Contact us: info@strategic-culture.su

The reactions of astonishment, repudiation and some discomfort that have spread through the mainstream press regarding Donald Trump’s statements about taking Greenland by force, the Panama Canal and even Canada, mostly suffer from the most shameless hypocrisy, huge doses of delusion and unacceptable ignorance, especially on the part of those who make it their business to tell others what to think, assuming that they are in possession of an above-average level of information.

Given what has been the behavior of the United States of America, its presidents, sovereign bodies and those that act as its main tentacles, within and beyond its borders – I’m talking about multinational corporations and NGOs  – , what is different about Donald Trump’s behavior? Is this a new attitude from a U.S. president?

Are we back to the days of “political incorrectness” or lack of politeness, masks used to create the idea that the U.S. elite is preocupied with others claims.., complies with international law and respects the sovereignty of other nations? Do we have to watch another replay of the moralistic parade that characterized Trump’s first term in office, even if they all ended up not only doing things similar to what he said but, more importantly, not undoing what was done by him?

Donald Trump, as we’ll see later, is simply giving voice and body to the power he thinks and somehow knows he has in his hands, doing so in the most direct, pragmatic and brutal way. Which has been the way of many throughout U.S. history. Including Biden. Trump does everything he can to present himself as the “real deal”, rather than the “political correctness” that characterizes the equally barbaric liberal and neoliberal attitude. Under Trump we can all access the privilege of seeing the empire in all its brutality and viscerality, without behavioral masks, without emotional filters

What used to be closed off only to a commanding elite or to the stubborn who insist on taking a critical stance towards any fact, idea or information that comes their way, is now unveiled to all the people. In this sense, Trump’s attitude is more democratizing, in other words, more mobilizing of democratic action, in the sense that it activates, exhorts and prompts action in response from a much wider social group, previously numbed by the politeness, harmlessness and falsehood of the situationist political attitude.

Is Trump’s proposal so different from other annexations that the U.S. has made throughout its short but intense history? Would the U.S. be the superpower it is today if, in the mid-19th century, it hadn’t annexed Texas, making it the 28th state? Or California? States whose partition gave rise to Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah?

And who was responsible for this annexation? A Republican? Not really. It was the Democrat James K. Polk, elected as the 11th president of the USA, who was responsible for the annexation of Texas, California and Oregon. Of course, this was the newly created pre-Civil war Democratic Party, a intrinsically liberal oriented party. But the process that was then undertook does not differ substantially from U.S. interventionism at the hands of Democrats and Republicans over the last 80 years. At that time, all that was needed was to send some settlers to those places, finance their revolt and apply the so-called “Polk Corollary”, according to which the U.S. would incorporate the territories whose “peoples” wanted – very “democratically” – to join them.

It should also be noted that the doctrine of “Manifest Destiny” was essentially defended by the Democratic Party itself, founded in 1828. It was on the basis of this doctrine that the war against Mexico, which ended with the conquest of the aforementioned territories, was justified. The Whigs, on the other hand, were against foreign interventionism, especially in relation to questions that have to to with European colonizers. And isn’t Trump’s attitude a corollary of the unmasked application of the Monroe Doctrine (that is different from what Monroe actually said)? The doctrine according to which Latin America was classified as the U.S. “back yard”?

Let’s face it, U.S. expansionism didn’t stop there, it reached Puerto Rico, a territory in which the U.S. practiced all kinds of barbarities to prevent the self-determination of that people, who overwhelmingly supported the Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico (War against all Puerto Ricans, revolution and terror in America’s colony, by Nelson A. Denis), maintaining that territory as a colony to this day. Indigenous peoples will have hundreds, if not thousands, of stories just like Trump’s. Trump is, in fact and in his way, behaving like a truly American president.

Nowadays, nothing has changed, apart from the capacity for propaganda, benefiting greatly from scientific knowledge in the field of communication and psychology. Examples of annexation abound, Syria being just another example. It was under Obama that U.S. troops arrived in Syria, namely on 22 September 2014, supposedly to fight ISIS, although it is known that, in essence, the troops sent by Obama were there to form, train and mobilize what they called the “Free Syrian Army” and its “moderate rebels”. In 2019, it was Trump who demobilized the troops in Syria, leaving some behind, according to him, to “keep the oil“.

It’s interesting, or just another example of why this whole attitude towards Trump is a monumental hypocrisy, that Joe Biden, after serving a full term, not only failed to vacate illegally occupied Syrian territory, but also played a key role in supporting Turkey to destroy that nation, creating the conditions for a longer and more entrenched U.S. stay. Nor has he stopped the brazen theft of oil.

