This paper was delivered by Professor Jagdish Bhagwati, Arthur Lehman Professor of Economics and Professor of Political Science, Columbia University at a Public Lecture organized by Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore on 18 September 1996. Professor Bhagwati talks about the threats to free trade that we face today, especially threats to multilateralism in free trade which can take two forms: those that directly attack the notion of multilateral free trade and those that indirectly undercut it by supporting trade arrangements that undermine the spirit and principles of multilateralism.