Is Trump bluffing overseas?

Perhaps he is.  The number of his veiled or unveiled threats against foreign actors seems to multiply every day.

1.  The president said at his presser with the Italian that Iran has not lived up to the "spirit" of JCPOA.  What does that mean?  As I recall the agreement's finalization was immediately followed by cries from Congress that the Iranians should expect no lessening in hostility from the US.  Was that in the "spirit" of JCPOA?  This is ridiculous.  The bi-partisan warhawk nationalists in Washington want Iran on its knees begging for forgiveness,  The question asked should be - Or what?  US air strikes designed to fight a war that Israel wants but cannot accomplish?  A naval war in the Gulf?  Or what?

2.  The president has said that North Korea "should behave."  Or what?  Some military gesture to demonstrate US disapproval of their nuclear weapons/ballistic missile programs?  Or a full blown war to the death on the peninsula?  Really?  Does Trump or the evidently mad duo of Mattis/McMaster fully grasp the scale of the destruction and people losses that would ensue?  Some of the people of SST have suggested that maybe NOKO could actually be bargained with if we adopted a different attitude toward the little bastards.  Really?  What a thought!

3.  Tillerson went to Moscow to bring the Russians to heel on various matters and left with nothing to show for his trouble   NATO keeps moving assets into Eastern Europe to confront the Russian menace.  The prevailing idea in the Borgist foreign policy establishment in Washington and London seems to be that the US (with UK advice) must guide human events and any thought of national independence anywhere in the world must be stamped out.  Really?  How is that to be enforced?  With war? With yet more economic sanctions that drive Russia toward China?

4.  Mattis (without producing evidence) insists that Syria has retained some indeterminate number of tons of chemical weapon materials.  This is a transparent effort to justify further aggressive action against Syria.  At the same time AQ connected guerrillas, heavily armed with US TOW are attacking to re-capture the southern Syrian border city of Deraa from government forces.  these forces are heavily supplied with US material support from sources in Jordan just to the south of the city.    Will Mattis/McMaster justify direct US intervention there to create a "safe zone" in preparation for partition of the country or as a base for a drive on Damascus to unseat the government and install the jihadis?

All of this raises the question of why the Trump Administration is placing itself in position in which if we are defied we will have to fight a number of bloody wars simultaneously  Why?  pl

Comments

[b]

The three power centers were first describe in

C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite, 1956
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000S1LXKC?keywords=power%20elite&qid=1457325072&ref_=sr_1_1&s=digital-text&sr=1-1

I observe and then look for a construct that fits the observation. In my view the "three power-centers" fits in explaining the recent election.

As for the MIC. Every active U.S. General seems to be looking for a future job as a board member of some industrial conglomerate. This drives a lot of military powerplays in the interest of that industry.

[aleksandar]

Don't trust the poll. I guess Marine will lost at the end, all chickens will gather to vote for anybody else during second round.
MSM propaganda about "far right" is on full speed aand Macron is THE Borg candidate. What is interesting is that the "Left" as a Marxist force is dead. Marine assesment that political struggle in future will be between internationalists and nationalists is accurate.
If you want to protect your assets, buy roubles, the only currency that will not collapse, no debt and big gold stocks.

[aleksandar]

Hum, not so easy. Most of the european people will be glad, the various europeans Borg will not.

[confusedponderer]

My late grandmother of mother's side had excellent ears.

Whenever I visited her by bike, she opened the door becore I could ring. She said she had heared me coming. Actually that was a quiet bike, and I wasn't singing or the like, so I was always wondering how she could hear me. Well, she told me that she always had an excellent hearing.

That's where the story got odd: She added that her excellent hearing was found to be quite useful during WW-II. After bombings she was routinely sent to leave the cellars first and tell, by listening carefully, wether the aircraft were gone already. That's an unpleasant way to give a compliment for an excellent skill.

At the time it was rather common that farmers in the area were found shot up on their fields, probably attacked by fighters. At least so it seemed to me when grandma told her story about being strafed on the road by a fighter when she was riding to the next town on her bike. She escaped, fortunately, since a neighbour of the road gave her cover and hid her in her cellar.

