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15. INTO THE AGE OF TRUMP

AMERICA AND THE WORLD IN THE AGE OF TRUMP

CONTENTS

Trump's wall

A new trade pact with Canada and Mexico

Venezuela

Confronting China

Putin's Russia

The world of Islam

Trump's relations with Europe

The textual material on this webpage is drawn directly from my work
        America's Story – A Spiritual Journey © 2021, pages 470-478. But this section has been updated somewhat to reflect developments since the 2021 publication of the book.
TRUMP'S WALL

Trump had made it a central campaign theme of his that he was going to build a wall to stop the invasion of American territory by throngs of Central Americans (joined by others from different countries and with different agendas) fleeing the anarchy that reigned in Guatemala and El Salvador, but especially in Honduras.

Liberals called Trump's blocking of this massive influx of huge caravans of refugees "inhumane."  Some even called for an end altogether of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), though it is doubtful that these same voices would have been willing to give permanent residency to these foreign refugees in their own homes.  But it made for a very Liberal narrative, despite the fact that ICE had been just as active in protecting the U.S. border from invasion under Obama's presidency.

But as the Democratic Party knew well, it gets the support of social classes that have come to expect those in authority to take care of them – such as the way things were supposed to work in Central America.  But, as happens regularly, those countries had run out of economic assets they could continue to seize and redistribute to their supporters, and thus simply had failed as societies.  Consequently, the mass exodus from Central America.  And thus also, seeing potential votes (even if not yet citizens) in these government-dependent refugees, Liberals were very upset at Trump's effort to block or just slow up the invasion.

Trump did not get Mexico to pay for the border wall (a rather ridiculous idea), he did get Mexican cooperation in slowing up and stalling the caravans passing through Mexico on their way to the United States.  And he would indeed add (even though only slightly) to the reach of the border wall – or at least upgrade portions already in existence – a matter in which he took great pride.

A NEW TRADE PACT WITH CANADA AND MEXICO

Part of this Mexican cooperation was in response to the trade deals that Trump meanwhile had worked out with not only Mexico to the South but also Canada to the North.  That in itself was a major Trump achievement, in an effort to get something of a balance in the trade between America and its neighbors.  It had taken some Trump toughness economically to get economic talks underway – new tariffs on Canadian and Mexican steel and aluminum, and his threat to pull out of the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) altogether. NAFTA was the result of an agreement put in place back in 1994 to help Mexico get going economically – but which over time had come to disadvantage greatly American trade with Mexico (and to a lesser extent Canada).  It took a whole year to reach a settlement.  But it did cut back considerably the barriers Mexico had placed on American imports (through the mechanics of its own Valued-Added-Tax or VAT program) and provided a more equal flow of goods and services from country to country.

But at the time of the signing (November 2018) the Democrats had just been voted into a majority position in the House and were not in a very cooperative mood – until some additional provisions favorable to American labor and environmentalist groups were  added, allowing finally at the very end of 2019 the new United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) to go into effect.

VENEZUELA

Further to the South, in Venezuela, similar problems had been developing with the putting in place there in 1999 of a strongly Socialist regime under Hugo Chavez (nationalizing Venezuela's rich oil industry), a program then passed on to Nicolás Maduro with Chavez's death in 2013.  The Socialist government hoped to use oil assets to reward its supporters among Venezuela's lower social classes.  But the international pricing of oil had dropped considerably – cutting back severely that Socialist payoff.  Now Venezuela found itself sinking rapidly into national poverty.  Consequently, there was also a mass exodus of those able to escape the country (about 4 million or 12 percent of the population), headed mostly to other parts of South America and the Caribbean islands.

In 2017 Trump placed an embargo on Venezuelan oil[1] – but also exports of food and medicine to Venezuela.  Then in 2018, Trump was joined by numerous European leaders hoping that Venezuelan elections that year would bring to power the more politically centralist Juan Guaidó, pledged to open the country's economy internationally.  But confusion, corruption – but most importantly, the support of Maduro by the Venezuelan military – foiled the effort.

