Dana Schmalz on the “population argument”

“For the sustainable habitation of our planet, the decisive thing is how we live and consume, not how many of us there are." – Dana Schmalz (1)

Giant problems seem to call for giant solutions. And they are also a temptation to look for easy answers. But we also need frameworks to conceptualize big problems. The leading environmental activists, Bill McKibben, for instance, has stressed that the most important elements of environmental policies are batteries, wind turbines, and solar panels. (2) This is a good way of focusing the need for addressing climate change to understandable concepts for public policy that people can conceptualize without having to understand how to build a solar panel or being able to explain how exactly ocean temperature affects jet streams.

In her book The Population Argument: How the Concern Over Too Many People Influences Politics (my translation of the German title), Dana Schmalz looks at the ways since the 18th century that concerns about population growth have affected popular and scientific understanding of social problems. One of the more toxic contemporary examples is “eco-fascism,” which is, yes, A Thing these days.

She cites several recent cases of far-right mass murderers who cited “eco-fascist” motives: the Christchurch, New Zealand case of 2019 (51 killed), El Paso TX in 2019 (23 killed), and Buffalo NY in 2022 (10 killed). The idea in all these cases was that minorities, Muslims, and/or immigrants were ruining the environment. This notion is often joined with xenophobic or racist ideologies like the far-right Great Replacement Theory.

As Schmalz’ historical account relates, the scientific and fact-based study of population issues have often been used as part of racist, eugenic, colonialist and ethnonationalist projects. The British economist and demographer Thomas Malthus (1766-1834) elaborated a demographic theory the human population grows geometrically while the world’s food supply can only grow arithmetically and therefore the food supply would not be able to support the growth rate of the world population, with starvation, mass misery, and recurrent social crises being the inevitable result. He argued for social policies to discourage and limit population growth.

Here social-scientific interest and social concern were thereby mixed with an apology for the better-off: the poverty of many workers could be explained by the fact that they had too many children - and not by the fact that wages were too low. The population argument instead of social redistribution. (Schmalz, p. 17; my emphasis)

This Malthusian notion that those people – not the respectable ones – have to be controlled and regulated for their own good, as well as to protect the affluent from them, has never lost its attraction for those who count themselves among the most worthy and deserving.

The concern for “overpopulation” would also figure in significant ways in the movement for women’s rights and reproductive freedom, sometimes in the form of seemingly unlikely alliances:

Equal reproductive freedom [became] repeatedly threatened from several sides: by conservative opponents of birth control such as the Catholic Church, by racist anti-feminists who only approve of births of certain people, and by representatives of neo-Malthusian approaches who want to regulate reproduction with a view to an alleged or actual common good.

The development of demographics in the 18th and the following centuries did not first create notions of superior and inferior groups. But the beginning of the modern age, conventionally dated from 1492 with the European “discovery” of the New World and colonialism there and in Asia and Africa greatly encouraged the notion. The post-1492 sudden vast expansion of the Spanish colonial project coincided with the Spanish Inquisition and the accompanying notion of pure blood (limpieza), i.e., the quasi-racial notion of the superiority of Christians to Muslims and (especially) Jews. (3)

With the development of biological studies in the 18th century, the use of classifications in zoological and botanical taxonomy based on the scheme propagated by Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) grew. And eventually a classification by race was applied to humanity, as well. This notion was then used by many to call some of the races superior to others. In practice, the human racial classifications were always more pseudoscience and ideology than anything scientific. (4) These pseudo-scientific assumptions and biologically and racially superior groups were obviously convenient for European colonialism in the New World and elsewhere.

Schmalz provides an overview of these historical debates. For example, the philosopher William Godwin (1756-1836), husband of the feminist and author Mary Wollstonecraft, argued from a democratically-oriented view that inequality and suppression of political rights were more important causes of social ills than the population numbers. And she reviews the even more radical-democratic criticism that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels famously made of Malthusianism, which among other things contested Malthus’ argument that population would automatically grow exponentially without systemic efforts to lower birth rates.

The callousness that the Malthusian view could promote was famously illustrated by Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol, when two gentlemen come into Ebenezer Scrooge’s office to ask for Christmas donations for the poor. Scrooge grumps that there are prisons and workhouses that provide for the destitute:

“I wish to be left alone,” said Scrooge. “Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don’t make merry myself at Christmas and I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned—they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.”

“Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.”

“If they would rather die,” said Scrooge, “they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. ...” [my emphasis] (5)

Since then, the argument over whether social ills are due to too many people or too little equality and economic justice has been a recurring one, albeit in evolving forms.

The plague of eugenics

The development of the theory of evolution of which Charles Darwin was the most important figure brought as a (toxic) biproduct the notion of eugenics, the notion that human reproduction should be regulated and restricted in such a way that “desirable” human characteristics should be promoted and less desirable ones eliminated.

Eugenic claims were used to bolster the remarkably racially discriminatory immigration in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th century. Schmalz cites Harry Laughlin and Prescott Hall, the head of the Immigration Restriction League, as two prominent figures who used eugenic arguments to justify these extreme immigration-restriction laws. Those laws were particularly impressive to a young Austrian politician named Adolf Hitler. American race and immigration laws became important models for the Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935. Hitler’s National Socialist movement became enthusiastic supporters of eugenic notion that helped justify gruesome genocidal policies.

But eugenic ideas were considered respectable in Britain and the US, as well. As an example, Foreign Affairs, the prestigious journal of the US Council on Foreign Relations is the direct successor to a journal published from 1910-1919 called The Journal of Race Development. The lead article in its inaugural issue was titled, “The Point of View toward Primitive Races.”

To be fair, its author was G. Stanley Hall, a leading American scholar who played a key role in introducing Sigmund Freud’s theories to the United States. And, as cringy as the vocabulary sounds today, he was making an argument that those who imagined themselves to be more “advanced” had an obligation to promote equality and improvement for all:

Whether the nations that now rule the world will be able to indefinitely wield the accumulated resources of civilization is by no means established. It may be that some stocks now obscure may a few centuries hence take up the torch that falls from our hand and develop other culture types very distinct from ours; and that to them and not to us will be appointed the task of ushering in the kingdom of the superman. [!!] (6)

But Schmalz notes that in the US and Europe at that time, “Overall, attention in these years was focused on issues the distribution of population in space: territory, territorial conflicts and migration.” (p. 94)

She cites the view of Hannah Arendt argument that the notion that overpopulation was a critical threat was an essential element of authoritarian movements in the 20th century:

Arendt described the feeling of people's own superfluity as a basis of totalitarian systems of rule. The idea that a population had to be cultivated like a garden and subjected to selection also formed a basis of totalitarianism. Zygmunt Bauman has analyzed this "gardening state" as an aspect of modernity and as an essential step towards the destruction of the Holocaust. Looking at population as something to be ordered was generally linked to the modern view of the world as formable and made use of a scientific logic, even if the resulting racist classifications lacked any real scientific basis. Above all, such an approach, which "sorted" the population according to value, negated the fundamentally equal dignity of human beings. In extreme cases, it opened the door to arguments that even called for the destruction of life "for the good of the community". Such a eugenic and racist ideology of annihilation reached a climax under the National Socialists. (p. 55)

As Arendt put it, “Only where great masses [of people] are [held to be] superfluous or can be spared without disastrous results of depopulation is totalitarian rule, as distinguished from a totalitarian movement, at all possible.” (7)

We see this notion in the current far-right rhetoric against refugees and immigrants in the US and Europe: there are too many of them here, we don’t need them, they’re taking our jobs, and they’re taking our tax dollars!

Population concerns after 1945

Eugenics after the Second World War was generally discredited, not least by the horrors which racist ideology could generate with eugenic goals as the justification.

But population was still also a major consideration in the approaches to economic development that were a major focus in the decolonizing world after 1945. “Gradually, the theme of population growth was understood as an aspect of development, and the concept of development as such increasingly became a central concern.” (p. 62) In the 1960s, population growth became a more frequent consideration. And in the 1970s as the seriousness of environmental issues was becoming more obvious, it also figured in the debates over what role population played in ecological problems. As Schmalz relates, concepts like “population explosion” became more common.

UN Secretary General U Thant suggested in a 1966 speech that too many people could become a danger for individual rights. That theme was taken up 1968 by a major conference in Teheran on human rights, whose official declaration that hunger and poverty caused by population growth was a danger to those rights. But that view was also contested in subsequent years. Another aspect of this discussion involved women’s reproductive rights, both in terms of women having access to birth control and family planning services and in the context of population control measures that actively sought to limit the number of children per family, as China famously did for years with its one-child policy. India also undertook major sterilization campaigns starting in the 1960s. Schmalz writes, “China’s one-child policy [1979/80-2015] was an extremely oppressive measure and, as such, prompted international criticism.” (p. 78)

The world’s population has grown rapidly. Part of the challenge in understanding the issue was then and still is: “The underlying debates were based on complex bodies of knowledge – on statistical knowledge about the total population in a country, the distribution of age groups, average life expectancy, but also statistics on education and access to health services.” (p.82) It’s complicated, in other words, and that leaves plenty of room for demagogues to cherry-pick data to distract and confuse people. (Not a problem unique to demography, obviously.)

