Behind President Donald Trump’s pseudo-pacifist rhetoric of insisting to “stop the killing” lies the soft sell of a new imperialist world order, where borders are redrawn by centres of power and small nations risk losing their sovereignty at the will of stronger neighbours. This is the world that President Trump envisions and is creating with his hallmark “peace deal” which he wants to impose on Ukraine by forcing it to capitulate to Russia. President Trump is basically doing what he promised.
European leaders are aware of this new change from a rules-based order to an imperialist order and they are reacting by envisioning a stronger Europe, both in economic terms and in its defence and security capabilities. However, in Brussels, Paris and London, there is still a lingering feeling of resignation as President Trump rolls out his new imperialism with a red carpet in Alaska. The International Criminal Court doesn’t even matter anymore. Vladimir Putin has invaded Europe and bombed the civilians of an EU-member candidate on a daily basis and is now, not only being allowed to get away with it, he is being rewarded.
Apparently, everyone now seems eager to dismantle the international rules-based order simply because the most crooked President in US history wants to “stop the killing.” Ukraine, the victim of an invasion launched to reabsorb into Russia a supposedly “non-existent country” invented by communists and the West (in Putin’s own words), is somehow assigned the responsibility of “stopping the killing”. A genocidal war against a European nation now appears on the verge of being formalised with a so-called “peace contract,” in which the victim is blamed for nothing more than existing and refusing to be annihilated.
Sovereign nations no longer have the right to fight for their existence. On April 14th, President Trump said that “You don’t start a war against somebody that is 20 times your size and then hope that people give you some missiles.” Xi Jinping is watching this diplomatic charade like a gift falling on his lap that will unlock his ambitions about Taiwan.
Europe fought two world wars for the right of small European nations to exist, but today, Vladimir Putin and President Trump are successfully dismantling this precedent.
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