The great Chinese theorist and philosopher of War, Sun Tzu, placed great emphasis on creating uncertainty, thriving of chaos and crafting an aura of unpredictability.
From a crackdown on illegal immigrants in the US, choking off US AID, threatening broad and deep tariffs on imports into the United States and exacting quid pro quos from other states, and above all threatening to displace Gazans to Egypt and Jordan, US president is positioning himself in the interstices of Sun Tzu’s suggestions and advice.
To repeat, these are uncertainty, unpredictability overlaid by chaos. All this is complemented by a domestic agenda where President Trump sees an ‘enemy within’ that is not merely sought to be displaced but squelched.
To ensure that the Trump legacy lives on beyond the president’s second term, the US president with his advisors and ideological acolytes is seeking to craft a new institutional paradigm by grafting his version of conservativism on the detritus of the country’s institutions (some call aspects of this activism as ‘radical constitutionalism’).
Trump as 'insurgent & disruptor'
All these themes and the issues they beget corresponds to Donald Trump’s self-concept and image as an ‘insurgent’ and a ‘disruptor’. While aspects of the Trump agenda appear to hold water-the elite capture of US institutions and an elitism that is at odds with the welfare of the ‘average ‘ Americans and so on-it appears only within a month’s time since he assumed office, the 47th president of the United States is overreaching.
One glaring and egregious example of Trump’s overreach is his threat of depopulating Gaza and ‘deporting’ Gazans to Jordan and Egypt. On the face of it, this threat is egregiously bizarre. But scratch the surface and think deeper, the threat appears to be more in the nature of a negotiating tactic- corresponding to Donald Trump’s penchant for the ‘art of the deal’.
US threatening adversaries, allies alike
This is how it goes. President Trump knows that despite being in relative decline, the US has immense power. He appears to be employing this reservoir of power by making and staking out very extreme(even bizarre) positions.
By combining American power with extreme negotiating tactics, it appears that Donald Trump wants adversaries, opponents or his sparring partners in negotiations to come to terms with what he wants, (say a middle ground) but from a position of strength. Consider the Gaza ‘proposal’.
Donald Trump’s real goal might be to disrupt the Middle east by throwing the proverbial spanner into its works. After initial reactions by major players in the region, Trump ‘by setting the agenda’ will guide these players to a minimum threshold and acceptable ‘solutions’.
While Trump may or may not succeed in this - from a game theoretic and real perspective - what he risks is both the prestige of America (or more accurately what is left of it) and his own credibility as an ace negotiator. Or, in other words, by making himself predictably unpredictable, the American president by creating chaos and uncertainty may succeed for a given moment.
But when this ‘moment’ passes, Trump risks ‘collective action’ by other states that are in his cross hairs. This may or may not take the form of balancing against America. It may be more subtle and thereby more insidious for America and its strategic and long term interests.
Hegemonic stability theory
By way of a digression , and from the vantage point of the realist school of international relations, while states are irreducibly competing entities that compete for power and seek security in an anarchic world, they do co-operate and seek avenues for the same.
A somewhat allied theory – the Hegemonic stability theory - suggests that in the anarchic structure of world politics, it is the hegemon of the day (benign?) that imparts stability to international relations. An important corollary here is that of giving ‘voice’ to other states, which, among other things, gives legitimacy to the ‘hegemon’.
At the end of the day, it is held that this is a win win situation for all. But Donald Trump is giving short shrift to all this. The idea or the underlying premise appears to be that by creating chaos and inducing uncertainty, team Trump will arrive at a ‘solution’ that maximizes benefits for America and gets the country’s competitors, adversaries and so on to exactly where Donald Trump wants them to be.
On the face of it and in the short term, team Trump appears to be succeeding. But it is precisely here that Trump can flounder. By creating a group of disaffected states and nations, through sheer uncertainty and chaos, and staking extreme positions, Trump risks withholding of ‘willing co-operation ‘ by these entities.
What are tacticle gains?
In the short term, yes they have no choice but to acquiesce. But from a longer term perspective, this induced acquiescence can turn into sullen withholding of co-operation in vital areas of interest(s). This, in turn, can lead to balancing behaviour of a different nature against America.
In the ultimate analysis, Donald Trump in his first month of office is eliciting tactical gains. But he can convert these into strategic gains only and only when inserts and injects some sobriety, gravitas and stability into the melee of uncertainty and chaos.
If Donald Trump persists in the uncertainty and chaos model he has induced, this can spill over and have implications on his domestic agenda too. It is a truism to state that the tone of a given political office, governance and overall disposition is set in its initial stages.
Stakes and risks involved
Donald Trump has ably done that. But given the stakes and the risks involved, now is the time to temper his approach and accord latitude to elements of sobriety and stability into the mix. Otherwise by being ‘predictably unpredictable’, Donald Trump risks a lot.
Now is the time to ‘knead the political and grand chess board dough' of international relations into a shape that redounds to the benefit of the United States and the world at large.
Contrarily, if Trump does not stop his own Tsunami, and temper it with by giving it a bold and beautiful direction and shape, the omens do not look too good.
At the level of personality, and type thereof, Donald Trump’s extroversion must be complemented by some degree of introspection. The rest, which is mere corollary, will follow.
Axiomatically.
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