Tag: Canada
The foreign policy smokescreen
As Donald Trump prepares to assume the presidency January 20, he is talking obvious nonsense about Canada, Greenland, and Panama. What is he up to?
The nonsense
The three propositions, as best I understand them, are these:
- Canada should become the 51st state;
- Denmark should sell Greenland to the United States;
- Panama should lower shipping fees through its canal or the US will take it back by military force.
None of this is happening. Nor is any of it desirable from America’s or even Trump’s own perspective.
Canadians pride themselves on their differences with the US. They include a national health system and wide social safety net. Absorbing its population of more than 40 million would tilt the American political scene definitively towards the Democrats. Nor would most US citizens want the francophone part of Canada. Absorbing even anglophone Canada would remove a buffer that shields the US from direct Arctic confrontation with China and Russia.
Denmark has already said it is not interested in selling Greenland, which has a population of only 57,000 or so. It has relatively large deposits of rare earth minerals. Those are available to the US with Greenland under Danish sovereignty. We only need pay the price. Owning Greenland would shift the burden of its defense to the US. It would also make the island a juicy target for America’s adversaries. We wouldn’t be able to limit its defense to the minimalist approach Denmark has taken.
The 1977 Panama Canal Treaty turned the Canal Zone over to Panama in 1979 and the Canal itself in 1999. A Panama-government-owned entity has run it well since. Trump has complained about high transit prices and claimed Chinese soldiers control the Canal. Prices are up due to water shortages that affect Canal operations. The claim about the Chinese is bogus, though there are Chinese companies running ports and building infrastructure in Panama.
The why
Why would a President-elect stake out objectives that are obviously not going to be reached? One reason is to gain leverage in upcoming negotiations. Trump is transactional. He figures weakening the Canadian government by pooh-poohing its prime minister will be to American advantage in coming trade negotiations. He’ll hope to get a deal for Greenland’s minerals that will exclude China. And he’ll try to get a discount for American shipping through the Panama Canal.
But there is more to this flood of bad propositions. Trump is trying to hide what is going on within his own electoral coalition. Its MAGA loyalists are in a verbal fracas with his new-found tech friends, including Elon Musk. The techies want H1B visas so they can import overseas technical talent they claim is not available in the US. Trump wants them too, as he uses them to import cheap labor for his hotels and golf clubs. But his MAGAtes see them as one more hole in the proverbial fence at the border.
There’s more. Trump is trying to distract from his blatantly unqualified presidential nominees. The worst of these, Matt Gaetz, for Attorney General, is gone. He fell victim to his own abuse of young girls. But the equally abusive and alcohol abusing Pete Hegseth is still up for Secretary of Defense. And Kash Patel, sworn to avenge what he alleges is Trump’s mistreatment, is hoping to sneak by as FBI Director. Not to mention the blatantly unqualified RFK Jr as Health and Human Services Secretary. And the Moscow-compromised Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence.
He’s succeeding
The presidential nominees and the Republican split on immigration policy are both more real than Trump’s dumb imperialist proposals. Canada is doing to remain independent, Denmark will keep Greenland, and Panama will keep the Canal. But once again he has us talking about things that don’t matter instead of the things that do. Trump isn’t really a master communicator in the sense of Ronald Reagan. But he is a master at setting the daily agenda, not only to attract but also to distract. His foreign policy smokescreen is succeeding.
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What good is a norm if it will be breached?
My cousin by marriage, Bill Caplan, is an engineer and former hi-tech business owner. After selling his business, he dared in retirement to get a master’s degree in architecture. He has devoted himself for years to unraveling the mysteries of energy conservation in buildings and how the world should respond to global warming. He is convinced that our current efforts are inadequate.
Smarter and better
But he is not urging faster and more. He is urging smarter and better.
Watch the video above. Bill argues that just constructing a building that uses less energy is pointless by itself, and even sometimes counterproductive. This is because production and transportation of the building materials emit so much carbon dioxide even before construction starts. That’s my crude account of his argument. Best to listen to him.
I have no doubt that he is correct on the merits. But I doubt that his proposed solution is adequate. He has devoted himself to raising the consciousness of practicing architects. That merits applause. They could correct some of the worst abuses. But you would have to give a lot of American Institute of Architect lectures to reach any significant number of them. We can hope the video embedded here gets lots of viewers.
