TRUMPING THE WORLD

Interview Published in https://www.mscnewswire.co.nz/component/k2/item/4043-urgently-needed-in-foreign-policy-in-trump-era-a-new-way-of-thinking-acting-plus-a-study-of-sun-tzu.html  #TRUMPING

The newly installed Trump Administration continues to catch New Zealand officialdom by surprise. So MSC Newswire asked Washington insider Scot Faulkner what Wellington’s response should in fact be? Mr. Faulkner was elected the first Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives. His reforms became a model for the operation of national parliaments around the world.

The New Zealand Foreign Ministry has set up a special focus group solely for the purpose of identifying early warning of new policies promulgated by President Trump, the ones which will have an impact on this country. Can you short circuit this by helpfully forecasting any of these pending surprise policies?

The New Zealand Foreign Ministry’s Trump Task Force will only be of value if it discards long held assumptions and embrace a totally new way of thinking and acting. Trying to predict Trump through traditional means, such as monitoring after-the-fact media, is like using Ouija boards, tarot cards, and horoscopes.

The Ministry’s primary objective should be to move at “Trump speed” and navigate in Trump’s world. Non traditional sources, non traditional methods will be keys to success. Thinking like a visionary risk-taking entrepreneur instead of a politician is the first step into this new reality.

Trump is unique. No one like him has ever been the President of the United States. While a few Presidents had business experience, their main credentials were either the military or government. America usually faced political or military crises. The 2007-2008 economic collapse convinced most Americans that something radical was necessary. So they rallied around a businessman who was known to most as a reality television star. As Trump stated, “everyone else has failed you – what do you have to lose? Try me.”

Trump’s unique background means unique thought patterns and processes. President Trump gets his ideas, news, and validation from places never before involved in governing. He is fearless, non linear. He embraces chaos, acts on intuition, moves quickly, and uses surprise as a strategic weapon. Sometimes only he knows the ultimate objective. He is a student of military history, especially Sun Tzu. That is what gave him the winning edge in business, the Republican primaries, and the 2016 general election.

Trump’s new Administration is already being tested by China, Russia, and a variety of other nations. President Trump’s responses will indicate many things: how fast he responds, how he responds, how he views the challenge and the challenger, how he frames the challenge within his existing world view, how willing is he to vary from stated positions to address a unique situation, how willing is he to escalate, whose advice does he value, who he collaborates with, and who, how, and what does he communicate regarding the challenge to Congress, the American public, and other nations.

New Zealand needs to understand that the next four to eight years has a very different global player. Trump’s approach will be very personal, intimate, intuitive, immediate, chaotic, and against all conventional wisdom, very successful.

All the indications are that the New Zealand diplomatic apparatus in New York and Washington was wrong footed by the Trump ascendancy. This led to falling in line with the Obama era last moment positioning of New Zealand as co-endorser of the UN anti-Israel resolution. Does New Zealand need to backtrack here?

New Zealand should always be wary of being pulled into American politics. Obama’s last minute swipe at Israel during his waning days as President should have been avoided at all costs. Obama’s behind the scenes orchestration of the resolution, which was being delayed until the new Administration, was ill-advised and dilatory. It undermined decades of America being a positive force in the region.

President Trump is a great friend of Israel. He and his team believe that, historically, enemies of America have funded the radical elements of the Palestinian cause.

Trump is committed, heart & soul, to destroying radical Islam and reining-in Iran. His priority is working with those nations that share his view. He sees Israel, and the moderate Arab governments, like Egypt and Jordan, as allies in eradicating ISIS, Hezbollah, Hamas, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and their regional and tribal affiliates throughout the Arab world, Asia, and Africa.
Trump and his foreign policy team fundamentally differ from the Neo-conservatives who surrounded President George W. Bush. They adhere more to the Reagan-Thatcher/John-Paul II approach of destroying tyranny, but not trying to second guess centuries of local custom through nation building. America’s role is to inspire, not intervene, in a nation’s journey toward a freer society.
Israeli settlements are far more complex than the media portrays. Palestinian contractors and workers build Israeli settlements. West Bank unemployment soars whenever Israel slows or suspends new settlements. The chasm between peaceful, free, and democratic Israel and violent, oppressive, Islamic failed states in the region is stark. Land for Peace has been a chimera for Israel. De-radicalizing Palestinian leaders and their movement would go further in creating lasting peace than continuing to place the onus on Israel.