But this in turn offered China, Russia, Cuba, Iran and even Syria and Bolivia opportunity to come to the aid of what was the strongly anti-American Maduro regime – with the intent not only of embarrassing Trump politically, but putting these "assisting" powers in a very strong position to influence political developments in the Western Hemisphere.  And as long as Maduro remained in power so too would they remain as part of the political and economic dynamic in that part of the world.  Especially for China and Russia, this was a big win.

[1]Anyway, America really did not need Venezuelan oil as it was basically oil-self-sufficient by this point thanks to American shale-oil production.

CONFRONTING CHINA

China seemed to be going down the same road as North Korea, strengthening the role of the Great Leader in society.  Chinese President Xi Jinping had been making his firm grip on affairs both at home and abroad very attractive to the Chinese mind – that sees this strength only in a Tianzi or "Son of Heaven."  Thus in March of 2018, the Chinese National People's Congress voted 2,964 to 2 to end the Chinese Constitution's two-term limit on the presidency – put in place back in the 1990s by Chinese reformer Deng Xiaoping, to ensure the "collective" rather than personal rule of the Chinese Communist Party (such as had been the disastrous case under Mao Zedong).  So, the Chinese found themselves heading down the road of unlimited personal rule again.  That seemed to work best for them in their understanding of political dynamics.

And indeed, the Chinese had reasons to be well pleased by the service Xi had been offering the country.  He was a skilled player of political Weiqi (or Go), a Chinese board-game where a player wins by the careful placement of numerous checker-like pieces on the grid, and succeeds in finally isolating the opponent, who cannot make any further moves.  The Chinese government was carefully sending out technical advisors to numerous Third World countries, to help them develop their economies, in the process making the Chinese economic – and thus also political – position indispensable in their countries.

But China was also taking an ever-stronger position in the West's world as well.  America (and many other Western countries) find their industries deeply dependent on governmentally subsidized and thus cheap Chinese labor to make their products inexpensive and thus marketable.  At the same time, China was skillfully developing its electronic communications industry, financed also by extensive government subsidy – plus a lot of disregard of the World Trade Organization's (WTO) international patent rights (just plain technology theft) – in order to advance China's own technological position.  China was also helping its 4G telecommunications giant Huawei move into dominance in the 5G telecommunications sector, hoping to make as much of the world as possible China-dependent in the telecommunications field.  Also, Chinese companies such as Alibaba and Tencent were growing to enormous size, both in China (near monopolies in their respective realms), but also to positions of dominance abroad by buying out foreign companies.

As a sign of the success so far in this venture, in April of 2019 the leaders of some 40 countries gathered in Beijing to celebrate the success so far of China's "Belt and Road Initiative" (started up in 2013) designed to integrate closely the economies of these countries with the Chinese economy.  Needless to say, America did not participate – nor did China’s Asian archrival India.  But Putin did, as well as a lot of African and Middle Eastern leaders, and some European leaders (Poland, Hungary, Serbia, Greece, Italy, Spain. Czech Republic, Switzerland), even NATO ally Turkey, and some Latin American countries (Chile, Argentina).  That was quite a show of Chinese support!

Trump responded in March of 2018 by putting in place tariffs amounting to $250 billion on Chinese goods seeking entry into American markets, in order to bring them closer in line with the pricing of unsubsidized international goods.  China retaliated with $100 billion aimed at American goods coming to China (but the Chinese were actually already importing much less of the more expensive Western products).  Efforts between Trump and Xi to renegotiate trade relations were attempted in 2019, but with little by way of results.  But other Western countries joined the effort to not have Chinese products dumped into their economies, or have their companies bought out by Chinese profits gained in the government-subsidized economic competition.

PUTIN'S RUSSIA

Russia's "President-for-Life" Putin was doing everything he could to bring Russia out of the Third-World status it fell into when it attempted "democracy" under Yeltsin – and return the country to the status of being something resembling more closely the superpower it once was.  After all, it still held an amazing quantity of nuclear weapons and possessed a well-developed military machine.

