Trump - a capitalist "dove of peace"

Translated, edited, and excerpted from Rizospastis article.

There are not a few who have placed their hopes for avoiding the generalization of the war in the newly elected President of the USA, the big business, capitalist Donald Trump.

In the past, many media outlets in Greece and internationally have portrayed Trump as little more than a "puppet" of Putin. Those who bought into even fragments of this narrative now wait for "Putin’s man" to bring an end to the roar of guns and cannons—at least on the Ukrainian front.

This world is fooling itself to imagine Trump as a well-fed "dove of peace" simply because he claims he will end the war in Ukraine within days or reconsider NATO’s role. Let us not forget that in 2019, comedian-turned-politician Zelensky defeated industrial businessman Poroshenko in Ukraine's presidential election by handing out promises of "peace" and speaking in Russian.

We must not overlook that even after Trump’s inauguration, the interests of Lockheed Martin and other major U.S. military contractors will not take a backseat—far from it. The U.S. currently boasts the largest military expenditures in the world and the most powerful war machine. Looking back at Trump’s first presidency, which set the stage for much of what we are witnessing today, it becomes clear that U.S. Department of Defense spending consistently increased during his tenure.

A clear priority for Trump are the interests of American capital, and any changes he brings to US foreign policy on the issue of the imperialist war in Ukraine should be examined under the light of the US effort to deal with monopolies and power of China, which challenges their primacy in the global capitalist system.

We saw this fact a few days ago also confirmed semiotically, in the dimension of the rot of capitalism. We're talking about the "contemporary art" exhibition, Art Basel, in Miami Beach, where a banana taped to the wall with electrical tape was exhibited and sold. This time the sought-after "work of art" was bought not by an American billionaire, but by Chinese businessman Justin Shan, from the capitalist "People's Republic" of China, who is involved in cryptocurrencies and worked for years with another Chinese billionaire, Jack Ma, of the Alibaba Group monopoly. The banana cost him $6.2 million.

The penetration of Chinese monopolies on every continent, their clash with their American counterparts is a top priority for the new American President, who will seek by all means to maintain and strengthen the economic, diplomatic, and military power of the USA, which is losing ground but remain a powerful capitalist force. Here too there will be bargains, the "carrot" and the "whip" will be on the agenda of all sides.

Let's remember that last February the Russian President, Putin, in an interview with the American journalist Tucker Carlson, addressing the US leadership, noted: "We are as bourgeois now as you are, we are a market economy and there is no Communist Party rule. Let's negotiate".

Negotiations and deals between the USA and Russia, both covert and overt, have never ceased. A recent example is the news that the President of Russia has ordered a halt to the export of enriched uranium to the USA. This move comes as a response to President Biden's decision to ban the purchase of Russian enriched uranium starting from 2028 through 2040. What does this development signify?

For nearly three years now, as hundreds of thousands of young lives on both sides of the war have been lost on the battlefields of the Euro-American conflict with Russia—fought on Ukrainian soil—the Russian state has continued to supply uranium to the Americans. In 2023 alone, the U.S. purchased a record $1.2 billion worth of enriched uranium. Moreover, Russia continues to sell various metals to the U.S., some of which are critical for constructing a range of modern weapons systems already entering the market. It becomes evident that in capitalist states, the profits of monopolies are secured through deals, while the cost is paid in the blood of ordinary people.

The "Gordian knot," made of scalp bark, was said to be so intricate that its beginning was impossible to find. Alexander the Great famously cut through it with his sword, declaring, "What cannot be untied is cut." According to another account by Aristobulus, Alexander unraveled the knot by removing the stora—a large wooden pin securing it to the chariot's yoke.

It remains uncertain how Trump might choose to address the "knot" of the war in Ukraine, but we must not lose sight of the fact that war is inseparable from capitalism. The "war economy," along with the reconstruction of destroyed infrastructure that will inevitably follow, serves as another tool—much like the so-called "green and digital transition"—to funnel accumulated capital into conditions ripe for the next global capitalist crisis. It is naive to place faith in the "peaceful" rhetoric of bourgeois politicians, who uphold the exploitative capitalist system. This system is responsible for countless atrocities, including the war in Ukraine and the genocide that has been unfolding in Palestine for over 14 months.

Eliseos Vagenas
Eliseos Vagenas is a member of the Central Committee of the KKE, in charge of the International Relations Department of the Central Committee