There is a saying in politics that sometimes a year is like a day, passing by without much happening. Then a single day can have so many dramatic events taking place that it is like a year. Yesterday was one such day.
An extraordinary few weeks, when the US humiliated various Arab heads of state, sided with China, Russia and North Korea in the United Nations and insulted European political leaders, finally culminated in an astonishing spectacle in the Oval Office, when Ukrainian president Volodymir Zelenskyy was humiliated before the world’s media.
In Donald Trump’s first month in office, his administration has turned all the ‘norms’ of US politics, established over many decades, both nationally and internationally, on their heads. What we are witnessing is a key turning point in world history, comparable to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, or the French revolutionary movements of 1968, or the 1938 Munich ‘agreement’ between Hitler and Chamberlain.
Like a medieval emperor surrounding by fawning courtiers, Trump has held audience with various foreign government leaders, including Keir Starmer, most of whom he has been busy disparaging in one way or another. Several of the leaders of states previously considered political and military allies of the USA have been offended, insulted, humiliated or vilified by Trump, either off the cuff, or on his social media platform. Insults he hasn’t managed himself have been dished out by his chief courtier, JD Vance, or his court jester, Elon Musk.
Greatest humiliation reserved for Volodymir Zelenskyy
But the greatest humiliation was reserved for the Ukrainian president, in a set-up clearly prepared in advance. Trump has no doubt held a grudge since 2019, when Zelenskyy refused Trump’s call to investigate Joe Biden’s son, Hunter. On this occasion, Zelenskyy was in Washington to seek US ‘security guarantees’, but after the hectoring in the Oval Office he only came away with a flea in his ear.
It is important at his point to restate what ought to be a basic socialist position on the three-year long Ukraine War, a conflict that is not and has never been in the interests of either Russian or Ukrainian workers. It was launched by Putin for no other reason than to enhance the power, prestige and influence of his government, by firmly establishing Ukraine as part of Russia’s “sphere of influence”.
Those on the left who focus solely on NATO ‘provocation’ effectively let Putin off the hook, as if his invasion was somehow ‘justified’. It was not. Socialists, we must reiterate, do not recognise “spheres of influence” and despite historic ties between the two countries, Ukraine has a right to self-determination and independence, as expressed in the only referendum there has been on the issue, in 1991. On that occasion, every province, including Crimea and the East, voted for independence from Russia.
Those on the left who see this war as a ‘proxy’ war between NATO and Russia, and nothing else, have missed the point entirely – and in so doing, they have ended up in the lap of Putin and, now, in agreement with Donald Trump. What we have to understand is that Ukrainian workers see this as a defensive war, and they have a right to defend their homes, their families and their communities – and they will do that with whatever weapons they can find, from wherever they find them.
Zelenskyy, like all capitalist politicians, is a wheeler-dealer
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has always been a creature of one faction of Ukrainian oligarchs and he presides over a corrupt, inefficient and faltering government. The best guarantees of a successful defence of Ukraine’s national rights is not a government of greedy oligarchs, but a workers’ government, with an economy owned by the public, democratically run and managed in the interests of all, and defended by an armed working class.
But that is an idea light years from Zelenskyy’s thinking, and so, like all capitalist politicians, he thinks only in terms of wheeling and dealing with other capitalist politicians and powers. The argument between the USA and Ukraine revolves around two things. There is first of all what Zelenskyy calls ‘security’ against the possibility of another Russian offensive after a treaty is agreed – and Putin is quite capable of doing that: he is utterly untrustworthy and pursues only the interests of Russia’s ruling elite.
The second disagreement is over who should exploit the workers and natural resources of Ukraine after the war. It has always been understood, if not openly discussed, that the military and financial aid given to Ukraine by NATO would be ‘paid for’ postwar, by allowing western capitalists to exploit Ukraine’s wealth.
Zelenskyy’s big business and oligarch friends are prepared to divide the spoils with American or European businesses, but there is a serious argument about how that will be done. Trump is demanding the lion’s share for the USA alone, and is offering no ‘security guarantees’ in return, leaving Zelenskyy in a corner.
Trump’s switch in international policy has been nothing if not dramatic. In contrast to his treatment of the former ‘allies’ of the USA, he has showered praise on Putin, even allowing Russian media into the Oval Office to see Zelenskyy’s humiliation. His determination to achieve a peace deal is tantamount to a call for Ukraine to surrender to Russia and accept huge territorial losses. As for the future of NATO, Pete Hegseth, the US Defence Secretary, told a special NATO committee on Ukraine that the Europeans were on their own from now on.
“America has turned on its friends” – Financial Times
Such has been the rapid and unpredictable shift in the international stance of the US that the Financial Times chief economic commentator, was moved to write an article with the title, “The US is now the enemy of the west”, in which he wrote, “Today, not only are autocracies increasingly confident. The US is moving to their side. That is the lesson of the last two weeks”.
The editorial in the FT a few days before also suggested that “America has turned on its friends”.
“…it is always tempting” the editorial said, “to believe that Trump does not mean what he says. Perhaps this is a feint in some grand art of the deal. But allies and erstwhile friends must banish those self-soothing thoughts. With Trump, what you see is what you get. America has turned”.
