Donald Trump is once again set to helm the most powerful imperialist power in history. He has made sweeping promises to bring back American “greatness,” and there are big expectations for a serious shake-up of the hated status quo.
However, the world has changed significantly since he first entered the White House in 2017. The botched pandemic, the debacle of NATO’s proxy war in Ukraine, and the genocidal slaughter in Gaza have transformed world relations and upended any illusions millions may have had in the system. World capitalism is in serious trouble, and American capitalism is at the heart of the rot. Trump’s unenviable task is to manage the systemic crisis of capitalism, and in particular, US imperialism’s accelerating decline relative to other rising powers.
Needless to say, Marxists understand that domestic and foreign policy are deeply intertwined. However, given the splash Trump made at his recent Mar-a-Lago press conference, this article will focus on the bigger geopolitical picture.
Making sense of Trump’s musings, pronouncements, and social media posts can be like reading tea leaves. Keeping everyone guessing is part of his fight against “the blob” of the “deep state,” which is moving might and main to suck him into the swamp before he can gain any traction. Much of what he says is intended merely as a distraction or red meat to his hardcore base. Nevertheless, there is a certain method to his madness, and if one reads between the lines, a discernible outline of his intended policy begins to emerge.
Whether we refer to it as the “Trump Corollary” or the “Donroe Doctrine”—as the New York Postdid—Trump clearly intends to implement his “America First” vision by returning to the idea of “fortress America,” “peace through strength,” economic nationalism, and his own brand of aggressive “isolationism”—with fat profits to be made by the arms manufacturers.
The idea of an “American Hemisphere” and “the Americas for the Americans” is nothing new. At various times, elements in the US ruling class have dreamed of annexing Canada, Mexico, Cuba, Panama, and even the entirety of South America all the way to Patagonia. After the Spanish-American War of 1898, there was talk of a “Greater America” and even “Imperial America.” As Diego Portales, a Chilean businessman and minister, wrote to a friend after the Monroe Doctrine was announced: “We have to be very careful: for the Americans of the North—the only Americans are themselves.”
The Monroe Doctrine and American Exceptionalism
Conceived in 1823, President James Monroe first articulated the Monroe Doctrine in his annual message to Congress. The basic idea is that the US would not tolerate further European colonization or interference in the Americas. Coupled with the later notion of “Manifest Destiny,” the US clearly intended to dominate the Western Hemisphere. Following a predatory war with Mexico and treaty agreements with Britain, the borders of the mainland US were more or less defined.
Fast forward through the Civil War, Reconstruction, the Gilded Age, the subjugation of the Indigenous peoples of the West, and the rise of organized labor, and we arrive at the 20th century, which Lenin characterized as the tipping point for fully fledged capitalist imperialism.
This was the heyday of “gunboat diplomacy,” with the Roosevelt Corollary of 1904 representing a significant update to the Monroe Doctrine. Teddy Roosevelt now asserted that the US had the right and duty to intervene in Latin America to defend US corporate interests and keep the Europeans out. And it did precisely that, with countless bribes, coups, assassinations, and invasions.
After the Russian Revolution and two world wars, a relative equilibrium was established between the US and Soviet superpowers during the Cold War. But the collapse of the USSR—due to the bureaucratic and undemocratic contradictions inherent in Stalinism—led to a so-called “unipolar” world. US imperialism was unhinged and counterbalanced by no one.
The hubris of those who became known as the “neocons” knew no limits as they sought to cow the world working class and extend the Monroe Doctrine to the entire planet. People like Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Robert Kagan dominated the State Department and dozens of influential think tanks. The “Wolfowitz Doctrine” declared that no rival should be allowed to emerge after the fall of the USSR. It advocated unilateral and preemptive military action to suppress potential threats and prevent anyone from rising to superpower status. The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, were just the excuse for GW Bush and co. to put this into action.
But the laws of economic, political, and military gravity eventually asserted themselves, and US imperialism hit its limits and found itself bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan. However, the hawks in the Biden White House and US State Department know only how to attack, not to retreat. Fueled by their messianic belief in American exceptionalism, they doubled down on these humiliating defeats with devastating and disastrous adventures in Ukraine and the Middle East.
