TARIFFS , TERRITORIAL AMBITIONS & OTHER TRUMP THREATS by Hugh J. Curran, published in "Countercurrents" & "Informed Comment"
Among tariffs, territorial ambitions and other threats to America's well-being by Pres. Trump, one of the more severe threats may be his willful ignorance concerning climate change. Michael Mann, one of America's most highly regarded climatologists, noted that the Trump administration has given polluters and fossil fuel promoters "the keys to the [fossil fuel] car to drive it over a cliff".
But there are other pressing problems in Trump's first 100 days in office, "tariffs" being one that is receiving a good deal of attention. In 1890 President William McKinley set in motion policies involving high tariffs and initiated the Tariff Act, which had its lowest rate set at 38%. The purpose was to protect American manufacturing, but the result was that farmers paid more for their imported farm machinery and received less for their agricultural products on international markets, thus worsening their financial hardship.
President Trump is replicating another McKinley policy when he expanded America's land acquisitions by initiating the Spanish-American War. The historian, Alfred McCoy, who has written on America's invasion of the Philippines, despite the vociferous efforts of the Anti-Imperialist League, led by Mark Twain and William James.
McCoy quoted a passage from The Second Coming, a poem by the Irish poet, WB Yeats: -- what rough beast, its hour come round at last/ slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? This quote was meant to illustrate the failure of past imperialisms and the foreboding sense of future territorial conflicts that may take place in the Panama Canal. In the 19th century the Panama Canal was a French project that suffered two failures but in 1904 Theodore Roosevelt persuaded Congress to purchase the rights so as to complete the Canal.
But it was not for these reasons that the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to President Roosevelt; rather it was for his efforts in bringing together representatives from the Russo-Japanese War in Portsmouth, NH, in 1905 in order to negotiate a peace treaty. Perhaps there is an opportunity for President Trump to gain the same prize if he can broker an equitable and fair settlement between Russia and Ukraine.
Following WWII and the formation of the United Nations, the U.S. made a collective decision to forego any further territorial ambitions and devote its energies to commerce and capital rather than conquest. A "new world order" was defined by the U.N. Charter of 1945, which guaranteed all nations the right to independence and free trade without tariffs.
We are presently facing an attempt to resurrect McKinley's ghost by appropriating foreign territories, imposing tariffs on allies, while trying to make "deals" on an international scale. A Trump advisor revealed that acquiring Greenland is of strategic importance in order to control the Arctic shipping lanes, the result of climate change melting the Arctic sea ice at five times the global average. One would think that the rapid melting of Arctic ice would make Trump more aware of climate issues, but the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords indicates that he is unwilling to link ice melting with climate change.
In another, far more intense, conflict zone, Ukraine, Trump's transactional approach to diplomacy means that he is willing to go "full steam ahead" to gain "peace" but only if considerable mineral rights are acquired, even if large swathes of Ukrainian land might have to be ceded to Russia. This kind of devil's bargain will be hard for the Ukrainian people to swallow, especially after sacrificing tens of thousands of young men to the conflict with Russia.
Gaza too, is another area of considerable conflict. It has suffered enormously from bombs supplied by America that have obliterated its school, residences, hospitals and universities and caused 50,000 deaths. Trump believes it is acceptable to transfer 2 million Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring countries, appearing to view land in terms of real estate rather than as a homeland for Palestinians. In this way, he betrays an inability to understand the profound relationship that Palestinians have with their ancestral land. His lack of sympathy for a Palestinian State is contrary to the support given by 146 out of 193 member states of the U.N., including Ireland and Norway. Trump's solution for Gaza's 2.2 million residents is to build six "safe communities" outside Gaza while America would build a "Riviera of the Middle East". Despite the desperate circumstances most Gazan residents are suffering, they show no inclination to accept this proposal. After all, many of them are descended from the 750,000 Palestinians who had been compelled to leave their homes in 1948, after which Israel proceeded to expropriate 5 million acres.
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