In more recent years, the issue of migration has also involved invocations of a threatening population growth. Africa currently has the world’s fastest-growing population and is also being hit hard by climate change. This has led to hair-raising projections of billions of people being on the move, with European countries supposedly the preferred goal for them. Germany’s Angela Merkel, who argued for more acceptance of refugees in the so-called refugee “crisis” of 2015-16, stated in mid-2016 that 1.2 billion people leaving Africa was a core problem for Europe. Schmalz cites a book, The Scramble for Europe: Young Africa on Its Way to the Old Continent (2019) by Stephen Smith of Duke University that promotes this notion, though she notes that not all of Smith’s analysis is as sleazy as some of the marketing for the book. But she also discusses how this scare talk about Africans flooding into Europe has produced some brutally bad measures to restrict immigration to Europe. She observes, “Population growth is already serving as an occasion and justification for massive migration control.” (p. 89)

This is a common theme in the European immigration debates today. And, like many of the arguments xenophobes and ethnonationalists use, it’s bogus. There are not a billion black and brown people flooding out of African towards Europe. Most of the shocking numbers of total refugees in the world are either internal refugees within their own countries or in a nearby country. That doesn’t mean they don’t have serious problems, they do. But they aren’t flooding into distant wealthy countries. But it’s an illustration of how the Malthusian idea of too many people still affects politics in significant ways.

She argues that, “Today, the dominant idea is that states must shape population growth politically in such a way that emigration is not necessary.” (p. 95) Not only is that view unrealistic in today’s world economy. But heavily ideological, ethnonationalist influences dominate that view of development even today.

The demographic and economic development of Europe is often seen as a model. It is claimed that other countries and regions must go through the same developments in this later time. But it is precisely the massive emigration [within and out of Europe] that accompanied the growth of the European population is left out of that concept. (p. 96)

The xenophobia that has been a key issue for far-right parties in Europe and the US lives on anecdotes and prejudices. Facts are powerful things. But facts alone won’t in themselves counter political demagoguery. It requires democratic parties to introject those facts into the political debate in a way that voters can understand and, yes, it requires stigmatizing the xenophobic claims. Rightwingers can and do sneer at such efforts as “woke.” But voters make much better and more practical decision when they are awake rather than asleep.

The scorn of the more affluent for those less materially fortunate that Adam Smith in the 18th century lamented as a remarkably persistent prejudice, the kind of contempt that the German sociologist Wilhelm Heitmeyer calls “respectable callousness” (rohe Bürgerlichkeit), still plays a large role in perception of “overpopulation.” Smith described it in 1759 this way:

This disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition, though necessary both to establish and to maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society, is, at the same time, the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments. That wealth and greatness are often regarded with the respect and admiration which are due only to wisdom and virtue; and that the contempt, of which vice and folly are the only proper objects, is often most unjustly bestowed upon poverty and weakness, has been the complaint of moralists in all ages. (8)

Schmalz describes that kind of respectable callousness in the present-day debates over “migration” in Europe:

The poorer the people who migrate, the more likely their number will appear to be excessive. Even though planes land in Europe every minute, it is the overcrowded boats that represent immigration for many, and whose occupants are the subject of endless discussions. The fact that populations in poorer countries on average are growing reinforces the impression among many that an ever-increasing, poorer proportion of the world's population is incessantly pushing into the richer parts of the world. This gets combined with racist prejudices. It is always "the others" who are too many. Racism contributes to the fact that people are not seen as having their individual stories, but as a non-individualized group. (p. 98) [my emphasis]

She also devotes a chapter to the ways in which women’s rights become mixed with immigration issues and can be used to reinforce “traditional” women’s roles, as well as to incite fear and hatred against immigrants. She quotes the geographer and migration researcher Nancy Heimstra: “The fertility of immigrant women, or more precisely, of non-white immigrant women, has long been the subject of fear and anger in the USA." (2001)

And Schmalz elaborates:

This observation from the United States can be applied to other places. The reproduction of immigrant women is often viewed critically, with the support of racist stereotypes and nativist fear. The rightwing discourse about the "too many children" that immigrant women supposedly have is often paired with an anti-feminism that laments the "too few children" of the local population. (p. 104)

She closes the book with an account of the present day discussions on ecological sustainability and population, emphasizing that sustainability has to do with factors like CO2 fuels that generate global warming, the need to not sluff those problems off as being secondary or pointless by falsely framing the problem as too many people. “Whether with eight billion, ten billion or much fewer people - the next few decades will be about survival and the good life on a threatened planet.“ (p. 154)

She also notes that based on current projections, world population would be expected to peak in half a century or so and then decrease: “Worldwide, the average number of children has been falling for years, while humanity continues to grow. The current forecast is that in the 2084 the most people ever will live on earth, and the world population will decline from then on.” (p. 153)

And she expects that for the next few decades, the so-called overpopulation problem will be most heavily discussed in connection with migration issues. The sooner democratic political parties learn how to advocate humane and practical measures for managing immigration and defusing ethnonationalist demagoguery, the better off the world will be. But those parties will still have to find ways to push back and discredit the “too many people” arguments. Facts and good sense can beat fearmongering and hate in politics. But it doesn’t happen automatically. It takes effort and creativity.

Notes:

(1) „Für das nachhaltige Bewohnen unseres Planeten ist ausschlaggebend, wie wir leben und konsumieren, nicht, wie viele wir sind.“ Schmalz, Dana (2025): Das Bevölkerungsargument. Wie die Sorge vor zu vielen Menschen Politik beeinflusst, 148. Berlin: Suhrkamp. All translations from the German here are mine.

(2) McKibben, Bill (2023): Yes in Our Backyards. Mother Jones May-June 2023. <https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2023/04/yimby-nimby-progressives-clean-energy-infrastructure-housing-development-wind-solar-bill-mckibben/> (Accessed : 2025-03-04).

(3) The father of the current Israeli Prime Minister was the author of a book on this development: Benzion Netanyahu, The Origins of the Inquisition in Fifteenth Century Spain (1995).

(4) Kolbert, Elizabeth (2018): There’s No Scientific Basis for Race—It's a Made-Up Label. National Geographic 03/12/2018. <https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/article/race-genetics-science-africa> (Accessed: 2025-03-04).

(5) The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Christmas Carol in Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas. (1843) <https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/46/pg46-images.html>

(6) Hall, G. Stanley (1910): The Point of View toward Primitive Races. The Journal of Race Development 1:1. <https://www.jstor.org/stable/29737843?origin=crossref&seq=2> (Accessed: 2025-03-04).

(7) Arendt, Hannah (1958): The Origins of Totalitarianism, 311. New York: Meridian Books.

(8) Smith, Adam (2004 [1759]): The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Part 1, Section 3, Chapter 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Mexico and Canada respond to Trump's new tariffs

Mexican President Claudia Scheinbaum doesn't back down to bullying. And she actually has some concept of international strategy, i.e., it’s more than a big mob "protection" racket. She can also express a chain of thought in complete and coherent sentences. Gosh, imagine a President who can do that! Like: "It is time for the defense of Mexico and its sovereignty." (As opposed to, say, "Don't tell us how we're gonna feel! You don't have the cards!") (1)

Scheinbaum is a physicist who has published two books and over 100 academic articles, so she's had practice in putting together coherent sentences.

She's called for a rally in Mexico City Sunday where she will announce what Mexico's retaliatory tariffs will be in response to the ones the US announced today against them. "Proudly, we are a country that is free, independent, and sovereign."

And Scheinbaum doesn’t hesitate to say how much damage that the drug consumption in the US generates for Mexico. Including the massive arms traffic from the US to drug cartels in Mexico, thanks to the American policy that firearms have the inalienable right to reproduce and be sold on the "free market." US President Richard Nixon announced the "war on drugs" in 1971. Maybe another in another 54 years or so it will finally start solving the problem.

All I can say is, Respect! And: ¡Viva la Presidenta!

Also, Canada’s Prime Minister, who I understand that some people consider to be quite a hunk, has his own patriotic thoughts on the situation. I’m pretty sure he won’t be asking for Canada to become a state of the United States. Just a wild guess. (2)

It's worth remembering that it was the Trump 1.0 Administration that negotiated the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement that encouraged business cooperation among the three countries. (3) I guess he’s changed his mind on that whole idea!

Notes:

(1) Es tiempo de unidad y defensa de nuestra soberanía. Conferencia presidenta Sheinbaum. Claudia Scheinbaum Pardo YouTube channel 03/04/2025. <https://www.youtube.com/live/PiTc8oW2Q6s?si=vLVX1kmzDtjPBiJG> (Accessed: 2025-04-03).