This is the context for Trump 2.0. US imperialist arrogance has accelerated a reshuffling of the world, with China and Russia emerging as economic and military powerhouses at the head of BRICS, a rapidly expanding economic bloc including India, Iran, and Brazil, posing a clear and present danger to continued US-led Western dominance.
Although the neocons refuse to accept it, the liberal capitalist order they tried to impose everywhere after the Soviet collapse has reached its limits. The architects of the “Project for a New American Century” have had their dreams shattered by the ruthless realities of global capitalist competition.
To some degree, it seems Trump and those around him understand that instead of trying to police the entire world, US imperialism should retrench and attend to its immediate “backyard.” Expanding the country’s borders would give it greater strategic depth. Although he and the Zionist ideologues in his orbit will almost surely continue backing Tel Aviv to the hilt, he has thrown Obama, Biden, and even Netanyahu under the bus for the mess they created in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Like Putin in Russia and Pezeshkian in Iran, it seems Trump will not fall for Biden’s desperate attempt to force the US into a wider conflagration. Though he will not be able to end the war in 24 hours, as promised, he has bluntly told Zelensky that Ukraine will not be allowed to join NATO, which was the entire reason Moscow embarked on the war in the first place.
As Trump recently put it: “Russia for many years said you could never have NATO involved with Ukraine. That’s been like written in stone. And Biden said no, they should be able to join NATO. Then Russia has somebody right on their doorstep. I could understand their feelings about that.”
In his latest electoral victory speech, he said, “I’m not going to start wars; I’m going to stop wars.” That being said, despite bringing in some “non-swamp blood,” Trump is still largely surrounded by Zionist neocons gunning for Iran, China, and Russia. Events may well suck him into something he didn’t intend.
Nonetheless, given how vain and mercurial Trump can be, those who bet everything on the neocon’s roulette number are in a panic, including the tops of the Democratic Party and their liberal stooges in Europe. A sharp turn toward the Americas would mean turning away from Europe, leaving them literally in the cold—with a resurgent and fed-up Russia right on its borders.
NATO was originally intended to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down. Today, Russia has no interest in Europe beyond securing its western border and is keen to focus on its own “pivot to Asia” and the Arctic. Furthermore, if US imperialism did go to war directly against Russian imperialism in Ukraine or anywhere else, it would be confronted with a strategic defeat far more consequential than Afghanistan.
As for Germany, by cutting itself off from access to cheap Russian energy, its economy has been brought to the brink of ruin, and it is no longer a serious economic rival to the US. Therefore, US imperialism doesn’t need to maintain its expensive presence on the continent, at least to the extent it has today.
No modern economy can disengage from the entire world, and this is especially true in the case of the US. Nonetheless, Trump seems to think that the US could be more or less self-sufficient if it dominated the Western Hemisphere even more than it does now. Whether such a “pivot to the Americas” would position US imperialism for a future aggressive turn to the Indo-Pacific remains to be seen—the horse has probably already bolted the stable when it comes to “containing” China.
Trump equals chaos, but it is not the kind of chaos the ruling-class establishment favors. Their preference is to slow US imperialism’s downward trajectory by keeping their rivals unbalanced and stirring up trouble in their spheres of influence. This explains their policies in places like Romania, Georgia, Moldova, Syria, Lebanon, Taiwan, and Argentina. Trump’s version of chaos is different. He stands personally at the center of the typhoon, threatening to unleash forces the ruling class can’t control. This is why they hate him.
However, while Trump’s apparently outrageous proposals may take a different form, the content of his foreign policy is fundamentally the same as that of his predecessors: to defend the power and profits of the US capitalist class by any means necessary.
In 1823, President James Monroe first articulated the Monroe Doctrine, signaling the American ruling class’s clear intention to dominate the Western Hemisphere. / Image: Victor Gillam, Wikimedia Commons
Greenland and the race for the Arctic
Trump may be intelligent and clever, but he is also profoundly ignorant and easily influenced by whoever last had his ear. As always, what he says and does isn’t always the same. His priority is to negotiate “better deals” for the American bourgeoisie. So perhaps it is mere “trolling,” or an elaborate distraction from the impending collapse in Ukraine. But of all his recent proposals, acquiring Greenland is probably the most serious. Should he succeed in acquiring the island, it would be a splashy and relatively easy win and show of strength.
