20-1-25
Dear Partners in Thought,
President Trump will always be strange to most rational people, all the more so due to his personality and style, combined with his likely feeling that he is now free to do whatever he wants without the executive and legislative guardrails of his first term. Both his obedience-first core team and all the Republican Senators and Representatives are now backing him without any doubt, reflecting his acumen in having changed the Republican Party and their expected human focus on preserving their own positions. Putting aside unforeseen issues that may have helped a Trump 2.0, such as “woke” and a weak Democratic leadership, America and the world are now in for a very different period of executive power in Washington that history and its books will make us remember for generations.
The recent outlandish and unsettling Canada, Greenland, Panama Canal and Gulf of America statements we know were there with a potential transactional approach in mind, but also to appeal to the core MAGA base that needs America to be “strong” as they understand it – with benefits hopefully derived from this “long-needed” and “refreshing” approach for them. Trump may also want to show them that it’s not only campaign-funding Big Tech and their deregulation needs that matter. It was interesting that Trump so far avoided any direct verbal attacks against key European countries. His focus was not totally devoid of a master plan, however dangerous for America and the new world it may foster.
It is a now confirmed sign that, as expected, the post-Cold War and globalisation world may be changing, with Trump focusing on a narrower but stronger and more manageable core geographic area of American supremacy, also fitting a certain form of isolationism, which could be mostly centred on both Americas, this combined with expected tariff rises and an aggressive self-interest on trade and diplomacy globally. In that approach, he would likely be leaving China more or less in charge, to different extents, throughout Asia – apart from a far too big India – while Taiwan may remain on-and-off an issue of contention. A Trump 2.0 could leave Russia in control of Eurasia and gradually Eastern Europe, with players like Iran or North Korea being useful additions in its existential quest for revival. There is little doubt that both China and Russia will like the new US approach, all the more so given their own respective domestic challenges. Europe (Western and Central) is thus at great risk from a war-flavoured (economically and socially) Russia that may no longer be able to go back to old post-Cold War and globalisation ways. Given a new world that may arise, Europe should thus not rely any more for its security only on the US, whose values and principles (making the American Dream), together with its Western leadership nature, may de facto vanish.
Trump is seen as a bully by most, even by his admirers who like it, but he could be a “transactional” one, even if this feature may be seen by potentially naïve old-fashioned foreign policy experts. We hear a lot that his “crazy” geopolitical statements, aimed at long-time allies of the US and not at its traditional enemies, are made to gain an edge on specific matters related to the potentially new primary American supremacy zone. In doing so, and while there might be a strange game plan in Trump’s mind that no close adviser will dare challenge, unlike in his first term given the “faithful first” team around him, Trump is not realising all the direct and indirect benefits that America gained since the end of WW2 – and even more so post-Cold War – in acting as the natural and beneficial leader of the West and, for long, most of the world. American leadership brought many benefits, not only politically but economically, also for the US private sector and its naturally globalised corporations. Foreign affairs and globalisation are obviously not topics that easily resonate with its core electoral base, even if it may usually be the case with most electorates in Western democracies for which the economy and their purchasing power matter first. The Trump isolationist or “withdrawing” approach, even if it might give the US a smaller but better focus, would cost America and his electorate dearly. Then the abandonment of the values and principles that made America strong and differentiated globally may also be very costly, as the US may become just another great power with the risk that many in the world might prefer China or Russia after all – this eventually with geopolitical realignments as Moscow and Beijing could also be very transactional, even with Europe. One of the side benefits of this American withdrawal (as we would see it in Europe) may be a much closer relationship with the UK and the EU since “being together” in such dire times would make eminent sense and might not be disrupted by the personal political ambitions of a few. On this latter point, it is amazing to think of the impact of key individuals (even if not really alone) on the world or their region, not to mention own country, thinking about Donald Trump or Boris Johnson.
Post-election win, Trump has been strangely quiet on matters dealing with Russia or even China, the latter that was his arch-nemesis (arguably with a bipartisan mode) with Taiwan being the semi-conductor heaven and geopolitical sacred ground. Today he is not sure that he would ban China-rooted TikTok in the US, where 170 million people use it, even if the Supreme court, that he had re-engineered years back, was all for it. As for Russia, it is clear that his relationship with Putin matters, probably as he envies his executive style that is likely in his own mind more that of a true leader of a great power, this even if there ever were or not FSB files on his bad behaviour in a Moscow hotel. The statements that he would stop the Ukraine War in one day have not been heard recently, while the emphasis is on his being greatly instrumental in getting a cease-fire agreement between Hamas and Israel thanks to his own envoy, Secretary Blinken’s months of work having just been for show.