(2) Watch Trudeau speak directly to Trump during blistering speech. CNN YouTube channel 03/04/2025. <https://youtu.be/wz_42pckM7w?si=bNdg7viBqpeKlUyJ> (Accessed: 2025-04-03).

(3) United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Office of the United State Trade Representtive, n/d. <https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements/united-states-mexico-canada-agreement> (Accessed: 2025-04-03).

Timothy Garton Ash thinks “NATO is dead”

I’m trying to hold off for a few days on posting more about the Russia-Ukraine War and the uncertain prospects for ending or pausing it. But I’m posting this interview with British historian Timothy Garton Ash of Chatham House, who gives his current take on what looks at the moment very much like an important turning point in US-European relations. (1) This is one of those moments where a large part of the public can legitimately have the feeling that Big Changes Are Happening. It’s a lot for everybody to digest.

On the ”NATO is dead” comment, it’s worth remembering that NATO survived both the end of the Cold War and the Iraq War.

Notes:

1) 'NATO Is Dead,' Says Chatham House's Timothy Ash (Full Interview). Bloomberg Podcasts YouTube channel 05/03/2025. <https://youtu.be/AfvShTxYwas?si=qMi3mEKiQijW0TR5> (Accessed: 2025-03-03).

Tim Walz: a welcome alternative to the Oval Office show

After the Trump Oval Office horror show with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy on Friday, it’s encouraging to remember that there are still serious and competent political leaders in America who not only belief in democracy and decency but are committed to policies that make people’s lives better. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is one of them: (1)



Notes:

(1) Gov. Walz On What Went Wrong On The 2024 Campaign w/ Molly Jong-Fast. Fast Politics Podcast YouTube channel 02/26/2025. <https://youtu.be/S8Wz-TeXXto?si=TWIIasLjy-BQB4-N> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

Trump-and-Vance vs. Zelenskyy

This has been quite a week in US and European foreign policy!

Trump on Friday presided over one of the greatest diplomatic disasters in modern history. Tempers flared, voices were raised and protocol was shredded in the once-hallowed Oval Office. As Trump got into a shouting match with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a horrified Europe watched the post-second world war order crumble before its eyes. [my emphasis] (1)

It was Donald Trump and his Opus Dei Vice President J.D. Vance who presided over Friday’s fiasco. Co-President Elon Musk was for some unannounced reason not present at the event.

Eric Edelman and Eliot Cohen did this podcast on the conservative site The Bulwark, in which both appear to be genuinely stunned by Friday’s bizarre Oval Office show with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. (2)

Cohen here argues that Trump’s brand of isolationism is the same as the realist/restraint school of foreign policy thought, which is misleading, although we could identify occasional overlaps. I think he’s mostly taking a dig here at the Quincy Institute and their Responsible Statecraft website by talking about their namesake John Quincy Adams.

(Trigger warning: They introduce the ubiquitous Munich Analogy within the first four minutes. I hope by the 22nd century people won’t have to hear about the Munich Analogy year in and year out.)

Also, I hope I never feel the urge to use the phrase “objectively pro-Putin” as they do here. We have more than enough tired tropes in foreign policy discussions as it is. Fun trivia: it’s a favorite habit of neocons to accuse their critics of being “objectively” pro-Bad-Stuff, e.g., objectively pro-Saddam, objectively pro-terrorist, etc. This is a rhetorical holdover from the Trotskyist roots of so many neocons like Norman Podhoretz. It’s always helpful to remember that all of foreign policy involves some form of taking sides with this or that country or one issue or another or maybe many. Approving of some policy position by Country X does not in itself mean that that someone is “objectively pro-Country-X.”

Eliot Cohen suggests that the Friday Oval Office meeting may have been seen by European NATO allies as a kind of nail-in-the-coffin for any lingering hope that Trump may be willing or able to conduct some kind of practical foreign policy with half-competent diplomacy. Cohen says that his advice to European allies would be: “For the next three years and 11 months, you cannot trust this American administration.” To his credit, he also acknowledges that there are people in the world who have had good reason before now to have less than complete trust in the US.

Here Brian Tyler Cohen interviews Tommy Vietor of the Pod Save the World podcast about Friday’s fiasco. Vietor was as spokesperson for Obama’s National Security Council 2011-2012. (3)

Kaja Kallas is Vice-President of the European Commission and the foreign minister of the EU, though her formal title in the latter role is High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. In 2021-2024, she was the Prime Minister of Estonia from the liberal (in the European sense) Estonia Reform Party. She says it’s time for Europe to take up the hoary if informal title of Leader Of The The Free World, since the Trump-Vance-Musk Administration. (4)

Juan Cole has a sobering reflection, “The West has Long Demanded of Palestinians what Trump Demanded of Ukraine — and More”:

I don’t bring all this up to talk about the rights and wrongs of the Ukraine War. There are military analysts and political scientists who have argued for some time that given Russia’s advantages in size and manpower, an outright Ukrainian victory is unlikely. That said, emboldening Putin in this way is unwise, sort of like letting your rival at the poker table know you don’t have any face cards.

I would like to take the moment to point out that Trump’s demands of Ukraine are no different than the US and Western Europe’s demands of the Palestinians back in the 1990s, and that nowadays the West appears to expect the Palestinians simply to commit mass suicide. (5)

The future of Ukraine

It’s always helpful to keep in mind in the current state of the Russia-Ukraine War that official government positions are an always somewhat messy combination of formal positions, practical considerations, and negotiating positions. Countries also act out of principles of some kind. At a minimum their positions reflect some kind of ideological framework. Those frameworks are typically remarkably flexible when applied to foreign policy.

Kaja Kallas in the interview above talks about percentages of national budgets spent on military budgets, which is often how military spending is discussed politically. But while such percentages are an indication of a country’s policy priorities, they don’t give a comparative measure of actual military capabilities.

The World Bank has a table for national GDP by country for 2023 in US dollar equivalents. (6)

So, if 3% of GDP would be a prudent amount for Italy to spend on defense, would it be adequate for the Russians with a similar GDP to spend 3% on national defense? Or for Brazil?

A quick look at the map shows that each country has a very different geographic situation and very different potential risks. Brazil is more endangered by the possibility of a US-backed coup than from the threat of Paraguay ganging up with Uruguay to attack it. Even if Portugal were on the most hostile terms with its fellow NATO ally Spain, it wouldn’t need to build up the same size army and navy as Spain to be able to defend effectively against a Spanish invasion. Then there’s Russia, the country with the world’s largest land mass, a nuclear arsenal, sea borders all over the place, and various land borders with countries including China who have not always been on good terms with Russia, even if we look at only the last century or so.

The physical military defense needs of a country just can’t be measured in any meaningful way by what percentage of GDP it spends on its military. In the readjustments that Trump’s drastic downgrading of the NATO relationships are forcing, the European NATO countries will have do not only make hardheaded realistic assumptions about Russia’s intentions as well as their capabilities. And the European countries will need to make similar evaluations of their own positions. This will create pressure for a new arrangement with France and Britain for nuclear defense. And the larger powers including Poland and (yes) Germany will also have to re-evaluate their own lack of a nuclear deterrent.

Ukraine and future European defense

The adjustments that European countries make on self-defense in the coming months and years won’t be unmitigated good news for Ukraine. The EU nations do take the position that Ukraine deserves assistance in the fight against Russia. But their strategic priority will be to set up security arrangements to prepare for the contingency of a war with Russia. Ukrainian defense will necessarily be a secondary priority.

Timothy Garten Ash recently said on a Chatham House podcast:

I don't think there's much sense in going deep into what one might call Trumpology. It may be that there is simply no consistency in what is clearly a totally disinhibited narcissistic personality who tells us he was saved by God from an assassin's bullet in order to make America great again and save the world. There's a wonderful term sashing trying to make sense of Trump's nonsense, called “sane-washing”. …

But for me the important conclusion … is simply this: we should assume the worst case scenario that we cannot now rely on, we in Europe I mean, cannot now rely on Trump for supporting Ukraine, or ultimately long term for our own security.

So that rather than speculating about the mind of Donald Trump I think the real conversation we need to have is what do we do next in Europe. (7)

It seems to be safe to assume that Ukraine will not regain the control over its legally recognized territory before the Russians’ seizure of Crimea in 2014. And that there will continue to be resistance to Russian occupation in the other eastern parts of the country occupied by Russia. Chatham House last October spelled out four broad scenarios for how the Russia-Ukraine War could play out, the first two of which seem particularly relevant at the moment:

‘Long war’ – An attritional conflict giving each side the possibility to exhaust the other. Ukraine would continue to fight and try to rebuild at the same time, while incurring ever greater human losses on the battlefield and to migration.

