Trump won the election with his desire to “make America great again.” Certainly, as an American President, his task would indeed be to work towards American greatness rather than against it. There is also some point to his critique of America as it is today: We seem to have lost our confidence, our sense of mission, our belief in our selves. The American Dream is much less of a promise than a question mark anymore.
Some of that has to do with domestic politics — more visible homelessness, years of inflation having led to skyrocketing prices, unregulated immigration, lack of good jobs, continued pandemic and other health challenges — all these are amongst the reasons for the feeling that something has gone wrong, and people have trusted an outside, for a second time, to try to fix the system, or at least to do anything else than what has been done before. Whether Trump and his team will be the ones to actually fix America will be left to see. I have doubts, but I do wish for a better America as well.
However, the maybe even larger part of the problem is the perception of the decline of American power abroad. I do believe that Republicans might be right to assert that Putin would have shied away from attacking Ukraine in February 2022. Trump has mastered the technique of playing the madman, and surely, that probably served as deterrent. But it should not need a Trump and certainly should not need an American President appearing mad so that everyone is scared. Fear is a bad recipe in foreign policy.
American power works best if America is not feared but respected as a hegemon – a leader that others will willingly follow, a leader who has the trust of his allies and inspires in current and potential enemies the desire to not even think of provoking them.
Ukraine has three times decided to side with America, with Europe, with the free and democratic world. It has become and will be an Ally. It will be an asset to both the EU and to NATO, and thus to America. This is precisely why Putin wants to eliminate Ukraine and destroy everything Ukrainian before he proceeds to undo the biggest US Foreign Policy success in recent history, namely the defeat of the Soviet Union in the Cold War. Putin’s price for not waging war against Ukraine was expressed clearly by him: undo ALL of NATO expansion after 1990 — which would, of course, include even East Germany. His propagandists scream for a Russia from Lisbon to Vladivostok. Putin’s aim is clear: the humiliation of NATO, the EU, and ultimately, the dethroning of America not just as the hegemon, but the destruction of the United States as a democratic republic with both strong soft and hard power. If American democracy falls, democracy in the world falls. This is Putin’s dream. We must not give in.
Additionally, Putin is helped by Iran (and his Hamas, Hezbollah and Huthi allies), North Korea and China. He needs to be stopped. He is being stopped. Putin is losing. Yes, Ukraine is suffering also, but the sanctions are working, Russia’s economy is going down, his soldiers are dying in record numbers, his military machinery diminished day by day. Ukraine, and the world, cannot give up now. Ukraine needs to win, and be restored to 1991 borders, and once that will happen, it will help to restore faith in democracy, and in the largest military alliance in history, led by the United States of America, whose greatness then will have been demonstrated clearly.
Democracy always has to stand up against Tyranny. Tyrants must not be appeased, they must not be tolerated, they must be defeated. Always. Sic Semper Tyrannis.
Ceterum censeo Ucrainam esse defendam. Слава Україні!
Erratic Attempts 