The Fog of Delusion: The Collapse of Liberal Democracy and Atlanticism

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/donald-trump-and-the-new-world-order-the-end-of-the-west-a-b71fa1bd-6147-47a4-8738-5c17eff44a55

This piece was written before Trump even took office and yet it has proven prescient - to a point. You won't read or hear about any of this on the FOX channel. Visiting their website is like a trip to fantasy-land - they are completely detached and divorced from the reality that the rest of the world sees and is dealing with.

Of course the Der Spiegel article presents a rosy and yet ridiculous understanding of Liberalism and the dots are not connected, the internal contradictions are not addressed. Liberalism's individualism and utilitarian approach to ethics and economics is ultimately self-destructive and leads to the very plutocratic and oligarchic scenarios it so fears. A host of external factors connected to issues like population, resources, environment, and the threat of actual democratic resistance to the monopolistic order also leads to the authoritarian and autocratic scenarios liberalism is supposed to prevent.

The Liberal West was always doomed and that's part of the story no one wants to tell. For Americans the more immediate reality is the fall of the American Empire. Historians will be arguing about this for generations just as they continue to do in the UK - with many insisting that somehow the British Empire was of a different order. It was moral and upright they argue - ignoring the carnage and global exploitation. Just the other day I caught John Bolton one of the more odious and amoral warmongers in the United States dismiss the idea that the US was an empire or had any imperial tendencies at all. Let's just say that empires become a kind of drug and those who inhale deeply are lost in a fog of delusion.

So it is with the Trump cult - for that's what it is. Everything about him points to historical examples of fascism. When compared to the Liberal order established by the American Founders (an order that has failed and only survived by continually re-inventing itself), Trump is its antithesis. His cult doesn't understand this as they wave their flags and consider themselves to be uber-patriots - even as they work to pull down the house that Jefferson, Madison, and Washington built.

Trump is destroying American Empire and replacing it with a mafia domain and a gangster spoils system ethos. He doesn't want to be president, he wants to be Il Capo de Tutti Capi, the boss of all bosses who is feared, worshipped, and obeyed. He sees himself not as the First Citizen or Princeps but as a Potentate. He doesn't understand what the Liberal order was supposed to be about and doesn't care. And yet the truth is the Liberal order has long been a lie. The biggest problem with Trump is he doesn't play the game. The mask is removed and the raw nature of American power is revealed in all its ugliness. It's also clear the US Establishment is paralyzed. Its own fragmentation has generated rival factions and while some despise Trump - they don't actually despise him as much as some would think. He is useful to them. The dark secret is just how broken the US system is. It couldn't go on as it was. The unilateral moment and dream of unprecedented and unchallengeable global empire seemed possible in the 1990's and 9/11 was a gift to these strategic planners (if gift it was) - but by 2008, the hope was broken. Some have tried to revive the dream or simply re-assert US hegemony in order to temper the growing global multi-polarity. But it has proven impossible to do this while maintaining the pretense of liberal values.

Trump doesn't care about these things and some hope that power can be sustained even if the 'dream' and narrative of America is dashed. Others hope that maybe he's a kind of Pisistratus - a tyrant-dictator whose rule will prove episodic and will eventually pass. And yet there are still others who figure the American moment is passing but in the meantime there's still a lot of opportunities and a lot of money to be made. It took Britain decades to dismantle its empire. A lot can happen in the years to come.

Trump is shattering institutions and generating disorder and chaos. The trust that many had in the US as something solid and unshakeable is quickly coming to an end. There's going to be a lot of rage when things don't go as expected (and in response) and another possibility is civil war. What will happen after Trump? God only knows.

In only a month he has undermined world stability and destroyed the trust of allies and client states. In the FOX fantasy world all the short term 'wins' will be celebrated even though many are not in fact 'wins' and in the long term the loss will become apparent as the US shuts doors, loses clout, and the voids are filled by others. Already these same allies and client states are starting to look elsewhere and weigh their options. For some it's going to be like Britain in 410AD - the empire is just leaving. They're on their own. It's a brave new world.

It will be interesting to see how in a few years the Trumpites try to push around these states and find that they've actually disarmed themselves, their toolboxes are empty, and many of these smaller nations will have new friends and allies who have their back.

NATO is breaking right before our eyes. I'm the last one to weep over it but for those who want American to be 'great' - what utter folly. Trump is making enemies in the realm of trade and is weakening the US role as banker and the power it exercises in that role. Other military alliances are at risk. Apart from dealings with Moscow and Israel, diplomacy is in free-fall. The 'gangsters cutting deals' style that comes with Trump might work for awhile but the strong states will move on and the weak ones will eventually look to the other options. And those options are growing. Unless the US is prepared to use its military and resort to regime change, Washington is going to find itself having to compete, and when Trump makes his outrageous demands they're simply going to wave their hands and turn away. New financial centres are rising and this will allow companies to not have to deal with New York - and thus they can evade US sanctions which Washington is going to resort to more and more - sometimes in desperation.

The lessening of America is well underway. What a story. I can't help but think back to the days after the Berlin Wall fell and then twelve years later - 9/11. Who would have guessed that a mere twenty-five years later the US would be in danger of being de-throned and relegated to the status of a mere player in a multi-polar world? It turns out the order which emerged in 1945 would not last a century. The end of the Cold War in 1991 would not result in the 'end of history' and triumph of liberalism. On the contrary both Cold War systems would self-destruct.

Here's the truth that will be painful for some in American to grasp - the hope of liberalism lies not in America but in Europe and yet even within the EU it stands on a knife's edge and may not survive.

Contrary to Kurbjuweit (the author of the Der Spiegel piece), NATO did not represent liberalism but militarism and aggression. Many today forget, but the Soviets did not respond with the Warsaw Pact until the re-arming of West Germany and its incorporation into NATO in 1955. When founded in 1949, NATO was posited as a necessary response to Soviet advances in Eastern Europe - particularly in Czechoslovakia. But in actuality most of the buffer zone sought by the Soviets had been agreed to by Churchill - though this 'Percentages Agreement' was not revealed until 1953 and yet was not subject to significant reporting until much later. Stalin kept his word and abandoned the communists in Greece. Czechoslovakia was not part of the agreement, but given that its eastern border touched the USSR - it was unlikely that Stalin would risk it slipping into the Western Bloc.

Kurbjuweit also ignores the long history of US manipulation of its 'allies' - in reality client states. Elections were subverted, governments were overthrown and intelligence agencies engaged in massive disinformation campaigns, and episodes of political and false flag violence.

There are many more aspects to Kurbjuweit's narrative that are problematic and yet in the broad strokes - his argument is sound. This does not mean that Liberalism is correct or represents the only moral choice, but in terms of its mismanagement and fragmentation, he's right. But it's these ugly realities and the dark truths hidden beneath the surface that played a huge role in bringing society to the point that it produces parties like the AfD, and politicians like Orban, Wilders, Le Pen, and Trump.