‘Frozen conflict’ – An armistice that would stabilize the front line and allow both sides to regroup and rebuild their depleted forces in preparation for further fighting. There would be no agreement on Ukraine’s future military status or the size of its armed forces. Ukraine would remain formally committed to the goal of full restoration of its 1991 borders. [my emphasis] (8)

For the coming months, the “frozen conflict” option would require some kind of serious US diplomacy with Russia to make this happen. But the last two weeks have dramatically reminded us that Trump has shown no capacity to manage a strategic negotiation successfully.

At the Responsible Statecraft site mentioned above, Anatol Lieven and George Beebe seemingly try to be generous and give Trump credit for having some kind of broader strategic vision over the Russia-Ukraine War.

Based on their own view of the world and international relations (shared in private by a good many tough-minded members of the U.S. establishment) Trump and Vance by contrast believe that Russia had certain legitimate reasons to see Western ambitions in Ukraine as a threat to its security and vital interests. They see this war as part of a broader geopolitical conflict between the West and Russia over NATO expansion and Europe’s security order. Absent diplomacy, they think the spiral of action and reaction in this geopolitical conflict will only escalate, risking, in Trump’s words, “World War III.”

Trump and Vance see Putin as a ruthless but rational actor (much, perhaps, as Trump sees himself) who will make a deal and stick to it if it meets Russia’s essential conditions. They do not believe that Putin has any intention of going on to attack NATO. Above all, they are determined not to make any more U.S. security commitments in Europe beyond NATO’s existing borders. [my emphasis] (9)

Like I said, this seems to be a generous interpretation. Lieven and Beebe there are giving Trump and Vance credit for having something like a realist-theory model of the conflict. I haven’t heard anything from Trump or Vance that would make me think that is so. And I doubt that Trump is even capable of conceptualizing the situation in such strategic terms. He’s a cheap hustler who thinks foreign policy is a mob protection racket. Vital interests? A broader geopolitical conflict? Does anyone recall ever hearing anything like that from Donald Trump’s mouth?

I did a Google search on the question, Has Donald Trump ever used the phrases "broader geopolitical conflict”? No quotes popped up, but the Lieven-Beebe article was at the top of the results list.

So I tried ChatGPT (AI), which replied: “I couldn't find any public records of former [sic] U.S. President Donald Trump specifically using the phrase ‘broader geopolitical conflict’."

Microsoft Copilot (AI) replied:

Donald Trump and JD Vance used the phrase "broader geopolitical conflict" during a heated Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on February 28, 202512. This discussion became particularly tense as Trump and Vance criticized Zelenskyy for his stance on the war in Ukraine and his perceived lack of gratitude for U.S. support.

Which I hadn’t caught in watching it. But Copilot gave me two references. Neither of which contained the phrase. Nor did the transcript provided by Foreign Policy. (10) It’s still prudent to stay on a trust (maybe)-but-verify basis with AI searches.

But this part of the Lieven/Beebe analysis seems pretty straightforwardly obvious:

Ukraine’s position is gravely weakened; and if in the next round of negotiations the U.S. and Russian teams can come up with a reasonable compromise, Ukraine would be well advised to accept it in principle and try to negotiate as many advantages as possible over the details of the ceasefire and any changes to the Ukrainian constitution — negotiations in which Ukraine will of course have to be involved, whatever the state of relations between Trump and Zelensky.

For if Ukraine continues to oppose a deal and Trump withdraws U.S. support (including not just weapons but even more importantly Starlink and real-time battlefield intelligence), Ukrainian forces will face huge difficulties in holding their present positions and warding off a catastrophic defeat.

This will be true even if European countries continue their support. The governments of the EU and UK are now facing a critical dilemma, to which they will have to respond at their summit (including Zelensky) this coming Sunday, March 2. They will no doubt pledge to continue supporting Ukraine with aid.

But those European countries will not only have the limits on their own resources and the urgent pressure for building up themselves militarily. They will also have in mind the same unstated assumption of which the Biden Administration was clearly aware, which is there is a potential advantage for them in a longer war between Russia and Ukraine as opposed to a shorter one. Despite public rhetoric, they will also not be thinking exclusively in terms of the moral virtues of the “rules-based international order.”

And they have no reason to expect another “1989” to happen suddenly, where Russia decides to pull back from its current militarily goals in Ukraine in a way similar to what happened at the end of the Warsaw Pact.

Notes:

(1) Smith, David (2025): Diplomacy dies on live TV as Trump and Vance gang up to bully Ukraine leader. The Guardian 02/28/2025. <https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/28/trump-zelenskyy-shouting-match-oval-office> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(2) Oval Office Ambush. The Bulwark YouTube channel 03/01/2025. <https://youtu.be/09jLvF2IYGg?si=ZOo3BTM-FLXPrwZE> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(3) Obama official issues DIRE WARNING over Trump's Oval Office meltdown. Brian Tayler Cohen YouTube channel 03/01/2025. <https://youtu.be/2QlFS01-dOA?si=U9YtJ-JGbmokmEaO> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(4) Full interview: European Union's top diplomat Kaja Kallas. Face the Nation YouTube channel 02/28/2025. <https://youtu.be/F6d1iH5MxR4?si=b0hdb4m5ogzwW8S2> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(5) Cole, Juan (2025): The West has Long Demanded of Palestinians what Trump Demanded of Ukraine - and More. Informed Comment 03/01/2025. <https://www.juancole.com/2025/03/demanded-palestinians-ukraine.html> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(6) World Bank Group GDP (current US$). <https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(7) Should Europe start planning for the worst? Chatham House YouTube channel 02/24/2025 (after 4:30 in the video). <https://youtu.be/lU0V0c5Ig-w?si=S_rP1KOq0rEkTQ7q> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(8) Briefing Paper: Four scenarios for the end of the war in Ukraine (2024): Chatham House Oct 2024. <https://www.chathamhouse.org/sites/default/files/2024-10/2024-10-16-scenarios-end-war-ukraine-lough.pdf> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(9) Lieven, Anatol & Beebe, George (2025): Hard truths about the Trump-Zelensky-Vance Oval Office blow-up. Responsible Statecraft 02/28/2025. <https://responsiblestatecraft.org/zelensky/> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

(10) Rathi, Anusha & Lu, Christina (2025): Read Trump and Zelensky’s Fiery Oval Office Exchange. Foreign Policy 02/28/2025. <https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/02/28/trump-zelensky-meeting-transcript-full-text-video-oval-office/> (Accessed: 2025-01-03).

How is the Russia-Ukraine peace process going?

This may be the most memorable moment of Trump 2.0 so far. (1)

Trump posted this afterward:

Zelenskyy's body language after 8:35 when Trump says, "They respect me!" is particularly notable.

Notes:

(1) Zelenskyy and Trump clash in Oval Office. Al Jazeera English YouTube channel 02/28/2024. <https://youtu.be/uVQuA4TNgSE?si=jvVhk6Ks7T_fWiJ9> (Accessed: 2024-28-02).

European defense and Trump’s fantasy world

Deutsche Welle reports on Donald Trump’s latest create-your-own-reality concoction: “The European Union was formed in order to screw the United States.” (1)

Trump’s revisionist history was in the context of threatening European countries with tariffs, which is the main topic of the DW interview with Ethan Bearman of Loyola Law School. It’s nonsense, of course, though the EU really is a European institution and not some American shell organization. It began with what was called the European Coal and Steal Community (ECSC) in 1952, established by the Treaty of Paris. The “founding myth” of the EU emphasizes the initiative of Germany and France in trying to unify Europe and end the divisions in western Europe that were so central to the two world wars. However, the United States strongly encouraged that process.

As Stephen Walt notes in a piece cited below, in the immediate aftermath of the war, the fear that the US would disengage with Europe provided an incentive to think more seriously about European unity. But that wasn’t an anti-American impulse, it was coupled with a widely-held view that a continued strong US presence would be beneficial. The Soviet Union didn’t share the western European perspective on that point. But they adjusted after a few years to a system of de facto spheres of influence in Europe. And there was no direct US-Soviet war.

The process continued with the establishment of the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1957 and membership gradually expanded to include other nations. The Maastricht Treaty of 1992 established the European Union, which was a direct continuation of the EEC. The EU expanded to include what are now 27 members. Britain left the EU with its “Brexit,” which took final effect in 2020 after a national referendum in 2016.

The United States actively encouraged expansion of the EU after the end of the Warsaw Pact, seeing it as a way to promote stability, economic development, and democratic institutions. Of course, the US under the Clinton and Cheney-Bush administrations was aware that the EU in some ways was a competing power center, particularly in economic affairs. But there was heavy overlap between EU membership and NATO membership, and the US was and is the dominant power in NATO.

