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Bulletins and News Discussion from February 3rd to February 9th, 2025 - Fuhrer Failsons

Image is of Elon Musk giving the Nazi salute a week or so ago.

I didn't really want to keep spotlighting American domestic events as I had assumed that shit would calm down pretty quickly, but it appears that the Trump administration, including Musk, are determined to bring down the empire from the inside.

One of the most important lessons of ruling a country - and especially an empire - is to never, ever believe your own propaganda; and yet now we have neo-Nazi failsons disrupting parts of the imperial apparatus and causing general government mayhem because they actually seem to believe in libertarianism; that the state and the capitalists are somehow in opposition, rather than working in lockstep to maximise profit and boost American hegemony around the world.

I'm not so optimistic as to believe that a national collapse is FOUR DAYS AWAY, like those weird anti-China cranks often speculate - the US has at least a decade or two left even under these conditions. But consider the damage being inflicted in these past couple weeks, and extrapolate that over the next four years. Does any living American political figure possess the competency to halt - or even meaningfully slow - the already ongoing decline? And could they achieve power (or even be allowed to do so) after Trump's term is done?

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  • Some images of the removal and taping up of USAID signage at Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington D.C. Comrades, I don't think we'll get more poetic imagery than this of the death of contemporary globalised neoliberal capital:

    Which brings me to the point of discussion, what comes afterwards? More barbarity? Isolation? Protectionism? The fall of empire? I encourage any analysis or reply, no matter how brief or detailed.

    As for me, the enternal pessimist, I think we're entering a new phase of the US empire, not a fall or decline but a shift in tactics, and the current focus appears to be around shipping lanes and freedom of navigation. If we look at the current targets of the US administration's aggressive rhetoric, in Panama, Canada, México, Greenland, Egypt, Iran and China, and even South Africa, a picture emerges: that is drawn on the USA controlling the world's shipping. With Panama we have the Panama canal as an obvious flashpoint, México with the Gulf of México, then with Egypt we have the Suez, Iran is about the Strait of Hormuz and the oil trade with China, with China itself it's about the South China Sea, with Canada and Greenland there's the Arctic shipping lanes such as the North West Passage, and with South Africa there's the Cape of Good Hope and Durban. It really looks as if Trump and his advisors are playing the board game "Risk" here, and looking to exert influence or directly control key points in this regard. If manufacturing can't be brought back to the United States, the consolation prize is to control the flow of goods and the world's oceans.

    What Iran and Yemen demonstrated over the past year and a half in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden is scary for whoever seeks to control the world's oceans. Which brings me to the topic of Yemen, Trump has been scarily quiet here, with regards to Ansarallah/the Houthis. Aside from designating them as a terrorist organisation, he hasn't said much. When the right hand is moving, you must watch what the left is doing. Trump's first call to a foreign leader after taking power was to Saudi Arabia's MBS. Yes, even before Netanyahu. There was been increased US and French reconnaissance flights around Yemen. And despite all the cuts to USAID and various other three letter organisations, rumours are that the US has increased contact with the opposition/internationally recognised government in Yemen. If I were in the position of Ansarallah, I'd be preparing for for engagements with the United States.

    • Assume for a moment that they know the US empire is on its last legs and China is about to ascend and break the US's grip on global finance. What would the logical next step be? If we're really going to have a multi-polar world, the US had better get its act together and consolidate a power base it can defend while it still enjoys the advantages of global hegemony. Tightening the grip on Europe, consolidating direct control in North America and the near abroad, and trying to protect and rebuild domestic industry are all sensible moves if the objective is not to justify a global neoliberal hegemony, but to survive as a separate imperial bloc among several competitors. I honestly don't see that as being much more workable than maintaining global hegemony, but if you can't beat China, you need a different plan.

      • I think it's also a matter of turning currently existing military capital into tangible accomplishments. The US Navy is still the strongest in the world, but for how much longer? Once China starts mass producing nuclear powered aircraft carriers with 5th generation stealth aircraft onboard, the US Navy's ability to police the oceans will decrease significantly. If there was ever a time to act, it's now. On the opposite side of the world we saw something like that with Russia and Ukraine, Russia turned their Soviet era military stockpiles into a tangible result in Ukraine, before those stockpiles became completely obsolete in modern warfare (drones are already useful now, imagine in 10 years). It's very much a "use it or lose it" scenario.

    • my gut feelings about USamerican domestic politics is that we are about to see a commensurate rise in state’s rights with all the federal bloodshed that’s happening. Some people might not call it that, but a lot of lawyers are going to make money talking about state and federal authority soon. Your South Carolina’s already don’t have expanded Medicaid, and now they have some sort of mandate to terrorize trans and Hispanic people. Your Oregon’s are going to be forced to lean more on regional alliances and might face budgetary issues. They might also terrorize trans and Hispanic people. Firefighting agreements and water compacts already “unite” most of what’s west of the Rockies. i am not familiar enough with things east of that. If domestic politics are scrambled, and Trump/ DOGE manage to gut the CIA and bureaucracy, then foreign policy is a crapshoot. USamericans truly do not think or care about other people in the world.

