If Western mainstream media are to be believed, the likes of North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Syria and, until recently, Venezuela are rogue states. They are considered “rogue” because they supposedly flout international law by “promoting terrorism,” seeking to develop or already having nuclear weapons, widely disregarding human rights, or engaging in the narcotics trade. As such, they are subject to sanctions or punitive measures to restrict them or hamper their financial and economic transactions and, consequently, curb their “rogue” behavior against the international order.
Yet current events point to the very rogue-like behavior of the so-called developed countries with strong militaries.
In our part of the world, it is China, with its occupation of many areas of the Philippines’ maritime exclusive economic zone and complete disregard of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos) and the binding Philippine legal victory at the Permanent Court of Arbitration. In Europe, it is Russia, with its invasion of Ukraine and its war of sabotage against many European countries, particularly members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization or Nato. In the Middle East, it is Israel with its occupation of Palestinian territories and perpetual conflict with its neighbors, particularly its nemesis Iran.
But the truly international rogue is the United States under President Donald Trump, whose hallmark is unilateralism and whose favorite weapon is brute force.
If Trump had his way, he would see Canada becoming the 51st US state, take over Greenland and Cuba, and unleash the American military on Mexican drug cartels. He has had some success with Venezuela, which he recently ordered invaded and its president, Nicolás Maduro, captured and hauled to the United States to face “narco-terrorism” charges. He is now in active pursuit of regime change and other things besides in Iran, but the mullahs are pretty muleheaded and are not giving up.
The people Trump is “afraid” of are Russia’s Vladimir Putin and China’s Xi Jinping, probably because they drive harder bargains than he does. Putin regularly trots out the nuclear threat; Xi out-trades Trump. These leaders also have no domestic opposition and cannot be hoped to be replaced by anyone even less farcical than Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former Iranian dictator whom the Americans said they favor to succeed the mullahs.
Trump has a best friend forever in North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and he is bosom buddies with Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu, for whom there is a standing warrant of arrest issued by the International Criminal Court. (Putin, by the way, also has a standing warrant of arrest from the ICC.)
Economically, Trump attempted to shortcut and undercut the competition through a unilateral tariff regime. If he had his way, the United States would have a positive balance of trade with all countries and make “tons of money” by having direct access to their natural resources like oil. These are practically impossible, unless a country has the best factories compared to others in the entire world, or the best salespeople or the best distribution networks bar none, and at the same time the most austere consumers.
The world economy is so intertwined that it is no longer a world of comparative advantage among competing nations. It is now a world of comparative dependencies where, to some degree or another, we cannot make do without a raw material or product or service provided by another country or company.
One thing is clear: There is no universal rules-based international order, the United Nations notwithstanding. We must be powerful if we are to survive and thrive. What kind of power should we have? Economic power. Military power. People power of the right kind (not the people power that, in certain grimy hands, went from world paragon to world shame, used and abused by politicians to gain, well, power).
There is no substitute for economic and military power. Hard power. Balanced by the soft power of an intelligent, hardworking people with the right values. The easy examples of countries with these are the Nordic states and, in our part of the world, Japan and South Korea.
It is a dangerous, unpredictable world. It has always been said that we cannot control the behavior of others. The only behavior we can control is ours. Here, the path is clear: self-reliance, with the support of like-minded allies.
We have both strategic location and rich natural resources. It is up to us to parlay these to serve our interests and not be at the mercy of whichever rogue or hegemonic state threatens us. CS