And, like Xi, Putin was very aggressive in putting his country into the middle of global dynamics again, having Russia act exactly like the major power it once was.  In fact the two, Putin and Xi, found themselves working closely together because they shared the same goal:  to bring down America from its superpower status and have it join the company of the former international greats, Spain, Portugal, France, Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, etc., who now occupy at best only a secondary level of importance in the international scheme of things.

Thus it was that Putin was quick to come to Assad's aid in Syria when Obama tried to weaken and then topple Assad's government, merely undercutting America's diplomatic position there, and advancing Russia's at the same time.  And thus it was that Putin was also quick to come to Iran's aid when Trump attempted the same thing against Iran, in rejecting Obama's treaty with the Muslim government and then deepening the boycott of Iranian oil.  And thus also Putin jumped to the opportunity to be of help to Maduro's government in Venezuela that Trump was trying to bring down.  And so it went, counter-moves (in alliance with China and others) whenever America attempted to exert influence over developments abroad.

Indeed, Putin and Xi's cooperation was extensive, developing China's Maritime Silk Road access to Europe across the newly open waters of the Arctic above Russia's Siberia, at the same time working to complete the Russian pipeline with the goal of sending much-needed natural gas to the vast Chinese market.  And the two countries found themselves working together in the development of a new 5G network, as well as in other infrastructure and technology development.

And then there was also the matter of Russia's natural gas pipeline to Europe, notably to Germany which also was deeply dependent on that Russian gas.  This helped put Russia in a pivotal economic position in Europe that America was finding it hard to compete with.

And thus it seems that the Russians were in no hurry to replace Putin with any other individual.  The Russians were not as wed to the idea of "democracy" as America and the rest of the West.  They had not fared well in the 1990s with their democratic experiment under Yeltsin.  They have been very happy to have a strongman lead them, and – like the Chinese – have seen no need to turn over leadership on a regular basis.

Indeed, a 2019 poll taken by the Levada Center[2] revealed even that 70 percent of the Russians believed that (what we consider a monster) Stalin played a completely or relatively positive role in the life of the country!

[2]FP Morning Brief (Foreign Policy), January 12, 2021.

THE WORLD OF ISLAM

Why Western-style government is not going to work in the world of Islam.  It seems almost impossible for Americans to understand the world of Islam.  When Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims are not fighting each other (their mutual hatred is ancient and deep, something along the lines of the Catholic-Protestant rivalry of the 1500s and 1600s in Christian Europe), they find the one thing they do agree on to be the danger that Western Secular-Humanism poses to their world.  Unlike the Westerners themselves, they understand Secular-Humanism to be simply another religion, one which as Muslims, whether Sunni or Shi'ite, they deeply oppose, simply for the way it has placed Human Reason at the head of human life, not the God or Allah that created and directs all life.  In this they share parts of the same worldview as Christians, although they are as anti-Christian as they are anti-Sunni or Shi'ite in their own world.  It's confusing.  But not beyond understanding, if Western leaders – such as American presidents – would simply take the time to learn about these things.  It would have saved America a lot of trouble in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria.  And it was only the intervention of the Egyptian military in Egypt that spared America from making the same mistake in Egypt.

Bush never really caught on to this all-important dynamic.  But Obama seemed to understand this dynamic no better than Bush, supposing that "democratic" Secular-Humanism would inevitably rise to dominance in the Muslim Middle East if we simply got rid of other Arab dictators, like we did with Saddam.  Libya, Egypt and Syria became test cases for the Obama (and Bush, Jr.) idea that "democratic progress" would be the inevitable result.

And of course, as in Iraq and Afghanistan, such intervention merely spun these societies into a horribly cruel state of civil war, from which millions of people were displaced from their homes and thrust into refugee status.  And in the end, this merely gave opportunity for fiercely anti-Western Sunni Muslims to advance the cause of jihad, even to the point of succeeding in establishing a new Sunni Caliphate (the Islamic State) in the war-torn zone of Western Iraq and Eastern Syria.

Dealing with Iran.  But Obama did feel that he had achieved at least one foreign policy success (in addition to the taking out of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan) with his appeasement rather than confrontational approach to Iran, with the signing of the nuclear development agreement that would open the West (Europe as well as America) to Iran again.