[aleksandar]

Maybe he is just buying time.

[LeaNder]

PNAC is gone, closed it's doors a long time ago, Hindenburg, wisedupearly.

It seems to make much more sense to watch the institutions that may have replaced it.

Jim Lobe, who I consider a bit of an insider on matters, had the impression that this could be some type of New Manifesto in 2016.

https://lobelog.com/neocons-launch-2016-manifesto/

Choosing to Lead:
http://www.choosingtolead.net/

Isn't 'Making America Great Again' somewhat connected to that leadership? Or may there not have been some implications lost in the individual interpretation?

And yes, vaguely another more recently founded institution comes to mind. The Foreign Policy Initiative, FPI.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Policy_Initiative

From the top of my head.

[Cold War Zoomie]

I don't know what the hell is going on. Hunker down and wait it out.

[LeaNder]

Yes, Babak, one of my experiences around here may be summed up by the basic discomfort that "we the people" may easily be attracted to whatever type of names/terms/tags/human psychological traits for the evil out there.

On the other hand what precise advise would you have given the American Electorate during the last election? You may have indeed done, but if so, below my perception radar.

[Nancy K]

I didn't like Clinton either, I just preferred her to Trump. I voted for her in the primary even though I preferred Bernie because I didn't think he could win. Big mistake.

[Nancy K]

I agree. But it wasn't the biggest FU. Having Trump as president is the biggest.

[Nancy K]

You are possibly right. I imagine she would be looking towards Iran, and not waving an olive branch

[sid_finster]

The problem with Trump as Mighty Thor is that Mighty Thor is easily manipulated.

[jsn]

EN,
I agree with your framing but would add context. The last 40 years has reduced the functional United States to two industrialized and fairly modern corridors along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. With the exception of a shrinking constellation of aspiring city states in between, the remainder of the country has been hollowed out and more or less abandoned: that zone is functionally reduced to second or third world status and with regard to infrastructure that status extends right into the heart of the Borg in DC and the Blob in Boston, New York, Seattle and San Francisco.

That bi-coastal, mostly modern state now relies on manufacturing supply chains all over the "empire" outside it's protected borders for its munitions and provisioning and increasingly for properly educated "staff". The elite in this zone is oblivious to enormous and increasing fragility that has resulted in all of its economic and political infrastructure even to the extent of thinking fighting wars with mercenary forces is a good proposition.

I've been wondering the last few years if it's 1988 and we're the Soviet Union or if its 1913 and we're Great Britain. Since November 9th I've been thought maybe it is 1913 but we have our Kaiser Wilhelm.

But the global dynamics are even bigger than that, in the context of what I've just outlined I'm beginning to think Trump has more in common with Muhammad Shah who rode the Mughal Empire down to collapse and dismemberment in the 1750s. In 1988, the Soviets still had a well educated and healthy (minus the alcoholism) population; in 1913 the Kaiser had one of the healthiest and most modern industrial societies in the world behind him: Trump has inherited the desiccated rump of a hollow empire that has systematically monetized the health and education of its population now for two generations, reversing higher earlier levels of education and now actually increasing the mortality rate for its citizens. Ours has become a deeply corrupt and blindly self destructive empire like that of the late Mughals.

The avarice and corrupted commercial ethos of our elite reminds me also of those of Renaissance Italy who's greedy short sightedness invited nearly instant conquest by Charles VIII: they thought they could hire armies to protect them too, but when Charles rode in with a hardened and patriotic French army these forces fled or flipped. When push came to shove the force commander became the commander of force, taking over from civilian government when, after conquering the whole peninsula Charles bonked his head on a door jamb and died leaving Italy in the newly militarized hands of these former mercenaries.

At least those elites had presided over a cultural fluorescence that made Italy worth conquering in whole whereas the present of the US makes a simple resource imperialism the more likely interest to intervene. Like the rest of the Empire, Trump thinks he still has the solid base under him that gave his present perch the prestige it now holds: things change.

