Tag: United States
All that glitters is not gold
President Trump is promising a golden era. Let’s have a look.
What’s he doing now?
Tariffs, immigration restrictions, refusal to help democracies in Europe: this reminds me of the 1930s. So too does withdrawal from international institutions and stock market jitters. We know how that ended. Will it be better this time?
The campaign against woke as well as diversity, equity, inclusion is racial and gender prejudice incognito. Racism without the white sheet and pointy hat.
Firing of government workers and canceling of government grants and contracts is how both Trump and Elon Musk conduct business. These are the people you never want to do business with. They don’t keep commitments. They lie about accomplishments. The savings are going to be minimal. Firing all government employees would save 4% of the Federal budget. Firing IRS agents is going to increase the deficit.
The dismantling of USAID is already killing non-Americans who suffer from HIV, malaria, and other diseases. It is also hurting American agriculture and the American contractors who implement most of the work done abroad. At less than .5% of the budget, the savings are minimal. Once the court cases clear, I doubt there will be any savings at all.
What’s he aiming for?
Trump isn’t hiding his goals. He wants to extend a tax cut from his first term that will cost the US government $4.5 trillion. We know what that did the first time around: it was expensive and skewed to the rich. It did not deliver promised benefits. There is no way to compensate for the full $4.5 trillion, but the Republican House proposal is to take $880 million from Medicaid, depriving one-fifth of Americans of health insurance:
Trump will claim the savings come from waste, fraud, and mismanagement (WFM), but that is flim flam. There isn’t anywhere near enough WFM.
Trump has already suspended military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine, while asking nothing of Russia. Moscow continues its bombardment of civilians and its push for more territory. Trump’s goal is to get Ukraine to agree to give up land in exchange for Russian security guarantees. Putin has repeatedly proved those worthless. Trump expects the Europeans to provide peacekeepers, but that is entirely dependent on US backup through NATO’s Article 5. Trump is saying he won’t commit to that. The push to end the war in Ukraine is again flim flam. Dangerous flim flam as it is encouraging Putin to do whatever he feels like doing.
In the Middle East, Trump is still bragging on Gaza-lago, his scheme for rebuilding Gaza into a Mediterranean resort. No one things that is happening. If he were successful at moving the Palestinians out, it would make Americans targets of terrorism worldwide.
Dross is what you get
I underestimated Trump. To me, he is an obvious fraud. But he fools a lot of Americans. They think Musk is doing something that will balance the budget. They believe Trump will somehow make peace in Ukraine. His supporters don’t care that his Gaza ideas are bogus. It’s not just that all that glitters is not gold. It’s that anything Trump touches turns to dross.
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America needs to right itself
Unlike her compatriots on MSNBC, Rachel does real digging and finds things others haven’t reported on. This segment on the realignment with Russia was a fine example.
Why Russia?
Still, why is Trump abandoning Europe in favor of a country with an economy smaller than Canada’s? Russia has a few things going for it. It is the largest country on earth. Its giant land mass has good odds of containing lots of minerals as well as oil and gas. It borders both Europe and China, making it strategically vital to both.
Russia has also proven capable of upending order in Europe and in the US. In Europe it has used cyber attacks, disinformation, covert action against infrastructure, corruption, and military aggression. In the US it uses all but the last of these. The purpose is to show democracy as dysfunctional. It works, as we saw in the UK withdrawal from Brexit and in the rise of the neo-Nazis in Germany.
Why Trump?
Trump has been laundering Russian assets through real estate deals for decades. One of his buyers was present for the US/Russia negotiations in Saudi Arabia last month. He has also sought to invest in Moscow. Trump boasts about his close relationship with Russian President Putin. He is not hiding it. He openly sought Russian assistance during his first presidential campaign.
Friday’s meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky went well until minute 40. Then it went awry because Vance realized Moscow would not be pleased. Trump piled on. His alignment with Russia might not have survived a successful signing of the minerals agreement. Even though that is nothing more than an agreement to negotiate.