The solution
A carbon tax can be more widely effective. It could raise the cost of materials whose production and transportation uses carbon and discourage at least some of the practices Bill cites. The European Union is implementing a carbon tax in 2026. Canada and twenty of the EU member states had already levied carbon taxes by 2023. Here are the European numbers:
I don’t know if these taxes are high enough or sufficiently well-designed to avoid unintended consequences. But the US would be well-advised to figure it out and follow suit. Our national habit of bemoaning high energy prices and avoiding gasoline taxes slows the transition to non-carbon fuels. Refusal to tax carbon also incentivizes subsidies to wind, solar, and nuclear. Better to make the polluter pay and allow the market to drive carbon reduction.
A norm is better than none
Bill is discouraged, as he sees the breach of the 1.5 degrees centigrade norm looming soon. That is bad. But I still think we are far better off than in the past. We knew the mechanisms and prospects of global warming when I worked on the first UN Conference on the Human Environment in 1972. Nothing was done to prevent the consequences for decades thereafter.
Now at least we have an agreed global norm that virtually every country on earth accepts, with the notable exception of Donald Trump’s America. Knowing that we are going to breach a norm is better than not having a norm at all. Avoiding 1.5 degrees of warming has mobilized a great deal more effort to slow global warming than previously. It might even eventually motivate a carbon tax in the US.
For more from Bill, see his Environmental Law Institute book Thwart Global Warming Now: Reducing Embodied Carbon Brick by Brick. For more on international norms, see my own Strengthening International Regimes: the Case of Radiation Protection, which discusses the 1.5 degree norm.
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Stevenson’s army, September 18
– Senate has changed its dress code. I think that will lower decorum and seriousness.
– Senate Democrats need 67 votes to suspend the rules [in this case rule XVI on appropriations] to package 3 spending bills.
– Jake Sullivan and Wang Yi spent 2 days in important talks
– There’s a Sahel security pact
– Intercept says US got arms from Pakistan for Ukraine in return for IMF bailout
– WaPo says deal with Iran could lead to more. Brett McGurk explains and defends deal
– Trudeau accuses India of killing Canadian Sikh
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 15
– NYT says US is still paying Russia billions for nuclear fuel.
– NYT also has more on US-Iran talks.
– Canadian quits China bank, claiming CCP interference.
– FT says Putin backs Defense over Wagner.
– SAIS prof Ed Joseph has a Kosovo plan.
– Europeans discuss guarantees for Ukraine.
– Politico’s China Watcher explains problems facing Blinken’s trip.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, March 24
– US retaliates after deadly drone strike in Syria.
– US complained to Israel about new law.
– Dan Drezner warns about Taiwan dilemmas, citing this article.
– CSIS study sees Chinese pressure ineffective. Here’s that report.
– WSJ says – Ukraine trouble getting troops.
-Canada doesn’t want to take lead in Haiti.
– Blinken refuses to declassify dissent cable.
– RollCall finds less party unity in House, more in Senate last year.
– Senate is taking up AUMF repeal, but look at Politico’s list of amendments:
Here’s a quick rundown of amendment to expect in the Senate next week on the AUMF:
- Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) amendment would empower “the President to use force against forces of Iran, a state responsible for conducting and directing attacks against United States forces in the Middle East and to take actions for the purpose of ending Iran’s escalation of attacks on, and threats to, United States interests.”
- Sen. Ron Johnson’s (R-Wis.) amendment would require Senate approval for any World Health Organization convention or agreement or treaty.
- Sen. Rick Scott’s (R-Fla.) amendment would create a joint select committee to look into the United States/Afghanistan withdrawal in 2021.
- Sen. Pete Ricketts’ (R-Neb.) amendment would require the president to certify “that Iraq, Israel,and other United States partners and allies in the region have been meaningfully consulted on the ramifications of repeal.”
- Sen. Dan Sullivan’s (R-Alaska) amendment ensures that the AUMF repeal won’t impact the effectiveness of U.S. response to Iran.
- Sen. Josh Hawley’s (R-Mo.) amendment would appoint an inspector general to oversee Ukraine aid.
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Stevenson’s army, November 8
HuffPost lists the states which are regularly slow to count ballots. Don’t expect results in close races tonight.
PM Trudeau says China interferes in Canadian elections.
I urge you every now and then to go on fas.org and look for recent CRS reports. Here’s a new one on emerging military technologies.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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