Trump’s problem – or, rather, our problem with Trump – is that he can’t think analytically. Or at all. He simply accepts what he’s told by his ideological allies, on Fox TV and social media, or by the last world leader he has spoken with. The most recent of these was Vladimir Putin, who sent him away with the ideas he then blurted out about Zelenskyi’s being a ‘dictator’, and responsible for starting the war with Russia. All of which must of course disqualify him from acting as an ‘honest broker’ – or a genuine ‘peace-maker’ – between the two sides.
If he had given any proper thought to the Ukrainian situation he would have realised – as all professional diplomats must – that the issue is far more complex than he assumes, and not to be settled by a simple business deal, or division of assets: Ukrainian territory to Russia, Ukrainian precious metals to the USA; and without Ukraine’s participation in the talks. Elsewhere, Trump’s suggested settlement of the Gaza ‘problem’, by expelling the Palestinians and replacing their blighted homes with Riviera-like hotels for the rich, comes from the same playbook. Which is entitled, of course, The Art of the Deal.
Indeed, The Art of the Deal could serve in much the same way as Mein Kampf did – or should have done – by revealing the minds of the putative dictators who authored them. (Or in Trump’s case presumably had ghost-written for him.) Trump sees all negotiations in terms of ‘winning’ (or losing) ‘deals’; with the narcissistic element of his personality wanting this to reflect positively and personally on him. (Is it true that he’s hankering after a Nobel Peace Prize?) This is another reason why he seems to have taken Putin’s side over this crisis: because it offers the easiest ‘win’, and profit, for him.
Whether this explains or even illuminates what is going on at the Russia-Ukraine border just now is doubtful. If Trump could think more analytically, or simply think, he might realise that life at any level, let alone this elevated international one, involves more than just ‘dealing’ in this simplistic way, but has broader human, emotional and historical components that also require to be taken into account. A knowledge of Trump’s business brain is useful to understand how he approaches these issues, but not the issues themselves.
At best it may exemplify what I’ve hinted at once or twice in this blog: my economic-deterministic (Marxist?) view of our modern history’s being governed by the development of global capitalism; with the overt domination now of a couple of late-stage capitalists (Trump and Musk), and of their methods – businesspeople have always been impatient of social democracy – perfectly illustrating this.
Maybe Trump’s ‘deals’ over Ukraine and Gaza will succeed. I almost hope not.
Porter’s Pensées 
This article by Lawrence Freedman in the New Statesman is the most thoughtful I’ve come across so far:
https://www.newstatesman.com/world/europe/2025/02/ukraine-jd-vance-threat-of-peace
Meanwhile, I’ll try to follow my own advice on a digital diet.
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The usual historiographical objection to interpretations that link capitalism to specific political movements such as imperialism is that capitalists are a diverse bunch and don’t all share the same interests. Of course, that doesn’t preclude certain sectors or groups of capitalists from going hand in hand with government – indeed that was part of Cobden’s (and later Hobson’s) critique.
You can certainly see how Trump has built an alliance of tech capitalists (fighting regulation in the UK and EU), new tech industrialists (wanting rare earth minerals) and old industrialists (wanting protection), but what of his capitalist critics, of whom I suspect there are many in finance? They seem to be keeping a low profile, which I think is partly due to the degree to which Trump intimidates his opponents.
I can even see a future in which, supposing Musk does get heavily fined, he refuses to pay and defies the UK or EU to block his products. So many of us voters are now effectively junkies addicted to social media. Will governments risk inconveniencing the general public in order to enforce the law? (I suspect an enforced digital diet might do us all some good, myself included.)
There are some seemingly anti-capitalist strands to Trumpism – criticism of globalisation and of elites – which speak to a sense of loss of control in the wider public. Many developing countries have long experienced shifting economic fortunes at the hands of global financial markets. Now that sense of insecurity is shared by many in the global North. Trumpism promises not to abolish capitalism (Americans have not suddenly lost all faith in the American dream) but to bend it to national objectives – jobs for US citizens rather than for Chinese or Mexicans. To a degree this view of a conflict between the objectives of the nation-state and international capital was shared by the likes of Peter Shore and Tony Benn, and informed their hostility to what was then the Common Market.
Even so, I can hardly imagine Tony Benn supporting ethnic cleansing to facilitate a real estate deal, or Peter Shore taking advantage of an invaded ally to rip off its mineral wealth. Which brings me to ask, what are the people around Trump thinking? I suppose there has always been a sector of the general public that has lapped up the rhetoric of naked self-interest in international affairs, but politicians and officials have tried to temper that in pursuit of longer-term goals. Despite temperamental and political differences, the likes of Charles Haughey and Margaret Thatcher would never have allowed a major diplomatic row over abortion. The difference now seems to be that the poison of social media seems not just to be affecting “the masses” (long the scapegoat of intellectuals of both left and right) but also the supposed “grown-ups” (as if a man-child like Trump has ever grown up), and the irritation and anger of the web are becoming the new staples of public diplomacy. Maybe one day the fate of the world will hinge on an impulse expressed in no more than 280 characters.
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