US interests
Americans are not with Trump on Russia. They don’t trust Putin. Opinion on support for Ukraine is more divided. But most Trump supporters back Ukraine. There really is no question about who started the war. The question is whether Russia or Ukraine will emerge the winner either on the battlefield or at the negotiating table.
The alliance with Europe kept the peace during the Cold War and thereafter. The Alliance triggered its mutual defense obligation only once, in response to the 9/11 attack on the US. Anyone who endangers NATO is not acting in the interest of the United States. Trump has endangered it repeatedly. He has also neglected to recognize that Europe is doing more for its own defense, as he himself has urged.
We’ve elected a president who serves Russia’s interests better than he serves American interests. He is also dismantling the US government Those are serious problems. Fixing them will be hard. We need what used to be termed an “intervention.” Here is one idea: get the ex-presidents to intervene.
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Americans deserve better but may not get it
Trump and Zelensky were doing fine yesterday:
Zelensky had several times challenged Trump. Europeans, Zelensky said, had provided more aid than the US and it did not have to be paid back. He noted Putin’s record of violating agreements, as well as his torture of prisoners and theft of Ukrainian children. Trump was taking it, even though it made him visiblyu uncomfortable.
The culprit was Vance
Things went south about 39:50, when JD Vance chimed in about the virtues of diplomacy rather than force. Zelensky responded “what kind of diplomacy?” But things only went off the rails when Vance then called Zelensky disrespectful. He had not been disrespectful, though he was clearly annoyed that the VP was chiming in. It was Vance who was being disrespectful.
Quarreling at that point was unwise. Zelensky should have said “we’ll have to disagree about the prospects for successful diplomacy.” Or “I agree about diplomacy, but it has to be backed by strength.” Or “diplomacy with security guarantees makes sense to me.” But give the man a break: he was exhausted and tired of these Russian dupes.
Why did Vance do it?
There are several possible explanations for why Vance made the false claim that Zelensky was disrespectful:
- They had met privately in advance of this public session. I had the sense there was already bad blood between them. Maybe it just flowed out.
- Trump and Vance may have agreed that the President would play good cop while the VP played bad cop.
- Vance may have decided the meeting was going too well and that his minders in Moscow would not be pleased.
- Trump and Vance may have (rightly) decided the agreement Zelensky was about to sign was a nothing burger.
Whatever the cause, it was, as Tom Nichols put it in The Atlantic, an ambush. Zelensky was not at fault.
Humpty dumpty
The question now is whether Humpty Dumpty can be put back together again. I doubt it. It was not just this meeting that went badly. Trump’s entire initiative for peace in Ukraine is cockeyed. He is trying to wean Russia from China and make Moscow a friend of the US. That isn’t going to happen. Putin knows his country is nothing without Chinese backing. He certainly won’t trade it for the uncertainties of US support.
But there is no telling with Trump. He is a bad negotiator. He concedes things up front that he needn’t concede. Trump holds back on things that need to be clear up front. He reverses himself even on issues he has said are vital. The European backing for Zelensky should make an honest US president wonder if he has got this right. But of course Trump despises the Euros. And he isn’t honest
America will shrink
That leaves us with a giant split in the NATO Alliance. Trump is aligned with Russia. The Europeans align with Ukraine. But will the Euros get their act together to fill in for the US aid Trump will cancel? If they don’t Putin will win this war. Then after a few years of rearmament he will start a new one in Moldova, then Poland or the Baltics.
America will have shrunk to a Western Hemisphere power pining after Panama and Greenland. And complaining to Mexico and Canada about the drugs Americans are abusing. Washington will be unable and unwilling to defend its allies in either Europe or Asia. Our economy will be noncompetitive due to tariff protection. The society will return to its tradition of white robber baron supremacy. Americans deserve better but may not get it.
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The agreement they didn’t sign
I wrote most of this piece before today’s meeting. The analysis of the agreement is I think correct, even if OBE.
