Wasted Opportunities/Shooting from the Hip

On June 25^th, the New York Times reported: “American intelligence officials have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing coalition forces in Afghanistan — including targeting American troops — amid the peace talks to end the long-running war there, according to officials briefed on the matter.” That caused a massive stir. 

Huge news reporting everywhere. Two days later, on June 28^th, Trump tweeted that “Nobody briefed or told me” or Vice President Mike Pence or chief of staff Mark Meadows about “the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians.”

Let’s assume the above Russia report is totally false; we actually do not know yet. After all, Congress also claims it was not so informed. Why would the first reaction from a sitting president of the United States be a denial that he knew anything about this report? You would think that, before making any statement, he would first ask his senior intelligence and military what they knew, and if they too had no corroborative information, to investigate. Instead, it was all about Donald Trump. Denial and shunting responsibility. Wow! But that’s what’s you get when the President’s policies are primarily his gut reaction to a crisis or information of the moment… unless Fox News has a suggested response. But what if the report is true?

“Democrats including Trump’s prospective presidential rival, Joe Biden, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sharply criticized Trump’s seeming indifference to the explosive report in Friday’s New York Times… Neither Trump nor other administration officials have specifically denied the report, which has since been confirmed by several other news organizations… On Sunday [6-28], Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming joined in the criticism, saying that if the information was genuine, the White House needed to explain why Trump was not told and why the administration has done nothing in response.” Los Angeles Times, June 29^th. Embarrassing? Unpresidential?

Daily briefings for the President began in 1946 under President Harry Truman and have been given continuously ever since. Generally, these are coordinated by the president’s most senior intelligence advisor. Every US President since then has relied heavily on these detailed summary documents. Except Donald Trump, who seldom even looks at them, and when he does, they have too much information to hold his concentration for long. He readily admits this practice, even though the devil is in the details. “President Trump has declined to participate in a practice followed by the past seven of his predecessors: He rarely if ever reads the President’s Daily Brief, a document that lays out the most pressing information collected by U.S. intelligence agencies from hot spots around the world.

“Trump has opted to rely on an oral briefing of select intelligence issues in the Oval Office rather than getting the full written document delivered to review separately each day, according to three people familiar with his briefings…  Reading the traditionally dense intelligence book is not Trump’s preferred ‘style of learning,’ according to a person with knowledge of the situation.

“The arrangement underscores Trump’s impatience with exhaustive classified documents that go to the commander in chief — material that he has said he prefers condensed as much as possible. But by not reading the daily briefing, the president could hamper his ability to respond to crises in the most effective manner, intelligence experts warned.” Washington Post (2/9/18). Which explains why Trump has been so dramatically under-prepared for every major international conference, treaty or trade negotiation, international trip or meeting with a head of state since his inauguration. He trusts his instinct over preparation. And his instincts are usually wrong.

Trump predicted a quick nuclear arms treaty after meeting North Korean Kim Jung-un. Wrong. He predicted normalized US-Russian relations after meeting with Vladimir Putin. Wrong, and Russia has taken advantage by a full-on assault on our elections and by embracing our enemies in the Middle East. He said he would negotiate the “best trade” agreement ever with his newfound buddy, China’s Xi Jinping. Wrong again. Sino-American relations have not been this bad for almost half a century. Trump made a mid-course pivot to blame as much as he could on China. He also told us that the pandemic was almost gone, and it has gotten worse every day since… and he still won’t change his projections even after 125,000 Americans have died from the disease.

Sanctioned by the big economic powers comprising the G-8 (now G-7) for violating a treaty by invading and annexing Crimea, Russia now has Donald Trump’s sole support for rejoining that august body. Even as Russia mounts attacks on Ukraine with annexation as a goal. Despite unanimous findings by his entire intelligence community to the contrary, Trump continues to believe Putin’s inane assertion that Russia never interfered with US elections. Having terminated arms limitations agreements with Russia, before trying to fix the problem, the President now has to negotiate ground zero treaties with a much smarter and better-prepared Vladimir Putin.

