Piloting the world’s greatest power

Two aviation tragedies rattled the United States last week. Airplanes crash for a number of reasons. It could be mental fatigue; bad weather; and pilot’s error to include poor navigation, low blood sugar because of fasting or much of alcohol in the blood stream. Anxiety at high altitudes is dangerous and puts reason and competence in absolute jeopardy. But in aviation, a saying goes that ‘when tragedy happens, mostly it is not the plane but the pilot.’

Metaphorically speaking, leaders of the countries also act as pilots and fly the plane of their countries at low and high altitudes. Their intellectual incapacity largely means a lot in how they end up flying their countries’ planes. The entire scenario of competence or incompetence in the cockpit or the political office throws up two interesting questions. One, if the pilots or the leaders are so lacking in intelligence how are they allowed to become pilots or leaders in the first place? Two, if their performance at the highest levels brings opprobrium then why are they still allowed to continue? Today, all eyes are set on Donald Trump, the president of the great global power; and hypothesising from what the world has seen in the last two weeks, the debate about the pilot or the plane is back in the reckoning.

President Trumps first weeks back in the White House have been nothing short of dizzying as he has already created a storm of international anxieties. The era of war on terror had already swung the pendulum of international relations towards a world where, in the words of President George W Bush, “there were no rules”; but coming into this new era of fragmented global order in which prosperity is not evenly divided and in which there is a huge gap between the countries of the global north and global south, the world expected far better global leadership than what President Trump has begun to offer. His test case is the Palestinian issue and all he has done is to take a wrong foot out as a first step to begin the journey.

The US president welcomed the Israeli PM to White House despite criminal warrants initiated by the International Criminal Court against him and his defense minister. It took months of genocide for the Israeli leadership to be served these warrants, yet it mattered little to an American president who gives a clear message to the world that the bad habit of flouting international norms that the US picked up in the era of war on terror will continue and the superpower will continue to relive the unipolar moment and go alone expecting others just to fall in line. The cost of not falling in line is to be left out in an increasingly turbulent and uncertain order with no parachutes, less and less economic opportunities and no safe landing. President Trump’s dislikable Gaza outburst gives the world a message that not the common values – the universal values and adherence to them – are important; and as long as countries share common interests with the US, it will be willing to act as their guardian patronage. His out-of-the-blue suggestion of taking over Gaza, relocating Palestinians in the neighbouring countries and owning the Palestinian land is nothing but a farce.

After over 15 months of genocide, both the US and Israel know that they are back to the 6 October 2023 situation. People of Gaza are returning to the giant open prison and are willing to rebuild their lives through the rubbles on the land that belongs to them. Hamas and Hezbollah, though degraded, are regrouping and will continue to be a potent force in the future. Like the Iran-Iraq war, the longest war of the 20th Century that ended up consolidating the Iranian revolution, the Israeli military campaign in Gaza has also now consolidated the resolve of many countries to support the Palestinian cause on humanitarian and moral grounds, if on nothing else.

The first and second stages of the ceasefire are relatively easy in which the displaced Palestinians return, humanitarian aid is allowed in Gaza and Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners are swapped. It is the third stage which is difficult in which Israel will have to lift the blockade of Gaza and reconstruction process lasting three to five years will begin. The US and Israel cannot do this on their own; they will have to take the world along in planning and implementing the third stage of the ceasefire. President Trump’s initial outburst on the issue suggests that he is toeing the Israeli line and supporting the idea of establishment of a greater Israel which is very unfortunate not only for the Middle Eastern politics but for the world’s.

President Trump’s policy of emphasising peace through strength cannot be implemented at the cost of the plight of the displaced Palestinians returning back to their lands. President GW Bush’s nation building adventures during the war on terror era was also a policy based on achieving peace through strength but ended up pushing the world into greater geopolitical struggles. If Trump’s intentions are also read as doubtful and he is also seen as not a reliable American president then the global order will deteriorate and fragmentate.

The likely assumption is that President Trump will accelerate the fragmentation of the global order, with China and Russia extracting maximum benefit, as alternatively it is these two powers towards which most of the global south will hinge. It will be difficult for the US to subdue both these powers and the alliances and partnerships that they may build around them.

Professor John J Mearsheimer states that orders tend to expire in a prolonged deterioration rather than a sudden collapse. President Trump may just be the American president to preside over a small phase of prolonged deterioration of this order, accelerating the American decline as a global hegemon. The world will sit with its seatbelts tied because President Trump promises a bumpy ride full of turbulences as he tries to navigate and pilot the greatest power in the world. How well he flies will determine how soon the existing world order expires and gives room to the new order to take over.