroeconomic Disasters and Lost Decades in
Latin America, The Covid-19 Experience in a Historical Context, Peterson Institute for
International Seconomics (PIIE), September 2023, 30 pp.
Patricia Cohen, “Chinese Unrest Over Lockdown Upends Global Economic Outlook,” New York
Times, November 28, 2022.
Jason Douglas and Stella Yifan Xie, “Pandemic Bolsters China’s Position as the World’s
Manufacturer, The West Relies on Chinese Factories, Despite National-Security, Supply-Chain
Concerns,” Wall Street Journal, August 21, 2022.
Ben Casselman and Ana Swanson, “Supply Chain Hurdles Will Outlast Pandemic, White House
Says,” New York Times, April 14, 2022.
Valbona Zeneli, “After Ukraine and Coronavirus, Globalization Should Be About Freedom,”
National Interest, April 8, 2022.
Edward Wong and Ana Swanson, “Ukraine War and Pandemic Force Nations to Retreat From
Globalization,” New York Times, March 22, 2022.
Damien Cave and Christopher F. Schuetze, “Contending With the Pandemic, Wealthy Nations
Wage Global Battle for Migrants, Covid Kept Many People in Place. Now Several Developed
Countries, Facing Aging Labor Forces and Worker Shortages, Are Racing to Recruit, Train and
Integrate Foreigners,” New York Times, November 23, 2021.
Megan Greene, “Don’t Believe the Deglobalisation Narrative, Data Show Trade Balances Are
Not Shrinking and Foreign Investment Continues to Pour into China,” Financial Times,
November 16, 2021.
Rajiv Shah, “Rich Countries Saved Themselves During the Pandemic. Poorer Countries Are
Reeling. Developing Countries Had Been Closing the Gap with Wealthier Nations for Decades.
When Covid-19 Hit, That Stopped,” Washington Post, October 22, 2021.
Zack Beauchamp, “‘Neoliberalism Has Really Ruptured’: Adam Tooze on the Legacy of 2020,
The Global Aftershocks of Covid-19 and the Economic Crisis It Caused, Explained,” Vox,
September 9, 2021.
Editorial Board, “China’s Changing Role in the World Economy, Delta Variant and Supply Chain
Problems Are Slowing the Global Recovery,” Economist, September 1, 2021.
Peter S. Goodman and Keith Bradsher, “The World Is Still Short of Everything. Get Used to It.
Pandemic-Related Product Shortages—from Computer Chips to Construction Materials—Were
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Supposed to Be Resolved by Now. Instead, the World Has Gained a Lesson in the Ripple Effects
of Disruption,” New York Times, August 30 (updated September 23), 2021.
Emily Rauhala, Anu Narayanswamy, Youjin Shin, and Júlia Ledur, “How the Pandemic Set Back
Women’s Progress in the Global Workforce,” Washington Post, August 28, 2021.
Jayati Ghosh, “Specter of Stagflation Hangs Over Emerging Markets, Rich Countries’ Pandemic
Policies Are Sucking Growth and Capital Out of the Developing World,” Foreign Policy, August
5, 2021.
Gabriele Steinhauser and Drew Hinshaw, “India’s Covid-19 Agonies Highlight Growing Rich-
Poor Gap in Vaccinations,” Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2021.
James K. Galbraith, “The Death of Neoliberalism Is Greatly Exaggerated, The West’s Economic
Orthodoxy of the Past 40 Years Has Been Shaken by the Pandemic—But the Fight Isn’t Nearly
Over Yet,” Foreign Policy, April 6, 2021.
Nita Bhalla, “Africans Slam Rich Nations For Blocking Access To Generic COVID Vaccines,”
Reuters, March 11, 2021.
Colm Quinn, “Rich vs. Poor (Again) at WTO, Months after India and South Africa Made Their
Initial Proposal, the World Trade Organization Has Another Chance to Waive Intellectual
Property Rights for Covid-19 Vaccines and Treatments,” Foreign Policy, March 10, 2021.