In particular, the US actively encouraged the expansion of the EU to happen sooner rather than later. In one sense, the US saw EU expansion as a kind of economic development and assistance program for former Warsaw Pact countries. And also as a way to prepare those countries for NATO membership, a fact of which Russian policymakers have been very much aware.

The US has always – at least until Trump 2.0 – discouraged the still-modest EU efforts to form a common army and defense policy. The US policy looked to have an EU that was economically strong but dependent on the US and allied to the US in strategic defense issues. There were certainly disagreements over particular policies with NATO, notably over the Iraq War. (2) And, until now, the EU countries were more-or-less fine with that arrangement, though France was always particularly keen on having a more independent EU position militarily and politically.

(This is being written before the scheduled meeting of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with Trump scheduled for Friday, February 28.)

Trump has (so far only figuratively) blown up that decades-old assumption. At the moment, European leaders have to assume that as long as Trump is President, the US is no longer a reliable ally in a potential conflict with Russia. And they can hardly ignore Trump’s statement that the whole purpose of the EU has always been to “to screw the United States.” Combined with what appears at the moment to be a strategic shift toward a pro-Russian foreign policy by the Trump-Musk Administration, the EU now faces a situation where the US can no longer be trusted to honor its mutual-defense commitment under the NATO treaty, though no EU leader is likely to say that out loud.

As Jo Inge Bekkevold recently observed:

Even though U.S. officials have signaled that they still support NATO, the Trump administration is now driving the most comprehensive remaking of Europe’s security landscape since NATO expansion in the 1990s—or, if the transatlantic rift deepens, since NATO’s creation in 1949. (3)

As Ethan Bearman notes in the DW report, Trump likes to strike a posture of blustering and threatening as part of his particular “transactional” negotiating style, by which most people presumably mean his view of negotiations as a zero-sum game in which one side wins and the other side loses. But it really is doubtful how much of what is normally called a “strategic” view of foreign policy that Trump actually has.

In the proverbial Grand Scheme of Things, traditional power-balancing considerations would suggest that the official US policy since 2011 that balancing against China is the biggest strategic goal means that the US should be trying to improve relations with Russia and to loosen its current close association with China. But, similar to the sea change in policy that Nixon’s improvement of relations with Maoist China during his Presidency represented decades ago, that would require an actual strategic understanding of the many adjustments that would have to be made with various countries to make that happen.

But what that would look like would be more along the lines of: Look, Russia, we are willing to arrange new, extensive nuclear-arms control agreements that mutually benefit us. And establish new trade relationships that do the same. But you to have back the hell off from Ukraine. And we’re willing to come up with some mealy-mouthed formula where NATO pulls back from its unambiguous commitment to making Ukraine a NATO member someday by saying they’re not backing off but that it could take 100 years or so for that to happen.

But declaring that Ukraine started the war and announcing to everybody that the US doesn’t intend to honor its NATO mutual-defense commitments is not likely to lead to that kind of strategic shift. If Russia has a solid alliance with China – which is does at the moment – and the US is sounding like it’s ready to blow off its commitments to its own long-standing allies, that looks much more like the Trump Administration doesn’t really know what it’s doing. (4)

It does sound like it’s in line with the TechBro anarcho-libertarian mantra of “move fast and break things” (in Trump fanboy Mark Zuckerberg’s famous formulation).

Whether move-fast-and-break-things was ever the optimal approach to the tech business itself is questionable:

Larry Fink’s 2018 letter to CEOs articulated the need for a new paradigm of stakeholder accountability for businesses across the spectrum. In the technology sector, venture capitalists must play a role in driving this change. The technologies of tomorrow—genomics, blockchain, drones, AR/VR, 3D printing—will impact lives to an extent that will dwarf that of the technologies of the past ten years. At the same time, the public will continue to grow weary of perceived abuses by tech companies, and will favor businesses that address economic, social, and environmental problems.

In short, the “move fast and break things” era is over. “Minimum viable products” must be replaced by “minimum virtuous products”—new offerings that test for the effect on stakeholders and build in guards against potential harms. (5)

In short, the “move fast and break things” era is over. “Minimum viable products” must be replaced by “minimum virtuous products”—new offerings that test for the effect on stakeholders and build in guards against potential harms. (5)

In dealings with Russia, that “build in guards against potential harms” thing is pretty important!

European powers like Britain, France, Germany, and Poland are very focused on the “potential harms” of Trump’s European policies at the moment.

Über-Realist Stephen Walt, who tends to be right in his calls on foreign policy than even his colleague John Mearsheimer, recently made this argument:

For most European leaders - and certainly for those in attendance at Munich last week—the situation feels very different today. For the first time since 1949, they have valid reasons to believe that the president of the United States is not just indifferent to NATO and dismissive of Europe’s leaders, but actively hostile to most European countries. Instead of thinking of the nations of Europe as America’s most important partners, Trump appears to have switched sides and sees President Vladimir Putin’s Russia as a better long-term bet. Speculation about Trump’s affinity with Putin has been swirling for years; those sympathies now appear to be guiding U.S. policy. [my emphasis] (6)

He notes that, in the abstract, it would seem to be a “realist” move for the US to try to improve relations with Russia to balance against China, as referred to above. But Trump 2.0 is doing something else:

If only that were true [that Trump is pursuing a realist approach]. In fact, Trump, [J.D.] Vance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and other administration officials have gone well beyond the long-standing disputes about burden-sharing, the need for a more sensible division of labor within the alliance, or the long-overdue reassessment about how to handle the war in Ukraine and relations with Russia. Their aim is to fundamentally transform relations with long-standing U.S. allies, rewrite the global rulebook, and, if possible, remake Europe along MAGA lines. That agenda is openly hostile to the existing European order. [my emphasis]

He cites the trade-war threats Trump makes against Europe as arbitrary and dishonestly justified and Trump’s seeming willingness to disregard even the most serious international commitments like NATO. Then there’s this whole seizing-territory thing he keeps talking about:

No wonder Trump is not troubled if Russia ends up with 20 percent of Ukraine, given that he wants all of Greenland; may reoccupy the Panama Canal Zone; thinks Canada should give up its independence and become the 51st state; and raves about taking over the Gaza Strip, expelling its population, and then building some hotels. Some of these musings might seem utterly fanciful, but the worldview they reveal is something no foreign leader can afford to ignore.

Walt also points to the Administration’s support for anti-liberal-democracy elements like Viktor Orbán and the far-right AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) in Germany as a grim sign. Walt doesn’t support the sort of missionary diplomacy represented by neocon “democracy promotion” efforts and doesn’t trust the associated claim that democracies don’t go to war with other democracies because democracies are somehow particularly peace-oriented. The latter assumption, after all, isn’t clearly compatible with the history of democracies during the last couple of imperialism spreading “higher” civilizations to the benighted races abroad. But the “realist” viewpoint doesn’t not have any particular preference for authoritarian government, who are at least vulnerable to making bad, non-“realist” assumptions about other countries as democracies often are.

But Walt also makes the key point that the Trumpistas are not anti-European in some generic sense:

... Trump and his minions support European far-right nationalist movements that share their basic worldview. They are hostile to a vision of Europe as a model of democratic governance, social welfare, openness, the rule of law, political, social, and religious tolerance, and transnational cooperation. One might even say that they would like America and Europe to have similar values; the problem is that the values they have in mind are incompatible with genuine democracy. [my emphasis]

And he observes in good realist fashion, “openly bullying other countries tends to encourage national unity and a greater willingness to resist (as we are now seeing in Canada), and the chaos Trump and Musk have been unleashing here in the United States may make Europeans wary of trying similar experiments at home.”

He also describes what a hard-headed European approach to Trumpist America First policies might look like:

Finally, if America is now an adversary, Europe’s leaders should stop asking themselves what they need to do to keep Uncle Sam happy and start asking what they must do to protect themselves. If I were them, I’d start by inviting more trade delegations from China and start developing alternatives to the SWIFT system of international financial payments. European universities should increase collaborative research efforts with Chinese institutions, a step that will become even more attractive if Trump and Musk continue to damage academic institutions in the United States. End Europe’s dependence on U.S. weapons by rebuilding Europe’s own defense industrial base. Send EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Kaja Kallas to the next BRICS summit and consider applying for membership. And so forth.

Because all of these steps would be costly for Europe and harmful for the United States, I don’t want to see any of them actually happen. But Europe may be given little choice. Although I’ve long thought the transatlantic relationship was past its high-water mark and that a new division of labor was needed, the goal should have sought to preserve a high level of transatlantic amity rather than encourage open hostility. If Trump’s diplomatic revolution turns 450 million Europeans from being some of America’s staunchest allies into bitter and resentful adversaries increasingly looking for ways to hinder the United States, we will have only ourselves—or, more precisely, the current president—to blame. [my emphasis]

The current European rearmament discussion is a reminder that weapons that can be used for legitimate defense and just wars can also be used for illegitimate and criminal ones. But European policymakers facing a potential US-Russian squeeze including concentrated efforts like J.D. Vance recent campaign speech for the AfD in Munich need to be thinking very pragmatically about what changes need to be made.