Climate change is accelerating, and glaciers in the Arctic are melting at an alarming rate. In fact, the amount of sea ice lost each year is equivalent to the state of South Carolina. Over the last three decades, the oldest and thickest ice in the Arctic has decreased by 95%. Based on current projections, the Arctic could be ice-free in the summer by 2040. Already, coastlines have shifted dramatically, and previously inaccessible areas can now be navigated, opening enormous areas to natural resource exploitation.
As it happens, roughly 20% of Russia’s extensive landmass is in the Arctic, and its northern coastline spans 53% of the Arctic Ocean. It also has the world’s only fleet of nuclear-powered ice-breaking ships. 75% of Canada’s coastline and 40% of its landmass are considered Arctic. Then comes Greenland, two-thirds of which sits above the Arctic Circle. And thanks to the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867, about 15% of the US is also in the Arctic. Recognizing the importance of the region as new seaways and lands open up, China has also jumped into the race, pledging to build a “Polar Silk Road” as part of its Belt and Road Initiative.
Baffin Bay alone, which borders the island and Nunavut in Canada, is larger than the Mediterranean. The Arctic sea route cuts transit times from the oil-rich North Sea to the coast of China far more than the Suez Canal. US imperialism is spread thin around the world and is behind in the race for the Arctic.
Given the shifting geopolitical realities confronting US imperialism, this explains Trump’s acute interest in these regions, particularly Greenland. According to Trump, “ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity” for the US in the interest of national security.
With the exception of the continental expanse of Australia, Greenland is the largest island in the world, roughly equivalent to the whole of Mexico. It is home to vast untapped deposits of coal, iron, graphite, uranium, copper, gold, lead, molybdenum, cryolite, precious stones, titanium, zinc, and much more. Crucially, it is thought to hold 25% or more of the world’s strategically vital rare earth elements.
Just 57,000 people inhabit the island, 80% of whom are Greenlandic Inuit, who refer to their land as Kalaallit Nunaat, while the remainder are mostly Danes. Although it has a form of autonomous self-rule via a unicameral parliament based in the capital, Nuuk, Greenland remains a colony of the Kingdom of Denmark, and there is growing support for outright independence, which is sure to gain steam given recent events.
US interest in the island goes back many decades, and it has had a military presence on its northwest coast since 1941. Inspired in part by the purchase of the US Virgin Islands from Denmark in 1917, President Truman secretly offered Denmark $100 million in gold for the island in 1946, though the Danes declined the offer. In 1951, the US began construction on Thule Air Base. Located more than 700 miles north of the Arctic Circle, it was one of the US’s most critical military installations during the Cold War. Not only is this corner of Greenland “way up north,” but it sits right between the US and Russia, making it a perfect place to refuel nuclear bombers or intercept Soviet aircraft. No wonder elaborate facilities were built, and 10,000 troops were stationed there at the height of the Cold War.
Now renamed Pituffik Space Base, it is home to a significant part of US imperialism’s global network of missile warning sensors, space surveillance, and space control sensors for NORAD and the US Space Force. It is also home to the northernmost deep water port in the world, and its runway handles more than 3,000 US and international flights every year.
Despite its interest in investing in Greenland, China has been rebuffed in recent years through heavy American pressure on the Danish and Greenlandic governments. Both its Kuannersuit uranium mine and Isua iron ore mine were put on hold or terminated in the preliminary stages. China was also denied when it tried to purchase an old maritime station abandoned by the Danish military.
According to Rasmus Leander Nielsen, head of the NASIFFIK Center for Foreign and Security Policy and an assistant professor at the University of Greenland, this overture was “kind of vetoed by Washington.” In 2019, the China Communications Construction Company backed out of its bid to build two airports, one in Nuuk and one in Ilulissat.
Utterly unrelated to Trump’s comments, Donald Jr. and Charlie Kirk just so happened to make a quick jaunt to the island shortly after Trump promised to “make Greenland great again.” He added: “Greenland is an incredible place, and the people will benefit tremendously if and when it becomes part of our nation. We will protect it and cherish it from a very vicious outside world.”