Scott Lincicome, “The Pandemic Does Not Demand Government Micromanagement of Global
Supply Chains,” Cato Institute, February 24, 2021.
Fatima Hassan, “Don’t Let Drug Companies Create a System of Vaccine Apartheid, To Avoid
Repeating the Pitfalls of the HIV/AIDS Crisis, Governments and the WTO Must Make COVID-
19 Vaccination a Public Good by Temporarily Waiving Intellectual Property Rights and
Compelling Emergency Production,” Foreign Policy, February 23, 2021.
Peter S. Goodman, “One Vaccine Side Effect: Global Economic Inequality, As Covid Inoculations
Begin, the Economic Downturn Stands to be Reversed, but Developing Countries Are at Risk of
Being Left Behind,” New York Times, December 25, 2020.
Michael Shields, “Pandemic Speeds Labour Shift from Humans to Robots, WEF Survey Finds,”
Reuters, October 20, 2020.
Scott Lincicome, “Why a Successful COVID-19 Vaccine Depends on Globalization, Each of the
Vaccines that the United States Has Secured Appears to be Heavily Reliant on Globalization to
Produce the Final Doses at the Absolute Maximum Speed and Scale,” National Interest, October
16, 2020.
Josh Zumbrun and Yuka Hayashi, “China Growth Limits Global Economic Damage From
Pandemic, IMF Says,” Wall Street Journal, October 13, 2020.
Eric K. Hontz, “The Fate of Globalization in the Post-Coronavirus Era,” National Interest,
September 12, 2020.
Niccolò Pisani, “Trump’s China ‘Decoupling’ and Coronavirus: Why 2020 Upheaval Won’t Kill
Globalisation,” The Conversation, September 9, 2020.
Carmen Reinhart and Vincent Reinhart, “The Pandemic Depression, The Global Economy Will
Never Be the Same,” Foreign Affairs, September/October 2020.
Anthony B. Kim, “Protectionism and the Pandemic Are Curtailing Global Trade. Policymakers
Must Act Accordingly,” Heritage Foundation, August 5, 2020.
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Allied Defense Spending and U.S. Alliances
Amy Kazmin and Demetri Sevastopulo, “India’s Covid Calamity Exposes Weakest Link in US-
Led ‘Quad’ Alliance, New Delhi Virus Response Undermines Its Coalition with America, Japan
and Australia to Resist China,” Financial Times, June 14, 2021.
Michael Kugelman, “The U.S.-India Relationship Has a New Top Priority, The Indian Foreign
Minister’s U.S. Visit Shows the Partners Are Primarily Focused on Tackling the Coronavirus—for
Now,” Foreign Policy, May 27, 2021.
Tom Waldwyn and Fenella McGerty, “How COVID-19 Has Impacted South China Sea Defense
Spending and Procurement,” Defense News, May 10, 2021.
Mike Glenn, “COVID-19 Contributes to Jump in World’s Military Budgets: Report,” Washington
Times, April 26, 2021.
Jeffrey Lightfoot and Olivier-Rémy Bel, Sovereign Solidarity, France, the US, and Alliances in a
Post-Covid World, Atlantic Council, 2020 (released November 11, 2020), 28 pp.
Pierre Morcos, Toward a New “Lost Decade”? Covid-19 and Defense Spending in Europe,
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), October 2020, 7 pp. (Posted online October
15, 2020.)
Alice Billon-Galland, COVID-19 and the Defence Policies of European States, NATO Defense
College, October 2020, 4 pp.
Claudia Major, Catalyst or Crisis? COVID-19 and European Security, NATO Defense College,
October 2020, 4 pp.
Olivier Rittimann, NATO and the COVID-19 Emergency: Actions and Lessons, NATO Defense
College, September 2020, 4 pp.
European Union
Isaac Chotiner, “How the Pandemic Changed Europe, The historian Adam Tooze Discusses the
Vaccine Rollout and Shifting Politics in the E.U.,” New Yorker, April 15, 2021.
