Dear Kaima,
This is an excellent essay of
Ivan Krastev which I read with great interest and pleasure. It is a very important essay, because it shows an European outsiders view in the American Powerbase of
the White House and
Capitol Hill.Ivan Krastev (Bulgarian: Иван Кръстев, born 1965 in Lukovit, Bulgaria), is a political scientist, the Chairman of the Centre for Liberal Strategies in Sofia, permanent fellow at the IWM (Institute of Human Sciences) in Vienna, and 2013-14-17 Richard von Weizsäcker fellow at the Robert Bosch Stiftung in Berlin. He is a founding board member of the European Council on Foreign Relations, a member of the board of trustees of the International Crisis Group and is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times.Maybe an outsider is the wrong word for
Ivan Krastev, because he clearly has
his American top level contacts. Due to
Krastev‘s essay I feel the distance between
Europeans and the
American administration today.
Donald Trump likes to divide and rule European countries, but he has to little knowledge of Europe and is to unpredictable to reach his goal.
Donald Trump with European leadersTrump wants bilateral deals with single European countries, by ignoring the EU,
the Berlin-Paris axis, the strained but still existing
Weimar Triangle (
Berlin-
Warsaw-
Paris), old trade and political relations that exist between European nations and for instance organisations like the
OSCE (
Organization for Security and Co-operation),
the Council of Europe and
the European Free Trade Association (
EFTA).
A big mistake
Trump makes is the fact that he doesn’t sees the dangers of an isolated,
Isolationalist Autarkic America. He doesn’t understand that the European continent and
the EU can exist without
the USA. We have been here for thousands of years. We had empires, countries, civilisations, trade organisations. Alliances and ties long before
the USA even existed.
Market performance for small household appliances across five European market regimesWe still have Economical, military political and Financial empires.
Germany is a huge economical power with its chemical (Hoechst, Bayer, BASF), electronic and consumer goods (AEG, Siemens, Bosch), agricultural sector, car industry (Volkswagen, Audi, Mercedez Benz, BMW, European Ford) and military industries. France is still a nuclear and colonial power. Italy is a manufacturing country, Poland has a strong economy, is a diplomatic and militairy power in Europe. The inner European market is huge and European legislstion is influential next to national law.
Schengen created
an enormous European economical free zone which was unprecedented in the history of mankind.
Trump will try to play
the Visgrad group countries (
Poland,
Hungary,
Czech Republic and
Slovakia) to distance them from
the European Union (
the EU) and Western European countries. He will like the present Austrian and Italian government and he loves Brexit. But the British will tty there upmost best to restore what is lost with bilateral trade negotiations with individual European nations. That will br a long and difficult process. There are for instance 2 mayor Anglo-Dutch multi-nationals Shell and Unilever. The British car industry needs an European area of distribution, the huge European car market and other British industries need the European market too. Next to that a lot of British expats live and work in Europe.
Europe will become less economically dependent of the USA if an Eurasian market will emerge. A combination of the European and Asian markets. In the same time the Europeans will face huge American competition, because the Americans trade with the Asians too, and there are important American-Japanese, American-South-Korean military alliances. The US has the most powerful military in the world. It has the most modernized and sophisticated military weapon systems and possesses a huge number of nuclear warheads. And the US isn’t shy about showing its military power to the world.
The USA is still the number one military power in the worldThe United States is the most powerful country in the world. It has the largest economy in the world, thanks in large part to its massive entertainment and media industry. The economy in California alone produces about $2.5 trillion. Assuming California was a country, that number would have made the California economy one of the top six in the world. Imagine that.
In terms of political influence, the US is unparalleled. A founding member of the United Nations, the US plays a huge role in almost all international issues, especially ones regarding global security. Despite being currently led by a dude named Donald Trump, the US remains a powerhouse in the international community. But respect for the US government takes a hit every time Trump sends out a Tweet.
US economyAccording to
Financial Advisor magazine the USA is stil the largest economy in the world.
The U.S. economy increased from around
$19.4 trillion in
2017 to
$20.4 trillion this year. It is expected to grow to about
$34.1 billion by
2050. The
World Economic Forum reports
the U.S. economy accounts for about one-quarter of the world's economy.
