Perhaps the most important nonevent of 2014 was that war did not break out in the Pacific Rim. This was far from guaranteed at the beginning of the year. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, there was a lot of chatter that a century after the start of World War I, the Sino-Japanese dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands would lead to a similar conflagration. Some of that talk came from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, so there were valid reasons for worry.
The tensions in the region seem less severe at the end of the year, however. A successful Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit led to an outbreak of comity when China and Japan agreed to disagree. Also, bilateral deals on climate change and trade illustrated a robust Sino-American relationship. After a year of “could 1914 happen again?” rhetoric, it is comforting to see that the longest post-Westphalian streak of “no great power war” will continue into 2015…
Even in the parts of the world where bad things happened, the worst-case scenarios did not materialize. In the case of Ebola, there was a lot of concern that the epidemic would spread into Nigeria, the most populous and interconnected country in West Africa. Council on Foreign Relations fellow Laurie Garrett warned — in a Foreign Policy article ominously titled “You Are Not Nearly Scared Enough About Ebola” — that if the disease spread into Nigeria’s largest city, it would make the film “Contagion” look like a fairy tale. Garrett’s warnings seemed sober once an Ebola diagnosis was reached in the United States. Sen. Rand Paul, among others, warned that the disease was far more contagious than the Obama administration had stated.
Fortunately, the apocalyptic scenarios turned out to be groundless.
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