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I’ve been an avid follower of US presidential elections for 40 years, and ever since I was a 12-year-old in Jeddah eagerly devouring the coverage of the 1984 contest between Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale, I’ve rooted for the Democratic candidate. But not this time. In fact, I could not be more delighted that Donald Trump has triumphed and the Democrats will soon be banished from the White House.
My reasons are simple. First, like many others, I believe the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris administration has been complicit in a genocidal campaign in Gaza. They could have put a stop to Israel’s wanton killing, maiming and destruction, but instead they enabled it. As a senior regional official in South-east Asia put it to me over the weekend: “They need to be punished. That means supporting Trump.”
Second, there are plenty in East and South-east Asia who think the world could be a much safer place with Mr Trump back in office. Let me explain.
There are numerous territorial and maritime disputes in the Asia-Pacific region, some of which are potential flashpoints that could lead to armed conflict between the US and China. The future status of Taiwan, which China views as a renegade province that must reunite with the mainland at some point, is perhaps the best known.
The Democrats, said my friend the official, have been “goading” Taiwan towards declaring independence, specifically citing former speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 2022 visit, which enraged not just Beijing but ordinary netizens in China as well. “We don’t want war,” added the official.
I concurred, as did the Singaporean public intellectual Bilahari Kausikan when he wrote in the ThinkChina e-magazine earlier this week: “Biden’s four statements clearly supporting Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack … have bred a sense of entitlement in Taiwan. The attitude in Taipei is ‘I am the only Chinese democracy so you must help me’.” This, Mr Kausikan added, could lead “Taiwanese politicians to push the boundaries too far”.
Compared to Mr Trump, he said Ms Harris was more likely to emphasise values in her foreign policy that might encourage Taiwan’s sense of entitlement. Ms Harris has given no signal that she would not follow in the disastrous liberal interventionist-neocon tradition that dominated both the Republican and Democratic parties until the arrival of Mr Trump.
His instincts, on the other hand, are clear: he has no desire to fight wars of choice to defend or export American-style democracy. Given that it is hard to overstate just how devastating a superpower conflict in the Asia-Pacific could be, and how easily it could escalate to threaten the lives of billions, Mr Trump’s insistence that he will “stop wars”, not start them, is extremely welcome.
That is not to say he is a pacifist. Mr Kausikan also wrote that “[former president Barack] Obama made prettier speeches, but Trump understood – perhaps instinctively – hard power better”. He gave the example of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who he said in August 2017 “got carried away and threatened Guam with his missiles. Trump responded by threatening to rain 'fire and fury' on Pyongyang. Since then, as far as I can determine, North Korea has never tested any long-range missile on a trajectory that takes it anywhere near Guam”.
Further proof of Mr Trump’s willingness to use the leverage of the Oval Office effectively comes in a recent Times of Israel report that, before the election, he told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that if he won, the war in Gaza must be over by the time he retook office. An Israeli MP told the same newspaper: “Netanyahu has managed clashes with Democratic presidents without paying a heavy price. In fact, he campaigns on his ability to stand up to them.” A fight with Mr Trump, however, “is something he’d want to avoid”.
So it’s entirely plausible that unlike Mr Biden, Mr Trump could choose to insist on a ceasefire, both in Palestine-Israel and maybe in the Russia-Ukraine conflict as well. Deciding to save, rather than expend, lives may be a novel policy for an American president, but it’s a good one in my book.
Now, you don’t have to be suffering from “Trump derangement syndrome” to concede that the President-elect has flaws, that he has tested the limits of his office (and not in a good way), and that he has given the English language new words. (Remember his 2017 tweet? “Who can figure out the true meaning of ‘covfefe’ ??? Enjoy!”) Many profess themselves appalled that a convicted felon could end up in the White House.
But these same people are curiously forgiving of presidents George W Bush, Mr Obama and Mr Biden, who between them are complicit in or responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands in the Middle East. They are treated as leaders in good standing, and their wars and backing of leaders such as Mr Netanyahu regarded as mere foreign policy “mistakes”. Yes, the consequences were lamentable, but the roads to Baghdad, Benghazi and Baalbek were at least paved with good intentions.
I’m sorry. Which is worse? Having a highly disruptive approach to political, linguistic and legal norms? Or pursuing policies that led to the re-establishment of slavery on the Mediterranean coast in Libya, opened space for the creation of a terrorist entity – ISIS – in Syria and Iraq, and left millions either displaced or dead? If you truly believe Mr Trump’s record was worse, you might need to go for “diversity, equity and inclusion” training to adjust your attitude to the value of non-European or North American lives.
But Mr Trump, who everyone from Bill Clinton to Oprah Winfrey used to court before he entered politics, is different. Perhaps Mr Biden believes that not just his followers but the President-elect, too, is “garbage”. Oh, the echo of Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables” – for these revealing flashes of liberal contempt for the masses, I am also glad that Mr Trump has won, and laughed out loud at his brilliant use of a garbage truck and hi-vis vest to turn the insult to his advantage.
We also saw instances during the campaign of a different Mr Trump to the caricature created by his opponents. Believe it or not, he can be charming, amusing, kind and self-deprecating. The millions of American who voted for him could evidently see through his demonisation.
For them, he needs to deliver on his promise “to help our country heal”. For the rest of us, if he can keep to his words, “I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars”, that will be more than good enough.
