Colombia/Columbia

 Heather Cox Richardson talks about the recent brief, bizarre tariff war between the US and Colombia (not Columbia, as some GOP morons have spelled it). Part of her Substack is to create a primary source document for future historians, so there's a fair amount of summary of events with the implications being somewhat implicit. She speaks briefly about the dynamic of this spat that seems important going forward.

As she lays out, the US and Colombia are long time allies with good relations - somewhat unusually for a Caribbean nation. The Biden Administration had an agreement in place with Colombia, and in fact the migrants on that plane had been arrested and processed by the Biden Administration. Trump's decision to use a military flight, with the migrants in shackles is what prompted the spat, which has apparently been mostly resolved.

The significance of this weird, short incident is twofold.

First, Trump provoked Colombia into a fight. He actually quickly backed down. He immediately spun it as a victory. This sort of Politburo style media strategy could work in the degraded press environment we currently have. Trump broke an agreement with Colombia, Colombia kicked back, Trump agreed to honor the existing agreement, he declared victory. I think that's going to typify a lot of what he is going to do. A lot of bluster and braggadocio but very little actual policy movement (where it doesn't rely solely on the Executive Branch of the US government). We saw this with the NAFTA/USMCA during his first term. He tweaked NAFTA and said he had rewritten the rules.  Bullshit.

Secondly, Trump erratic, belligerent global leadership is going to be a huge boon to China. The more fights Trump picks - with Colombia, with Panama, with Denmark, with Canada - the more soft power programs that he axes - like PEPFAR or the WHO - the less influence the US will have.

From 1992-2005, the US came very close to being a global hegemon. Even after that period, there was little question who the most powerful country in the world was - economically, militarily, diplomatically. Some of that power, though, was a byproduct of the relatively benign nature of US global leadership. Sure, we did some terrible things like invading Iraq for nonsensical reasons. Generally speaking, though, the globe saw America's pre-eminence as largely something they didn't have to worry about. In some instances, like the Navy's commitment to keeping trade routes open, it was a positive good.

Trump doesn't realize this. He thinks "soft power" is for suckers. This is why he's embracing naked imperialism - whether he pushes ahead with militarism is another question.

The Colombia Incident is a stark reminder that he exists in the reality that he creates for himself. He "won" the incident". He also takes actions that imperil America's unique place in the world.

The latter will likely be the most damaging.