Trump at the UN warns America’s enemies abroad, while at home his own enemies are gathering. Impeachment anyone?

Trump’s address to the 74th UN General Assembly was less an address and more a long ultimatum in which he placed the world on notice: Mess with America, and you suckers will pay.

Over the course of its history, the United Nations has been host to many dramatic moments; its General Assembly addressed by some of the most iconic and legendary figures in modern history. These were men and women carrying with them to the podium the hopes and dreams of entire peoples and continents.

In 1964, when Cuban revolutionary leader Che Guevara marched to the podium to address the assembled delegates, he did so dressed in the combat fatigues which by then had come to symbolize revolution in the 20th century.

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Ten years later, PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat’s address introduced the Palestinian liberation struggle to a world for whom the Palestinian people had until then been consigned to the status of historical footnote – an unavoidable casualty of realpolitik in the postwar period.

In 2006, Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, having inspired a mass movement responsible for turning a continent that had known only pro-US puppet governments and dictatorships into one where socialism in the 21st century was born, created a sensation when in his address to the General Assembly he described US President George W. Bush as “the devil.”

And, of course, in our time, who could ever forget the address given to the 70th UN General Assembly by Vladimir Putin in 2015? It was tantamount to the announcement of the birth of a multipolar world, one in which Washington would no longer enjoy the uncontested primacy and hegemony it had since the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Which brings us now to Trump and an address that rang with malevolence and anger towards America’s enemies, of which more seem to be added to the list every year. There he stood, the leader of the free world, emitting an aura of menace that was compatible with a mafia capo shaking down a rival’s territory, warning of the consequences of defiance.

Trump does not appear at ease or comfortable in such settings. He comes across like a man who does not really believe that he belongs. Watching him read his address from the autocue – his delivery so monotone and flat it was like listening to a wall being sandpapered – was painful. “The future does not belong to globalists,” he proclaimed. “The future belongs to patriots.”

Here we had laid out further confirmation of the nationalism that Trump has embraced, which sits alongside his detestation of trans-border trading blocs, such as NAFTA and the EU, and multilateral agreements such as the Paris Climate Agreement and the Iran Nuclear Deal (JCPOA).

But inconvenient though it might be for the alt-right cranks whose nutty conspiracy theories have heavily influenced the 45th US president to hear, ‘globalists’ did not attack and destroy Iraq in the wake of 9/11. That was patriots who did that – American patriots seething with the desire for revenge, which was unleashed against an entirely innocent country when it came to the attack on the Twin Towers.

Trump’s verbal assault against China was that of the leader of an economic hegemon that no longer rules the roost:

“Not only has China declined to adopt promised reforms, it has embraced an economic model, dependent on massive market barriers, heavy state subsidies, currency manipulation, product dumping, forced technology transfers and the theft of intellectual property and also trade secrets on a grand scale.”

In other words, Beijing must stop running its economy as it sees fit, and start running it as he sees fit.

Moving on, it came as no surprise that Trump’s most withering attack was reserved for Iran.

“No responsible government should subsidize Iran’s bloodlust. As long as Iran’s menacing behaviour continues, sanctions will not be lifted. They will be tightened.”

This was the part of the address when reality finally exited the chamber and the unreality in which Trump and his neocon pals exist took its place.

But bluster aside, in taking the wise decision to row back from full scale war with Tehran over the claim that it was behind the missile strike on the Saudi Arabian oil facility and oilfield recently, Trump revealed that he understands the gap that exists between bellicose rhetoric and the folly involved in acting upon it.

In this regard, Vietnam and Iraq will forever loom large in the Oval Office when war talk ensues. Because both conflicts leave no doubt that while a giant with feet of clay can wreak enormous damage, the damage inflicted on itself in the process is inordinate. More importantly, the idea that American mothers and fathers would be willing to give up their sons to fight for Israel and Saudi Arabia, exactly as they would be if Trump went to war against Iran, is totally absurd.

Ironically, as Trump thundered against America’s enemies abroad, his own enemies at home were gathering. The impeachment proceedings that have just been launched against him by Democrats in the House of Representatives means that if the president does happen to lose his mind and actually launch a war, he will find himself battling on two fronts.

Don’t do it, Mr. President. 

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