The oddball political genius in Donald Trump is to keep everyone guessing: When he throws around remarks about taking over countries – such as Greenland – and not “ruling out” military incursions, is he serious, joking, bluffing for negotiating or simply keeping himself in the spotlight?
It’s what he told a meandering news conference held at Mar-a-Largo for little reason other than to preen, and, apparently to offer opinions untethered to facts about January 6, about judicial rulings in his sentencing and the delayed release of a Special Counsel report on his federally investigated behaviors, and such varied topics as ocean windmills and dead whales. He was asked about squeezing Greenland and Panama economically and militarily and declined to dismiss invasion as an option.
His brash posturing and outward self-depiction as a global imperialist serve both to threaten and to signal to his supporters that the “greatness” he seeks for America is there to be grabbed forcibly. Damn the opposition, the law, treaties, alliances or even the wishes of the residents of those targeted properties in Greenland, Panama, Canada and Mexico.
Of course, without basing his opinions in fact, who can know what he is thinking other than a future history book noting a Trump administration for vastly increasing the size of the country. Why are we always forced to ask what he means? What are we to make of sending Donald Trump Jr. on a sudden tourist visit to Greenland?
No organization in which I have played a part ever succeeded with a leader who was not clear. Why should this be any different?
What Does It Mean?
Whether Trump means to suggest a modern-day Louisiana Purchase or a Wyatt Earp clean-up at the cartel corral, his smug justifications sound eerily like Russian leader Vladimir Putin looking over the Ukrainian border to take a big bite of territory. That kind of disdain for sovereignty and borders is illegal, immoral and what prompts wars.
If Putin was wrong to invade Ukraine, why wouldn’t Trump be wrong not to “rule out” military invasion towards a rekindled American expansionist dream? As noted by journalists, unleashing a military action in Greenland over minerals access in the name of American national security would put the United States in conflict with its own NATO allies, who would be obliged by treaty to respond.
Putin says he is acting the in the name of restoring a Russian empire. Trump apparently has invented an American equivalent in the name of, well, MAGA.
In any event, from global news reports, government officials in in countries friendly or not to the United States feel compelled to respond and to prepare for considering the U.S. as less ally and more rival. At the same time, China, Russia, Iran and Middle East nations are reaching out for more influence in non-aligned areas for economic or strategic alliance of interest.
Again, the Putin example: By massing troops on Ukraine’s border, he believed the threat or only a quick exchange of bristling weaponry would prompt a Ukrainian surrender or only a quick exchange of bristling weaponry.
Mario Rubio is about to enter a confirmation hearing as Secretary of State and Elaine Stefanik as U.N. ambassador. Do they really believe they won’t be asked to explain our international intentions towards neighbors and allies?
Serious or not, negotiation tool or attention grabber, Trump’s loose threats should be something to which all domestic political parties could agree to say, “Stop.” If he means to conduct a war policy — economic or military — with all the consequences, he should say so.
Otherwise, we will find ourselves mired in perceived conflict when none was really intended.
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