Notes:

(1) Trump floats 25% "reciprocal" tariff on EU goods. DW News YouTube channel 02/27/2025. <https://youtu.be/p62zvCoWD4I?si=e8WixNkA1tOvMzcy> (Accessed: 2025-27-02).

(2) Gordon, Philip H. & Shapiro, Jeremy (2004): Allies at War: America, Europe and the Crisis Over Iraq. New York: McGraw Hill.

(3) Bekkevold, Jo Inge (2025): Trump Remakes the Security Order. Foreign Policy 02/21/2025. (Accessed: 2025-27-02).

(4) Russian state media praise Trump and the US - and not everyone is happy about it. DW News YouTube channel 02/27/2025. <https://youtu.be/wxHqQkNCf3s?si=pxmXYWeA-CqU7CFX> (Accessed: 2025-27-02).

(5) Taneja, Hemant (2019): The Era of “Move Fast and Break Things” Is Over. Harvard Business Review 01/22/2019. <https://hbr.org/2019/01/the-era-of-move-fast-and-break-things-is-over> (Accessed: 2025-27-02).

(6) Walt, Stephen (2025): Yes, America Is Europe’s Enemy Now. Foreign Policy 02/21/2025. (Accessed: 2025-27-02).

US drones over Mexico and President Scheinbaum’s firm but cautious approach to the Trump Administration

Kyle Kulinski in this segment focuses on how Mexico’s President Claudia Scheinbaum is approach dealing with the new Trump II Administration. (1) Her name is German but she pronounces it “shayn-bom,” which I understand is the Yiddish pronunciation. She’s not only Mexico’s first woman President and its first Jewish President, as well.

He reports on Scheinbaum’s response to the military threats from the Trump Administration, which has involved declaring drug cartels in Mexico to be “terrorist organizations,” which the US can then use as an excuse for military action in Mexico, aka, invading Mexico. So that is a clear military threat toward Mexico. But so far in their first few weeks in office, the US is coordinating with Mexican forces. They recently started flying US drones over Mexico – which is a military threatening act – but Mexico at the moment is cooperating with those actions. Sheinbaum herself has said she formally requested the flights. (2) That could be a face-saving measure. But it is also Sheinbaum’s way of saying this cannot be done without Mexico’s permission.

For an idea of how touchy even that can be, we can recall Colin Powell’s infamous presentation to the United Nations in 2003, where he held up a bottle of powder and warned that the fearsome world power Iraq could use their drones to drop anthrax powder over the US:

“Iraq has been working on a variety of UAVs for more than a decade. This is just illustrative of what a UAV would look like,” Powell said, showing a photograph of a small unarmed drone. “This effort has included attempts to modify for unmanned flight the MiG-21 and with greater success an aircraft called the L-29. However, Iraq is now concentrating not on these airplanes, but on developing and testing smaller UAVs, such as this.” He went on, “Iraq could use these small UAVs which have a wingspan of only a few meters to deliver biological agents to its neighbours or if transported, to other countries, including the United States.” (3)

In his January 2003 State of the Union address, President Bush warned:

Before September the 11th, many in the world believed that Saddam Hussein could be contained. But chemical agents, lethal viruses and shadowy terrorist networks are not easily contained. Imagine those 19 hijackers with other weapons and other plans -- this time armed by Saddam Hussein. It would take one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known. We will do everything in our power to make sure that that day never comes. [my emphasis] (4)

The deadly menace of Iraq’s Drones of Doom turned out to have been, uh, somewhat exaggerated:

The prospect of Iraqi unmanned aerial vehicles spraying chemical and biological agents over densely populated areas over the United States was widely reported in the media. But soon after the invasion of Iraq, as the tall stories of Iraq’s WMD arsenal began to fall apart, Powell’s and Bush’s claims about the scale and sophistication of Iraq’s drone program proved to be wildly exaggerated. In their speeches, Powell and Bush had neglected to mention that the capabilities of Iraqi drones had been a matter of debate in U.S. intelligence circles, according to the Associated Press. The Air Force, it was later revealed, had maintained that Iraqi drones were not capable of posing any real threat to the U.S., or even to the countries bordering Iraq. “We didn’t see there was a very large chance they [UAVs] would be used to attack the continental United States,” Bob Boyd, director of the Air Force Intelligence Analysis Agency, told the Associated Press, also noting that it was unlikely that Iraq was planning to use its drones to deliver chemical weapons, since there was little crossover between the two programs.

Indeed, in the final days before the invasion, Iraqi officials had displayed one of the military’s drones in an apparent effort to refute claims that these systems had any of the capabilities that U.S. officials claimed they had. According to the Christian Science Monitor, the drone had “‘God is Great’ written in Arabic along the fuselage and on each wing, with a red permanent marker.” The aircraft’s wings were apparently held together “with tin foil and duct tape, and two wooden propellers bolted to engines far smaller than those of a lawn mower.” (5)

But that was good enough for the Cheney-Bush Administration to launch an illegal “preventive” war against Iraq, which was pretty generally a disaster. And had the strategic effect of strengthening Iran, because the new Shia-dominated Iraqi government wanted good relations with Iran, unlike the secular Saddam Hussein regime which we ousted – along with its anthrax tin-foil-and-duct-tape Drones Of Anthrax Doom.

So, yeah, Mexico has legitimate reason to worry about the Trump Administration flying military drones over its territory without permission. Even without inventing doomsday fantasies. And, of course, weaponized drones were relatively new in 2003. They are now a major element in military operations, as the Russia-Ukraine War has illustrated. The currently-paused Gaza War has also featured Israel’s use of drones for targeted assassinations. The US, of course, has also used them for that purpose.

Brian Finucane recently reminded us of how Peace President Trump has been approaching Mexico this year in the context of his peaceful military strikes during his first term:

With President Trump once again the commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces, military action against drug trafficking organizations in Mexico is all too plausible—including because of his administration’s recent designation of a number of drug trafficking organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) and revelations of increased U.S. aerial surveillance of drug labs in Mexico. ...

Trump’s track record on the use of force is relevant here. Although adverse to large-scale foreign military deployments in his first term, the United States under his leadership engaged in new conflicts and expanded and intensified existing ones. Trump’s prior administration turned frequently to airstrikes against terrorists (including escalating the U.S. air wars in Somalia and Afghanistan); raids by special operations forces; and crowing over the killing of “high-value targets” such as Islamic State leader Abu-Bakr al-Baghdadi who he claimed “died like a dog.” During his first term, Trump also ordered actions other presidents eschewed. For example, he directed attacks against Syria in retaliation for its use of chemical weapons in 2017 and 2018—something President Obama had refrained from in 2013 and which likely violated international, if not also domestic law.

Further, Trump also authorized the controversial drone strike in 2020 against Iranian general Qassem Soleimani—who both the Bush and Obama administrations had abstained from attacking due to serious concerns over Iranian retaliation, particularly given the U.S. military footprint within striking distance for Tehran and allied paramilitary groups. The prior designation of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC) (in which Soleimani was a senior commander) as an FTO seemed to have greased the skids bureaucratically to using other, more kinetic counterterrorism tools. Significantly, Trump appears not to have fully appreciated the risks of Iranian retaliation. He seemed taken aback by Iran’s unprecedent ballistic missile barrage at U.S. troops in Iraq—and immediately sought to deescalate the situation, including by downplaying the traumatic brain injuries Iran inflicted on U.S. troops as “headaches.” [my emphasis] (6)

Notes:

(1) Trump TORCHED By Mexico’s Left-Wing President. Secular Talk YouTube channel 02/25/2025. <https://youtu.be/DUfVyuIdbY4?si=IT3o9m_CPrgOnmPp> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

(2) Mexico's president says her government requested US surveillance drone flights. Associated Press YouTube channel 02/19/2025. <https://youtu.be/ZiPS0MMnZFo?si=Xyhrs1075kbWR_7d> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

(3) Michel, Arthur Holland (2025): History Lesson: Iraq’s Foil-clad Drones. Drone Center 03/13/2015. <https://dronecenter.bard.edu/history-lesson-iraqs-foil-clad-drones/> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

(4) President Delivers “State of the Union.” White House Archives January 2003. (Speech date: 01/28/2023).<https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/01/20030128-19.html> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

(5) Michel (2025), op. cit.

(6) Finucane, Brian (2025): U.S. Military Action in Mexico: Almost Certainly Illegal, Definitely Counterproductive. Just Security 02/20/2025. <https://www.justsecurity.org/107850/us-military-mexico-illegal/> (Accessed: 2025-26-02).

Negotiations over the Russia-Ukraine war, Trump-style

Regardless of what one thinks of the Trump Administration’s decision to try to put a quick end to the Russia-Ukraine War at this time, there are practical considerations that need to be kept in mind, unless someone is just a MAGA-cult cheerleader.