True to his brash and bullying negotiating tactics, he has questioned whether Denmark even has a right to the island: “Nobody even knows if they have any right, title, or interest.” Buying such a massive chunk of land along with all its inhabitants wouldn’t be cheap, to say the least. And although he has left the option on the table, it is doubtful he would resort to military action against Denmark—a member of the EU and NATO.
Laughably, France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, defiantly declared that the EU would not let Trump “attack its sovereign borders.” And while he doesn’t believe a US military invasion of Greenland is the most likely scenario, he correctly noted that “we [the imperialists] have entered into a period of time when it is survival of the fittest.”
But there may be other ways for US imperialism to ensure total control in perpetuity, starting with merciless economic pressure and Trump’s threat to “tariff Denmark at a very high level” if it did not accede to US annexation of the territory.
While many in Greenland are dissatisfied with high prices and dependence on Denmark, it is not clear that a majority would prefer to become a US dependency. According to Denmark’s Foreign Minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen: “We fully recognize that Greenland has its own ambitions. If they materialize, Greenland will become independent, though hardly with an ambition to become a federal state in the United States.”
Nonetheless, he added that the Danish government recognizes that the US has “legitimate” interests in the region and is “open to a dialogue with the Americans on how we can cooperate, possibly even more closely than we already do, to ensure that American ambitions are fulfilled” [our emphasis].
In other words, despite putting up a show of resistance, tiny Denmark is all but ceding effective control, if not legal ownership, to the US while paying lip service to the right of self-determination of Greenlanders.
As for Múte Egede, Greenland’s Prime Minister, he immediately said, “We are not for sale.” But as always, small powers and populations are mere playthings in the eyes of the imperialists, especially when the economic and the great power stakes are so high.
Pituffik Space Base is home to a significant part of US imperialism’s global network of missile warning sensors, space surveillance, and space control sensors for NORAD and the US Space Force. / Image: United States Space Force
The Panama Canal
The other, perhaps more serious proposal by Trump was to regain effective control of the Panama Canal, dubbed the “Panamaga Canal” by the sensationalist rag, the New York Post. As with Greenland, Trump insists that the US needs it for economic and national security, asserting that “the Panama Canal was built for our military.”
In 1903, Teddy Roosevelt helped orchestrate Panama’s “independence” from Colombia, and the new government granted the US lands on which to build a maritime passage across the thinnest isthmus in the Americas. Costing approximately $375 million and over 5,600 workers’ lives, construction was completed in 1914. The Panama Canal had enormous implications for the world economy, further solidifying the US’s position as a rising manufacturing and maritime power. Ships could now cross from the Atlantic to the Pacific without the long southern detour around Cape Horn. For decades, the US operated the canal for both commercial and military purposes. For example, during World War II, the US built over 100 bases across Panama.
But in 1977, the Torrijos-Carter Treaties began the transfer of ownership and control back to the people of Panama, who committed to permanent neutrality for the waterway. As of December 31, 1999, the Panama Canal Authority operates the 51-mile series of locks and passages as an autonomous agency of the Panamanian government, modernizing operations and completing a significant expansion project in 2016.
Now, Trump regrets that the US gave it back. It would seem he agrees with Senator S.I. Hayakawa’s ironic quip during the 1977 debate over repatriation of the canal: “We should keep the Panama Canal. After all, we stole it fair and square.”
Trump claims that the Panamanians are charging American ships “exorbitant” rates that violate the Torrijos-Carter Treaties. Furthermore, he claims that the canal is “falling into the wrong hands”—an apparent reference to China, which controls two ports near the canal, but does not operate the canal itself.
For his part, Panamanian president José Raúl Mulino has denied that the US was being unfairly charged or that anyone besides Panama was in complete control of the canal and affirmed that the canal was part of the country’s “inalienable patrimony.”
Rep. Brandon Gill of Texas thinks that Canada, Panama, and Greenland should be “honored” by Trump’s ambitions to make them part of the US: “I think that the people of Panama, I think that the people of Greenland, I think that the people of Canada for that matter should be honored that President Trump wants to bring these territories under the American fold.”
Once again, we see that the interests of small nations—including Canada—are mere pawns in a new “Great Game” as US imperialism seeks to assert greater control over its near abroad by pushing out the Chinese and other rivals.