The US-Ukraine minerals deal were supposed to sign today has one great virtue. There are no obvious no-no’s, like limits on its territorial extent or obligations Ukraine will find onerous. It really doesn’t constitute what President Trump said he wanted, which was payback for US assistance. It does make Ukraine devote half its future natural resource revenue to the joint fund the agreement promises. But that is no loss since the fund is devoted exclusively to investments in Ukraine.
But if there are no glaring errors, it still doesn’t constitute a “devastating blow” to Putin. The devil is in the details, which haven’t been negotiated yet. Does this agreement apply to all of Ukraine’s sovereign territory as of 2014, before the first Russian intervention? Can the US turn around and negotiate a similar agreement with Russia that applies to territory Moscow now controls? It just isn’t clear.
This is essentially an agreement to negotiate an agreement. No harm yet in that.
No security guarantees
The big omission from Ukraine’s perspective is the lack of security guarantees. The agreement says this:
The Government of the United States of America supports Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees needed to establish lasting peace.
That is a backhanded way of saying the US won’t give guarantees but will support Ukraine’s effort to get them. The implied source is Europe, including the United Kingdom and Turkey as well as the European Union. No one else is available. The Europeans should bear this burden. Russian guarantees aren’t worth the paper they are written on.
The problem is that the US saying that the US will not guarantee the guarantors. That is, if NATO European member states guarantee Ukraine’s security, NATO’s Article 5 will not apply to their forces. If the Europeans get into trouble, for example with the Russians, the US will not help them out.
That is important. The obligation to protect European forces in Bosnia led to the Dayton peace agreement. Dick Holbrooke convinced President Clinton it would be better to deploy Americans to end the war rather than conduct an evacuation of the Europeans.
Production isn’t going to be easy or quick
Ukraine is a big country and may have lots of resources of interest to the US.
Here are the more “critical” deposits, rare earths and others (the pinkish area in the southeast is Russian-occupied territory):
But none of this is going to be easy or quick to exploit. Yesterday’s NPR interview on the subject suggested it will 18 years from the required up-to-date mapping to mineral production from a mine:
That would be 18 years in peacetime, or in a peaceful area of the country. I’m not holding my breath.
So why did it blow up?
Signing this agreement, which is no more than an agreement to negotiate, would have been much better than a pissing match. But Vance and Trump seem to me determined to sandbag Zelensky, who wasn’t humble enough for their tastes:
Zelensky should not have taken the bait. Who knows what comes next!
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Who should decide Bosnia’s fate?
I am delighted to see Milorad Dodik, president of Bosnia’s Republika Srpska (RS), held accountable. A Bosnian court convicted him Wednesday for his refusal to implement decisions of the international community’s High Representative.
But let’s not celebrate too much. Some of us remember how war criminal Radovan Karadzic behaved after the war in Bosnia. He continued to govern in the RS even though barred from office. Only when he went underground to escape capture did he lose control.
Dodik can pay a fine to escape the one-year prison sentence. The six-year ban on holding office will prove meaningless unless his loyalists are removed from power.
Is the bear a paper tiger?
That said, Dodik, known as the “Bosnian bear,” has so far been unable to rouse his supporters to outright rebellion. His threats of secession are proving hollow.
Serbian President Vucic will make a show of backing Dodik, but Belgrade doesn’t want the RS to secede. That would put Vucic in a tight spot. If he recognizes an independent RS, the European Union will be unhappy. If he doesn’t, his own ethnic nationalist constituency will be unhappy. Better for him if Dodik remains non grata and unable to compete politically. Vucic isn’t the first Serbian president to fear competition in Belgrade from a Bosnian Serb nationalist.
Only time will tell, but Dodik could be a paper tiger.
The self-licking ice cream cone
That won’t solve Bosnia’s problems. They are rooted in a stubbornly unreformed constitution the US and EU imposed at Dayton in 1995. It ended the war at the cost of functional governance. Changing that will require a new configuration of Bosnian politicians willing to risk the disapproval of ethnic nationalists. That configuration is difficult to produce because the constitution favors the election of ethnic nationalists. It’s a self-licking ice cream cone.