So the truth here is very simple: Trump, like Bush the father, like Bush the son, were just the ugly faces whom the Democrats – defenders of U.S. manifest destiny, globalism and interventionism – accused of carrying out the acts that the Democrats themselves, later, not only consolidated, but deepened. With the exception of Afghanistan, from where Biden withdrew, the normal thing is for the Democrats, their disciples and proxies in Europe, Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand, to blame interventionism on the Republicans, but the Democrats, like the Republicans, not only don’t undo, but continue and deepen these policies.

The example of Afghanistan means for Biden what the withdrawal from Iraq means for Trump. If Trump hasn’t withdrawn completely, it’s once again because of oil. Biden, even after the Iraqi parliament voted to withdraw U.S. troops, continued to resist their withdrawal.

None of the international fronts opened by Trump were closed by Biden. The technological war against Huawei was intensified and extended by Biden to other companies and technologies, and the same goes for the trade war. Unlike Trump, who in his first term was able to talk to Vladimir Putin, Biden refused any contact and, in good Democratic fashion, deepened the gap between a country as important as the Russian Federation, creating an international security crisis the like of which has not been seen for a long time

It was also under the “leadership” of the Democratic Party that NATO destroyed Yugoslavia, and it was under Biden that the first televised and online genocide in human history took place in Gaza. In fact, if there is a prominent and present figure in U.S. interventionism over the last 30 to 40 years, it is Joe Biden, the right-hand man of Bill and Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama.

Everyone remembers how Joe Biden said, next to a stunned and hierarchically subordinate Chancellor Scholz, that he would destroy the NordStream gas pipeline if Russia “invaded” Ukraine. The pipeline, jointly owned by the Russian Federation and NATO countries, was thus destroyed, which under international law constitutes an act of war against a civilian infrastructure, moreover the sovereign property of “allied” countries. This threat, which was later carried out, is essentially no different in its brutality and disregard for other people’s sovereignty from Trump’s claim to Greenland, despite Denmark.

Perhaps the “moderates”, an epithet used to designate the fanatics of situationism and other fanboys of U.S.-led neoliberal globalism, love those narratives commissioned to hide the truth, such as the one that it was a group drunken Ukrainians who, in one of the best-guarded seas in the universe, not only threw a wild party but also blew up an energy installation protected by international law. But this paradoxical, delusional and lying narrative only confirms everything I’ve been saying here. Trump and the Democrats only differ in the amount of honesty with which they assume their real interests. The former tells it like it is, in Wild West fashion, while the latter are compulsive liars and illusionists, experts at pointing one way and turning the other, benefiting from the scientific use of the disciplines of illusionism and contortionism.

Like Trump, whose attitude shows how little regard he has for current European leaders, not even considering them worthy of a euphemistic or mystifying speech to justify aggression, Biden was no different (we all remember Nuland about Europeans opinion on Ukrainian matters). Nor did he respect Scholz as the head of state of one of the most important countries in the world. Confirming what we’ve seen about the character of such figures, Scholz didn’t even defend himself or his country. Not even to try some kind of diversion, a joke or something. As if his proximity to his boss had frozen him in fear.

Perhaps the so-called “moderates”, the majority of commentators who populate the increasingly irrelevant Western mainstream media and those elected to political office who simply follow the directives issued by the U.S./G7 and NATO power directories, attach too much value to a cynical and hypocritical attitude that is so fashionable in the corridors of power in the West and which consists of thinking one thing and saying another; of wanting something very much and showing that you don’t really want it that much. But those on the ground, in the day-to-day reality of the struggle for survival and the struggle to transform the world, might benefit from the susceptibility of a growing number of people to look at their TVs and, instead of watching some politically stylized Copperfield show, have access, for a change, to the real face of the empire, its tics, quirks and whims.

I don’t know if it’s tragic or caricatured, but the public space in the West, the space of “post-truth”, has become a vast and continuous theater in which figures parade continuously and successively, making it seem as if the opposite of what is practiced is being done, making it seem as if the opposite of what is objectified is being defended, making it seem as if the real people responsible for what we all see and see happening are being hidden. On these stages of illusion that the media have become, mystifying has become synonymous with informing and illusionism has become communication itself.

On such a stage, of course, figures like Trump, Putin, Xi Ji ping, Maduro, Claudia Sheinbaum, Lukashenko, Fitzo or Orban, whatever their political-ideological camp, are deeply hated figures. What they think they say and what they say, as a rule, coincides with what they stand for. They also commit the mortal sin of wanting to exercise the power that has been constitutionally entrusted to them, not allowing interference that is not in accordance with their will and the responsibilities assigned to them. This sovereign (towards themselves and others) and haughty character earns them the epithet “dictator”, which, let’s face it, often comes from a booklet called the “CIA World Factbook”.