Trump insists that the US needs the Panama Canal for economic and national security, asserting that “the Panama Canal was built for our military.” / Image: Dozenist, Wikimedia Commons
Canada
With the Americas on the brain, Trump has also taken potshots at his neighbors to the North. Despite having negotiated the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement to replace NAFTA during his first term, he has threatened to slap punitive tariffs on Canadian imports in his second term. After a desperate attempt to mend fences at Mar-a-Lago resulted only in ridicule and humiliation, Justin Trudeau’s shaky grip on power collapsed, and he was compelled to resign as Prime Minister. Apparently, being called “Governor Trudeau of the great state of Canada” didn’t do much for his already crumbling authority.
Trump responded to Trudeau’s resignation by posting on social media: “Many people in Canada LOVE being the 51st State. The United States can no longer suffer the massive Trade Deficits and Subsidies that Canada needs to stay afloat. Justin Trudeau knew this and resigned. If Canada merged with the US, there would be no Tariffs, taxes would go way down, and they would be TOTALLY SECURE from the threat of the Russian and Chinese Ships that are constantly surrounding them. Together, what a great Nation it would be!!!”
He also recalled a recent conversation with Canadian hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, in which he urged him to run for prime minister. Trump claims Gretzky asked him whether he should be running for prime minister or governor, to which Trump said he replied: “Let’s make it governor. I like it better.”
Trump also posted two maps of North America, one with the American stars and stripes spanning from Texas to the Arctic, and another with the words “United States” stamped across both countries. In contrast to his allusions to military force when it comes to Greenland and the Panama Canal, Trump restricted himself to the threat of “economic force” to cut a better deal.
Canada is an enormous country with a small population relative to its size and tremendous natural resource reserves. A member of NATO and close collaborator with the US military, for example, through NORAD, it is the US’s second biggest trading partner, with a robust flow of goods and services flowing both ways across the border.
While the idea that Canada would ever become a US state may seem absurd, the Americans tried to conquer Canada twice before. In 1775, during the First American Revolution, they actually came quite close but were foiled by disease, winter weather, and bad luck, leading to a defeat at the Battle of Quebec. In 1812, they invaded once again to force Britain to negotiate concessions on maritime trade and end British support for anti-US Indigenous peoples. The Americans also dreamed of control over the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River to open up new land for American settlers.
From the perspective of the imperialists’ “Great Game,” bringing Canada even more fully under US domination has a certain logic. The US has entirely supplanted the former world hegemon, British imperialism, which has been relegated to irrelevant economic and military impotence on the margins of a Europe also in decline. Despite being nominally independent since 1982, Canada is a constitutional monarchy with King Charles III as its head of state, represented in Canada by the Governor General. It is part of the British Commonwealth of Nations. Cutting those ties once and for all therefore makes a certain sense.
Even on the basis of capitalism, a larger economic and political unit with an unrestricted flow of commodities and labor would bring efficiencies and economies of scale. But this would, of course, only benefit the capitalists and their ability to profit from the exploitation of the working class. Based on the socialist revolution and a workers’ government, the artificial borders between the US, Canada, and Mexico would be abolished, and a rationally planned economy would be established based on mutual respect, solidarity, and prosperity. A socialist federation of North America would be a key component in a socialist federation of the Americas and the world. But of course, this isn’t quite what Donald Trump has in mind.
From the perspective of the imperialists’ “Great Game,” bringing Canada even more fully under US domination has a certain logic. / Image: The White House, Wikimedia Commons
Mexico
True to form, Trump also came out swinging against his southern neighbor, Mexico, claiming that the Gulf of Mexico would be renamed “the Gulf of America.” Instead of scurrying to Florida to kiss the ring like Trudeau, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum did a bit of trolling of her own by unveiling a map from 1607 in which most of North America is labeled “America Mexicana,” and saying, “Mexican America, that sounds nice!” The name was internationally recognized and used as a maritime navigational reference going back hundreds of years.
But the reality is that the relationship with Mexico, the US’s largest trading partner, is fraught with tension and contradictions. It’s not for nothing that the Mexican dictator, Porfirio Diaz, is alleged to have said, “Poor Mexico, so far from God, so close to the United States.”