Trump has declared that the future of US international relations will no longer be multinational treaties and organizations, instead relying on bilateral negotiations and agreements. He has pulled out of WTO arbitrations, defunded international global coordinating entities (like the UN and the UN’s WHO), pulled out of the clearly functional Iran nuclear accord, rejected multinational trade agreements only to watch them close without and to the absolute detriment of the United States and almost uniformly failed at closing his most important bilateral negotiations as noted above. But the issues that matter most – the pandemic, climate change, trade and arms control – are all global issues. They simply cannot be addressed bilaterally.

Even with the largest military on earth (we still spend 41% of the total global military budget), as a result of all of the above, Donald Trump has single-handedly so diluted American power and influence in the world to the point that both our enemies and allies either ignore Trump entirely or figure simple work-arounds to counter his policies that they simply disagree with. China’s President Xi is watching what was once the most powerful nation on earth flail, make lots of noise, and lose credibility on a daily basis. There is no one to stop the most ambitious Chinese leader since Mao Zedong. Certainly not Donald Trump.

Xi has taken a small island in the Spratly chain in the South China Sea and expanded the surface area with his man-made mega engineering buildout, complete with a major set of runways. Using this expanded land mass to exert a claim of sovereignty over adjoining international waters, Xi has confronted nearby nations – particularly Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam – over regional fishing, navigation and territorial rights, capturing their crews and even sinking boats in the process.

Xi has completely ignored China’s 1984 treaty with Britain that turned over Hong Kong to China, an accord that guaranteed HK free speech, political/judicial autonomy and a neutral capitalist economic system. Instead, Xi is using force and laws emanating from mainland China, to crush freedom, subjugate the judicial system, nullify personal freedoms and eviscerate local democratic elections. He’s also locked up masses of his own Western Chinese Uighurs in what are effectively concentration camps.

Attempting to assert the Chinese position in a territorial dispute with India – in Galwan Valley in the disputed Ladakh region in the Himalayas – on June 15^th, Xi sent PRC troops across his border with India to take control of that disputed region. Almost two dozen India soldiers died in the short-lived conflict. Perhaps that unprovoked attack was the shock that the region needed to see that unbridled and naked aggression has redefined China’s regional goals.

After Mao and before Xi, China had very much conducted a laissez faire foreign policy based on Mao’s successor’s (Den Xiaoping’s) famous slogan: “Hide your strength, bide your time.” Xi has reversed decades of China’s unwillingness to delve into international conflicts, and with a powerless United States under Donald Trump, now is undeterred in his actions. There is, literally, no one to stop him or Vladimir Putin in their quest to expand land and power. By numbers of vessels, China now has the largest navy on earth and the largest naval force in their Asian sphere of influence. The animus has even spread to the South Pacific.

Trade issues and Australian demands for more information on the origins of the coronavirus in China led to this: “The Chinese embassy [in Australia] has labelled the move politically motivated, with one Chinese state media editor comparing Australia to ‘chewing gum stuck to the bottom of China's shoe’… Hu Xijin, the editor of the state-run Global Times, wrote on Chinese social media platform Weibo that strained ties between the major trading partners meant their relationship must be reconsidered.” SBS.com.au, April 29^th.

Trump made Putin smile and US allies wince (particularly the Eastern European bloc of the European Union), as he announced pulling US forces out of Germany. Meanwhile, Philippine President, Rodrigo Duterte, who had summarily disinvited the United States from continuing its five military bases in his country (see above map) – including Antonio Bautista Air Base, which is strategically located near the contested Spratly Islands in the South China Sea – quickly reversed course after the China’s military incursion into India. With China’s new aggressions, regional powers are now imbued with a newfound appreciation for the US military bases scattered around the area.

Because of the economic pressures from the pandemic that have pushed China’s regional infrastructural Belt & Road Initiative to the financial breaking point for many of the nations that accepted the relevant loans, China’s hyper-aggressive and unrestrained military efforts in the region may have pushed China’s out of the perceived role of benefactor to malefactor. What a perfect time for the United States to step in and reassert its once determinative and dominant role in strategically essential Asia. We would actually be welcomed with open arms. Ah, but then Donald Trump is President of the United States, and we know that won’t happen. Another wasted opportunity.

          I’m Peter Dekom, and as a US Foreign Service brat with all my parents having given significant service to the US government/military, I have never been so embarrassed by the foreign policy incompetence of any senior US official, especially from any US president.