An American madman is loose.
At a press conference on his plane as he returned to Washington for a new political year he entertained the idea of targeting another four nations.
He started with Colombia, which he said had a leader who “likes making cocaine” but is “not going to be doing it very long”. A US operation there “sounds good to me”, he said.
Iran risks being “hit very hard by the United States” if protesters there are killed, he said.
In Mexico “we’re going to have to do something”, he offered without being asked. He said he had proposed sending US troops over the border “every single time” he had spoken to the Mexican president.
And he repeated his longstanding insistence the US “needs” Greenland for American national security, “and the European Union needs us to have it”.
Who knows what MAGA supporters will think of this? Anarcho-imperialism is hardly America First.
I also struggle to understand its strategic implications. Such a grab bag of countries lined up for Venezuelan truncation defies any cohesive strategy.
Even in Venezuela, Trump’s rationales rotate through a dizzying array of ideas with a half-life of about ten seconds. Venezuela already seems to be transitioning towards another strongman rule, with the military playing a significant role.
Others are more sure.
Listening to Trump, Marco Rubio or Pete Hegseth will not yield much in terms of understanding the US’s grand strategy, but paying close attention to Elbridge Colby, under-secretary of war for policy and widely regarded as the brains behind “America first” security planning, is illuminating. His book A Strategy of Denial is a must-read for anybody interested in understanding the ongoing shift in American strategy.
In it, Colby argues that, due to the sheer magnitude of the rise of China, the US can no longer maintain the global unipolarity that it held during the 1990s and early 2000s. Instead, it must recognise the return of great power politics, shed the burden of upholding an unaffordable and ineffective “rules-based order” and turn to a realist approach to grand strategy, wherein the US seeks to fortify its regional hegemony in the Americas while denying China the ability to set up its own dominance in Asia. Failing to do so will lead to imperial overstretch, reversals and, ultimately, defeat.
The US is now transitioning from a global liberal empire – established through its military and economic might but undergirded by agreements, international institutions of law, government and rules – to an exploitative hegemony, undergirded by power and realpolitik. Venezuela is the first major step in reasserting US regional hegemony. Greenland and Cuba are likely next.
Sure, but this is Donald Trump, not Eldridge Colby or some strategic genius. His motives are much more personal, and his execution of policy is much less reassuring than highfalutin, slow-moving strategic analyses.
For some time, I have wondered how Donald Trump would remake himself as the centre of things, his only goal as the supreme narcissist, after his soft-power assaults on trade and borders have faltered and faded from view.
Now we know. His insanity now controls, seemingly without oversight, the most terrifying military on earth.
The danger is not that it advances on some broad front. The risk lies in its ability to launch additional anarcho-imperialist precision strikes that drive all governments insane. Simultaneously, the majority of the US military retreats to its sphere of influence, allowing mini-madmen to operate freely worldwide. He may not even need to take any further action. The daily Madman routine is enough.
If Trump does move militarily on any of the above countries in the near future, he is going to cause mass panic in governments worldwide.
This issue is far more significant than tariffs or border policies. The Madman now wields the most powerful weapon in the world, and he is directing it at anyone he chooses for reasons he struggles to communicate, if there are any.
This is hard power rendered uncertain, and the only outcome is the spread of hard-power uncertainty.
Some countries will switch allegiance. Some will hedge with China. Some will lose their heads, and some will seek opportunity. And why not? Unless you are on the Madman’s personal hit list, you appear to have a free hand, just like he does. International normatives emanate from the hegemon.
The Trump anarcho-imperialist norm in international relations isn’t a “realist” liberal bloc or even an exploitative hegemony. It represents an extreme destabilisation of American power such that what was once unimaginable has now become plausible anywhere, everywhere, all at once.
NATO is in imminent danger of collapse. Vladimir Putin could potentially emerge as the dominant force in Europe. South America could see a sweeping series of right-wing or military coups. China and Japan are at each other’s economic throats, with no credible broker to reach a deal.
With American prestige gone, a single Chinese truncation of any neighbouring government would crash the US alliance network in Asia overnight. ANZUS is next to worthless, just as China advances aggressively into South Pacific waters. AUKUS is even worse, years away and dependent upon the Madman.
A massive global arms race is about to commence.
I don’t generally subscribe to the “great man of history” doctrine, seeing history’s engine as more structural.
But, once in a while, a Madman can shunt the forces of production into new and dangerous territories.
We are alarmingly close to that here.