Michael McFaul was US Ambassador to Russia (2012-2014). He has tended to take a rigidly hawkish position on the Russia-Ukraine War and is currently, which it would be hard to argue has worked out unambiguously well for Ukraine so far. He is currently a senior fellow with the conservative Hoover Institute at Stanford. But he does have direct experience of negotiating with the Russians. And this observation about what he sees as an amateurish approach to the current Trump Administration negotiations with Russia over Ukraine. He thinks the Russians were likely surprised by the big concessions Trump made on this issue last week.

I watch Russian television so you don't have to. And. honestly, I think they are surprised by how much they have already gained in the last week of negotiations. I think they didn't expect that it would just be handed to them in the way that it does.

Like I said, I've negotiated with them. You hold your hardest cards to the for the last play in the negotiations, right? Like I helped to negotiate the New START treaty [of 2011]. And you left the very last plays to the end. We did the same thing on many other negotiations. And that’s, everything was just handed to them [by the Trump Administration in the last week], I, honestly, I think they were surprised by that.

Now, again, I hope that we're going to get better. You know, this was just their first time on the field. And [Russian Foreign Minister Sergey] Lavrov sitting there - he's been at it for 21 years. Secretary Rubio has been at it for three weeks. That's a big asymmetry in experience. I hope they get it right. But the first round definitely goes to the Russians. (1)

The need to negotiate an end to the hostilities seems obvious. And the Ukrainians’ most successful pushback against the Russia forces was in 2022, the first year of the war. They are now at an obvious disadvantage on the battlefield. So, there’s a good argument to be made that the West should have been making an aggressive push for a ceasefire two years ago.

But such negotiations are complicated, way more complicated than practicing for an episode of The Apprentice. And high-stakes international negotiations like this are particularly complicated, requiring some basic amount of professional trust and predictability on the part of the negotiators.

McFaul notably calls Trump’s negotiating approach “trolling.” And he sees it – plausibly – as a sign of weakness in negotiation.

Investment banker Bill Browder, the CEO of Hermitage Capital Management, has been one of the prominent critics of the Putin regime. He’s very familiar with the Putting regime and has been outspoken in his criticism of it for years. Not that it directly affects his competence as a commentator on Russia, but it’s an interesting biographical factoid that his grandfather was Earl Browder, who served as Chairman of the US Communist Party 1934-1945. Here is an interview with him from Times Radio, affiliated with the conservative Times of London: (2)

He also refers to the bumbling, confusing nature of the current approach Trump and Marco Rubio are taking in their current diplomatic posture.

Another specialist on Russia with interesting “red” ancestry is Nina Khrushcheva of the New School, the great-granddaughter of Nikita Khrushchev, the main leader of the Soviet Union 1953-1964. She mentions that she was also the last research assistant of the foreign policy scholar and expert on Russia, George Kennan.

Early in the following interview (3), she also makes the argument that Über-Realist John Mearsheimer has been making, which is that it has not been Putin’s aim earlier in the war or even now to capture all of Ukraine, though it’s very common for politicians and commentators to take it for granted that completely absorbing Ukraine is a goal of the current war. Khrushcheva does say that Putin may well want to have a puppet government of some sort in Ukraine. (Russia has formerly declared the Crimean Peninsula and part of eastern Ukraine as having been annexed to the Russian Federation.)

At 4:00 in the interview, the host asks her, “Are you concerned about what a Trump-brokered peace deal might look like?

To which she responds with a chuckle, “Well, I mean, I am concerned about anything [a] Trump deal would look like. I mean, generally I'm concerned about Trump globally. As far as NATO goes everybody knows that Ukraine's road to NATO may never happen.”

She goes on to say that the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO in the face of Russian opposition was always highly unlikely.

Another NATO complication

Another practical consideration for the European NATO allies is one that most commentators seem to find too delicate to mention. But, whatever one thinks of the grand strategy of NATO expansion, both Democratic and Republican administrations tended to look to expansion as a “freebie,” in the sense that it would increase American influence but was not going to be taken to require seriously preparing for war with Russia that could break out at any time.

The unification of Germany in 1990 added territory to former West Germany that was already a NATO member. (Exactly what promises the US made in those negotiations is still the subject of polemics to this day.) The first “NATO enlargement” after that was the addition of the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Finland joined NATO in 2023 and Sweden in 2024.

J.R.I. Shifrinson made an important point in 2023 on the problem with looking at new members as more-or-less freebies:

NATO enlargement may expose the United States to a variety of security ills while limiting its ability to respond to these dilemmas. First, ongoing expansion requires the United States to defend several Eastern European states of questionable strategic value, up to and including the use of nuclear weapons. Even if some of the members to which NATO has expanded are useful for denying prospective rivals room to prove their mettle (e.g., the European Union) or to expand their geographic reach (e.g., Russia), many of the member states to which the United States offered security guarantees via NATO are of minimal long-term importance. Loss of the Baltic states to Russia, for instance, would do little to shift Europe’s strategic map, while none of NATO’s new Southeastern European members are of use in either reinforcing US power or denying power to others. Having taken on the commitment, the United States—as NATO’s principal military backer—is now stuck having to try to defend these actors. [my emphasis] (4)

This is part of what is very misleading about all the Munich Analogy talk we’ve been hearing the last three years around the Russia-Ukraine War. It is commonly asserted that if the Western powers don’t help Ukraine stop the Russian invasion, Russia will absorb all of Ukraine and then start taking over Poland and other countries.

But what NATO countries have to take into account as a very practical matter is that Ukraine is not a member or formal military ally of NATO. The Baltic countries are. As Shifrinson further points out:

As the Russia-Ukraine War and the prospect of further Russian aggrandizement has thrown into stark relief, this is no easy task. The Baltics present an especially problematic situation, particularly for conventional defense. Local geography is unfavorable, the distances involved make reinforcement difficult, and the proximity to local prospective threats - in this case, Russia - means it is nearly impossible to obtain favorable force ratios. Nevertheless, the United States and other NATO members have tried to engage the problem, committing growing assets along the way. The alliance is therefore playing a fraught game. The United States and its partners can certainly try to develop military tools to meet NATO’s expanded commitments, but doing so is expensive, may exacerbate tensions with Russia, stands a real chance of failure, and—insofar as allies are under the US security umbrella—risks the United States putting its own survival on the line by extending US nuclear guarantees in the face of a nuclear-armed opponent. In sum, US backing for enlargement has left the United States with a suppurating sore of a strategic commitment, putting it on the firing line in Eastern Europe.

I think this is the first time I’ve ever encountered the phrase “suppurating sore of a strategic commitment”! And he adds in a footnote about the then-pending memberships of Finland and Sweden:

Likely Swedish and Finnish membership in NATO may mitigate some of the problems associated with a conventional defense of the Baltics, though is unlikely to resolve all issues. For that matter, Finland - despite its impressive indigenous capabilities - may present another difficult military challenge for the alliance.

It seems unlikely at the moment that Trump, who is trying to shove an unfavorable peace arrangement down Ukraine’s throat, will offer to commit US troops in Ukrainian territory. But with characters as erratic as Trump and his appointees, who knows?

Perhaps more relevant at the moment are European considerations of picking up the slack for American aid to Ukraine. With Trump communicating repeatedly that he does not consider himself bound to European defense under the NATO Treaty obligations, European NATO members are facing immediate decisions about how much additional aid they can or will provide to Ukraine. (5)

If the US pulls its support, European nations’ decision-making will be heavily influenced by the vulnerabilities Shifrinson describes – even though European leaders are unlikely to describe them publicly as a “suppurating sore of a strategic commitment.”

Notes:

(1) Trump Cozies up to Russia — Why “Nobody Trusts America”. Katie Couric YouTube channel 02/21/2025 (23:00ff in the video). <https://youtu.be/UOyy571-p-k?si=Zni2iThP-evgbpOv> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

(2) Bill Browder: Putin can’t afford to end the war in Ukraine. Times Radio YouTube channel 02/21/2025. <https://youtu.be/MO81t_Vgz7k?si=fhdC_Sdke0vxgk0U> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

(3) Nina Khrushcheva: 'It's Putin and Trump against the world'. Al Jazeera English YouTube channel 02/21/2025. <https://youtu.be/7c4Mufpj7a4?si=4HxXBhSf6L5Nr4Cu> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

Shifrinson, Joshua R. Itzkowitz (2023): The NATO Enlargement Consensus and US Foreign Policy: Origins and Consequences. In: J. Goldgeier, J. & Shifrinson J.R.I. (eds.), Evaluating NATO Enlargement: From Cold War Victory to the Russia-Ukraine War, 122-3. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. <https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23364-7_4>

(5) Gleichschaltung apparently hasn’t been fully implemented yet at the Voice of America. They report that European countries have contributed more to Ukraine in non-military aid than the US has, contrary to a public claim by Trump.