Steven Erlanger, “Vaccine ‘Fiasco’ Damages Europe’s Credibility, The European Union’s Failure
to Secure Adequate Vaccine Supplies, Followed by an Export Ban, Has Dented the Reputation of
the Bloc’s Leaders. It May Also hurt their Ability to Act in Other Areas,” New York Times, April
2, 2021.
Tim Gosling, “Russia and China Are Exploiting Europe’s Vaccine Shortfalls, Slovakia’s Prime
Minister Has Resigned Over a Secret Delivery of Moscow’s Sputnik V as Brussels Struggles to
Keep the EU United,” Foreign Policy, March 31, 2021.
Laurence Norman and Jenny Strasburg, “Vaccine Fight Between EU and U.K. Threatens to
Escalate, Officials on Both Sides Are in Talks to Prevent Bans of Exports of Covid-19 Shots and
Vaccination Supplies,” Wall Street Journal, Updated March 22, 2021.
Caroline de Gruyter, “Europe Needed Borders. Coronavirus Built Them. The Pandemic Has the
Continent Increasingly Discussing Its Common Boundaries—and Common Identity,” Foreign
Policy, December 4, 2020.
Colm Quinn, “Can Europe Come Together to Save Itself? A Quarrel over the EU Coronavirus
Fund Threatens to Stall Economic Recovery Efforts,” Foreign Policy, November 19, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Joseph de Weck and Elettra Ardissino, “The Pandemic Is Showing What the EU Is Good For,”
Foreign Policy, September 8, 2020.
Adam Tooze, “It’s a New Europe—if You Can Keep It, The Continent Has Managed to Take a
Great Leap Forward—But There Still Might Be a Crash Landing,” Foreign Policy, August 7,
2020.
Editorial Board, “The Pandemic Has Made Europe Stronger,” Washington Post, July 28, 2020.
Joseph de Weck, “Germany Is Finally Ready to Spend, In the Long Run, the COVID-19
Pandemic May Change Europe’s Economy for the Better,” Foreign Policy, June 22, 2020.
Patrick Donahue and Arne Delfs, “Merkel Calls for Agreement on EU Fund Before Summer
Break,” Bloomberg, June 18, 2020.
Desmond Lachman, “A Eurozone Economic Crisis Thanks to Coronavirus?” National Interest,
June 2, 2020.
Definition of, and Budgeting for, U.S. National Security
Josh Kerbel, “The US Talks A Lot About Strategic Complexity. Too Bad It’s Mostly Just Talk,
The Pandemic Sidelined a National Security Community that Gives Only Lip Service to a Vital
Concept,” Defense One, March 9, 2021.
Susan B. Glasser, “What Does National Security Even Mean Anymore, After January 6th and the
Pandemic? Talking Threats, Foreign and Domestic, with Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff,” New Yorker, March 4, 2021.
Jacob Parakilas, “The Lesson of 2020? Security Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Does, And
Science and Technology Will Only Take Us So Far When It Comes to Future Threats,
Conventional or Otherwise,” Diplomat, December 23, 2020.
Patrick M. Cronin and Audrey Kurth Cronin, “Rebuilding America in the Post Trump Era, The
Trump Administration’s Woeful Response to Many Threats, but Especially the Coronavirus
Pandemic, Demonstrates that Dealing with Tomorrow’s Bioterror Threat Must be a National
Security Priority,” National Interest, December 18, 2020.
Kevin Bilms, “Will COVID Finally Force Us to Think Differently About National Security? The
‘Softer’ Approaches of Irregular War Offer Outsized Benefits During Competition and Armed
Conflict Alike,” Defense One, December 15, 2020.
Michael R. Gordon and Warren P. Strobel, “Coronavirus Pandemic Stands to Force Changes in
U.S. Spy Services, After Years of Underplaying Soft Threats Like Disease and Climate Change,
National-Security Establishment Faces Calls for a New Approach,” Wall Street Journal,
November 22, 2020.
