Trump`s number one rule? No rules

The US operation in Venezuela — the kidnapping of President Maduro and his wife, compelling the new government into subservience to Washington — has triggered a global avalanche of reactions. Those fall along two main spectra. One is emotional, spanning from outraged cries of "American imperialism has finally bared its fangs" to envious whispers of "I wish we could pull that off" (with a fair share of "they've shown their hand, so should we"). The other is analytical, ranging from "the US has turned a new page in global affairs" to "it's the same old US playbook, just with less pretense."

The operation's justification, articulated before and after the fact, is equally telling. Three statements capture the essence. Trump: "In foreign policy, I am bound only by my personal morality and judgment, not international law." Secretary of State Rubio: "The UN? I don’t care what the UN says. They're clueless." White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller: " We live in a world in which you can talk all you want about international niceties and everything else. But we live in a world, in the real world that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power."

Indeed, just as the assessments blend contradictory elements ("for and against," "novelty and more of the same"), the events themselves are complex composites. The entire modern era of US foreign policy is defined by the interplay of competing forces: idealism versus pragmatism, national self-interest versus a messianic impulse, alongside the intertwined duality of cosmopolitan globalism and self-sufficient imperialism. Further tensions exist between pure national interest and the agendas of specific corporations, bureaucracies, lobbies, and diasporas, and between projecting conservative-liberal Christian values or radical liberal-anti-traditional ones.

Rarely has any US administration, party, or faction maintained a consistent, pure ideological line over the long term. Presidents who entered office vowing restraint abroad (like Clinton and Bush Jr.) ended up launching interventions, both humanitarian and otherwise. Jimmy Carter, perhaps the most human rights-focused US president, criticized and curtailed support for repressive allied regimes from apartheid South Africa to South Korea. Yet, in 1978, he saved Pinochet from war with Argentina by issuing a stern ultimatum to Buenos Aires. His administration also initiated the active support for Afghan mujahideen that, fifteen years later, paved the way for the triumph of Islamism in Afghanistan.

During Reagan's tenure, the Kirkpatrick Doctrine — endorsing support for any anti-communist regime, no matter how brutal — became ascendant, framed as a necessary tactical sacrifice for liberalism's ultimate triumph over the Soviet bloc. Notably, US support for figures like Pol Pot (after his ouster, within an anti-Soviet coalition) spanned both the Carter and Reagan eras. Similarly, Saddam Hussein remained a de facto Western ally until the very eve of the Gulf War.

Such ideological hybrids are standard. President George W. Bush’s decision to invade Iraq was couched in profound, seemingly sincere, religious conviction, yet was concurrently driven by the vested interests of the military-industrial and energy sectors. The 2003 Iraq war itself became a quintessential case study in a recurring political paradox: dazzling short-term tactical victory paving the way for catastrophic long-term strategic failure.

This point has been underscored by numerous analysts. The Italian scholar Giovanni Arrighi, in his work Adam Smith in Beijing, argued: "The Iraq occupation not only failed to usher in a second American century, it eroded global confidence in US military might and the dollar, while accelerating China's rise as a counterweight to American leadership in Asia and globally… Media mogul Rupert Murdoch, a war supporter, claimed the invasion would slash oil prices from $30 to $20 a barrel, boosting the US economy. Instead, prices quadrupled over four years of war, a stark testament to Washington's failure to violently enforce its claim to limitless energy consumption."

Washington's dismissive stance toward the UN and the "international community" is equally longstanding. In 1982, Secretary of State George Shultz threatened a US withdrawal if Israel were expelled. More recently, Trump's former National Security Advisor John Bolton famously asserted: "There is no United Nations. There is an international community that occasionally can be led by the only real power left in the world, and that's the United States, when it suits our interests and when we can get others to go along."

More than any recent president, Trump has laid bare enduring US tendencies: arrogance, aggression, cynical pragmatism, and contempt for even nominal international rules. His own path has been inconsistent, evolving from a semi-isolationist "America First" stance to intervening in one nation and threatening several others. The rhetoric of national interest transparently serves specific corporate and factional agendas, openly flaunted by their beneficiaries. His policy shifts are not just quarterly but daily, encapsulated in his motto: "I change my position because I can."

Upon closer inspection, even in his numerous peacekeeping impulses, the usual chatter about the inviolability of borders, protecting victims of aggression, and punishing aggressors is kept to a minimum. At least, when it comes to Trump personally. Yes, his statements periodically include passages about "saving thousands of lives" and "stopping senseless bloodshed." But overall, it's no secret that the primary goal is for any deal to benefit the US/Trump's team, and for all participants to remain maximally grateful to America/Trump — preferably becoming or remaining subordinate vassals. A concomitant personal ambition is the long-awaited Nobel Prize for the White House occupant. Humanistic liberal rhetoric can, of course, also be switched on and off — for example, Trump is currently threatening to use armed force to protect "the people's right to rise up" in Iran. But here too, it's obvious — and not particularly well-hidden — that the primary objective is to replace the Tehran regime with a more convenient one.

In the end, Trump's "discovery" of America is simply the extreme application of might-makes-right logic and the capricious rewriting of rules because he can. This relative novelty will now be tested by how the world responds and whether such a doctrine can sustain itself over time.