Powell, Anita & Babb, Carla (2025): US figures do not support Trump claims on Ukraine spending. VOA News 02/19/2025. <https://www.voanews.com/a/us-figures-do-not-support-trump-claims-on-ukraine-spending/7981441.html> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

J.D. Vance, our Opus Dei Vice President

Joe Conason has an appropriate analogy for Vice President J.D. Vance’s de facto campaign speech for the far-right German Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in the election that is being held today:

The comparison between the KKK and the AfD is all too appropriate, and not only because the German party echoes the racist rhetoric of thugs in white hoods. Back when Nazi spies in this country spent millions to subvert the United States during the years before World War II, their "German American Bund" forged a firm alliance with the Klan. It was a time when many American politicians, especially in the South, openly described the KKK as a legitimate expression of "the voice of the people." No doubt Vance would have been among them.

Today, the AfD members elected to public office in Germany don't hesitate to exploit anti-immigrant hatred and racial bigotry against both Muslims and Jews. No less an authority than the U.S. State Department — during the first Trump administration — repeatedly reprimanded the vile racism of AfD figures in its annual reports on human rights in Germany.

"While senior [German] government leaders continued to condemn anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim sentiment," the State Department noted in 2018, "some members of the federal parliament and state assemblies from the Alternative for Germany (AfD) Party again made anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim statements." [my emphasis]

Vance associates himself with the hard-right Opus Dei group and its social outlook, which could be described as a highbrow version of “respectable callousness.” Michael Sean Winters in the National Catholic Reporter describes the Opus Dei approach adopted by Vance this way:

Vice President JD Vance's comment to Sean Hannity about the hierarchy of love demonstrated why he and other prominent converts to Catholicism are so problematic. Vance told Hannity he was invoking "a very old school, and I think it's a very Christian concept by the way, that you love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after that, prioritize the rest of the world."

What followed was a window into the way so much of contemporary Christian life is deranged. Rory Stewart, a former aide to British Prime Minister Tony Blair who now teaches at Yale, tweeted, "A bizarre take on John 15:12-13 — less Christian and more pagan tribal. We should start worrying when politicians become theologians, assume to speak for Jesus, and tell us in which order to love ..." (2)

Winters cites an encyclical from the conservative Pope Benedict XVI to argue that Vance’s stunted view of Christian social perspective is Unclear On The Concept: “Vance, and the policies he is defending, does not start with grace and gratitude. He is not just ethically wrong. He doesn't understand the faith to which he converted.”

Bradley Onishi last year analyzed the difference in Vance’s Opus Dei outlook and that of the conservative Protestant-evangelical perspective represented by people like former Vice President Mike Pence. He explains that one Catholic philosopher with whom Vance has identified itself is the “postliberal” Patrick Deneen who in a May 2023 event:

... called for something more radical than January 6th: a complete toppling of the current American order. “I don’t want to violently overthrow the government,” he said. “I want something far more revolutionary.” Deneen proposes an “aristopopulism,” in which the virtuous elite provide order and structure to public life in order to ensure the flourishing of the ordinary citizens who cannot provide it for themselves. (3)

Notes:

(1) Conason, Joe (2024): Vance In Munich: Like A German Urging Americans To Embrace The Klan. National Memo 02/16/2025. <https://www.nationalmemo.com/jd-vance-racism> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

(2) Winters, Michael Sean (2025): The deeper problems with JD Vance's theological riffs. National Catholic Reporter 02/05/2025. <https://www.ncronline.org/opinion/ncr-voices/deeper-problems-jd-vances-theological-rifts> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

(3) Onishi, Bradley (2024): J.D. Vance Will Be A More Extremist Christian VP Than Mike Pence. Rolling Stone 07/27/2024. <https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/jd-vance-extremist-christian-vp-mike-pence-1235069117/> (Accessed: 2025-23-02).

Former general and current lobbyist Ben Hodges on the current Russia-Ukraine war negotiations

Former general and current lobbyist Ben Hodges has a been a reliable measure of pro-Ukraine hawkish sentiment.

Here he gives Deutsche Welle his view of the current situation: (1)

Lobbyist General Ben seems to be a bit discombobulated in this interview. More generously, we could say he seems to be taking a cautious stand in the face of uncertainty about just where the Russia-Ukraine negotiations might be going. From the video’s text summary:

Hodges emphasized that the U.S. has undergone a significant shift in its strategic approach to Europe, stating, “The U.S. has taken such a sudden change in our broad strategic approach to Europe.”

Hodges told DW that the shock waves of [Vice President J.D. Vance’s] speech in Munic[h] were intende[d]. “The Vice President is not going to be a foreign policy guy. The speech that he delivered was a shocking presentation, but I think it was intended to be that.”

About a possible peace deal in Ukraine Hodges said: “Ending the war in Ukraine is going to be a long process. This is it was not going to be 24 hours, it's not going to be 100 days. I think we're talking about many months.”

He said that Trump could easily change his approach to Russia: “The President wants to be respected. He could turn very quickly, when he realizes or begins to believe that the Russians are playing him, that they are, that they are never, ever going to give him the deal that he thinks he what and that. If the Russians overplay their hand, I can imagine the president turning on them very quickly.

He is asking and other European countries to finally step up: “Germany and other countries should not complain about being left out of these talks, but instead get involved in these talks.”

General Ben says that the Trump Administration is pursuing something that is “not a traditional diplomatic approach.” That may be lobbyist-speak for “it looks like a confused mess to me.” Which is a safe evaluation, I would say.

He also notes that the Russians “think they are winning right now.” Which does seem to be the case on the battlefield (by most accounts) and at the negotiating table, which at the moment looks like the US and Russia against Ukraine (without Ukraine being formally “at the table”). I think many commentators may be resisting the temptation to say the Trump Administration’s approach looks like a hopeless mess that can’t possibly bring about a stable peace agreement or armistice to end the war.

As Lobbyist Ben rightly explains, a stable ceasefire would require some kind of security guarantees, like an agreed-upon peacekeeping force. Which would be challenging enough in itself. But Gen. Ben talks about such a ceasefire as being a precondition for actual negotiations. And I think with master negotiator Donald Trump in charge, that possibility looks exceptionally dim, even already impossible. The big issues for a theoretical stable peace – Ukraine’s NATO and EU membership (or lack thereof), territorial compromises, timelines and guidelines for troop withdrawals, agreed arrangements for both Russia and Ukraine about the force levels allowed to be stationed near the borders after a longer-term settlement – would have required the US side to negotiate in a credible way over territorial concessions (temporary and permanent), an end to sanctions against Russia, and the broader nuclear arms-limitation framework with Russia.

But since the Administration is taking the position that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a dictator and the initiator of the war and is demanding Ukraine hold wartime elections to oust him while also demanding what can fairly be described as draconian reparations to be paid by Ukraine to the United States, this hardly seems like any remotely normal international negotiation for such a situation.

Gen. Ben makes a point that seems in line with what other analysts have been saying, which is that Russia faces a challenge in advancing forward with their army. In a longer-term perspective, Russia’s population advantage and its much larger armaments industry give it the definite advantage in a continuing war. But this is very much a conventional war, in which offense is normally more a challenge than defense. And both sides have been relying heavily on planting landmines, which are a major challenge for both side in achieving military advances. (Even in a model peace agreement, cleaning up the land mines would be a huge challenge, even without Ukraine being required to pay Trump’s proposed reparations to the United States.)

He also makes the observation that Trump has staked a enormous portion of his reputation on getting a Russia-Ukraine peace deal done. And if he were to become convinced that the Russians were getting the best of him in the negotiations, he might take a less conciliatory position. But in conventional negotiating terms, haven’t the Russians already gotten the best of him, with Trump having more-or-less conceded to the major demands of Russia on territory to be held and Ukraine to be excluded from NATO?

Ukraine in NATO and even Ukraine in the EU look like non-starter ideas anyway at this point. But as a negotiating strategy, why make those concessions at the very start of the process? Because it doesn’t look like the Russians are conceding anything up front. Ending a war in Afghanistan by just pulling out after 20 years of accomplishing not much of anything made sense. Treating the reshuffling of the entire security structure in Europe like an episode of a reality-TV series doesn’t.

I’ll have to give Gen. Ben credit on this one. He’s been a dogmatic hawk in his public statements on the Russia-Ukraine War in his interviews I’ve seen over the last three years. But in this one, he sounds more like an actual political and military analyst and less like a professional arms lobbyist than I’ve heard him before.

Notes:

(1) Ret Army General Hodges: A Ukraine peace deal will take months. DW News YouTube channel 01/22/2025. <https://youtu.be/hVD0jWlyP2c?si=W6ij2alSDI4P9kOo> (Accessed: 2025-22-02).