M D Nalapat
Trump knows that it is Beijing and not Moscow that needs undivided attention ‘if the US is to ensure that it remains the globe’s largest economy’.
Almost the entire mainstream media in the US dislikes Donald Trump,
and it shows. Television news reports, talk shows and newspaper
commentary are filled with a toxicity towards Trump that is reminiscent
of the vitriol directed against Chief Minister Narendra Modi from 2002
to around 2012, the year when he became a serious prospect for the Prime
Ministership of India. The abuse did little to damage Modi’s electoral
prospects in his home state, and the constant level of negative
commentary about Trump in the midst of an improved performance by the US
economy is proving unable to reverse the steady rise in the approval
rating of the 45th US President, which may soon cross the politically
significant 50% mark. The Democratic Party has yet to recover from its
folly of having been forced by the (still dominant) Clinton personal and
political machine to reject Senator Bernie Sanders as the party’s
nominee for the 2016 Presidential contest. Given the atmosphere in the
US during that year, Hillary Clinton was certain to lose to Trump and
Sanders to win. The US would have changed under a President Sanders in a
manner as comprehensive as it is during the tenure of President Trump,
but in a wholly different direction. However, on the issue of dealing
with a rapidly nuclearising Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
(DPRK), it is likely that Sanders would have trod much the same
conciliatory path that Trump has been taking, except that in the
latter’s case, his actual objectives and strategy remain a secret to all
except the President himself and a handful of his confidants, many of
the closest of whom are outside government, and most of whom have to
date remained outside media attention. Indeed, those who have been
written about in the media as being “close” to Donald Trump have usually
found their welcome significantly reduced once such flattering reports
come out. Influenced by an overwhelmingly hostile media across both
sides of the Atlantic, the global perception about President Trump is
that he changes his mind often and lacks either vision or a well thought
out plan of action that could fulfil his stated objectives. The reality
is that Trump does indeed have both a vision as well as a plan designed
to ensure its fruition, but covers up both through camouflaging them
with tweets and statements that deliberately confuse and mislead his
audience, including the countries or the interests that he is targeting.
Those close to him say that he has a “laser focus” on objectives that
are hidden from public view, and among the most consequential of these
is to repeat what Ronald Reagan did with the USSR, this time in the case
of the People’s Republic of China. With an eye on trendiness and
potentialities, Trump “has been aware for over eighteen years” (in the
words of an individual who has had contact with him even after 20
January 2017) that “the only threat to the continued primacy of the US
in the global order is China”, especially now that Xi Jinping, a leader
in the transformational mould of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, has
established firm control over the Chinese Communist Party and through
that, both the administration as well as the military in what is on
track to soon being the world’s largest economy.
ATLANTICISTS FIGHT TRUMP
The ecosystem of the Washington Beltway consists of a dense matrix of
think tanks, consultancies and state, as well as private agencies
staffed by “experts” who have devoted decades of their lives to
“understanding issues” from the 1940s perspective of the Atlantic
Alliance. Although global geopolitics has reduced the significance of
the European side of the Atlantic and at the same time steadily
increased the importance of the Asian side of the Pacific, those with
cosy sinecures within the Beltway remain moored to the 1940s worldview,
exactly as do the international institutions set up during that period,
such as the United Nations, the World Bank, NATO and the IMF. All four
have at the core of their control systems the countries forming the
Atlantic Alliance, an aberration that continues mainly because US
policymakers continue to think and act as though the post-1945 world
still exists, and not the world after the firebreak caused by the 1997
handover of Hong Kong to China, the event which first gave a glimpse to
the international community as to the identity of the Second Superpower.
Had India post-2014 adopted the “Minimum Government” model promised
by Narendra Modi in his 2014 Lok Sabha electoral campaign, by now its
annual rate of growth would have crossed the 12% mark and by 2019, it
would have been obvious both that Modi would win a second term and that
India would soon become the world’s Third Superpower. However, the
economic policies and administrative practices of the BJP-led government
have in practice been such as to throw both conclusions into doubt. In
contrast, the US under Donald Trump and China under Xi Jinping are both
transforming themselves at speed, with China outpacing the US in the
extent of internal systemic changes. “Digital India” remains a digital
colony of the US and China, while “Make Babies in India” seems more
accurate a description of the present situation than Make Manufactures
in India. Whether in the US or in China, the policy elites of both agree
that the immense unlocked potential of India remains locked by a
governance mechanism that stifles rather than creates value. The manner
of rollout of GST has made Franz Kafka’s depictions of bureaucracy seem a
model of simplicity and efficiency, while the less said about the way
in which the RBI implemented the 8 November 2016 changeover from Rs
1,000 to Rs 2,000 notes as well as the change in size and colour of Rs
500 notes, the better for those who seek to keep their blood pressure
under control. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been badly let down by
important elements of his team, but being a large-hearted man, this has
not resulted in any adverse impact on their careers. In fact, the
reverse has taken place, with several of the “heroes in reverse” of
demonetisation and the version of GST formulated by North Block moving
on to higher responsibilities. Similarly, those responsible for missteps
such as forcing through an alliance between the BJP and the PDP in
Kashmir or who persisted even after 2014 with the Manmohan brain-free
plan of an alliance of India with Japan, Brazil and Germany to help
secure a permanent UN Security Council seat (in fact, the move has
almost doomed India’s prospects) either remain at their posts or have
moved on to better pastures, thanks to the generous and forgiving spirit
that is the distinguishing characteristic of Prime Minister Narendra
Damodardas Modi.