Uri Firedman, “The Pandemic Is Revealing a New Form of National Power, In the COVID-19
Era, a Country’s Strength Is Determined Not Only by Its Military and Economy, but Also by Its
Resilience,” Atlantic, November 15, 2020.
Frank Hoffman, “National Security in the Post-Pandemic Era,” Orbis, Winter 2021: 17-45. (The
first page of the article carries an additional date of November 2020.)
Marigny Kirschke-Schwartz, “America Must Act To Avoid A Biotechnology Arms Race, the
Covid-19 Pandemic Has Shown Us the Potential for a Biological Incident to Upend Global
Stability, and the Implications Are Sobering,” National Interest, September 22, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Calder Walton, “US Intelligence, the Coronavirus and the Age of Globalized Challenges,” Belfer
Center for Science and International Affairs, August 24, 2020.
U.S. Defense Strategy, Defense Budget, and Military Operations
Frank Hoffman, “U.S. Defense Strategy After The Pandemic,” War on the Rocks, April 20, 2021.
Aaron Mehta, “After COVID, Are Billions in Biodefense Funds Needed to Deter US
Adversaries?” Defense News, April 9, 2021.
America’s Strategic Choices: Defense Spending in a Post-Covid-19 World, An Executive Outbrief
From The CSBA–Ronald Reagan Institute Defense Worskhops, Center for Strategic and
Budgetary Assessments, January 2021, 13 pp.
Tony Bertuca, “Lord Says Pandemic Sharpened DOD’s Focus on Re-Shoring, Especially
Microelectronics,” Inside Defense, September 29, 2020.
Mike Glenn, “Don’t Pay for COVID-19 Relief at Expense of Nation’s Defense, Esper Warns,”
Washington Times, September 24, 2020.
Mackenzie Eaglen, “More Safety for Less Security Is a Sucker Bet,” American Enterprise
Institute, September 3, 2020.
Jon Harper, “Army a Potential Bill Payer for COVID-19 Costs,” National Defense, August 18,
2020.
Matt Vallone, “U.S. Defense Spending During and After the Pandemic,” War on the Rocks, July
31, 2020.
Franklin C. Miller, “Never Let a Good Crisis Go to Waste,” Real Clear Defense, June 1, 2020.
U.S. Foreign Assistance, International Debt Relief, and Refugee
Policy
Meghan Benton, Future Scenarios for Global Mobility in the Shadow of Pandemic, Migration
Policy Institute, July 2021, 33 pp.
Catherine Osborn, “How to Escape the COVID-19 Debt Trap, This Crisis May Be a Turning
Point for How the IMF Treats Indebted Nations.,” Foreign Policy, June 4, 2021.
Bernard Aryeetey, “G20 Debt Relief for Poor Nations Means COVID Healthcare Investment,”
Thomson Reuters Foundation News, April 7, 2021.
Gabriele Steinhauser and Joe Wallace, “Africa’s First Pandemic Default Tests New Effort to Ease
Debt From China, Effort to Ensure that China and Bondholders Participate in Debt Restructurings
Could Help Resolve Zambia’s Default,” Wall Street Journal, November 18, 2020.
Dan Runde, Conor Savoy, and Shannon McKeown, Post-pandemic Governance in the Indo-
Pacific, Adapting USAID’s Strategy in the Face of Covid-19, Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS), September 2020, 11 pp. (Posted online September 25, 2020.)
Sam Denney and Kemal Kirisci, “COVID-19 and the Chance to Reform U.S. Refugee Policy,”
Lawfare, August 18, 2020.
Daniel F. Runde, “USAID Should Lead Global Pandemic Response in an Age of Great Power
Competition,” The Hill, August 17, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Rayn Ellis, “Conservative Foreign Aid Can Strengthen US Interests in the Coronavirus
Recovery,” Washington Examiner, August 11, 2020.
