The United States Waits for a Taste of Trump’s Disastrous Results

Published in China Times
(Taiwan) on 16 January 2017
by Xu Zongmao (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Gina Elia. Edited by Gillian Palmer.
Trump is about to take over as U.S. president. One year ago, reporters used to write articles calling Trump’s abrupt rise as a political force the “American Spring.” Trump’s formally taking over as president nowadays is evidently the continuation of the “American Spring.” As everybody knows, the continuation of the “Arab Spring” was division and chaos. Can the continuation of the “American Spring” avoid the same fate?

Trump’s sudden rise was due to the despair of America’s white working class toward the distribution of the economy. He is a big businessman, he approves of gambling, he has admitted to fraudulent insolvency multiple times, he evades taxes, he’s been married three times, there’s a lot of news of him in connection with the pursuit of pleasure and entertainment, and in addition he continuously explodes into foul language. A good number of conservative voters voted for him — in the context of despair it is evident, oh, how the standards of today’s “conservative” have declined! In the course of the election, Trump unceasingly issued forth language that humiliated minority ethnic groups, immigrants from abroad, political opponents, and so on. Yet after he won the election, on the contrary, he called for unity, as though the scars of the society he had cut apart with his own hands could be healed without any medicine! Even so, before he takes over as president, Trump is persisting in sending out veritable witch hunts to severely punish people he doesn’t like, make rash statements about diplomacy he’s not familiar with, unscrupulously find fault with businesses he isn’t fond of and completely defy the constitutional system of governance over which President Obama has not yet relinquished his post; the force of his counterattacks and their aftermath will without doubt be formidable.

First, Trump doesn’t understand the complicated nature of the international situation. He has consistently thought that other countries are profiting at the expense of the U.S., but he hasn’t realized that the expenses of the U.S. are just small odds and ends, kept low because the U.S. profits even more at the expense of other countries. World peace is built on a mighty balance of power; if you pull on one hair of it, you move the entire body. For example, some people are saying now that Trump should “form an alliance with Russia to control China.” The problem is that there are actually no disputes over sovereignty between Russia and China. Russia, Japan and Ukraine conversely have friction over sovereign rights, and thus there exists military tension between Russia and the European allies of the United States. If the United States forms an alliance with Russia, we will have to wait and see whether or not it will be able to “control China,” but an immediate effect will be the loss of faith in the main allies of the East and West.

In regard to using Taiwan to haggle prices with Beijing, the result is Beijing’s tacit consent to North Korea to develop nuclear warheads and intercontinental missiles directed against the United States. At the same time, China is strengthening everyday military presence in the Taiwan Strait. The U.S. cannot take on the first, while the latter increases the United States’ military expenses for patrolling the Western Pacific Ocean. Beijing will not compromise, and still the United States has hugely increased its risk. Trump’s habit of saying whatever he pleases does not reflect his ability to transcend national powers, but rather his lack of understanding regarding the closely-interlocked international situation.

Even so, Trump’s “Twitter Nation” has already made Europe and Japan extremely unsettled. The international reputation of the U.S. has already been hurt; every country’s congress is deciding its foreign relationships based on its own regional government, in order to avoid suddenly being betrayed by the United States and ending up without any allies. Recently, Malaysia and the Philippines have quickly been pulling closer in their relationships with Beijing, and I believe Singapore, Vietnam, South Korea and so on will all follow suit. Trump’s abrupt rise as a political force was due to the withering of the American economy and the downward slide of its national power, but with Trump’s censure of the politics and economy of every country in the world, it’s as though he is depending on his mouth to be able to “turn the world inside out” — the first and second situations are obviously in conflict. If Trump’s mission is to scramble for profit from every country in the world and give priority to the U.S. in directing all resources inward toward it, then he has no other choice but to abandon the status of leader of the world alliance and pay less attention to the affairs of others. This is the direction of development that the sliding U.S. national power cannot avoid.

Trump will very quickly realize that he is surrounded by the framework of an insufficient national force, and that he has no power to direct other countries. Worse, he has underestimated Russia’s capability, belittling Russian President Putin’s craftiness concerning international governments. The United States has frequently broken up other countries, seeing it as a method for controlling them. Now, however, America has encountered Russia using a path through its own people to govern it. Trump is seen as beneficial to Russia’s method of breaking up the U.S., a shield for Russia’s actions; Russia will wait until he causes ruptures in American politics, then plunge a knife in deeply. Just like that, Trump will not only cause greater division in the United States, but his administration’s very legality will become one big question mark. U.S. political infighting will never see peaceful days, the U.S. will have absolutely no power to attend to the international situation, and world order will have to be totally reconstructed.

