The recent Australia, US, and UK $368 billion deal on buying nuclear submarines has been termed by Paul Keating, a former Australian prime minister, as the “worst deal in all history.” It commits Australia to buy conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines that will be delivered in the early 2040s. These will be based on new nuclear reactor designs yet to be developed by the UK.

The US has gambled big in its latest sanctions on Chinese companies in the semiconductor industry, believing it can kneecap China and retain its global dominance. From the slogans of globalization and “free trade” of the neoliberal 1990s, Washington has reverted to good old technology denial regimes that the US and its allies followed during the Cold War.

Addressing climate without energy justice is only a new version of colonialism, even if it’s clothed in green. In the words of Vijaya Ramachandran, director for energy and development at the Breakthrough Institute, “Pursuing climate ambitions on the backs of the poorest people in the world is not just hypocritical—it is immoral, unjust, and green colonialism at its worst.”

Pandemics have not only spread death and destruction, but they have also changed societies in fundamental ways. The world will not look the same once the COVID-19 pandemic is over: either through vaccination or infections. But will it lead to society confronting capitalism’s greed against people’s lives? That is the challenge before all of us; this is how history will judge us.