The Anti-Israel Resolution validated Trump’s view that the United Nations is currently there to promote radical anti-Western policies while wasting vast sums of money. It further proves his wisdom of pursuing America’s interests through bilateral, not multilateral, arrangements.

New Zealand has supported in spirit the US-EU trade embargo against Russia called up by President Obama. Is there a defined timetable to conclude this embargo?

There is no defined timetable for ending or modifying the trade embargo against Russia.

President Trump and his inner circle have a non-ideological practical “America first” world view. It harkens back to the 17th/18th Centuries. During that era, Western nations united to stop the expansion of the Ottoman Empire then competed, sometimes violently, to dominate world trade.

President Trump wants to build relationships with Russia and China for ridding the world of rogue players – radical Islam, Iran, and North Korea. This is why he picked Rex Tillerson, who has strong relationships with Russia as his Secretary of State, and Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, who is friends with President Xi Jinping, as Ambassador to China. This is also why Trump picked a skilled fighter, James Mattis, as his Secretary of Defense.

Trump’s trade and business team is equally ready to help America win in world commerce. Wilbur Ross, Steve Mnuckin, and Robert Lighthizer will aggressively negotiate favorable trade agreements and rebuild U.S. competitiveness.

Russia remains problematic as its adventurism in Ukraine and intimidation of the Baltic States complicates Trump’s desire to be “frenemies”. Tillerson will be challenged to craft the right mix of incentives and punishments to refocus Russo-American relations. The current US-EU trade embargo will be assessed within this context.

The Transpacific Partnership Agreement signed in Auckland last year was No 1 on President Trump’s hit list. Looking at the longer term where do you see the advantages/disadvantages in this?

President Trump is all about building one-on-one personal relationships with world leaders. Bi-lateral relationships were his strong suit in business and will serve him well as President. They allow him more flexibility and agility. He has little interest in multi-lateral agreements or entities.

This is why TPP was in his cross hairs as a candidate and now as President. New Zealand and other TPP nations need to offer their best “value proposition” for trade relationships that will benefit the U.S. as much as themselves. These are the kinds of agreements that will get Trump’s attention and become his priority.

Trump prides himself on the foreign investments in America he has facilitated or promoted. He wants American companies to “come home” to America, and foreign companies to settle in America. Trump’s goal is to bring the best of the world to America to rebuild infrastructure and generate lasting employment opportunities. There is a new world of opportunity for New Zealand investment and partnering in America.

Given the available evidence it is hard not to conclude that officials here have only a threadbare understanding of what is going on in the relevant circles of United States policymaking. Where should they be looking? Who should they be talking to now?

Trump’s tweets remain the best original source. Trump won the nomination and the general election by going directly to the public. Over 50 million Americans follow Trump on Twitter and Facebook. The Washington-New York media have become completely irrelevant to the Trump Administration and to Trump’s America.

President Trump has revolutionized the way policy is created, promoted, and implemented. The establishments within the Federal Government, Congress, media, academia, and policy forums, still do not have a clue about what is happening before their eyes.

America’s post-Cold War drift through four failed Presidents has come to an end.

Reagan won the Cold War by using skills he developed in movies and television to command the world stage. Those skills destroyed the Soviet Empire, relaunched the U.S. economy, and redefined the role of government. Trump is using his business and reality television skills to command the world stage for himself and the United States. Like Reagan, Trump is seeking to defeat tyranny, in this case radical Islam, relaunch the U.S. economy, and not just redefine, but completely reinvent government. The establishment dismissed Reagan until he succeeded. The establishment is dismissing Trump, and will be just as embarrassed should he succeed.

Conservative talk radio speaks for Trump and puts his actions and tweets into context. They aggressively expose the liberal media and the Democrats when they promote fake news and conspiracies about Trump. Trump watches Fox news, listens & calls into conservative talk radio, and avidly follows their social media posts. Each validates the other. The most articulate and insightful conservative commentators are Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levine, and Chris Plante. Washington-based WMAL radio hosts all three.

OF BRICS & DRAGONS

This article was published on the History News Network

http://hnn.us/articles/how-game-thrones-mirrors-modern-geopolitics

The Season Three finale of Game of Thrones coincided with my recent meetings in China. There is more in common than first meets the eye.

