Trump in the world – Is it time to panic?

The would-be demagogues of the latest United States Presidency are playing their cards in rapid-fire regularity and the world’s media is behaving like a brood of chickens with the fox already in the pen.

Yes it is bad and even worse; it is terrible and shocking but we need to slow down and get our breathing back into a regular pattern.

There are several points to make at this time; these points largely have not been made as yet by the Commentariat.

The first point is that some of what Trump and his cohort are saying is valid.  It is time for Europe to look after itself.  If Europe doesn’t want the Russian wolf at its door it needs to make that door strong enough to resist them.  I am reminded of that lovely nursery story of the three pigs and their building of houses for different images of the future.  Right now many have build houses of straw or, at best, houses of timber.  There is not a house of bricks to be seen anywhere.

Both the United States and Europe have major problems with unauthorised immigration that is driving the kind of “extreme right” responses of the Trump administration and the successes of the various extreme right parties in Europe.  Germany has some three million refugees to deal with that make up some four per cent of the population.

Trump largely won the US election on the basis of his campaign pledge to rid the country of unauthorised immigrants and to hermetically seal the country from further encroachment.  It isn’t, right now, the time to debate the validity of his or any other “fortress” solution to the problem but rather to recognise that he has a point that there is a problem and to seek what will be more effective and humane solutions to the problem.  It isn’t anywhere near enough to say, “oh that approach is shocking!”

The voices of the political centre and centre-left are largely silent in terms of effective solutions to the difficulties posed by the massive problem of unauthorised immigration that is feed by the nearly 100 million displaced people across the Globe.  There is some commentary about the absence of criticism to the responses from Trump and others.  Yes this may be weak, counter-productive and vapid but without alternative approaches such criticism is going to be easily dismissed.

With regards to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the “drip feed” response of the United States and Europe to the armament requests from Ukraine has led to the current battlefield stalemate.  If the United States and the larger European countries had been more responsive, the Russian aggression in Ukraine possibly would have been already dealt with.

Fourthly, a stronger belief is needed of the democratic processes.  Much of the rhetoric around the actions of the Trump Presidency is categorised as a fundamental change in the position of the United States.  Trump has been elected for four years and it is likely he will do immense damage to the legitimacy and effectiveness of the United State’s role on the world stage.

However, we need to remember that this is not the first time in recent history this has happened.  When George Bush decided to invade Iraq the United States took major hit in credibility.  There is such a thing as a pendulum and it will swing back.

Finally, there is the question of self-determination.  There is an inclination to under-estimate its effectiveness particularly over the long term.  Recently, I wrote a piece in Open Forum about the history of Ireland’s long struggle for freedom from English dominance.  It is a history of many catastrophic failures in insurrection but each of these failures fed into ultimate success.

Ukraine has a similar history of association with the Russians.  Just listen to Putin; there is no such thing as a Ukrainian nation.  Tell that to the Ukrainians!  Whilst it is true that the weapons provided by the United States and others have been important, the Ukrainian success in holding off the Russian onslaught is more to do with their own valour and ingenuity than it is to do with an Abrams tank or an F16 fighter.

The democratic nations of the world need to be reminded that the Ukrainians have had too much of a taste of freedom to give up because Donald Trump doesn’t like them.  I read in the media that Trump is angry with Zelensky.  The Ukrainians are too busy fighting for their very existence to care that much about Trump’s feelings.

The ambitions of Putin to re-create the Russian empire are unrealistic.  Current day Russia does not have the capacity to brutalise countries the way it once did.  Sure, in the short term, if Europe does not become more assertive quickly there will be much destruction, death and suffering but, in the longer term, a contemporary Russian hegemony over Eastern Europe including Ukraine is not sustainable.  The world has moved on from 1945.