With executive-led persecution of refugees and illegal immigrants, the US is destined to become one of the least tolerant societies in the world, writes Shannon Ebrahim.
President-elect Donald Trump may not have spelled out the details of his foreign policy vision, but when he enters the Oval Office it will hit the world like a tsunami. Trump may have to get the Republican-dominated US Congress behind his vision, but he will doggedly pursue an isolationist US foreign policy not seen since World War II.
Trump’s approach to foreign policy will be neo-mercantilist - driven by what’s good for America, and what the US can get out of its relationships with other countries. Building peace, human security, disarmament, the development of Africa and the global south will not feature on his administration’s radar screen.
Trump will usher in a new paradigm that disregards human rights and international law, and dilutes US commitment to alliances that are costly for the US. His administration will renegotiate or abrogate trade agreements that are not deemed beneficial.
This new paradigm will likely see the US become a close ally of Russia and develop a new confrontation with China. A renewed era of tension with Iran will emerge, and those countries within the ambit of America’s protective umbrella will find themselves paying far more for this “protection”.
What underlies this foreign policy approach is a strategy to reduce America’s spending obligations overseas so Trump has more resources to achieve his domestic agenda. A positive outcome of this strategy is that the much-derided notion of America’s manifest destiny and global hegemony may now take a back seat to the promise to “make America great again”, which necessitates consolidating resources for domestic priorities.
To garner the necessary resources, Trump will need to have good relations with other countries - precisely what he emphasised in his victory speech. To relinquish the US’s role as global policemen, Trump’s administration will need to identify sources of destabilisation in the world, and decide which countries it can best work with to neutralise them. Trump indicated early on in his campaign that Russia will be one such partner, and even stated that he would be prepared to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin prior to his inauguration in January. He will not abandon America’s traditional allies, having already invited the British prime minister to meet with him. But the trajectory of US policy will be “on America’s terms”.
Perhaps the most disconcerting aspect of Trump’s foreign policy agenda is his disdain for the global human rights architecture. Some of his foreign policy advisers have already indicated the US will cut off funds to the UN human rights council, and former CIA director Leon Panetta has suggested that Trump may restore torture to US interrogations in violation of the US constitution. During his campaign Trump referred to the “need to be vicious” with America’s perceived enemies. Add to this his commitment to ban Muslims, a quarter of humanity, from entering the US, and his commitment to the surveillance of mosques in the US and it’s clear discrimination against minorities within the US is likely to escalate. With executive-led persecution of refugees and illegal immigrants, the US is destined to become one of the least tolerant societies in the world.
Trump will not only use but expand the US intelligence budget, which is already $40 billion (R573bn) to US$50 billion annually. Trump will increase federal spending on the military, even if that doesn’t translate into putting American boots on the ground globally. But he will eventually have to find ways to spur the military-industrial complex.
There is every reason to believe that Trump will build a wall on the US southern border with Mexico and ensure Mexico reimburses America for the cost. This will likely be done by confiscating Mexican remittances - stealing the salaries earned by Mexicans working in the US as they attempt to send the money home to their families.
But the greatest losers in Trump’s new foreign policy vision are likely to be the Palestinians. Trump has recruited foreign policy advisers on Israel that will wipe out any possibility of a two-state solution. Jason Dov Greenblatt and David Friedman have outlined the new Trump-approved policy on Israel, which will see the US embassy moved to Jerusalem and support for Israel’s land grab deep into Palestinian territory. This is in defiance of 49 years of UN resolutions calling for Israel to withdraw to the 1967 borders.
Such extreme positions will ultimately make the Middle East region more unstable, and create the most serious impediment to global peace and security, as terrorists use such US double standards as the justification for global jihad.
* Ebrahim is Independent Media’s Group Foreign Editor
The Sunday Independent