One last point that is worth mentioning is the rise of the “tech industrial complex” oligarchy (or indeed ”broligarchy”) mentioned by Joe Biden in his farewell address. While there has been indeed a rise of an oligarchy that served US interests well at first given its tech focus, it is clear that many of its leaders wish to play a role that go well beyond their business remit. Musk openly exemplifies this mutation with his governmental role in making the US “more efficient” with DOGE, but he is now going well beyond this in promoting extremist political leaders in the UK and Germany while attacking allies on the way they run their own countries. It would be odd for Trump not to have been aware of Musk’s attacks on Starmer or the laudatory exchanges with the new and differentiated female leader of the AfD, this perhaps as it was an easier way to start a new foreign policy approach. We will note that Musk had nothing mean to say about Russia or of course China, which is the location of his largest Tesla factory. It is clear that Big Tech is keen on being close to a winning Trump to ensure his support on deregulation matters at home (see Zuckerberg and his new approach to Meta content), but crucially in relation to the EU where the likes of Commissioner Margrethe Vestager led the fight to regulate Big Tech, admittedly also as it was US-made. And then Peter Thiel, Musk’s Paypal partner and original Facebook funder, writes opinion pieces such as in the Financial Times recently about conspiracy theories and the end of the party of the Ancient Regime, leaving many scratching their heads. And Bezos rescued the Washington Post (notable, given our social media times) though it is not clear what the newspaper may become going forward as some articles have already suggested, even if it stayed neutral during the last election. Not all Big Tech is, of course, personified by individuals who may not be the most principled. Whatever his life style, Bill Gates, the model of what Big Tech should be and focus on, spent three hours with Trump which he found productive and were very acceptable given his historical innovation role (as a potential wink to Bezos, the Gates Foundation just gave $700,000 to the UK Independent Media Group to fund journalism in “under-reported” parts of the world).
Looking at where we are, and putting aside Trump’s “differentiated” personality, management style and strategy, it is clear that the key word going forward when dealing with Washington will be “transactional”, and that Europe will have to show expertise, cunning and resolve. While we should do our best to engage with the US and keep NATO working, we will need to increase even further our own commitments to defence, hoping our various populations will understand what is at play and is required in terms of funding and organisational changes in this return of History. We can also hope that America wakes up, of course (maybe the 2026 mid-terms?), but this does not change the fact that Europe has been too reliant on Washington for too long, even if the latter wanted to be the august Western leader it indeed was. Defence will now be key and European resolve should be seen through a strong commitment to its own capabilities – as if there were no NATO – while working with it fully. In doing so, all key countries will also need to meaningfully contribute funding and avoid complacency, while no longer hiding behind any historical guilt, to focus more easily on business and economic matters. Those times are behind us.
Populists of whatever flavour and geography may hurt democracy – as we have seen in recent decades, but especially today. They are now great at combining spectacular showbiz and easy vote-grabbing, as if it were a needed recipe, taking advantage of the always-usual resentment of many that form a core base – this today worryingly amplified with loneliness and social media, especially with younger generations. And then they rarely deliver unless they adjust to reality, like recently in Italy while elections, when they still exist, become a sham like in Venezuela. As a Transatlantic European who believed in, and enjoyed, the “American Dream” I felt hurt by the recent American political developments and their impact on the world, also knowing the past decades had been great for Americans. However, this new populist development in the US had some benefits that perhaps were also needed. In an unexpected turn of events, and even if we should always hope for a return to a globalised world and the Western leadership we knew, Trump’s strange initiative may not help the US, but it could make a much stronger EU (and also Europe) with old friends getting back together anew, all while focusing on the tools of independence like enhanced defence and efficient coordination. All while hoping for America to return to its better ways, then also enjoying the benefits of a better-balanced alliance – this for all involved. Trump is not the America we need – something all my sound American friends would agree with.
Warmest regards,
Serge
Desperate Measures 