Is US President Donald Trump planning to invade other countries?
There have been frequent and repeated comments by Trump about "annexing" or "absorbing" or taking over other sovereign countries.
NY Times How 51st State talk became seen as deadly serious
White House Asked US Military for Panama Options
CNBC - Trump on US Annexation of Greenland
I think anyone paying attention to this should be extremely alarmed, especially when you connect this to the purges that he is doing to the US military and other organizations that would limit the power of the president, and of course recent supreme court rulings about presidential power.
It appears like he's trying to get people used to a new colonialism. Maybe if he attacks Panama and there isn't much internal resistance, then he'll attack Greenland, and so on. Sure we can guess whether he is doing this to help Putin, or to normalize Putin's invasion. In any case just the discussion of these things harms the other countries, the reputation of the US, and world stability.
Frankly I think this stuff, and the attack on federal workers and social programs and social security, is an attempt to not only do these things, but to generate mass protests which will be used as an excuse for martial law and the removal of other rights, including future elections.
Here's another article, This is by David Frum about how we allow people to minimize Trump's actions at our peril: The MAGA-Strategy Spin Machine
I don't think it's possible to overreact to this. A functioning US Congress would remove him from office right away.
A passing comment in a recent Ezra Klein episode illuminated it best for me. MAGA used to be the 50's, now it is the turn of the (previous) century. I think JD Vance's influence has him thinking of William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt as models for his legacy. Putting Roosevelt aside, McKinley famously endorsed tariffs (McKinley Tariffs raised the average tariff to nearly 50% on imports, and endorsed the Dingley Tariffs) and presided over an age of USian expansionism (annexed Puerto Rico, Guam, Philippines, and Hawaii.)
So to answer your question, I think he is serious and he imagines his legacy to be an expanded US border on maps. I don't attribute a high likelihood, but I expect a lot of turmoil, pain, and a weakened US resulting from the attempt.
Edit: he also "renamed" Denali to Mt. McKinley, which I think supports this reading.
It's as though he's trying to out-Putin Putin. However, Putin is an insidious clever bastard whereas Donald Trump is a banal brutish boor.
This is how you serve the world up to China and Russia to carve up as they see fit. Standing alone makes us weaker. This only makes America great fools again.
I see the ultimate end result as China out-soft-powering America. Jury’s still out on whether Russia collapses under the weight of their war with Ukraine. It’s not too late for Europe to screw them.
I don't think the EU has enough executive power to make anything really happen with regard to Russia. Putin (and Trump) are effective because they don't bother with the checks and balances. That gives them a huge advantage in two important ways.
First, they can do illegal things and then present it as a fait accompli, leveraging the whole "it's better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission". As long as we* (people, media, the US opposition) handle this [as the thread OP pointed out](the thread OP pointed out), that works.
Secondly, in a military situation, decisiveness is huge. While the EU is corralling its national leaders, herding cats that sometimes don't care about Ukraine or actively support Russia (we all know who and what Orbán is, but he's not the only one), Russia will accelerate its already-successful campaign of territorial expansion.
I'm very pessimistic on any good result coming out of this. This was extremely predictable since Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and their meddling with borders around them since then, to a great or lesser extent. EU industry got addicted to cheap energy in the form of Russian gas and that cannot be turned around in a timeframe in which Ukraine can be saved. The US defaulting here is terrible, but the EU chose to abdicate its leadership role here for pragmatic reasons years ago, and those chickens have now come home to roost.
*you, really, I'm not from the US nor do I live there, but the world is set up in a way that forces me to give a shit, unfortunately.
He said in his inauguration speech that he would see to a US that expanded its borders. I think he is serious. For a long time there was a weird consensus that Trump just said things he didn't mean as some sort of offensive tactic. If the last months have learned us anything it is that his words needs to be taken quite literally. He seems really motivated just to get USA look bigger on a world map. There isn't any deeper plan than that.
