Trump promises vengeance against UN member voters

By | December 21, 2017

The world had learnt nothing about Trump over the past year in his battle with the mass media and democratic party

The rhetoric coming out of USA’s UN Ambassador Nikki Haley cannot be taken lightly. Donald J Trump, the current United States President, had already proven himself to be a doer, someone who would do what he promised. So far, Trump’s administration over the past year, had already proven themselves to be the most efficient and most “to the promise” administration, probably ever, in the history of the United States. The Trump’s america is also showing to be an administration, that for once in a long time, practices “realpolitik”.

Donald Trump had already mentioned multiple times, endlessly, saying that it will be “America First”. America First is not just a political rhetoric – it is the new reality the world have to deal with – an USA that no longer view itself as a “savior” or “invulnerable” or have endless cash to print without care about its debt obligation. He had already set the agenda very clear, even to USA’s closest allies, that they will no longer tolerate any form of unbalanced deals that goes against the interests of United States – and he expects all nations to be the same, to always put their own countries’ interests first (which is the case for virtually all countries with exception to the USA prior to Trump).

A DOMESTIC DECISION
To Trump, the move of the US Embassy to Jerusalem is a “domestic decision” – he expect the decision to be controversial, but he feel that it is USA’s rights to do so, regardless what the world thinks. The thing that he will not expect, is for certain UN member states to vote against USA under the “pretense” of wanting to stand up for the Palestinians – in which he fires his first salvo: a stark warning to 180 of the 193 UN members that the US President will personally direct his country to take action against countries that voted in favor of declaring US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital “null and void”.

The Palestinians and their “backers” are trying to engage a diplomatic battle against Israel and the United States – with Monday’s vote (source: US outnumbered 14 to 1 as it vetoes UN vote on status of Jerusalem) to isolate the 2 countries, and along with the Muslim coalition’s pressure on the rest of the world to “uprise” against the dominance of United States on Thursday’s UN General Assembly vote. The strategy appears sound, as the 14-1 vote in the Security Council had shown that the world may be willing to stand together against USA.

However, Donald Trump had been fighting against seemingly insurmountable odds since his declaration to run as the Republican candidate for the Presidency, and his administration had been under virtually daily attacks from the mainstream media since even before he became president. This “global coalition” against USA would probably feel like just another case of déjà vu for him, and he is under no illusion that he had a lot of buttons to push, to punish those countries that would vote against the USA.

A Battle Between Rhetoric & Real Power
The entire Palestinian support is lack of substance and full of fluff. Palestine did not suffer only today or this year – they had been suffering for decades – and had their sovereignty fully undermined by the Israeli right from the establishment of the Jewish state after World War 2. 3 wars were fought (subjectively speaking, for the Palestinians), and 3 wars lost. Intifada after intifada, nothing had changed, but more suffering for the Palestinians.

Even the past 2 weeks, the riots and violence by the Palestinians had only caused sufferings or even death among their own people. It is not wise, it is not the way if you have no real power. The same goes for the UN General Assembly vote: the vote will count for nothing even if the vote count is 191-2. Israeli and United States military power decides what is “real” and what is not. All the political and diplomatic support given to the Palestinians will be for naught, if the countries are unwilling to go to war for Palestine. Similarly, a half hearted coalition going to war for Palestine and risk losing once again to the Israeli will only aggravate the situation for Palestine, as per every war against Israel, only reduces Palestinian territory.

Spending On Moral Support

Speaking at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Trump amplified Haley’s threat.

“Let them vote against us,” he said.

“We’ll save a lot. We don’t care. But this isn’t like it used to be where they could vote against you and then you pay them hundreds of millions of dollars,” he said. “We’re not going to be taken advantage of any longer.”

And for the “unrelated” member states, would they actually dare to vote against United States, after already receiving a direct threat by the United States. Like mentioned in the beginning of this article, every single country practises “RealPolitik” – every country will weigh their options, what they will gain and lose if they were to vote against the United States.

You can check out all the foreign aids US is provides here: USAID Reports

Just to put things into perspective, in 2016 (source) United States provided a whopping 34 billion dollars in foreign economic aids (excluding Military aid) to virtually every country in the world (yes, including Russia and China). The amount includes those that were contributed via United Nations. But with this coming UN vote, any countries that vote against USA is very likely to lose all form of funding that originates from United States (if you still do not think USA will go to such length… you must have not been paying close attention to him and his administration).

A quick look at the spending on aid by the State Department (2016) (source), top recipients includes:
– Lebanon (258 million)
– Syria (229 million)
– Iraq (205 million)
– Jorden (199 million)
– Kenya (156 million)
– South Sudan (144 million)
– Turkey (143 million)

Under US Agency for International Development (source) :

…ignoring Afghanistan and Syria…
– Ethiopia (845 million)
– Nigeria (442 million)
– Pakistan (419 million)
– Iraq again (361 million)

Jordan themselves received 231 million in Cash Transfer under “Economic Support Fund” (whatever that means, or for).

Are these countries, especially those in the Middle East, willing to give up hundreds of millions for Palestinians? Is voting against an inevitable US Embassy move (it is obvious USA is going to move the embassy no matter how the vote turns out… Trump is building the Wall, so he is moving the embassy) worth, perhaps 1.2 billion dollars, for Jordan? Or is it worth, 1.2 billion dollars for Egypt? Or perhaps 222 million dollars for Indonesia? Pakistan got 777 million in 2016.

Palestine themselves received over 416 million from the United States in 2016.

I’m sure these countries understands that Trump can’t wait to get the excuse he needs to cut funding and re-purpose these money for their own domestic use (note: the train derailment in Washington state is a good example of where he would love to spend these savings on). So are these countries whom are receiving so much money from USA willing to give it all up, just to give Palestine “moral support”?

Trump can’t wait to get the excuse he needs to cut funding and re-purpose these money for their own domestic use.

UN needs USA more than USA needs UN
Another new reality is how important USA actually is in the United Nations. USA contributes 22 percent of the UN Budget (2015), and any enforcement by USA to control how their contribution can be spent, and to whom, will seriously hamper the UN operations and credibility. While China and other countries might step in to fill in the gap, they will be spending money that they would have otherwise spent on their own country’s development. Donald Trump had already proved his resolve by withdrawing USA from UNESCO (The United States Withdraws From UNESCO), saving USA more than half a billion dollars in payments and arrears. Thus Trump’s USA will not shy away from withdrawing more fundings into United Nations if they cannot get what they want.

USA had already blanked TPP, Paris climate accord, TTIP and threatened to withdraw from NATO – all to ensure USA do not spend money on things that they cannot get a fair deal of, and if the members within the groupings are shown to be “dishonorable”.

Pushover No More
As United States is likely to follow through on their threats, all eyes will be on the vote tomorrow – to see if the world is willing to accept that they are not in the position to decide for USA what they should do, or are they willing to keep ranks, suffer the consequences and show Donald Trump that they will not stand for this new direction in US foreign policy.

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