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This text first appeared in May 2020.
SPIEGEL:
Sir Richard, are you suffering from sleepless nights at the moment?
Barrons:
Yeah, the world is changing so dramatically that it sometimes keeps me awake.
SPIEGEL:
Because of the corona crisis?
Barrons:
The changes were there before, but the pandemic has radically accelerated this process.
Covid-19 acts like a global, strategic shock that has a massive impact on Europe's security and prosperity.
And do you know what concerns me?
SPIEGEL:
Tell us.
Barrons:
How much we're lagging behind these changes.
For far too long we have believed that the others would leave us Europeans alone and that we could argue undisturbed about the state of the EU, the euro or Brexit.
SPIEGEL:
In fact ...
Barrons:
... we are experiencing a world in which the Americans will no longer set the tone, but the Chinese.
If the corona crisis has made one thing clear, this is it. China is on its way to global power as the US withdraws.
The predictable world of the West as we know it from the Cold War era is now a thing of the past.
Many of the pillars that guarantee our security and prosperity will collapse.
And there could be a big fight between China and the US.
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