It’s just like when recently Russia, Iran, Turkey and Assad’s government in Syria united to reconstruct order in Syria and obtained diplomatic recognition from the United Nations; this process happened completely without the participation of the United States. An omen of the forthcoming tremendous change in the world order!

The author is a senior media personnel. Xu Zongmao’s photographs and articles are available on Facebook.


川普即將接任美國總統,1年前筆者曾撰文稱川普之崛起為「美國之春」,如今川普正式接任總統,顯然是「美國之春」續集。眾所周知,「阿拉伯之春」續集就是分裂與混亂,「美國之春」續集能避免同樣的命運嗎?

川普崛起於美國底層白人對經濟分配的絕望,他是一名大商人,開賭場、多次惡性倒閉、逃稅、結過3次婚,花花草草的新聞多,且不斷爆粗口,保守選民大批投給他,可見在絕望下,現在「保守」的標準何其低落!選舉過程中,川普不斷對少數族裔、外來移民、政治對手等發出羞辱語言,當選後卻又號召團結,彷彿親手割下的社會傷痕可以不藥而癒!即使如此,接任總統前,川普持續對自己不喜歡的人大加撻伐,對自己不熟悉的外交輕率發言,對自己看不順眼的企業橫加指責,完全無視歐巴馬總統尚未離任的憲政體制,反撲力量和後遺症必然強大!

首先,川普並不了解國際局勢的複雜性,總以為其他國家一直占美國的便宜,卻未認識到美國的付出,只是美國對其他國家占更大便宜的小零頭。世界和平建立在強權的均勢上,牽一髮而動全身。譬如說,現在有人說川普要「聯俄制中」,問題是俄、中之間並無主權糾紛,俄國與日本、烏克蘭之間反而有主權的摩擦,與美國的歐洲盟友存在軍事緊張。美國一旦聯俄,是否能「制中」還有待觀察,但立即效應就是喪失東西方主要盟友的信賴。

至於拿台灣跟北京叫價,結果就是北京默許北韓發展針對美國的核彈頭洲際導彈,同時加強對台海的常態軍事壓力。前者美國承擔不了,後者則徒增美國西太平洋巡防的軍事開銷。北京不讓步,美國卻暴增巨大的風險。川普的隨性發言,並非他有超越美國國力的本事,而是他對環環相扣的國際情勢並不了解。

即使如此,川普的「推特治國」,已經讓歐洲和日本感到極度不安,美國的國際信譽已受到傷害,各國會根據本身的地緣政治,來決定對外關係,以免突然被美國出賣而兩頭落空。最近,菲律賓、馬來西亞快速拉近與北京的關係,相信新加坡、越南、南韓等也會跟上腳步。川普的崛起是因為美國經濟萎縮和國力滑落,然而川普對世界各國政治和經濟的指謫,彷彿他靠嘴巴就可以「翻轉世界」,兩者顯然是矛盾的!如果川普的使命是與世界各國爭利,優先把資源投入美國內部,那麼他別無選擇,必須放棄世界盟主的地位,少管別人的事,這是美國國力下滑無可避免的發展趨向。

川普很快就會發現自己困在國力不足的框架,無力指導他國。更糟糕的是,他低估俄國的能力,小看俄國總統普丁的國際政治手腕。美國經常分化其他國家,作為控制他國的手段,現在卻遭俄國以其人之道還治其人之身。川普作為俄國分化手段的受益者,袒護俄國的做法,等於在自己創造的美國政治裂痕中,再深深地補上一刀。如此川普不僅使美國更加分裂,他執政的合法性也將是一大問號,美國的政爭將永無寧日,根本無力顧及國際局勢,世界秩序勢必將重整。

就像最近俄國、伊朗、土耳其和敘利亞阿薩德政府,聯合重建敘利亞的秩序,獲得聯合國承認,其過程完全沒有美國的參與,實為世局巨變的前兆!

(作者為資深媒體人,徐宗懋圖文館facebook)

(中國時報)
This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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