I think this just shows how stupid he really is. And it's more is a dick measuring contrast
The US already has more than enough power to influence policy and has military bases all over the world. There is ZERO reason to expand boarders.
Ego is a reason, a bad reason, but a reason none the less.
Agree with your assessment. People are parsing nouns, verbs like it was an English grammar class when he speaks. Sorry, those times are long gone and he isn't some great orator. His words are plain and simple.
I think Trump idolizes Putin to an extent, and wants to emulate him. He wants his own piece of land that he just unilaterally decides is America's now, and which will always be associated with him for the rest of the nations history.
I dont know if he'll actually pull the trigger on it, or if this is just him trying to emulate Putin superficially so that people will think of the two in the same way.
Personally I don't know how seriously to gauge it either. There are multiple people backing Trump that want some land to build multiple tech company towns, whether it be from National Parks, Greenland, Gaza or? I mean... they already have Puerto Rico which is pretty close to libertarian paradise--I guess it's not enough for them.
Maybe they could turn the Grand Canyon into some cool Mœbius-inspired hellscape. They want to be Bruce Willis but actually they are Mr. Zorg.
I don’t think Trump much plans to do anything and that’s the common point of disagreement I have.
The Trump ADMIN might have plans, but trump himself is basically improv mixed with spite.
He will say something, see the reaction, then plow forward or remove it and claim success. Repeat.
Will he suggest it? Absolutely. I’m sure he already has. Will he do it/be able to, I think it’s a very complicated answer.
Edit:
And to be clear I think “Invade” is a very important distinction.
He’s already trying to draw new lines on a map but that’s not an invasion, and that kind of “annexation” happens a lot in contested areas (just not a common NA problem until now….).
Straight up sending troops across that border to secure and hold, as opposed to walk in and walk out as is standard in the SEA dick waving contest is another important distinction.
I have no faith in trump, but I don’t love when people use the most hyperbolic outcome and then group all lesser activity into it either.
I’ll also say “this is in regards to territories mentioned”. I’d say it’s WAY more likely we 100% legit invade Iran
Ok, when trump does something, that is shorthand for “the Trump admin does something”. It doesn’t matter which specific evil republican thought of it. I realize that he’s mentally ill and not intelligent and couldn’t come up with an evil plan. It doesn’t seem to matter.
The worst part is that he keeps doing more and more startling things. Illegal things. And nobody stops it. The tariffs are not legal. The president can only levy them in a wartime emergency. There is no wartime emergency. Fentanyl coming over the border from Canada is like 45 pounds a year. That’s no emergency. And then he gives different reasons for them, and none of those reasons are emergencies. But every day the news talks about what effect they’re having instead of just talking about how they’re illegal and whoever is actually charging them should not.
The same with the DOGE nonsense. They are cutting programs that have already been funded by congress. The president can’t do that and some agency can’t do that. But every days the news talks about whether the cuts are effective and all that. It doesn’t matter whether they’re effective. They’re illegal and for some reason they are still happening. So I guess we have a king now.
I know that's your intent but I do think the distinction is very important, because Trump has shown he's willing to tell literally every single person around him "fuck you". Trump IS capable of long term planning, he clearly has been since his loss in 2020. That's why I think it does matter.
The biggest concern I have is that Trump WILL want to stay president, no matter what his admin thinks, and then he WILL have a reason to see if he can drum up a war, because he'll probably think it'll keep him in power.
As for the rest of your post:
Look I get it. If you want to vent about Trump and the current admin, cool. Obviously it's a disappointing dumpster fire, and doubly so how few democrats and judges are even willing to try and obstruct or stop it. That said none of this really relates to anything I said or you even were originally talking about?
The connection I was trying to make is that he keeps crossing lines. With tariffs and cutting programs and other things. And since he isn’t being stopped at any of these lines, it seems that he’ll also get war if he wants. Latest news about Kursk shows that he’s successfully fucked Ukraine too. So the relation with the original post, and your comment, and my response, is that I think that military action is more likely than you think.
