The End of the American Century

Precisely 100 years after the U.S. entered World War I, Trump has announced the withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement. This is the sign that he has made America abdicate its role as the planet’s linchpin.

The “American Century” has ended with Donald Trump. In a powerfully symbolic coincidence, it has been 100 years since April 6, 1917, the day when the United States was (very reluctantly) dragged into that “useless slaughter” that was World War I. The U.S. never extricated itself from Europe’s conflicts, and later the world’s conflicts. First through scorching wars and later through cold wars, America shaped a world order where, up until the announcement of the withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement, it had always acted as the linchpin, regardless of victory or defeat, and of whether its actions were right or wrong.

That position has been deliberately relinquished by the most provincial and least knowledgeable elected man from Woodrow Wilson to Barack Obama. Trump went so far as to describe America as being the victim of a sinister international conspiracy to defraud it under the guise of environmental protection, as well as the butt of a joke that resulted in other countries “laughing at [it].” However, nobody has ever “laughed” at America. If the world laughs at all, it laughs at Trump, not at America.

This announcement will not change much because all major American corporations, ranging from Microsoft to General Electric, from Exxon to Disney, have already stated that they will not stray from their “green” path (including the oil companies, as the last thing they want is a return of coal as a competitor). The announcement’s nature is not ecological, but rather political.

It is a sign that Trump has caused America to abdicate the throne it created for itself starting on that day on April 1917 when the Senate voted to declare war on Imperial Germany. The U.S. is once again an actor searching for a role instead of the director. It is a small country with a formidable army. A whiny, self-pitying and paranoid nation that feels besieged by enemies determined to “disadvantage” it, as Trump laments, while sounding like a storekeeper railing against the unfair competition from the shop next door.

We do not know who or what will rise to the throne vacated by the super building-speculator from Queens – whether it is going to be a single nation or a group of countries that will clash less than the EU. Nor do we know whether the American Century would have ended anyway with the rise of other powers, like China and India, which was unimaginable just a few decades ago. However, one thing we do know. There would be no Republic Day on June 2 in Italy if, much like in 1917, America’s troops and their allies had not landed on Sicily’s shores in 1943 to demolish the monarchy and fascism.