The grandmaster of political-satirical talk shows and unrelenting long-time critic of Donald Trump Bill Maher recently revealed a few things he liked about Trump. He appreciated how Trump approached Taliban leader Abdul Baradar during negotiations for the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan in his first term. At the beginning of the video call, he showed him an aerial shot of his house with the message: ‘We know where you are, and if anything happens to any American soldier, keep that in mind.’ However, the message sent outward was one of very good talks with Baradar, almost partnership-like.
That same President Trump, who knew how to secretly and most directly blackmail while publicly praising even the Taliban leader, today leads an open political war against (so far the closest) European allies, publicly humiliating them. While it is possible to understand that his glorification of Putin is largely part of a negotiating tactic, it is harder to comprehend the purpose of repeating threats to take Greenland from Denmark ‘one way or another.’ Is Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, a rational social democrat committed to transatlantic cooperation and one of the few European politicians with leadership capacity, really the greatest enemy of the USA? Right after the Chinese leader Xi?
Introduction: A Tornado of Change
Donald Trump entered the White House for the second time with a prepared project to reset the international order: dismantling global international liberalism and strengthening the role of states in the international order, ending existing wars as part of creating a new security architecture for the world, including Europe, and with a project for social and political resetting of the Western world – from progressive wokeism to a new Western conservatism.
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By humiliating (European) allies and publicly disregarding them, Donald Trump is not only scoring occasional own goals but increasingly appears to be playing for the opposing team
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His first hundred days in the White House appear as an introductory tornado of changes that have affected all three areas: in the form of opening peace negotiations, defining defense priorities, and redefining defense obligations and alliances (NATO), and recently attempts at global economic resetting by opening trade wars. It is overly simplistic to reduce these very ambitious projects to mere Trump’s whims, as his political opponents often do. It is premature to speak of their eventual success or to condemn them in advance to failure and declare them a disaster.
However, it seems that for the success of these projects, at least coerced support from the political nomenclature of the states to which the changes pertain is necessary, and above all, public conviction that these changes are good, important, and necessary. It also appears that through his public antagonism with the EU, Donald Trump is on the best path to alienate even real or potential European political allies and to lose the support of that small part of the European public that has so far been inclined towards him despite the dictates of mainstream media. Distrust and mutual competition are not new; rather, they are a sort of constant in relations between the USA and the Old Continent. Meanwhile, Europe has usually been more successful in economic exchange (which Trump is trying to change overnight), while in defense and security matters, it has literally listened to and followed the dictates of the USA. But Trump’s predecessors did not say that Europe is robbing America. And America could have, with a little political tact, taken effective control over strategically important Greenland quietly, in agreement with Prime Minister Frederiksen, using the usual argument of strength behind the scenes, while demonstrating alliance on stage. The tasteless parade of Vice President Vance as an uninvited guest in Greenland makes the goal more distant and Trump’s administration more repulsive.
Only Trump Brags Publicly
It is no secret that even before the Russian-Ukrainian peace negotiations, European allies were excluded from processes led by the USA for very pragmatic reasons. The conclusion of the peace process for Bosnia and Croatia is one example. But Clinton did not publicly devalue them; rather, he publicly emphasized that non-existent alliance. It is not the first time that states have tried to indirectly charge for their military and humanitarian aid. But only Trump publicly boasts that he will condition military aid to Ukraine on a minerals agreement. If he showed at least as much respect and tact towards European allies as he once did towards the Taliban leader, the resetting of American-European economic relations and the construction of a new European security architecture would have a much better perspective. By humiliating (European) allies and publicly disregarding them, Trump is not only scoring occasional own goals but increasingly appears to be playing for the opposing team.
