The US has Zero Political Credibility Now

[canyonwalker]

With President Donald Trump's unauthorized acts of war and abduction of a sovereign country's sitting president this weekend the US has completely shot its credibility on the world stage. We have zero credibility any longer to tell (other) bad-actor countries that what they're doing is wrong, and our allies now have no ability to trust us. This should be self evident from any simple, objective statement of what the president did in attacking Venezuela this weekend, but here's an elaboration in case it's not:

First, the deplorable actions we've taken in Venezuela give political cover to our geopolitical rivals. Russian President Vladimir Putin can easily justify his nearly four-years-long invasion of Ukraine by pointing to Trump's actions and saying "Ditto!" His outward justification for attacking Ukraine has always been a flimsy claim that it's for his national security? So was Trump's attack against Venezuela and his abduction of President Maduro. But everyone knows Putin really wants Ukraine for its agricultural production and rich natural resources? Well, now he can boast about that openly, as Trump has boasted openly about taking over Venezuela's oil wealth.

The one parallel thing Putin hasn't done yet is assassinate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Oops, did I say assassinate? I meant "Send commandos to kidnap him and bring him to Moscow for trial... and during the military operation to ``exfiltrate'' him from Kiev he's accidentally killed in a gun battle." Totally accidental, of course. But clearly something that can happen when you send armed commandos to abduct a world leader from their home country.

Trump's acts also give license to China in its decades-long sovereignty claim over Taiwan. China has withheld attack for years partly because it fears ostracization by the world community if it seizes Taiwan by force. Well, let's watch how much or how little the US is punished for this stunt. Maybe China will take it by force. Or maybe they'll just abduct/assassinate its leaders.

Then there's what happens with our erstwhile allies on the world stage. Our word is shot. We cannot be trusted to honor any treaty we sign. We are oath breakers. We are a bad actor. And as it weren't obvious enough how to connect the dots already, Trump and his surrogates have gone on a tear today about how "Greenland's next".

This is like 1938 and the Munich Agreement (Wikipedia link). We are demanding a concession... but only a small part of Czechoslovakia— I mean, a mostly uninhabited part of Denmark! Will the modern equivalents of Neville Chamberlain and Édouard Daladier appease us? I mean, the SudetenGreenland is a small price to pay to achieve Peace For Our Time! (BTW, in this analogy  Donald Trump and the United States are Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. 🤯)


Edited to add: I still cross-post to LiveJournal. Look what got through the Russian Federation's filters there....

Comments

[edgecode]

Why are you saying Putin hasn't send commandos to kidnap Zelenskyy? How do you know? He did at the very beginnig of the invasion. They failed.

Why are saying China is withholding attack of Taiwan out of fear of ostracization? It doesn't take Taiwan by force because it lack such force.

Your picture of the world is very strange.

[canyonwalker]

I've checked and I believe you are correct. Putin has attempted kidnapping/assassination against Zelenskyy. In fact he has attempted it multiple times, according to sources such as the Ukrainian Secret Service and Zelenskyy himself. In my defense I'll note that it was not widely reported in US news sources. Most of the sources I found in checking I did today were from media such as BBC, The Guardian, Sky News, and Al Jazeera.

I'm curious what you mean by "Your picture of the world is very strange." Is that just because I was mistaken on a fact that I've now acknowledged? Your language is insulting.

[edgecode]

I find your picture of the world strange because in your picture Xi or Putin haven't done something because it's deemed unbecoming by… Actually by whom?

In the world I live in they haven't done it because they can't. Or they tried and failed.

[canyonwalker]

There's also Option C: They've chosen not to, because they've judged the consequences they'd suffer are too costly. While that's obviously not the case for Putin— he's risked the consequences and accurately determined the US, EU, and Canada are unwilling to do worse than the existing sanctions; while China, India, Mexico, and much of the rest of the world continue to profess neutrality— I believe China is more careful to protect its international standing.

[edgecode]

Inevitable catastrophic military defeat is the main reason China won't attack Taiwan. "International standing" is way down the list.

[canyonwalker]

At this point I feel I've addressed your challenges more than adequately, engaging a person whom I don't know, whom I've never spoken to and don't follow, and who doesn't even have a blog on this site I could familiarize myself with. Now you're arguing hypotheticals. To copy one of your first questions to me, How do you know? I find your line of debate tiresome. Have a nice day.

[some_other_dave]

The LJ page loaded for me but bitched about me using an ad-blocker. Then it went to page not found.

[canyonwalker]

Hmm, the page loads fine for me, including in an incognito window.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> The US has Zero Political Credibility Now <<

Yep.

>> "Send commandos to kidnap him and bring him to Moscow for trial... and during the military operation to ``exfiltrate'' him from Kiev he's accidentally killed in a gun battle." <<

That happened to a bunch of Native American leaders.

>>Maybe China will take it by force. Or maybe they'll just abduct/assassinate its leaders.<<

China has been testing both political and military options.

>>We cannot be trusted to honor any treaty we sign. <<

That was always true, for any case where US felt it could get away with that. Insofar as I know, they broke every treaty with indigenous nations.

>>Trump and his surrogates have gone on a tear today about how "Greenland's next". <<

A more credible threat this week than last. It's still a dumb idea for a lot of practical reasons, in addition to being morally wrong and illegal. Most of what they want is under over a kilometer of ice. While people have built bases in the ice before, it poses a lot of technical and social difficulties.

>>Donald Trump and the United States are Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. <<

So is Putin invading Ukraine and Europe doing nothing effective to stop it. They're certainly not going to put boots on the ground to defend Greenland. It's like they've forgotten history.

Re: Thoughts

[canyonwalker]

You've made several points. I'll respond to just one here.

While the US government's treatment of native peoples has been horrible, including literally breaking countless treaties with them, it has not impeded our credibility in negotiating treaties with other nations in modern history. Likely that is because most other nations have their own sordid histories of conquering people and mistreating them. In fact the only place I've seen it even be a discussion point in modern politics is in Whataboutism retorts from the Soviet Bloc in the 1950s through 1980s. (Which, of course, is richly ironic given what they were doing. But Whataboutism is a trait of bad actors.) But now any president after Trump is going to have a hard time convincing other nations, "No, really, we're different now. We're not like the US of 2021-2025 [or whenever Trump allows himself to be succeeded in office]." Because foreign nations have seen that the US now is never be more than 4 years away from the real possibility an electoral majority of its citizens knowingly elect a monster like Trump.