The Art Of The Juggle

In the most recent post here I made reference to Trump’s “baffle ‘em with bullshit” approach to geopolitical deal making. My point was that Trump is spinning narratives that simultaneously target his domestic audience while attempting to prepare for making some hard decisions to get the US out of its forever wars. This is most apparent in Trump’s statements about our war on Russia. I remain convinced that Trump’s counter factual statements—parroting old Zhou regime talking points—are knowingly made for the purpose of spinning narratives, not because he’s deceived by the Deep State. This is all predicated on Trump’s obvious need to end these disastrous wars in order to keep the momentum going for his domestic agenda. No, Trump isn’t about to abandon geopolitics, but he needs to simply our entanglements.

Having dropped a series of controversial statements about Putin and Russia last week, Trump then turned to the Middle East and parroted more Zhou regime ideas—relocating Palestinians out of Palestine to Egypt and Jordan. In other words Trump appeared to be endorsing a program of ethnic cleansing. Interestingly, just as Trump did a lot to prepare the ground for the hot war in Ukraine that happened after 2020, he also—with the Abe Accords—made the current war in Palestine basically inevitable. The main point of the Abe Accords was to bypass the Palestinians to “normalize” relations with regional Arab states, preparing for the expulsion of Palestinians from Palestine. The Palestinians were bound to resist that. Not only did Trump appear to resurrect that losing idea, but he also touted having sent more 2000 lb. bombs to Israel—the only use for which is to kill civilians and demolish infrastructure. The suggestion appeared to be that Trump is ready to greenlight more genocide.

What’s going on? As I presented it, “Turning to the Middle East, we see a somewhat similar situation [similar to Trump’s Russia rhetoric].” None of what Trump has said in recent days about Palestine and its people makes much sense. His suggestions for ethnic cleansing are none starters—the Palestinians will not voluntarily vacate their lands. Worse, any resumption of war is now up to Trump—having coerced the ceasefire and exchange of prisoners, Trump owns the war. Remember—Netanyahu wanted those Israeli prisoners dead. He did not want them returning to tell of their humane treatment at the hands of Hamas, to further debunk the Israeli penchant for atrocity porn. And he definitely doesn’t want them raising issues that could question how October 7th could have happened in the first place.

Is it possible that Trump is making these statements in another juggling act? Is he trying—on the one hand—to placate the Zionist crazies while—on the other hand—trying to exert some pressure on the Palestinians to agree to some peace deal that he’ll propose at some later date—as a prelude to US disengagement? This scenario may seem far fetched, but the basic reality that has to govern this situation is that war is NOT in Trump’s favor. Alastair Crooke made the same point today with Judge Nap. In so many words, Crooke maintained that, whatever Trump’s rhetoric, he cannot want more war. Because Trump will own that war. Everyone knows that he can tell Netanyahu ‘No’ and Netanyahu will have to do what Trump says. Trump’s coerced ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal removed all pretense in that regard. Trump stands in the middle now.

An article at American Conservative today supports this view that Trump is talking out of both corners of his mouth—or juggling, to be kinder. Recall that the Mike Dimino mentioned here has appeared multiple times on Danny Davis’ show. He always struck me as a straight shooter, and it turns out he did some straight shooting while getting confirmed to head US Defense policy in the Middle East:

Know Them by Their Enemies

The losers of a quarter century of ideological battle don’t get to dictate terms to the winners.

Sumantra Maitra’s main point is that Trump’s enemies lost the election—they were buried in a landslide—and so Trump gets the appointees of his choice. Maitra is eloquent on this point:

Senators Murkowski, Collins, and McConnell joined the Democrats against Hegseth, so the Bronze Star–winner and Ivy grad barely scraped through on J.D. Vance’s tie-breaker vote. By contrast, Lloyd Austin was confirmed as secretary of defense with a 93–2 vote, James Mattis with 98–1, and Leon Panetta unanimously.

This clearly shows something. The president deserves to get his appointees, but what about the massive propaganda machine for derailing anyone who might threaten the uniparty system?

If there’s any meaning to a democracy, then protest votes should mean, at a minimum, an actual change to the system.

I guess what this shows is the massive resistance that Trump has had to overcome. But he came ready for this fight.

OK, that’s a simple point, but then Maitra moves on to some interesting substantive observations—if personnel does, indeed, drive policy. Trump’s second tier DoD picks have non-conventional ideas, and haven’t been bashful about expressing them in their confirmation hearings. They want to end the war in Russia and they don’t think Israel’s wars on non-Jews should involve Americans. Maitra focuses on the political process, but please pay attention to the views of the people with whom Trump is populating the bureaucracy at policy shaping levels—how does this fit in with a litteral reading of Trump’s rhetorical excesses? Answer: It really doesn’t. And note that Maitra identifies as a colleague in arms with these Trump appointees, so his comments are also revealing.

The keen-sighted among us were already aware of a few hit pieces, the latest one being against some Trump DoD picks, naming, among others, Dan Caldwell, Michael DiMino, Tulsi Gabbard, and Elbridge Colby. Most of them have been frankly idiotic, and it is a small tragedy that one has to spend time on them. One “scoop” against Tulsi Gabbard, for example, warns that there’s a clique of Republican senators who are wary of her, without actually naming even a single one of these senators. The second one is a lengthy record of very mainstream quotes by Michael DiMino, a CIA analyst who was tapped to be Trump's DoD Middle East expert. DiMino dared to mention that the conflict in Israel isn’t a core American security concern, and that we should figure out how to get out of the Middle East. The third, a major hit piece on Dan Caldwell, mentions as an authority David Wurmser, Dick Cheney’s Middle East advisor who wrote in 1996 that America should overthrow Saddam to “enhance Israel’s security,” concern-trolling Trump’s nominee Pete Hegseth.

Think about that. Trump is appointing as the top DoD Middle East expert a guy who … wants to get the US out of the Middle East! And please don’t tell me that Hegseth came up with that appointment all on his own. Trump knows what’s going on with these appointments, and that has to mean that at some level he approves of their views.

There is a lot to write about here. My colleague Jude Russo has already rebutted most of the stupid accusations against DiMino. Like him, Caldwell, and Colby (all three of whom I know personally, even writing a joint paper on Middle East force posture with Caldwell, who was briefly my colleague at the Center for Renewing America), I don’t much care about the Middle East. I have no family ties to that region, and I think we should leave it to find its own equilibrium; we should avoid further engagement there. My concern here is less about the Middle East as such and more about what the fight portends for this administration: To what extent do the losers of a quarter century of ideological battle get to act as gatekeepers for the winners? …

The push for a “muscular” approach in the Middle East has been an unmitigated disaster, resulting in debt, deaths, and disillusion. It’s a miracle of unipolarity and American structural advantage that America survived the ordeal—although the fact that unipolarity now lies in ruins is a testament of how pyrrhic that survival was. History is littered with examples of great powers collapsing due to insolvency and overstretch. The architects of the bad, old model should all, at a minimum, spend the rest of their wretched miserable lives like penitent sages in the Himalayas who take on the voluntary “vow of silence.”

Yet here we are. “The neocons have never had popular support for their program, which effectively uses the United States like a rental car,” Tucker Carlson told this correspondent, “but the results of the last election demonstrate clearly that most Americans sincerely despise them, and for good reason. Trump should proceed accordingly, and treat the neocons as he would their allies Liz Cheney and Nancy Pelosi—as the malicious buffoons they are.”

Is it possible that Trump has a plan? It certainly is. Next up: Tulsi Gabbard, Russ Vought, and Kash Patel. Trump is determined. If this is what he’s trying to do we’ll find out soon enough.