“The Europeans are hanging on to the coattails of the US and are
dragging us down while pushing themselves up. This must change”, a key
confidant of Trumpworld revealed, adding that “the US should not always
be giving to Europe but should be getting as well, and this is something
US Presidents (before Trump) have not bothered to ensure”. An associate
went on to add that “(German Chancellor) Merkel makes much of her
surplus from trade from the US, but that does not stop her from
constantly attacking US policies and even the President personally in
(what she regards as) private gatherings”. At the same time, “to the
President in person she (Merkel) is very respectful. This is hypocrisy”.
Another serial offender is UK Prime Minister Theresa May, “who talks to
her staff in disrespectful terms about the Administration and even the
President despite the special relationship between the UK and the US”. A
relationship, he added, which President Trump is fully committed to. He
pointed out that Trump “early on promised the UK that it would be at
the head of the queue in trade agreements”, and that “this is a promise
he intends to keep”, although (Prime Minister) May’s often censorious
tone has created a distance between the White House and 10 Downing
Street. Those privy to the thinking of President Trump say that there
exists substantial evidence that elements of the British establishment
connived with Hillary Clinton in seeking to damage the Presidential
prospects of Donald Trump. “The Clintons have maintained extensive and
lucrative contacts, including with the GCC, Russia and China, but the US
media and FBI just want to look at the Trump family, “whose own
contacts are few in comparison to the Clintons or the Bush clan”, a
senior insider complained, adding that “they cannot forgive the
President for refusing to be led by the nose the way Obama was for
almost all his term”.
BEIJING NOT MOSCOW
If Trumpworld insiders are correct, Donald Trump has “for several
years” known that it is Beijing and not Moscow that needs the undivided
attention of US policymakers “if the US is to ensure that it remains the
globe’s largest economy well even in the 21st century”. The US Head of
State is “an old-fashioned patriot whose eyes still moisten when he sees
Old Glory (the flag) being lifted”, and “it would be torture to him to
watch the US economy take second place to that of China”. While a host
of appointments (such as those of former Secretary of State Rex
Tillerson) were made “in a futile staff-directed effort to pacify the
Beltway, increasingly Trump is forming around him a team that
acknowledges that the primary challenger to US supremacy—in fact, the
only serious challenger in exactly 99 years—is China. These include
National Security Advisor John Bolton and Trade Advisor Peter Navarro,
both of whom have been savaged by the pundits of the Beltway almost as
viciously as Trump has been. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, while
Director of Central Intelligence, “paid particular attention to the
systematic manner in which each and every member of the Trump team and
family were sought to be approached by individuals linked to the PRC”.
According to those in contact with the President, “Pompeo warned the
President each time such an approach was made” and in the case of the
Trump family at least, “whenever there was such a warning, those close
to Trump immediately downsized or gave up entirely contacts identified
as potential or actual agents of influence” or “useful idiots of the
challenger country” i.e. the People’s Republic of China. Unlike his
predecessors, “who allowed their (Atlanticist) prejudice against Russia
to dilute their vigil on China”, Secretary of State Pompeo “is entirely
on the same page as his boss as to which country needs to be the focus
of attention and action”. It may be added that Team Trump “has developed
considerable respect for (Chinese Communist Party General Secretary) Xi
Jinping for his ruthless determination to ensure that China reaches the
top of the global table during his tenure”. During his (by now several)
interactions with President Trump, “it became clear that Xi was quick
to understand the nuances of an issue and how it could be turned into an
advantage for China” in a manner absent from his two previous
predecessors, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. These Trumpworld fixtures add
that “the Chinese leadership has become so confident (of the future
ascendancy of their country) that they openly declare their intentions
in both manufacturing as well as in technology in words that admit of no
other meaning than global dominance for the Chinese”. At the same time,
the “unprecedented scale of the Belt & Road Initiative has exposed
Team Xi’s ambition to make China the hub of global commerce”, including
through making the RMB (or Chinese currency) as ubiquitous in global
financial transactions as the US dollar has been since 1945”.