In his first term, Trump insisted he would force the Mexicans to pay for a wall across the US-Mexico border. Now he has threatened 25% tariffs on Mexican imports unless Sheinbaum’s government increases efforts to stop migration and fentanyl trafficking. He has even threatened to send the US military across the border to secure it. Never mind that all of this could trigger an economic crisis in Mexico, leading to even greater migration and loss of control by the Mexican state, which has already lost roughly one-third of its territory to the narcos and their cartels, according to the US military.
Trump has nominated immigration hardliner Tom Homan as his “border czar,” and his pick for ambassador to Mexico is former Green Beret Ronald Johnson. Johnson’s background includes CIA operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and counter-insurgency work during El Salvador’s civil war in the 1980s.
Playing openly on racist tropes, Trump says he wants to “end migrant crime, stop fentanyl trafficking, and MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!” To this end, he supports the use of special forces, cyber warfare, and other actions against cartel operations. He has proposed designating them as terrorists to provide legal cover for intervention.
As in the case of Canada, the idea of the US invading Mexico may seem absurd to many. But the US has a long history of military interventions in Mexico, with at least ten such incursions. First was the Mexican-American War of 1846–48, which resulted in the conquest of nearly half the country, including the present US states of California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona.
In 1914, the US sent troops to occupy the vital port of Veracruz. And from 1916–17, US soldiers crisscrossed northern Mexico in a failed attempt to capture Pancho Villa. In addition, the US has invaded other Latin American countries more than 70 times, including Panama. With the arch-reactionary gusano Marco Rubio as Secretary of State, countries like Cuba and Venezuela will also be squarely in the crosshairs.
In his first term, Trump insisted he would force the Mexicans to pay for a wall across the US-Mexico border. Now he has threatened 25% tariffs on Mexican imports. / Image: Sgt. 1st Class Gordon Hyde, Wikimedia Commons
BRICS, China, Russia
Again, all of this is a function of the decline of US imperialism relative to other rising imperialist powers. Bullying Greenland, Denmark, Panama, and even Canada or Mexico may get him some concessions, but large powers like China, Russia, and even Iran are not so easy to push over. After decades of US insolence and disdain, these and other rising powers have been pushed closer to each other economically and militarily. Between them, China and Russia together control huge territories, populations, and natural resources, not to mention a formidable military-industrial base.
All things being equal—technology, access to natural resources, a skilled workforce, etc.—a country with a larger population will outcompete one with a smaller population. This is why the US, which has just 5% of the world’s population, has deliberately kept most of the world poor and uncompetitive since World War II. Fomenting constant chaos around the world is one way to keep the upper hand.
However, the capitalists’ short-sighted greed led them to deindustrialize their own countries while unwittingly accelerating the development of capitalism in other countries. They also imposed sanctions and other restrictions on trade, forcing many countries to develop their own advanced technologies. As a result, countries like China, Russia, Iran, India, and North Korea today are nothing like they were 30 years ago. So much for the alleged “end of history.”
The rise of BRICS is the most graphic example of this shift. Estimates vary, but by some measures, the economic bloc’s ten members and eight partners account for nearly 50% of world GDP, dwarfing the G7. Of the top ten countries by GDP, five are in BRICS: China, India, Russia, Brazil, and its latest member, Indonesia, the world’s seventh largest economy and the fourth most populous. The other five are the US, Japan, Germany, France, and the UK. However, the comparison is even starker when measured by manufacturing instead of GDP, which includes intangible services.
Manufacturing output in China accounts for over 38% of the country’s GDP and is nearly 27% in Russia. In the US, manufacturing accounts for just 10.2% of GDP, with services contributing 80.2%. On a world scale, China is now responsible for around 30% of global manufacturing output. Meanwhile, the US’s share of global manufacturing has fallen from around 30% in the early 1980s to around 16% today. These few figures speak volumes. After all, to produce quality armaments in quantity requires the necessary industrial capacity.