Game of Thrones is HBO’s outstanding fantasy drama about how royal families on the continent of Westeros intrigue against and slaughter each other. At the end of Season Three the key combatants remain oblivious to rising outside threats. The White Walkers, or basically “ice zombies”, are massing in the icy north looking to expand their feeding territory. Far to the south, across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys Targaryen is forming a massive army and building a cadre of capable advisors. She is waiting for the day her three dragons are large enough to lead her campaign to invade Westeros and reclaim the “Iron Throne”. A multi-year period of mild weather, the “long summer”, is about to give way to an equally long and devastating winter. Only a few whisper, “winter is coming”, and even less are preparing.

In the “real” world, America’s leaders intrigue against and politically slaughter each other. Myopia reigns supreme inside the Capital’s Beltway. Daily micro-battles over tactical issues are echoed in Lilliputian debates among hyperpartisan pundits. Like their Westeros counterparts, America’s political, economic, and media elite are oblivious to rising outside threats. This is not about terrorists, it is about BRICS.

BRICS are five major emerging economies that formed a cooperation pact in 2011: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. With the exception of Russia, BRICS are all developing or recently industrialized countries. Their common attribute is they all have large, fast-growing economies. This is allowing them growing influence on regional and global affairs. As of 2013, the five BRICS countries represent almost 3 billion people, with a combined nominal GDP of $14.8 trillion, and an estimated $4 trillion in combined foreign reserves.

BRICS are not always in agreement. Notably, China and India have serious border and water rights disputes. However, they collectively represent a major economic and trade force in the world. In many ways they are like the mercantile powers of the 17th Century. At that time, England and the Netherlands established global trading outposts, developed their merchant infrastructure, and built economic capabilities that soon encompassed the world. While the Netherlands was content to dominant trade, England leveraged its mercantilism to become the dominant strategic power for over three hundred years.

BRICS are following in these historic footsteps. China is methodically locking up strategic minerals and port facilities throughout Africa. China already holds the rights to most of Afghanistan’s mineral resources. It is fully content to have American coin and blood provide the security for Chinese miners. President Xi Jinping’s recent tour of the Americas strengthened his country’s presence in America’s “backyard”. His tour was topped off by Nicaragua awarding a Chinese company a 100-year concession to build an alternative to the Panama Canal. This will have profound geopolitical ramifications. China is also preparing to assert its highly expansive version of rights to islands and territorial waters throughout the Pacific rim.

BRICS strategically flexing their collective new muscles starkly contrasts with America’s nonexistent global economic strategy. It did not have to be this way.

In 1980, Ronald Reagan had a detailed strategic plan. His plan was to eradicate the Soviet Empire, end the threat of global Communism, and free millions of people from bondage. He masterfully and methodically implemented his plan succeeding beyond even his inner circle’s expectations. It was a combination of overt and covert active measures, coordinated with Britain’s Margaret Thatcher and Pope John Paul II. Together, they formed a “big three” that was far more globally effective and positive than World War II’s FDR, Churchill, and Stalin.

The problem was that so much planning and execution went into ending global Communism, little effort was spent on what happened next. For all the rhetoric about a “new world order” after the fall of the Berlin Wall, precious little actually occurred. After World War II the United Nations and countless strategic meetings, such as the Bretton Woods Conference, reshaped the world. America’s Marshall Plan in Europe and MacArthur’s counter part in Japan rebuilt ravaged parts of the globe, but also established viable markets for U.S. goods.

Presidents Bush 41, Clinton, Bush 43, and now Obama have been content to let America’s economy drift through the “peace dividend” and the information revolution without a strategic game plan. 9-11 opened a large rabbit hole where Bush 43 and his NeoCons squandered coin and blood on ill-advised, ill-conceived, and poorly realized foreign adventures. Today America is over extended politically, militarily, and financially. At home, our strategic drift since the fall of the Berlin Wall has led to hyperpartisan bickering over increasingly minute matters. The rise of the TheoCons within the Republican Party have reopened debates about science and reason that were resolved centuries ago, further diverting attention from strategic global issues.

Now in 2013, America is like Westeros, every day introduces new micro-conspiracies that diminish and divert attention from the real issues. America’s role in the world and its future as an economic power are drowned out by politicians and pundits fixated on whether Paula Dean should have a Food Network show. In the meantime, the BRICS’ “little dragons” and “ice zombies” are growing in strength. Washington politicians would learn more from following HBO fantasy dramas than Cable “news” talk shows.

[Scot Faulkner served as Chief Administrative Officer for the U.S. House of Representatives. Spent the month of June in China as advisor to the International Scholar Laureate Program. http://citizenoversight.blogspot.com/ ]