With a chain of resignations and dismissals of ranking White House staff, this summer was particularly hot for Washington watchers. Overall, the reshuffle manifested an irreconcilable internal discord over basic policy lines, as well as personality conflicts.
US mainstream media cast serious doubt over the viability of US President Donald Trump’s presidency, with a major focus on his competence to control and lead his top aides and staff.
However, the world has been largely misinformed of what is going on at the center of US politics. In last year’s presidential campaign, US mainstream media one-sidedly supported former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, while consistently assailing Trump with hostile criticism against his “politically incorrect” remarks.
Evidently, Trump challenged liberal values, policies and, above all, the liberal international order under US dominance, as deemed orthodox by the globalist establishment, both Democrat and Republican. Nonetheless, Trump won the election because he had unflinching grassroots core supporters, particularly the cornered white working class.
In his inaugural address, Trump declared an outright political strife against the establishment. He has since upheld his “America First” line, while rejecting to bear as much economic and military cost as necessary to maintain the liberal international order.
Until today, the struggle between the two is underway and, rather, all the more intensified, without seeing any good prospect for earnest reconciliation.
In the ongoing power struggle at elite levels, Trump and his allies are outnumbered and embattled by the establishment forces. They include the opposition US Democrat Party legislators on Washington’s Capitol Hill, the mainstream US Republican Party legislators thereof, the mainstream media, the intelligence community and the Wall Street business leaders.
Yet these forces are far from a monolith. In fact, they continually fought one another over specific policy measures even during the Cold War period, when they had bipartisan consensus on the strategy of containment against the Soviet Union and on free trade under growing interdependence.
Now that such a consensus has dwindled away almost completely, the forces are in disunity and, occasionally, in disarray.
Until the reshuffle this summer, Trump maneuvered rather successfully by driving one wedge after another between the establishment forces and forming temporary alignments and counter-alignments with some of the forces against the rest. No wonder that the president’s remarks and conduct, made out of political expediency, have quite often appeared inconsistent and incoherent.
The approach helped him to weather several offensives of antagonists.
In February, the president made General Michael Flynn resign from his post as national security adviser amid the merely alleged “Russiagate” interference in the presidential election. The resignation appeased anti-Russia hardliners on Capitol Hill, especially Republican senators, who work closely with the defense-industrial complex, significantly breaking a political deadlock over the Senate confirmation of major cabinet-level political appointees.
Trump instead had to give up early opportunity to pass security burdens, particularly in the Middle East, to Russia, which is in line with his “America First” agenda.
Toward the end of April, to keep running the government, the president maneuvered to make the Republican-controlled Congress pass additional legislative measures before the provisional budget expired. Trump accomplished this by taking hardline military and diplomatic action against Syria and its backer, Russia, and against North Korea and its backer, China, enabling his temporary alignment with mainstream Republican legislators who theretofore blocked the bills.
In May, the president abruptly dismissed former FBI director James Comey to challenge establishment forces in Congress and the mainstream media that were bent on flaming the “Russiagate” scandal.
Apparently, Trump was confident that he would never be impeached in the Republican-controlled Congress, at least now, for he enjoyed passive yet substantial support of the defense-industrial complex and anticipated tacit approval from Wall Street. It was eager to avoid the seeming good performance of the hopelessly debt-ridden US economy, buttressed with the expectation to Trump’s domestic economic reconstruction policy line.
However, this summer, the struggle in the White House over basic policy lines intensified in conjunction with next year’s budget bill and legislative measures to raise debt limits. Trump was forced to make a major compromise with the interests of the establishment through a reshuffle in the White House, including his closest aide, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon.
The president had no choice but to alienate his Republican allies, particularly the Tax-Enough-Already (TEA) Party legislators who oppose continuously budgeting for big government.
Surprisingly enough, taking advantage of the undeniable needs to finance post-hurricane rehabilitation and reconstruction policy packages, the president struck a deal with the opposition Democrats on Capitol Hill for a three-month-long provisional budget, nothing new given precedents in recent years marked by intensive partisan strife.
Now Trump has good political room for a while to proceed with his “America First” agenda.Consequently, the power struggle between Trump and the establishment necessarily continues and its outcome remains utterly unforeseeable.
Needless to say, amid the current turbulence in the regional security environment, Japan and Taiwan have to keep good respective working relationships with Trump. Yet they also had better hedge against never-fading uncertainty and possible wild repercussions by exploring informal coordination, if not formal cooperation, in foreign economic and security policies.
Renewed efforts are more necessary now than ever, when the two nations are about to confront Beijing’s version-upped communist dictatorship under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), a would-be strong man, that is anticipated to take a harder line in security and military policy.
Masahiro Matsumura is a professor of international politics at St. Andrew’s University in Osaka, Japan
Recently, China launched another diplomatic offensive against Taiwan, improperly linking its “one China principle” with UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 to constrain Taiwan’s diplomatic space. After Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13, China persuaded Nauru to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Nauru cited Resolution 2758 in its declaration of the diplomatic break. Subsequently, during the WHO Executive Board meeting that month, Beijing rallied countries including Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Belarus, Egypt, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Laos, Russia, Syria and Pakistan to reiterate the “one China principle” in their statements, and assert that “Resolution 2758 has settled the status of Taiwan” to hinder Taiwan’s
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s (李顯龍) decision to step down after 19 years and hand power to his deputy, Lawrence Wong (黃循財), on May 15 was expected — though, perhaps, not so soon. Most political analysts had been eyeing an end-of-year handover, to ensure more time for Wong to study and shadow the role, ahead of general elections that must be called by November next year. Wong — who is currently both deputy prime minister and minister of finance — would need a combination of fresh ideas, wisdom and experience as he writes the nation’s next chapter. The world that
Can US dialogue and cooperation with the communist dictatorship in Beijing help avert a Taiwan Strait crisis? Or is US President Joe Biden playing into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) hands? With America preoccupied with the wars in Europe and the Middle East, Biden is seeking better relations with Xi’s regime. The goal is to responsibly manage US-China competition and prevent unintended conflict, thereby hoping to create greater space for the two countries to work together in areas where their interests align. The existing wars have already stretched US military resources thin, and the last thing Biden wants is yet another war.
As Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu’s party won by a landslide in Sunday’s parliamentary election, it is a good time to take another look at recent developments in the Maldivian foreign policy. While Muizzu has been promoting his “Maldives First” policy, the agenda seems to have lost sight of a number of factors. Contemporary Maldivian policy serves as a stark illustration of how a blend of missteps in public posturing, populist agendas and inattentive leadership can lead to diplomatic setbacks and damage a country’s long-term foreign policy priorities. Over the past few months, Maldivian foreign policy has entangled itself in playing