The second largest economy in the world China increased its economy by $2 trillion from 2017, to $14 trillion. The PwC report predicts
China’s economy will grow to nearly
$58.5 trillion in
2050,
the largest in the world.
The third largest economy in the world is Japan. In
2017,
Japan’s economy was
$4.87 trillion. In 2018, it has grown to
$5.1 trillion. It is expected to drop to eighth in the world by 2050.
Japans economy is the third largest economy in the worldThe
CIA Factbook however states:
The US has the most technologically powerful economy in the world, with a per capita GDP of $59,500. US firms are at or near the forefront in technological advances, especially in computers, pharmaceuticals, and medical, aerospace, and military equipment; however, their advantage has narrowed since the end of World War II. Based on a comparison of GDP measured at purchasing power parity conversion rates, the US economy in 2014, having stood as the largest in the world for more than a century, slipped into second place behind China, which has more than tripled the US growth rate for each year of the past four decades.
The German economy is the forth largest economy in the world.
The German economy is
$4.2 trillion in
2018 and expected to reach only
$6.1 trillion by
2050.
The United Kingdom has a somber future prediction. The outlook for the future economy of the county is only
$5.3 trillion by
2050. Its current economy is worth
$2.94 trillion.
France has a
$2.93 trillion economy, but the report indicates a slow growth ahead, to about
$4.7 trillion in
2050.
Italy hits the list in the eighth spot with an economy of
$2.18 trillion. The PwC report speculates that the country could drop out of the top 20 economies over the next few decades.
The French economy is the eight largest economy in the worldCurrently,
China and
the United States are locked in an ongoing
trade war as each country has introduced tariffs on goods traded between each other.
US President Donald Trump had promised in his campaign to fix China's "
longtime abuse of the broken international system and unfair practices". The United States of America filed a request for consultation to
the World Trade Organization, in regard to concerns that
the People's Republic of China was violating
intellectual property rights. The U.S. administration is relying partly on
Section 301 of the Trade Act of
1974 to prevent what it claims are unfair trade practices and theft of intellectual property.
U.S. President Donald Trump and
Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will meet at the
Nov. 30-Dec. 1 G-20 Summit in Buenos Aires as trade tensions rage.
U.S. President Donald Trump with Chinese president Xi Jinping, who is in the same time general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC), Sunday, 04 March, 2018Ivan Krastev is right that in most European capitals, policymakers and the chattering classes want to believe that before too long, Mr. Trump will be gone and the world order — including the close alliances between Europe and the United States — will return. But he fails to mention that Donald Trump has support from the new rightwing Nationalist Populist political parties who are in the various National parliaments and in the European parliament and the fact that Donald Trump has support from certain European civilians, like some entrepreneurs, who like to see a businessman as president of the USA in staid of a politician (they wish that that could be possible in their countries). Young European rightwingers (millennials) love Trump, because he is anti-establishment, he takes a firm stance against European leaders they despise, took a strong anti-Muslim migration stance and anti-Mexican/South-American/Latin-American immigration. Young Dutch, French and German nationalists who wished Geert Wilders, Marine Le Pen or Alexander Gauland (born 20 February 1941), the leader of the National conservative, Eurosceptic Alternative für Deutschland party could be their prime-minister like President Trump. Western-European rightwingers are jealous of Trump, but in the same time they know Europe is different than the USA. That's why Steve Bannon receives some scepticism and distrust from some European rightwing Nationalist Populist movements, because he is an American and not a European.
Of course
Ivan Krastev article is about the old European power elite, diplomats and center right and center left leaders who are not exactly fond of Donald Trump. Trump is seen as a strange unorthodox politician, as a businessman who plays a politician, while politics is different than being a businessman, because politics is more than trade, free market and doing business. Politics has other technocratic, state affairs, etatist (non-Laissez faire), bureaucratic, diplomatic, sides and has to deal with public utilities, organizations that maintain the infrastructure for public services (often also providing a services using that infrastructure).
Cheers,
Pieter
Sources: Pieters thoughts, Wikipedia, Financial Advisor, CIA Factbook, Financial Times, the Economist, the Guardian, Financieel Dagblad, NRC Handelsblad and Foreign Affairs.