Dodik is only one mainstay of this self-perpetuating system. Croat nationalist Dragan Covic is another. He is still in place. Dodik’s plight will frighten Covic and make him an even harder line ethnic nationalist. He wants a “third entity” in Bosnia and is currying Moscow’s favor to get it.
Bosniak politicians also play the ethnic nationalist game. But they are more divided than either the Serbs or the Croats. They are also less fearful of a one-person/one-vote system. Their numerical majority gives them more confidence they can defend their vital interests.
The reforms needed
The needed reforms are no secret. The European Court of Human Rights has repeatedly said what Bosnia needs to do for EU membership. Jasmin Mujanovic has analyzed the options. Ismet Fatih Cancar has has outlined a route to Dayton 2.0, including NATO membership. But political leadership in these directions has been lacking.
Also lacking is international pressure in the right directions. The Biden Administration chose to appease Vucic and allowed the HiRep to coddle Covic. Jared Kushner’s business interests in Belgrade compromise the new Trump Administration from the start. Trump himself is an ethnic nationalist. If he agrees to partition of Ukraine, even temporarily, all bets are off for Bosnia and Herzegovina.
So the fate of Bosnia is where it should be: with its citizens. The conviction of Dodik can help, but far more is needed.
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Deal, no deal, ceasefire, peace agreement?
Ukrainian President Zelensky will meet Friday with President Trump to sign a minerals agreement the Americans have been insisting on. The Financial Times reports:
The final version of the agreement, dated February 25 and seen by the FT, would establish a fund into which Ukraine would contribute 50 per cent of proceeds from the “future monetisation” of state-owned mineral resources, including oil and gas, and associated logistics. The fund would also be able to invest in projects in Ukraine.
The $500 billion demand has disappeared. No security guarantees are included. The US stake in the fund is unspecified.
Deal, or no deal?
It is hard to know what to think about this, as it all depends on the details and on implementation. It is certainly not common practice for countries providing support to insist on repayment. But Trump is Trump. Personally, I wouldn’t sign anything he offers, but Zelensky is in a difficult spot. I hope he knows what he is doing.
The bigger question is whether this will bring Trump around to supporting Ukraine rather than Russia. I doubt it. Moscow will offer to match any terms Zelensky signs for minerals at least in Russian-occupied Ukraine. Trump won’t resist. Two deals of this sort will solidify partition.
What now?
Trump will continue to insist on peace talks. He desperately wants credit for ending the war. He has already given President Putin most of what Moscow wants. Trump is ready to accept Russian occupation of the territory it controls inside Ukraine. He has blamed Ukraine for the war. And he no doubt wants to end the shipment of arms to what he regards as the losing side.
Ukraine can do without the arms, at least for the next year or so. President Biden shipped ample supplies. The more important question is whether the US is prepared to continue providing intelligence. That is vital to Ukraine’s targeting. Also important to Ukraine is the use of Elon Musk’s StarLink satellite network, which it uses for military communications.
Trump’s reluctance to continue supporting Ukraine makes the Europeans more important than ever. If they step up their military supplies, Ukraine has a chance to outlast Russia in the current war of attrition. If they don’t, Kyiv’s manpower shortage will become ever more visible and relevant. Ukraine needs both Europe’s arms and its economic and financial support.
What about peace?
If Trump continues to insist, a ceasefire is a real possibility. Both Ukraine and Russia need a respite, during which they will resupply and reorganize for renewed fighting. The Europeans are saying they are prepared to observe a ceasefire. But the confrontation line is 600 miles long, with forces on both sides stronger than any the Europeans will deploy. The experience of monitoring a much shorter confrontation line in southern Lebanon does not bode well.
Neither Kyiv nor Moscow seems to me prepared to compromise on their basic war aims. Russia wants to limit Ukraine’s sovereign choices, like joining NATO. Ukraine wants Russia out of all of its territory, including Crimea. There may be a mutually hurting stalemate, but there is no mutually enticing way out. A ceasefire will give both sides time to contemplate whether one exists, but they certainly haven’t defined one yet.
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