Although this is not the place to go into the question, there is, overshadowing the dramatic turn in the geo-political stance of the USA, the question of tariffs. It is hard to keep up with Trump’s capricious twists and turns, but in general terms he is imposing tariffs on Chinese, Canadian and Mexican imports.
The EU and Britain will be next. Starmer’s visit to Washington has – supposedly – resulted in the possibility of a US/UK trade deal, but it remains to be seen how that turns out, given that the USA wants a big slice of the NHS, and wants to send to the UK millions of tonnes of chlorinated chicken, genetically modified grain and beef stuffed with hormones and antibiotics.
There is no question that the USA has great economic and military power. Well over half of world trade is conducted in dollars and in particular commodities, like oil, it is a higher proportion. The USA is still the world’s biggest economy and in per capita terms well ahead of the rest. Nearly 60% of the holdings of foreign currency reserves are in dollars. Militarily, it is the world’s pre-eminent super-power, spending almost as much on armaments as the next ten countries combined. The USA does not lack for clout around the world.
Diplomats lie to each other and to the public all of the time
What should concern the labour movement are not the alliances and ‘friendships’ between international politicians, because in any case, they lie all the time to their own public and to each other. ‘Diplomacy’ and alliances are not built on genuine trust and honest relationships, but on secret manoeuvres and machinations, with all of the participants looking out for what is in the best interests of their own ruling class. What should concern socialists are the effects of ‘Trumpism’ on the working class and the labour movement, both nationally and internationally.
It is certain in the coming years that European governments will try to significantly increase their spending on defence, to replace the US. But at a time when living standards are already under attack, and when public services like health, education and welfare are being cut to the bone, large increases in defence spending will only come at the expense of the social wage of workers. That is the problem the politicians will face.
Across Europe, there is already fightback against cuts and declining living standards, albeit that some of this protest at the moment is running through the channel of right-wing populist movements. But that can change as well. In the longer term, therefore, the switch in US policy, and the pressure on Europe to increase defence spending, will have incalculable social, economic and political consequences, because workers are going to object to having to pay even more on defence.
Plan for ethnic cleansing of Gaza will have momentous consequences
As a consequence of Trump’s ‘America First’ policy there will inevitably be a reaction across the whole world. The calculated humiliation of Zelenskyy in the White House has led to a big rise in support for him at home in Ukraine. In much the same way, Trump’s belittling of the Canadian Prime Minister – referring to him as ‘Governor’, the implication being that Canada should be a US state – has led to the Canadian Liberal party coming from eighteen points behind to being ahead in opinion polls.
Trump humiliated the King of Jordan two weeks ago, by doubling down on his plan to ‘take over’ Gaza and expel Palestinians (to Jordan, among other places), even as the grim-faced Abdullah sat next to him. That, and other slights on Arab sensibilities over US aid to Israel and support for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, will have momentous consequences for the Middle East, in time reshaping alliances and completely reconfiguring strategic geopolitical influences.
Donald Trump will get away with insulting world leaders because in the short term, the USA still calls the shots because of its economic and military power. But he is rearranging world politics in such a way that in the longer term the strategic economic and political interests of US imperialism are going to be irredeemably undermined.
How much Trump continues along this path in international relations depends in large measure on the development of opposition to him at home. As he has done abroad, Trump has unleashed a firestorm on domestic US politics, issuing more executive orders in his first days in office than any other president in history.
In only a single calendar month, he has created mayhem across a swathe of public services, federal departments and utilities in the USA. USAID has been effectively dismantled, heads of key services have been sacked and thousands of jobs have been put in jeopardy. All the civil rights of trans people have been removed at a stroke; Trumpian book-burners are eating into state education; science is being belittled by alternative ‘facts’ and US national health is seriously jeopardised by charlatans in charge of public health.
There is a lot of time for shock to give way to outrage
In an article on Left Horizons last November, on Trump’s cabinet appointments, we wrote, “there is likely to be sabotage, non-cooperation and non-compliance. But there will also be an increasing tendency towards chaos and dislocation in government departments, like health, education transport, environmental protection, and in all of the other functions of the state”. That is exactly what is now beginning to happen.
As it is around the rest of the world, the ‘shock and awe’ of Trump’s first month in office has left US workers stunned. But we are only five weeks into Trump’s administration. There is a lot of time left for that initial shock to give way to disquiet and then outrage.
Although the US trade union leaders are desperate not to rock the boat, their members will decide what kinds of protests they need and when they need them. And as their living standards (and hopes) are crushed and their jobs ‘disappeared’ by Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, they will not limit themselves to playing patsy in the courts and with the heads of the Democratic Party.
Trump is lighting fires everywhere and having done so, he is then pouring on petrol. It is others, especially workers in the USA and around the world, who will have to deal with the flames and the consequences. These same victims will eventually react with outrage to what Trump is doing. The forty-seventh US president is only a month into his administration but we have seen nothing yet, in comparison to the tidal wave of opposition that will come. As it will.
[Feature picture of Zelensky, Trump and JD Vance in the Oval Office, from Wikimedia Commons, here]
