By SJ Otto
President (and Emperor) Donald Trump laid out his world view in his latest speech to the United Nations and there was little in it that surprised me. Trump is a brutish buffoon who should have never been given the job of President of the United States . This country is seriously broken when an unprofessional amateur can manipulate the system, the electoral college, and win without the majority of his people's votes. His speech reflected his amateurish, uncouth, authoritarian views.
Yesterday a pundit on NPR read a few lines of a speech that former President Barack Obama gave the to UN when he was running things. There were surprisingly many similarities. So the speech was far less of a difference on policies and substance, but a difference of bad language and brutish and irresponsible threats.
That came to light over what he said about Democratic People's Republic (North) Korea 's leader Kim Jong Un, calling him "Rocket Man.
"The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea
Rocket Man is not really that strong of an insult. Most of those who were at the UN seemed to believe it was just unprofessional. Much worse was his threat to "totally destroy North Korea North Korea may not have any supporters at all. Supposedly China is their ally, but China has done little if anything to help out their supposed ally.
As stated above, Obama made anti-North Korean remarks somewhat similar to that of trump's when he was the president:
"North Korea
So calling out North Korea is nothing new to US politics. What is different is the stark language—an outright threat to wipe North Korea off the map. And also, just as in the past, this US president did not say he would attack if North Korea does. He said that North Korea was being aggressive just by having nuclear missiles. It doesn't seem to matter if Kim uses the missiles, just having them is considered an "aggression."
We have to wonder if Trump is so unstable that he would actually start a war with North Korea. There is no doubt who would win. The US has way more weapons and people to destroy that country. That could be done without any help from any other UN ally or country. The problem is it could end up killing a lot of people, maybe even in the millions. Even a few nuclear weapons from the north could wipe out the city of Seoul, South Korea's capital, which is just about 35 miles south of the border. Cities in Japan, South Korea and cities in US controlled colonies, such as Guam, could be destroyed. Any use of a nuclear missile could leave an area poisoned and useless for years. The US has wanted to take over North Korea ever since the war ended in July 1953. That real estate is part of the US Empire's global desires. North Korea stands alone on a peninsula that is covered in US allies. North Korea is the one nation that stands in the US Empire's way.
Trump urged the UN to join together in order to curtail North Korea's nuclear efforts.
"We meet at a time of both immense promise and great peril,"Trump said.
He also declared he would always put America first:
"As president of the United States, I will always put America first," he said.
But what did he mean? Did he mean the country, the government, the people? He couldn't mean the American people. Only a minority of people actually voted for him. And it is likely his support has actually gone down since the election. And he only represent wealthy Americans. His latest efforts to repeal Obama Care (Affordable Care Act or ACA) will leave many poor Americans to die from lack of health care. So Trump's "America" has no concern or respect for its less wealthy citizens.
Trump urged other leaders to do likewise and always"put your countries first."
"The potential of the U.N. is unlimited," he said.
Acknowledging that he's been a "critic" of the organization in the past, Trump praised its future, saying "there can be no better forum."
He may have praised the UN in his present day speech but he has been very critical of the UN in the past. In the past he called the UN anti-American. Trump left the Paris Climate Accord because he lamented it was unfair to U.S. workers. He's railed against multilateral trade deals, like NAFTA and the Trans Pacific Partnership, that he feels don't benefit the U.S.
Today we live in a Unipolar world. Since the fall of the USSR[1] there has been no other superpower to rival the US. Countries, such as North Korea, that oppose the US imperialist order can't put up any real military threat the way the USSR did. Russia today is imperialist, but they have the same ideology as the US. There are small imperialist countries, like Iran,[2] but they aren't able to put up any real challenge to the US militarily. Most of Europe's industrialized nations act as an ally to the US, taking their own share of the US Empire's spoils. Smaller weaker third world countries are completely under control of the US. Because of this, the entire UN body supports almost all of the US's actions and intentions. When Trump asked for sanctions against North Korea, no country got up and tried to oppose it.
The US has gotten complete support on the other rogue nations it has condemned, Iran and Venezuela. Except for Climate Change Trump has gotten everything he wants from the UN. With the exception of the nations of Europe, the US is full of yes-men and Imperialist lackeys. So Trump's accusations of UN anti-Americanism just doesn't make any sense.
The only country that opposed Trump's anti-Iran rant was Iran:
“Trump’s shameless and ignorant remarks, in which he ignored Iran ’s fight against terrorism, display his lack of knowledge and unawareness,” said Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, according to the official Fars news agency.
Trump called Iran a “depleted rogue state whose chief exports are violence, bloodshed, and chaos,” saying that it funds “terrorists that kill innocent Muslims and attack their peaceful Arab and Israeli neighbors” and uses its oil wealth to “shore up Bashar al-Assad's dictatorship, fuel Yemen 's civil war, and undermine peace throughout the entire Middle East .”
In turn, Zarif accused Washington
And while the other countries also oppose Iran , Trump's attacks on the agreement that Obama hammered out before he left office where not so welcome. Destroying that agreement comes across as reckless by the other countries. From Vox:
All of this raises a pair of questions: Is Trump making a valid argument when he says Iran
The answer to the first question is pretty clearly no. The International Atomic Energy Agency, which is in charge of monitoring the deal, has repeatedly certified that Tehran
It seems instead that Trump’s case against the deal is more political and strategic: His team believes that Iran is an enemy of the United States, one that frustrates US objectives in places like Iraq and Yemen, and that the nuclear deal hasn’t done much to solve the problem.
Over allwe see the rumblings of an arrogantand ruthless-inexperienced politician who can make or break anyone else's country. He inflicts fear on a lot of leaders. He can carry out any of the threats he has made in his UN speech. There is nothing any of the UN leaders can do to stop him or even slow him down. He is a dangerous man. That the US is an empire and today's supreme source of military and political power in the world is obvious and just about any US president would fit in with that assessment. The real difference between Trump and his predecessors is that he is way more reckless and dangerous.
As long as Trump is the president there is little we can do about his foreign policies. We can try and pressure members of congress, but there are very few members willing to stand up against him. There are a few, such as Bernie Sanders, who oppose at least some of his policies. Let's do what we can.
Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif © Brendan McDermid / Reuters