Keeping his opponents guessing and off balance can only get Trump so far. In the final analysis, words must be backed up by military might, and military power is a function of economic power. The crisis of liberalism reflects the crisis of capitalism, but Trump offers nothing fundamentally better. But whether he likes it or not, Trump is essentially working with the same tool kit that Biden had in his failed efforts to stop American imperialism’s downward slide. As we’ve analyzed elsewhere, the war in Ukraine was a turning point. At best, it has severely degraded the West’s ability to wage and win war, at worst, it has exposed it as a paper tiger.
It may make sense for Trump to work on consolidating US power in the Western Hemisphere instead of aiming for the entire world. Perhaps a modus vivendi can be reached with some of these other powers, a kind of gangsters’ agreement to leave one another to do as they see fit in their own fiefdoms.
However, all such agreements are temporary, if they are even possible, as the build-up to both world wars clearly shows. Even small countries have their own national interests and will try to keep what they have and expand even further. BRICS countries like Brazil and India are seen by US imperialism as “swing states” to be won back fully to the American camp, and they will put enormous pressure on them to make that happen.
As for US efforts to drive a wedge between China and Russia, these are too little and too late. Moscow and Beijing may have plenty of differences on a number of issues, but their current interests align far more than they do with those of the lying, cheating, and hypocritical “rules-based order” of the US and its closest allies. The development of the 4,500-mile-long International North-South Transport Corridor is another potential game changer. Already well underway, the aim is to build out a multi-mode network of ship, rail, and road routes for moving freight between India, Iran, Azerbaijan, Russia, Central Asia, and Europe.
America’s imperialist rivals see an opportunity to fundamentally rebalance the world in their favor. One way or another, US imperialism will have to come to terms with the fact that it is no longer a “hyperpower.” Though it remains the world’s most powerful and reactionary force, it is now merely one great power among several. This dramatic shift is already profoundly impacting mass consciousness in the US—and will inevitably spill over into the class struggle.
BRICS countries like Brazil and India are seen by US imperialism as “swing states” to be won back fully to the American camp, and they will put enormous pressure on them to make that happen. / Image: The Prime Minister’s Office (India), Wikimedia Commons
Explosions of the class struggle on the horizon
We are witnessing a return to the more classical epoch of imperialism, as described by Lenin in his classic work—with all the tensions, instability, class struggles, and revolutions that accompanied that earlier epoch—on an even higher level.
Trump is a classic example of accident expressing a deeper necessity. He has served as an accelerant for the deepening divisions in the US ruling class, which are preparing the way for tremendous upheaval at all levels of society. We can also thank him for dispensing with the hypocritical veneer of bourgeois democracy and being blunt about the nature of great power politics.
However, “Fortress America” is no solution to the crisis of capitalism or the danger of class struggle and revolution. There is no solution within capitalism. You can’t just batten down the hatches and ignore the world, even if you control an entire whole hemisphere. Trump’s promises and proposals are much easier said than done, and none of them can solve the fundamental problems facing the working class. Even he cannot square the circle of the inherent limits of a system based on exploitation and the ruthless pursuit of profit.
Carving the world into mutually agreeable spheres of influence so they can get on with exploiting their workers and the planet is sure to appeal to many big capitalists around the world. But the real world isn’t a game of Risk. Capitalism is a global system; even large and powerful blocs cannot survive in self-sufficient isolation from the rest of the world economy. Along with commodities, all ruling classes must export crises and unemployment to their rivals lest they face trouble at home. That’s just how capitalism works. Long-term peaceful coexistence isn’t in its DNA.
Furthermore, the world working class, which is numerically larger and potentially more powerful than ever, will have something to say about it. Working-class rage is accumulating and the extraordinary support shown for Luigi Mangione is not an accident. The skyrocketing rise in interest in communist ideas after decades of hibernation is also no accident.
Everything is fluid and changing and nothing lasts forever—even the borders of the US nation state. This is especially true in times like these, when one socio-economic system is dying, and another is fighting to be born. As Marx wrote in The Communist Manifesto: “All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”
For all their bravado, the most farsighted representatives of the American bourgeoisie know they are sitting on a pressure cooker of class struggle that will eventually explode in their faces. Ours is the epoch of the world revolution, and this is the perspective the Revolutionary Communists of America are preparing for.
To learn more about the rise and decline of US imperialism, be sure to read Colossus, the latest publication by Wellred Books.