Jamille Bigio and Haydn Welch, “As the Global Economy Melts Down, Human Trafficking Is
Booming,” Foreign Policy, August 10, 2020.
Zuhumnan Dapel, “It Is Too Late to Save These Victims of the Pandemic, The COVID-19
Catastrophe Is Shrinking Remittances from the United States and Creating a Looming
Humanitarian Disaster,” Foreign Policy, July 20, 2020.
Frances D’Emilio, “UN: Pandemic Could Push Tens of Millions into Chronic Hunger,”
Associated Press, July 13, 2020.
Emily Hawthorne, “COVID-19 Cash Shortages Will Cripple Global Humanitarian Efforts,”
Stratfor, June 30, 2020.
Olivia Enos, “The Danger for Refugees and the Most Vulnerable During COVID-19,” Heritage
Foundation, June 22, 2020.
Stephanie Segel, “International Financial Institutions Step Up, but Debt Sustainability Looms
Large for Future Support,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), May 21, 2020.
Joel Gehrke, “Fighting China with Foreign Aid: USAID Becomes a Critical Tool in Battle for
World Influence,” Washington Examiner, May 10, 2020.
Michael H. Fuchs, Alexandra Schmitt, and Haneul Lee, “Foreign Aid is Critical to Stopping the
Coronavirus,” National Interest, May 3, 2020.
Daniel F. Runde, Conor M. Savoy, and Shannon McKeown, “Covid-19 Has Consequences for
U.S. Foreign Aid and Global Leadership,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS),
May 1, 2020.
Non-state Actors
John V. Parachini and Rohan Kumar Gunaratna, Implications of the Pandemic for Terrorist
Interest in Biological Weapons, Islamic State and al-Qaeda Pandemic Case Studies, RAND,
2022, 59 pp.
Lindsey Kennedy and Nathan Paul Southern, “Endangered Species Are Paying the Price of
COVID-19, Diminishing Tourism Has Created New Incentives for the Illegal Wildlife Trade,”
Foreign Policy, July 11, 2021.
Kieran Guilbert, “Traffickers Seen Thriving in Europe as COVID-19 Hits Victim Support,”
Reuters, April 9, 2021.
Charlie Mitchell, “Palo Alto Networks Report Explores ‘Explosion’ in Cloud Attacks Amid
COVID-19 pandemic, Inside Cybersecurity,” April 6, 2021
Michael King and Sam Mullins, “COVID-19 and Terrorism in the West: Has Radicalization
Really Gone Viral?” Just Security, March 4, 2021.
Lindsey Kennedy and Nathan Paul Southern, “The Pandemic Is Putting Gangsters in Power, As
States Struggle, Organized Crime Is Rising to New Prominence,” Foreign Policy, February 15,
2021.
Lindsey Kennedy and Nathan Paul Southern, “How to Run a Criminal Network in a Pandemic,
Drug Dealers and Human Traffickers Are Upgrading Their Marketing and Delivery Services,”
Foreign Policy, September 5, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Joby Warrick, “Covid-19 Pandemic Is Stoking Extremist Flames Worldwide, Analysts Warn,”
Washington Post, July 9, 2020.
Ioan Grillo, “How Mexico’s Drug Cartels Are Profiting From the Pandemic,” New York Times,
July 7, 2020.
Edith M. Lederer, “UN Chief Warns COVID-19 Provides Opportunity for Terrorists,” Associated
Press, July 6, 2020.
Robin Simcox, “Terrorism After the Pandemic, Months of Isolation and Governments Grappling
with Other Crises Could Lead to a Rise in Attacks,” Foreign Policy, July 2, 2020.
Zachary Abuza and Alif Satria, “How Are Indonesia’s Terrorist Groups Weathering the
Pandemic?” Diplomat, June 23, 2020.
Camilo Tamayo Gomez, “Coronavirus: Drug Cartels Functioning as Governing Bodies Could
Receive Popularity Boost,” National Interest, June 23, 2020.