Fair enough, although I don't really agree it's anywhere near the same level.
His line crossing with tariffs, while gross, is the expected end result of the last 20+ years of congress sitting on its hands as more and more they force legislation to be a problem for the SC. He's got the court, he's got the congress, and the dems....well personally I think way too fucking many of them benefit and just put on a show so long as their feathers don't get ruffled, but if you're not as cynical then they're still spineless.
It's basically the same story with DOGE (although the courts are pushing back more there), and there's a soft vibe of "they're doing it wrong but fuck so much of this". If someone sane were in office saying "we're burning half this shit down over the next 8 years because it's ineffective, costly, and out of date" very few would disagree. I'm well aware that what DOGE is doing DOES NOT solve any of this in any reasonable way, but again there's very much a vibe there.
Yes, the news is not going to report on it. The media is for entertainment, not education, not mobilization.
The point I'm making is that a literal boots on the ground invasion is a BIG deal. Doubly so if you're talking about Canada. People were able to say "oh shit wow" about Iraq but it didn't affect the lives of the average citizen who was not in the military or didn't know anyone who was so for them it was business as usual and oh lets watch on the news as shock and awe hits followed by years and years of miserable "nation building".
Getting into a shooting war with Canada or Greenland (Which is really more of a "and Europe" thing) is an entire other level of shit because it's much much closer to home, and much more likely that everyone is going to feel it.
Panama is closer to the Iraq situation, but even then would be a shitstorm.
It is, oddly, the most "sane" one. The US, and basically every other country that can, has military bases near just about every shipping choke point in the world. It's well known that should shit hit the fan and not somehow go nuclear, these are areas that could disrupt the entire planet very quickly with a minimal amount of effort (as demonstrated in the suez).
The US did have military bases near the Canal in order to ensure this up until the 2000's, however I believe the theory since then has been "we're on good enough terms with Panama, they're not needed". I could see an argument that shits getting weird out there even without trump and maybe the US needs to take a long look at what it takes for granted, and maybe get a base back up in the region IN CO-OPERATION with the local government, because yeah it's going to be a very big fucking deal if we don't have access to it.
That said, of course Trump saying "fuck you we'll take it" is a very fast way to actually encourage exactly that, which is pretty much his specialty (causing a problem and then fixing it) so maybe that's the most likely of the 3?
I still think it's more noise and nonsense from him though, and him mostly wanting to play general and throw his weight around. That is, again, why i'm much more concerned about Iran who is a problem anyways, is not at all a fan of trump, and is a very obvious target for him if he goes the "war's = support" route.
Re Trump staying president, his age is significant although not a determining factor. If he becomes unable to hold rallies, what happens?
I tend to agree with this view - I often suspect if Trump thought that he could look stronger, while also winning the adoration of the majority of American's, he'd happily become a far left politician. But catering to the right currently gets him the most love, feeling of strength, and easy money, so that's what he does.
I also agree that it's the administration surrounding him that pushes the worst policies through him. Trump is a monster, no doubt, but the people pulling the strings are far worse - they have honest to god, unwavering beliefs about how the world should be run, and those beliefs are not a pretty thing.
Totally agree.
There's a quote that's escaping me at the moment.... Something to the effect of "it's not the greedy rulers who are most dangerous, but the ideological ones."
Trump is greedy, no doubt. Money, power, doesn't matter, he's insatiable. Peter Thiel though? That man has thoughts on how things should be; internally consistent, dangerous thoughts. And the money to make them happen (through puppets like Vance and Musk). That dude scares the shit out of me, and we need to be talking about him more.
Trump often says dramatic stuff. I don't try very hard to understand what it really means. I think it's more useful to read about what the Trump administration is doing. If there are serious plans for a war, it will leak.
Hard to say, but he did ask the military to draw up plans to take the Panama Canal.