The policies will continue

With Mr Trump’s election as US president, there is one big question right now about democracy and rule of law worldwide. Will they weaken?

At first glance, the answer is yes. The Republican Party that Mr Trump leads is eerily similar to several European parties where the extreme right-wing has taken hold: AfD in Germany, Le Penn’s National Rally in France, Meloni’s The Brothers of Italy, who are directly descended from Mussolini’s fascists, Austria’s Freedom Party, which calls its leader Volkskanzler – the Nazi term used for Hitler – Poland’s Justice Party, Greece’s Golden Dawn party, etc as well to our very own PTI.

Such parties have caused "the level of democracy enjoyed by the average person in the world in 2023 (to fall) to 1985 levels", says the V-Dem Institute in its latest World Democracy Report.

So, Mr Trump’s agenda should worry us if we care about democracy and rule of law. But look closer and you see nothing new in his fundamental policies. On these, he sees eye to eye with the Democrats: hawkishness towards China, unremitting increases in the US war budget, and unconditional support of Israel.

None bodes well for democratic norms and rule of law worldwide. Yet, these policies don’t change no matter who the president is. A closer look at each explains these continuities: First, why hawkishness towards China? Because a rising China threatens US economic dominance.

China "is the only country with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do it", says Mr Anthony Blinken – and rightly so. China has pulled ahead in several vital technologies such as lithium batteries, microchips, high-speed railways, and electric vehicles. Its production speed and scales are 5-10 times faster and higher than anywhere else. It accounts for a third of world manufacturing production or three times more than the US’s share. And its global trade and investments eclipse those of the US.

So, the US will keep hurting China: ramp up anti-China rhetoric, demonise it, impose trade barriers and sanctions, fracture the world trading system, and undermine the WTO.

If Mr Trump imposes 60 per cent or more tariffs on Chinese imports, as promised, and more Huawei-like sanctions, which cut Huawei’s access to advanced US technologies, the trade war with China will aggravate. But China isn’t taking it lying down. The Huawei sanctions didn’t work. It found alternate supply chains, and roared back, firming up its leading position in the global telecom market.

You can’t slow China down this way. Its planned economy is versatile. It bends and bows at will. It has reduced dependence on exports as its key driver of growth. And it comfortably maintains GDP growth of over 5.0 per cent propelled by state-led investments and growing consumer demand.

Instead, a trade war hurts the US more and drags us all, the rest of the world, down. For instance, tariffs on Chinese goods will be inflationary, and Chinese loans to finance US debt ($749 billion) may be jeopardised. And since the US and China account for 43 per cent of the world's GDP, whatever happens between the two affects the rest of the world. A sneeze in their relations causes a worldwide cold, which must be avoided at all costs.

Second, why does the US war budget rise unremittingly? On the surface the answer is to make the world ‘safe for democracy’ and ‘the American way of life,’ which means controlling the oceans and servicing 700 military bases in 80 countries, including 313 around China, to cordon, contain, isolate, and punish it.

Dismantling American military hegemony is not on anyone’s radar in the US. And the numbers show it: the 2024 $1.9 trillion US war budget is more than the countries with the next nine largest war budgets combined. And, rarely in the past half century have there been years when this amount was less than in the previous year confirming president (General) Eisenhower’s concerns about the ‘unwarranted influence of the military-industrial complex,’ and turning the US into a garrison state promoting the shadowy needs of an all-powerful military elite. These are the real reasons for the US’s unremittingly rising war budget.

Finally, about the US backing Israel’s military and territorial interests. The authors of 'The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy' say this is because the Israel lobby has a firm grip on the US system of power and influence – its legislature, executive, think tanks, and media – led by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which drives the US into the blind endorsement of everything Israel does.

For instance, AIPAC takes credit for passing more than a hundred pro-Israel bills/resolutions annually, such as the House of Representatives resolution last year celebrating the US$94.7 billion aid given and promised to Israel during 1998-2028. Taming AIPAC’s influence is impossible.

All in all, with Mr Trump, the embrace of these policies will continue. But hawkishness towards China, unremitting rise in the US war budget, and unconditional support of Israel make a toxic brew. They will make Mr Trump’s presidency a grim reality.

But one all too familiar, and nothing out of the usual line of business.

The writer is a freelance contributor. He can be reached at: Khwaja.Sarmad@gmail.com