Simon Harding, “How Gangs and Drug Dealers Adapted to the Pandemic Reality,” National
Interest, June 22, 2020.
Nikita Malik, “How to Prepare for the Coronavirus’s Impact on Terrorism,” National Interest,
June 21, 2020.
Anthony Faiola and Lucien Chauvin, “The Coronavirus Has Gutted the Price of Coca. It Could
Reshape the Cocaine Trade,” Washington Post, June 9, 2020.
Alexandra Lamarche, Arden Bentley, Rachel Schmidtke, and Sahar Atrache, “The Coronavirus
Has Become Terrorists’ Combat Weapon of Choice,” National Interest, June 9, 2020.
U.S. Attention to International Issues Other than COVID-19
David Ignatius, “The Rest of the World Is Taking Advantage of a Distracted America,”
Washington Post, October 6, 2020.
David E. Sanger, Eric Schmitt and Edward Wong, “As Virus Toll Preoccupies U.S., Rivals Test
Limits of American Power,” New York Times, June 1 (updated June 2), 2020.
James Jay Carafano, “Amid Coronavirus, Global Challenges Remain for U.S.—Keep Eye on
These 3 Hot Spots,” Heritage Foundation, May 20, 2020.
Kathrin Hille, “Taiwan Fears Uptick in Military Threat from China in Wake of Coronavirus,”
Financial Times, May 18, 2020.
Steven Erlanger, “Will the Coronavirus Crisis Trump the Climate Crisis?” New York Times, May
9 (updated May 11), 2020.
Steve Mollman, “China’s South China Sea Plan Unfolds Regardless of the Coronavirus,” Quartz,
May 9, 2020.
Thomas Spoehr, “U.S. Can’t Afford to Take Its Eye off the Ball As National Threats Loom
Beyond COVID-19,” Heritage Foundation, May 8, 2020.
Arjun Kapur, “Scotland Launched an Invasion During the Black Death. Does History Tell China
to Attack Taiwan?” National Interest, May 2, 2020.
Congressional Research Service
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COVID-19: Potential Implications for International Security Environment

Role of Congress
Daniel P. Vajdich, “Congress Has Been AWOL on U.S. Coronavirus Diplomacy, The Invisibility
and Silence of Congress Is Another Reason for America’s Shocking Abdication of Global
Leadership,” Foreign Policy, May 22, 2020.
George Ingram and Jeffrey L. Sturchio, “How Congress Can Address the International
Dimensions of the COVID-19 Response,” Brookings Institution, April 15, 2020.
Rob Berschinski and Benjamin Haas, “How Congress Can Save Lives, Protect Rights, and Exert
U.S. Leadership Globally in Response to Coronavirus,” Just Security, April 8, 2020.
Robbie Gramer and Jack Detsch, “Pandemic Stymies Congressional Check on Trump’s Foreign
Policy,” Foreign Policy, April 8, 2020.

Author Information

Ronald O'Rourke

Specialist in Naval Affairs

Acknowledgments
Original coauthors of this report were Michael Moodie, who was Assistant Director of the Foreign Affairs,
Defense, and Trade Division of CRS and a Senior Specialist in Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade until
his retirement from CRS in December 2020, and Kathleen J. McInnis, who was a Specialist in International
Security in the Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division of CRS until April 15, 2022.

Disclaimer
This document was prepared by the Congressional Research Service (CRS). CRS serves as nonpartisan
shared staff to congressional committees and Members of Congress. It operates solely at the behest of and
under the direction of Congress. Information in a CRS Report should not be relied upon for purposes other
than public understanding of information that has been provided by CRS to Members of Congress in
connection with CRS’s institutional role. CRS Reports, as a work of the United States Government, are not
subject to copyright protection in the United States. Any CRS Report may be reproduced and distributed in
its entirety without permission from CRS. However, as a CRS Report may include copyrighted images or
material from a third party, you may need to obtain the permission of the copyright holder if you wish to
copy or otherwise use copyrighted material.

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