With little prospect for normalcy to
reassert itself in our deranged political culture, the new year unfolds upon us
with three dominating stories: the intrusion into Venezuela, the killings by
ICE of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota, and the reigniting of Trump’s
obsession to control Greenland. This letter addresses the interrelated foreign
policy issues.
The move to take out Maduro cannot be
viewed in isolation but needs to be seen within a broader objective of exerting
U.S. power in Latin and South America and the intrusion into the wider western
hemisphere. Whatever other reasons offered, the least credible was that of
preserving democracy in Venezuela. Equally dubious was the accusation that Venezuela
was a primary source of fentanyl importation into the U.S., given that most fentanyl
imports originate in Mexico.
A somewhat stronger case could be made
for Venezuela’s role in facilitating cocaine shipments to the U.S., but Trump’s
pardon of former president of Honduras, Juan Hernández, who was serving a
45-year jail sentence for conspiring to import cocaine into the U.S., undermines
any claim that the administration’s Venezuelan’s policy was primarily based on
concerns over drug trafficking.
Access to Venezuelan oil reserves may
have been a more plausible rationale. The issue for the U.S. oil companies,
however, is whether the years needed to repair and effectively operationalize the
oil fields would be worth the investment, especially if oil decreases as the
primary source of energy in succeeding decades. If oil was a primary driver, one
wonders if it was based on anything more than Trump’s “drill baby drill”
obsession and repudiation of global warming as a problem of the first order. A
broader factor may have been the opportunity the corrupt Maduro regime presented
to assert U.S. dominance in the western hemisphere.
Thus, the “Dondroe” Doctrine—Trump’s
rebranding of the Monroe Doctrine of 1824—based on the aim of making the U.S. the
overriding power in the western hemisphere through direct military force, coercive
pressure, financial power, and the ever-present specter of raising tariffs. This
has played out in pressure campaigns against Panama’s sovereignty over the
Panama Canal, the rebranding of the Gulf of Mexico, and the ploy to make Canada
the 51st U.S. state. It has also been displayed in intimidating
pressures against Cuba, Costa Rico, and Mexico, and raising tariffs on Brazil
for the temerity of jailing its former president, and Trump supporter, Jair
Bolsonaro, for attempting to undermine the 2022 election. And on Trump’s insistence
on gaining direct control over Greenland.
The Greenland policy stands as the most
naked expression of the Trump administration’s drive to exercise its primacy in
the western hemisphere, in which that “block of ice” would become the
possession of the United States for no other reasons than “we need it”—whether attained
by force, intimidation, or purchase. As Trump declared, “we can do it the easy
way or the hard way,” but in whatever way, the U.S. is going to attain
Greenland.
The ratcheting up of tensions occurred when
Trump imposed sets of tariffs against eight NATO countries because they had the
temerity to oppose the U.S government’s right to take control of Greenland, a
self‑governing
territory within the Kingdom of Denmark. The administration’s rationale to
control the island is thin. There is little prospect of Chinese or Russian dominance
in Greenland now or in the foreseeable future. Still, Trump insists, it is only
the U.S. which has the military might to protect the island from foreign
intrusion. In making this case, the Trump administration has dismissed the
significance of NATO, whose collective defense capabilities would possess more
than sufficient military power to secure Greenland from any such danger. That
outcome, however, would require the U.S. to coordinate its NATO policy
constructively with Europe. Although this has been established U.S. policy for
decades, Trump’s supercharged confrontational orientation has left him disinclined
to move in this direction.
In the current context, the U.S. already
enjoys substantial military, economic, and strategic influence in Greenland through
long-standing agreements and its historical position as the preeminent power
within NATO. By taking an unnecessary confrontational stance, the Trump
administration has threatened the viability of NATO. It has also played right into
Putin’s hand, which would make Russia’s dominance over Ukraine a logical
corollary of any forced control over Greenland. It would also provide Beijing
with an additional rationale to take direct military action against Taiwan.
Such Trumpian belligerency reflected a
pre-Davos stance. With the European NATO partners hanging tough, Trump—while exhibiting
the bigotry of The Ugly American in his January 21, 2001 Davos speech—significantly
modified the administration’s stance. The announced change takes direct
military force off the table. It cancels the impending tariffs against the affected
nations. In agreeing to negotiations with NATO members in linking U.S. policy
to an Arctic joint security framework, the administration removes the ownership
of Greenland as an irrevocable red line. The critical issue is the extent to
which the emerging framework would provide a viable resolution for the
interested parties. On that, Trump remains the ever-mercurial wild card. One
hopes that the change in policy is not simply a tactical retreat. Time will
tell.
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