- Today, Trump simply announces or tweets, out of the blue, that he wants to annex Canada, buy Greenland, reappropriate the Panama Canal, and that ‘all hell will break loose’ if an agreement is not reached in Gaza
The author is an American academician.
ISTANBUL
On Jan. 20, US President-elect Donald Trump will be inaugurated as the 47th US President, and only the second US president to serve two non-consecutive terms, the other being Grover Cleveland in the late 19th century.
The unusual manner through which Trump earned a second term, by this time, should not surprise as Trump’s entire political career is a list of oddities. He earned his first term without winning the popular vote, an oddity; he had no political experience whatsoever when he assumed America’s highest political office, an oddity; he depended on family, in-laws, cronies, recommendations, and ideological media warriors like Steve Bannon to cobble together his first administration — in American politics, an oddity. His administration then lurched from crisis to crisis for the next four years as various figures fell from grace, or disgraced themselves, were defenestrated, and then replaced by someone of similar caliber.
Trump gets a do-over
As Trump embarks upon his second term, however, he is clearly more prepared for the task. Unlike the first time around, he began vetting candidates for various offices almost immediately after the ballots were counted in November. The more than 100 executive orders that he signed on his first day in office were another key piece of business. [1] Trump now controls the Republican Party, so he set to work directing his Congressional loyalists to carry out his agenda.
Or, rather, “agenda” — Trump has a notoriously short attention span and tends to establish the day’s political docket with early morning tweets on the social media network now owned by his comrade, Elon Musk. Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, will clearly function as “White House South” during the next four years and has taken on the aura of Jay Gatsby’s mansion, where he “dispenses starlight to casual moths.” Musk, in this context, apparently fulfills the Klipspringer role.
Tweeting imperial edicts
Various figures from global politics and business are now streaming to Trump’s “royal court” at Mar-a-Largo in order to get face time with the new “decider.” [2] Even though the world’s editorial pages are filled with commentary remarking on the “extraordinary” or “abnormal” [3] character of this scene, it has been a long time in the making. Simply, this is the American Imperium laid bare, with its profound ideological rhetoric abandoned and its fine republican clothes cast off.
Trump is the result of long-term US socio-political trends. A direct line can be drawn from Trump’s behavior back many decades, through Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, and Rush Limbaugh, through Dan Quayle and David Duke, through Ronald Reagan, back to Richard Nixon’s emergence on the national stage after World War II, and to Senator Joseph McCarthy’s demagoguery in the same era.
For example, the US leadership conducting foreign policy after World War II was carefully respectful of foreign governments’ sensitivities. Although no post-World War II state was even remotely as powerful as the US, Secretary of State George Marshall announced the initiative that would eventually bear his name at a commencement address which, normally, the press would not have paid any attention to. President Harry Truman, Marshall, and other US officials understood that if they simply demanded that European governments act in a certain manner, or even offer them aid in a manner that might appear condescending, European governments would not take up an initiative that was so clearly to their advantage. Naturally, US interests would also be preserved through the Marshall Plan, but leaving the choice to join each individual government’s preference was essential. [4]
Today, Trump simply announces or tweets, out of the blue, that he wants to annex Canada, buy Greenland, re-appropriate the Panama Canal, and that “all hell will break loose” if an agreement is not reached in Gaza. [5] Meanwhile, the Republican-dominated Congress rushes to pass the necessary legislation. [6] One imagines that Roman emperors would have felt jealousy.
Quo Vadis [7] Trumpian foreign policy?
If we compare Trump’s activities since Election Day to the foreign policies he pursued while he was president, few differences strike the eye. He still sees China as the preeminent threat to US global interests, but maintains a passive stance towards Moscow; he still thinks other NATO members are living off of American largesse; he still is vehemently anti-immigrant and casually insults various global societies. He still believes that import tariffs are the answer to America’s economic difficulties.
The only surprising development is Trump’s disposal of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. [8] That was especially interesting given Trump’s professed admiration for Zionism, his staunch support for the State of Israel, and his generally pro-Zionist choices for foreign policy positions, such as his secretary of state candidate, Republican Florida Senator Marco Rubio. Was Trump’s impulsiveness at work in the anti-Netanyahu outburst? At the moment, it is difficult to know, so Trump’s interactions with the Israeli leadership in the coming months will provide more insight into developments in the broader Eastern Mediterranean region.
Trump has already come out with an even stronger anti-war stance than during his first term. In addition to his demand for a Gaza ceasefire, he stated several times over the past year his desire for the Ukraine conflict to be wrapped up. But whether Putin will see eye-to-eye with him, and whether Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Zelenskyy can be convinced to make compromises remain unclear.
So, in response to the question of “quo vadis?” the answer is, most likely, helter-skelter. Trump will go after whatever issue he believes pleases his base, at whatever time. Beyond MAGA, [9] Trump has no ideology, no platform, no blueprint for foreign policy; his only vade mecum is his understanding of what benefits America at any particular juncture.
Marco Rubio as global proconsul
During his Senate confirmation hearings on Jan. 15, Marco Rubio [10] asserted that President Trump will base his administration’s foreign policy on three key questions: “Does it make America safer?; does it make America stronger?; does it make America more prosperous?” [11] That is the essence of Trump’s “America First” approach. But Rubio also emphasized one other essential guideline, that President Trump will establish foreign policy, and the State Department will simply implement it.
Thus, we will wait for President Trump to tweet US foreign policy at a time of his choosing.
[1] https://apnews.com/article/trump-day-one-border-executive-actions-30f78c3c983ae74555f281446fe22710
[2] As George W. Bush infamously titled himself in 2006: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z7sg_VwkXw.
[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/10/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-erica-frantz.html.
[4] For the historical consensus on this issue, see: John Lewis Gaddis, “Strategies of Containment,” pp. 37-39; Melvyn P. Leffler, “A Preponderance of Power,” pp. 158-159.
[5] https://apnews.com/article/canada-trump-us-state-131dcff58a8f56116765f160d9f35460; https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-wont-rule-out-military-economic-action-he-seeks-control-panama-canal-2025-01-07; https://edition.cnn.com/2025/01/07/politics/trump-warning-gaza-hostages-negotiations-inauguration/index.html
[6] https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/us-house-republicans-unveil-bill-to-authorize-possible-greenland-purchase/3449359.
[7] Quo Vadis is a Latin phrase meaning "Where are you going?"
[8] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/08/trump-video-crude-reference-netanyahu
[9] Make American Great Again, is the slogan for Trump’s first Presidential campaign, which is now used to refer to his political movement.
[10] Rubio’s candidacy has wide bipartisan support and his confirmation is expected immediately after Trump’s inauguration.
[11] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3sl7TtBUjl
*Opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Anadolu's editorial policy.