What we have to ask ourselves is why we need a power that says it is against torture, but keeps Guantanamo Bay running and, like that facility, thousands of secret prisons around the world. Or, a power that, over the last 80 years, has transferred around 20% of the wealth produced annually from the poorest 50%, the workers, to the richest 10%, the oligarchs, with these 10% now dominating more than 30% of U.S. output and the poorest 50% being left with a mere 6 or 7%. All this while making fine speeches about democracy – for the richest 10% of course – and human rights, as long as these don’t clash with more important interests, such as monetary ones.

These people will be delighted to hear Biden, at the same press conference, say that he is going to send arms to Israel and then say that he is concerned about the humanitarian situation in Gaza and ask Netanyahu to be more lenient with the bombs that he himself has authorized to be sent. They will also be delighted to see Blinken say that he has to “help” Ukraine with more weapons and then accuse the Russian Federation of tearing down Ukrainian buildings to eliminate the soldiers that NATO sends there. Or watching Zelensky say that he is fighting for democracy while eliminating all opposition to the left and center.

The politeness and cynicism that most confuse with “democratic culture” and “institutional respect” are based on the same principles – or lack thereof – that lead them to ban media outlets in the name of defending “freedom of expression”, and to stalk individuals on social networks, listening to phone calls, videos and analyzing private messages, in the name of defending freedom of opinion. It is in the name of this politeness that the billions of dollars a year that the U.S. budget devotes to the media are silenced, so that it can produce information that “counteracts the malign influence” of Russia, China or Iran. Even if, in order to produce such messages, facts have to be invented, lied about and manipulated. How can anyone sane, and with the slightest concern about the people he represents, allow a foreign country to use endless funds to eliminate the relationship between Europe and China, or Europe and Russia, as if they were our patriarchs or guardians and the European peoples were subject to a process of civil disqualification, incapable of exercising their rights and assuming their duties.

As we watch Elon Musk meddle in European politics, using his “X” to propagate his ideas, all those who are shocked should think twice and realize that Musk’s use of the “X” is no different from the use of Facebook, Google or the mainstream media (concentrated under Clinton’s auspices) by the White House and the CIA. Musk’s disrespect for the sovereignty of the European member states is no different from the disrespect shown by the political representatives of those states towards themselves and the people they claim to defend, when they gave up governing and left everything in the hands of Washington and the mandatary Ursula Von Der Leyen. Basically, Elon Musk is just using the power he knows exists, without any masks either.

Trump, Elon Musk or J.D. Vance (guys will still come out and say I support them) disconcert these people because they denounce, without subterfuge, without false modesty, without hypocrisy, the state submission and subordination in which European politicians find themselves vis-à-vis the White House, vis-à-vis the corporate empire they now head. Knowing this, they blatantly use this power, lowering the recipients of their orders to the level of what they are: mere corporate officials looking to climb the career ladder and corrupt (morally or financially) proxies, so easy to manipulate. If there is one skill that all affirmative leaders have, it is knowing where the triggers are that manipulate each being, each personality. Like no one else, they know how to pull them and reward them to get what they want.

Faced with such behavior, people like António Costa, Ursula von der Leyen, Kaja Kallas, Montenegro, Starmer, Scholz, Macron or Meloni (who they are now promoting as a new Mussolini 2.0 in a woke version) are totally disarmed. There is no more make-believe. Either they follow their leader or they are crushed. The other option is to fight, to assume an alternative. Trump is forcing them to take a stand and leave the swamp of indecision, salami-slicing and cynicism. No climber likes to be unmasked in this way. Neither for good nor for ill.

As the Democratic administrations have shown, the brutal attitudes that the Republicans adopt are always later confirmed and deepened by the “civilized” Democrats. Just as the “social democratic and socialist” parties (now all “liberal”) do in Europe, in relation to the openly neoliberal, conservative and reactionary parties. The latter pave the way, which the former later consolidate by saying they are not doing it. In the end, we all know that we have become poorer. And this creates the appearance of a movement that keeps everything the same.

This is nothing more than the “good cop – bad cop” story. The role of the Trumps and Bushes is to further the manifest destiny, which is to say, the expansion of the empire, so that the Clintons and Obamas can come along as saviors and, amid the fine words of unity, freedom and democracy, normalize the barbarity that they wanted and took advantage of. Speaking of progress, we can all see that we live in a more violent, impoverished, backward and less democratic society.

After all, what does the world need if not the truth? Be it brutal and oppressive, be it unacceptable or uncomfortable. But let it be the truth and, in that case, Trump is much more faithful to the truth than Biden. Trump gives us the true face of the USA, the one that is not masked and obscured by the Goebbelsian speeches of the Democratic Party. Even when he lies and conspires, Trump tells us the truth, because he does so with such presumption, imbecility and arrogance that it is easy to discredit and dismantle the speech.

You can fight with the truth. They hate Trump because he shows us who the enemy is, giving name and body to the monster that hides behind U.S.-led globalism. Everything that the Democratic Party and its followers try so hard to hide from the people… is no longer secret.