Trump, the masterful Soviet sleeper agent

The U.S. President can rightfully say to his masters in Russia and China “Mission Accomplished”

Published July 17, 2018 11:14AM (EDT)

 (Getty/Olivier Douliery)
(Getty/Olivier Douliery)

This piece originally appeared on The Globalist.
TheGlobalist

It is high time to rethink Donald Trump and give him credit where credit is due. The man who is making a hash of virtually anything he touches has actually succeeded in the domain least familiar to him — foreign relations — in the most mesmerizing and unexpected of manners. Provided one looks at it all from the perspective of his real bosses/handlers.

As we realize only now, Trump’s game plan in the international arena was never about cozying up to Russia. If anything, that was — and is — a flare to obscure his real mission.

Even more amazing for a man supposedly driven by sheer impulsiveness, Trump has gone about that business in an amazingly systematic fashion — by going straight to the core.

Trump has moved rapidly toward the break-up of the established Western order. That Trump has managed to do so right in front of our collective eyes, while the entire world was watching and interpreting his every move and tweet, is the tell-tale sign of a true world-class agent. That must please his masters in Moscow immensely.

The relentless pace of his attacks on bedrock elements of the Western order — such as faith in NATO, press freedom, public accountability and democratic structures — and his desire to implode existing structures has of course been facilitated by the fact that we live in times when public confidence in them has gotten very shaky.

From early cues to meticulous execution

Credit is due to Trump’s consistency: Every day of his presidency, he has moved from threatening to destabilize the existing order to actually making good on those threats.

He exited the Iran nuclear deal, which got him that much closer to splitting NATO. His disregard for NAFTA — and soon, the WTO — speaks further volumes about the true scope of his ambition.

He abandoned the Paris Climate Agreement which made him the odd man out in the G7. His angry tirades at the June G7 summit showed his utter disdain for the common values that bound this group for 40 odd years.

Trump and his team definitely see their United States as very much standing apart from the long-established Western “system” of governance. The only proposition they have on offer to the entire rest of the West is to subjugate themselves to Trump’s presumed deal-making acumen.

In the real world, his promises to the American working class are as empty as his false promise that his hyper-regressive tax “reform” law will serve the common man.

Diplomatic fallout

Given Trump’s apparent love of illiberal nations, one must ultimately wonder whether his real aim, at least in the sphere of global governance, is for the United States to depart from the G7 (“too much democracy”) and instead join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).

The organization was established by Russia and China in 2001 to create a global forum free of any Western values, set up to serve the highly illiberal tastes dictators and dictatorship-lovers.

This would be the perfection of Trump’s view of the preferred new world order, with Vladimir Putin not just as his partner-in-crime, but, true to style, also his handler.

Way smarter than Bush Jr.

In view of the above, Trump stands in stark contrast to George W. Bush, Jr., the 43rd U.S. President. The latter pronounced entirely prematurely and totally pompously “Mission Accomplished” in 2003 concerning the invasion of Iraq (Bush hadn’t — and it isn’t to this day).

In contrast, Donald Trump actually has plenty of reason to boast of his, very real “Mission Accomplished” moment. More amazingly yet, in his intent to destroy the Western order, he has never been shy to cover his tracks. To this day, his Twitter feed gives vivid testimony of this.

One final note: The ability to operate so openly and confidently is the ultimate sign of an extremely well-trained and highly professional sleeper agent.

This article is republished from The Globalist: On a daily basis, we rethink globalization and how the world really hangs together.  Thought-provoking cross-country comparisons and insights from contributors from all continents. Exploring what unites and what divides us in politics and culture. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.  And sign up for our highlights email here.

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By Stephan Richter

Stephan Richter is the publisher and editor-in-chief of The Globalist, the daily online magazine, and a columnist in newspapers around the world. He is also the presenter of the Marketplace Globalist Quiz, which is aired on public radio stations all across the United States. In addition, Mr. Richter is a keynote speaker at international conferences -- and the author of the 1992 book, “Clinton: What Europe and the United States Can Expect.” Follow him on Twitter @theglobalist.

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