[MRW]

PNAC is gone, closed it's doors a long time ago

I thought it just renamed itself with The word “Defense” in the title.

[Babak Makkinejad]

It is no my place to offer the American Electorate any advice.

But it has taken US a long time to arrive at this juncture and a single vote will not change things all that much.

Likewise for the European Union, which, having won the Cold War (together with US) against USSR and her allies finds itself - 25 years later - being explicitly threatened with nuclear war by the President of the Russian Federation.

Who is responsible but the Electorate?

[Babak Makkinejad]

China, Korea, Israel are the same.

I do not know about Germany, Russia, UK, and Japan; would not be surprised if it worked the same way there too.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Nixon was a very experienced politician, look at his Southern Strategy.

He was also a first rate strategist; all the contemporary EU leaders were impressed by his ability to discuss and describe the strategic situation with them and without notes over an hour.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Who are the "Borg" in Europe but dominant and dominating segments of the European Electorate.

Danish Electorate evidently have decided that Shia Muslims are their enemies; it has been a Free Choice; who am I to argue with their free choice?

[BraveNewWorld]

I have to wonder if after the Obama care fiasco the Republican leadership didn't quietly take the Trump team aside and tell them this is how it is going to be or we will have a vote of impeachment or some other threat. Even I don't believe Trump threw most of his team under the bus and did a full 180 based on the Fox news story of the day.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Good historical analogies.

I think you might also like to look at Spain during the time of Olivares.

I think in one of the Federalist papers, Adams implied that urbanization will endanger the republic since cities corrupt those virtues that make a republic possible.

In the United States, in the coastal regions, not all things are rosy either; public workers - such as teachers - need food stamps. There is a lot of homelessness and vagabondage as well.

[mauisurfer]

interesting statement about Israel/AIPAC/Zionists
You seem to have a lot in common with Chas Freeman,
wondering if you crossed paths in ME/DC.
quote
Over the course of decades, Israel has systematically eliminated alternatives to continued Jewish oppression or eventual expulsion of the non-Jewish inhabitants of all of the Holy Land. It has discredited the “peace process” and left no room for diplomacy. It has made brokering friendly relations between the “Jewish state” and its neighbors practically infeasible. Israel’s behavior is delegitimizing it and its policies, both in the region and internationally, while devaluing the regional and global reputation of the United States.

There is no military answer to these quandaries. It is a waste of time and money to pretend that U.S. gifts of weapons and money to Israel can eventually provide one. But it is difficult to see any opening for diplomacy as long as U.S. taxpayers continue to make it possible for Israel’s government to pursue policies it finds electorally expedient, despite their counterproductivity.

[different clue]

Babak Makkinejad,

Was it Adams who wrote that? Or Jefferson? I ask because I remember reading that Jefferson thought that pretty consistently and in general. But Adams could have felt that way from time to time too.

[different clue]

Nancy K

I have to agree with Doug Colwell here. Clinton might or might not have been "quicker" to use force, but she was determined to use it in such a way as to risk all-out war with Russia in particular. Combining that with her support for Free Trade Treason agreements meant she was a deadly danger to America's mere brute survival in any form whatever.

We can be grateful that Trump drove the Bushes out of politics for a while. We can be grateful that Trump has given us an opportunity to drive the Clintons out of politics for a while if we can figure out how to do that. (The Clintons are grooming Chelsea to run for something, so a determined effort to destroy her first run for office would be the next battle in the war to declintaminate the Democratic Party.) He did officially withdraw America from the TPP. And he provides a handy stage upon which Bernie Sanders can run wild in the power vacuum of the Clintobamacrats' hopeless bullsh*t.

We beat Mommy Wokest! And I helped with my vote here in Michigan. I do not regret my vote. I may reSENT Trump for his sudden turn to the ClintoBorg Dark Side, but that is not the same thing.

[serge]

Ex-PFC Chuck,
Can you explain what you meant by this?

[turcopolier]

mauisurfer

Freeman? (irony) If only I could have met him. Sigh ... Who was the other guy? pl