But Trump didn't see things in Iran the Obama way, claiming that a country whose motto was "Death to America" was not one to be trusted to keep its word on the agreement (there was already way too much secret activity going on in that part of the world concerning nuclear development) and he thus terminated Obama's agreement with Iran.

Whether confrontation rather than appeasement would prove more effective in keeping an Iran determined to bring the West's – and most notably America's – Secular-Humanist cultural dominance in the world to an end remained (and still remains) to be seen.  But Iran had been very busy allying with the Russians and Chinese wherever possible in undercutting the American-led Western position in the larger international realm. 

Would continuing appeasement have changed the direction of Iranian politics?  Certainly not, at least as long as militant Shi'a Islam continues to dominate Iran.

Of course, there were (and are) still many Secular-Humanists in Iran, but they have been deeply undercut politically by the Muslim militants and the Iranian Muslim leadership in Iran.  And American toughness seemed to do nothing to help the political position in Iran of these Iranian Secularists, who appear to other Iranians as highly treasonous in the way they seem to share the same values as the hated American enemy ... an enemy under Trump clearly out to destroy Iran's economy and thus society itself.

Trump replaces American army with American naval presence in the Middle East.  On the other hand, Trump also made the decision to start withdrawing American ground troops from other positions in the Muslim world, at the same time beefing up the American naval presence in the Middle East, especially in the vital Persian Gulf region where Saudi Sunni and Iranian Shi'ite oil interests were in direct conflict.

However, it was the U.S. withdrawal from Syria that finally severed Trump's stressful relationship with his Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who disagreed strongly with the move.  But it was part of Trump's effort to get the country out of the business of "nation-building" abroad, and instead finding other ways of working with the world of Islam.  Indeed, Trump went on to actually hold diplomatic talks with the Taliban, which in turn opened the way for broader political negotiations among all the Afghan political parties.   The Democrats, however, were not impressed (naturally), but said little about the matter. There was little interest in bringing attention to any diplomatic breakthroughs that Trump might have secured for the country.

The general withdrawal of American ground-troop involvement in the Middle East did not mean the withdrawal of American involvement in the region, as Trump demonstrated when he ordered a temporary beefing up of the American air and ground offense against the Islamic Caliphate at Baghouz (Syria), which Americans brought to collapse with the massive bombing in early January of 2019.  This did put an end to the Islamic State.  But of course it did not end the Islamic spirit of jihadism, although it certainly put something of a damper on that spirit.

At the same time, Trump worked very hard to strengthen relations with America's old Arab ally, Saudi Arabia – plus others of the Arab Gulf states.  But his agreement to sell arms to Saudi Arabia drew a lot of opposition from the Democrats, for no particular strategic reason other than it was Trump who put the deal together.  It seems that the Democrats instead would rather have him punish the Saudis for their involvement in the assassination of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.  Likewise the diplomatic agreement that Trump led the Arab States of Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates to enter into with their old enemy Israel received no acclaim from the Democrats, in fact very little mention at all by the American press corps of the enormous significance of this diplomatic breakthrough.

TRUMP'S RELATIONS WITH EUROPE

The Trump mouth turned out to be as big a problem in Europe as it had been in America.  Trump found it easy to offend people, especially those that political necessity normally required a strong working relationship.  It made little sense.  And it offered the "never-Trump" groups in Europe plenty of ammunition for their crusades.  Thus it was no secret how much Germany's long-time chancellor Angela Merkel disliked Trump, although she and others tried to warm up the relationship as much as possible.

Of course Trump's "hit hard and then negotiate a compromise" strategy (presumably developed during his many years in the business world) did have its positive results, in that his pressure did get some of America's allies moving up to meet their full national financial responsibilities as members of NATO.

But the world of politics is as much a matter of visible symbolism as it is behind-the-scenes deal-making, something that obviously Trump failed to understand.  Thus his threat in June of 2020 to withdraw American NATO troops stationed in Germany tended to result merely in deepening the anti-Trump mood in Germany ... and elsewhere in Europe.



Go on to the next section:  The Chaotic 2020 Elections

  Miles H. Hodges