LAST CHANCE
“If the US had acted in the high-minded manner mouthed by President
George H.W. Bush after (the events of) 1989 in China and followed a
policy of constraining the development of that country rather than
shrugging away 1989 as of little consequence, workers in the US would
not have undergone the agony of the hollowing out of its manufacturing
base to China, which took place during the Bush and Clinton period”, an
insider within Trumpworld said. According to him, “Both Bill Clinton as
well as the two Bushes (during their terms as President) were indulgent
to China and cared not a hoot about the economic consequences of such
generosity to US interests”. He added that “if the sources of some of
the funds that were made available to the Bush library and private
interests of family members, and to the Clinton Foundation, were to be
seriously examined by the FBI, some missing dots and dashes in alien
influence on US policy may get bridged”. However, “the FBI is desperate
to protect the Clintons while forcing the removal of President Trump”.
Why? Because of the “deep roots that the Clinton machine has within the
agencies, especially the machine’s tactic of assisting in secretly
providing jobs and other help to those close to agency personnel,
including spouses, mistresses and children”, beneficence that often
continued beyond an official’s retirement. “President Trump knows that
this is the last chance for the US to reverse the seemingly inevitable
climb of China towards global leadership (replacing the US), and he
intends to take it, no matter how difficult the path”. Team Trump is
aware that Xi Jinping is the most formidable competitor the US has had
since the 1930s, and that “efforts will be made by the lobbies active on
the East Asian giant’s behalf to scare and shock USG (US Government)
away from seeking a less one-sided trading relationship with China”.
Already, he added, “a cacophony has gone up of those arguing in defence
of the longstanding policy of allowing China to race ahead through
taking away our technologies”. However, he was emphatic that “the
President will not be deterred, as he shrugs off abuse and always moves
ahead doing what he knows has to be done”. The probability is,
therefore, that the trade scuffles between Beijing and Washington will
intensify.
THE NORTH KOREAN CASE
Recent US policy towards the DPRK (North Korea) highlights the
innovative approach of the 45th President of the US, who has thrown away
(failed) past precedents in his search for a winning strategy. While
there remains a steady drumbeat of demands that Supreme Leader Kim Jong
Un denuclearise “completely and irreversibly” (a practical impossibility
in the technological age), there may be a default strategy hidden away
in the inventive mind of the unconventional businessperson who has been
elected to lead his country by the US electorate. This may be to “co-opt
Kim Jong Un into being a US ally”, exactly the way skilled diplomacy
(initiated during the period in office of Barack Obama) has resulted in a
de facto alliance between Hanoi and Washington. Kim is seen as a leader
untethered to the ideologies of the past, and a steady warming of ties
with the US may result in his modernising the DPRK economy the way Deng
Xiaoping did in the 1980s. Such a transformation could come about even
if the US were not to participate directly in the North Korean economy,
leaving that to South Korea and to other powers such as India that may
be eager to tap into the mineral and other resources of the northern
part of the Korean peninsula. The calculation is that the more the Kim
Jong Un regime gets integrated into the global economy, the less the
possibility (or indeed the need) for him to adopt an aggressive line
with his neighbours. Even Japan’s approach may change, with the hawkish
Shinzo Abe being replaced with a more conciliatory politician in much
the same way as Moon Jae-In took over from Park Gun-hye in Seoul. The
“Surrender or War” option that Abe favours in dealing with Pyongyang
could result in several hundred thousand Japanese citizens getting
incinerated in the event of a conflict with North Korea, a reality that
may persuade enough Japanese voters to move away from Abe to result in
the defeat of the LDP. Because North Korea is treated as an outlaw (and
has no other way of securing access to materiel and money than through
clandestine and unwholesome methods), its weapons capability may be used
as a threat as a consequence of the hostility against it. However, if
Pyongyang gets integrated into the world economy (and not just China’s),
Supreme Leader Kim’s incentive for hostile action would get
considerably lowered. By giving Kim Jong Un unprecedented “face” through
the personal meeting, and possibly even a visit to Washington, Present
Donald Trump has (a) given Kim freedom of action in place of total
reliance on Beijing and (b) shown him the benefits of adopting a benign
rather than a threatening demeanour. The Shinzo Abe-John Bolton solution
(which like the Iraq or Afghanistan campaigns has no Plan B) would
result in a minimum of two million casualties (President Trump’s own
estimate is 30 million). Tensions around and within the Korean peninsula
have for the first time since the 1950s been brought substantially down
by the personal diplomacy of President Moon of South Korea, Supreme
Leader Kim of North Korea and, most consequential—indeed
indispensable—of all, President Trump of the United States.
Although many of his tactics may be camouflaged in “red herring”
rhetoric, his acolytes say that the objective of President Donald J.
Trump is clear “in his own complex mind”. It is to retain the Numero Uno
title of the US against all comers, most notably the formidable
challenger that is Xi’s China. Ultimately, insiders within the Trump
ecosystem say that a significant slowdown of the momentum of progress in
China could get caused by “smart” policy. And that this will result in a
fall in public support for the Chinese Communist Party sufficient to
create a mass reaction within that vast country. Hence their confidence
that President Trump will (especially if he gets a second term) be for
China what Reagan turned out to be for the USSR.
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