      The Monroe Doctrine revival idea is tempting, because it’s very rational. Yeah, the USA has been forced to recalibrate and retreat following the 2008 Financial Crisis, and the strongman demagogue who’s back in office has always been obsessed with Latin America. To put a very crude finish on the topic, Texas and the South have a moral/ race war angle on Mexico and Central America. They will always be chomping at the bit to shoot up more water stations and put up more barbed wire. California and the West managed a complex rotation of accepting and deporting vulnerable populations for massive economic gain for well over a century. They will always try and send a donation or lobby a bill away from messing with the money. i do not think those competing forces will be resolved until there is revolution on Turtle Island.

      The national and international capitalist both have no stake in invading Mexico or anywhere in Latin America. The current system is set up so that the first gets cheap labor in the USA, and the second gets it abroad. Historically, the CIA directly profits from the drug trade across Central America. i refuse to entertain the idea that Trump is somehow a delusional or irrational actor, he’s just petty and unfamiliar with the usual reasons and excuses of statecraft. For better or for worse, lots of people can tell that the current system needs to change. i think Trump ‘24 is Nixon’s second term as farce.

      Nixon pivoting on the gold standard makes infinitely more sense in retrospect than it did in the moment. i won’t pretend to know what is cooking within the current USamerican administration, but the long hangover of quantitative easing after ‘08 and China’s assertion of its global position all vaguely echo the rise of Japanese manufacturing and the inflation crisis that Nixon had. When Nixon abandoned the gold standard, the average USamerican thought they were being saved from foreign price gougers.

    • My guess is renewed focus on the Monroe doctrine and a shift from maximalist goals as single world hegemon to more modest ones, big dog of the anglosphere. Neocon goals like the breakup of Russia, regime change in Iran, and isolation of China are looking a lot less possible now, but the empire is still fully capable exploitation and juice squeezing from existing US vassals in the golf course countries and smaller states that are less autarkic, less able to resist (lots of Latin America).

      @xiaohongshu@hexbear.net has also discussed how while American cultural, diplomatic and military hegemony is waning relative to other nations, they are still the world's financial hegemon with any financial rival still years/decades away. If the libs of the various other contenders in a multipolar world fuck up, it's possible that American financial capital will be able to molt and shed the American nation state and parasitize a broader segment of the globe.

    • If they were interested in actually dismantling the infrastructure/stoping what USAID does they would start publishing all the evil and shady shit that was done through USAID, like aiding neo-nazis in Ukraine. This strikes me more about removing what the view to to liberals from the deep state and also being done with soft power.

    • dedicated radical captain or crew or saboteur (evidently) can shutdown both suez and panama

      I think they'll strip human face of usaid, and just finance government coup propaganda, without niceties of vaccinations/lgbt/food. Which would slowly stop working in poor countries, cause material conditions motherfuckers, probably would work fine in europe/china/asia

      • dedicated radical captain or crew or saboteur (evidently) can shutdown both suez and panama

        That appears to be exactly what the US is scared of. See their moaning about China building a bridge over the Panama canal. Which is why the US would want more control.

        As for USAID and all the three letter organisations, I think the plan is to try combine some of them, and put them under the direct control of the State Department or even the presidency. In its current form, these organisations had too many fingers in too many different pies. We had CIA backed rebels fighting against Pentagon backed rebels in Syria. We had USAID funding both pro Trump and anti Trump media. While causing chaos can be a positive, I think they'll switch to a more unified structure to prevent such in future.

    • I think the driving factor is killing the patronage networks USAID funds

    • More barbarity? Isolation? Protectionism? The fall of empire? I encourage any analysis or reply, no matter how brief or detailed.

      The minds behind the ruling class are reorganising themselves. They are falling back from neoliberalism back into previous organisation of society. This is occurring culturally, ideologically and materially in terms of structure and organisation. By this I mean the cultural - attitudes to patriarchy, lgbt, attempts to boost christianity, remove secularism, and so on. The ideological - end of history globalisation of capital. And the material in forms of the structures in governance that existed to spread this, USAID, courts, deglobalisation + reindustrialisation is being attempted, etc etc. All of these are being done together because there is a strong belief among these people that the social methods of controlling society are necessary in tandem with the intended ways you want to steer society and use the power of the state for intended goals. These ideological and cultural roots already proved to create societies that would allow the types of activities they wish to do while the culture currently running alongside neoliberalism has demonstrable become out of their control for things like Gaza's genocide.

      If we want to know how things are going to go from here on out, the 1800s up to 1990 is a good picture.

      This is my take. All actions need to be viewed holistically and they need to be seen not in the sense of what is happening right now but what has also been worked towards for a decade.

    • The US recently passed that anti-China propaganda bill that would've allocated $1.63 billion to the state department and USAID. I don't think getting rid of USAID would do much since the money is still being allocated for the state department to spend anyways. I wonder whether other funding uses this language. x billions of dollars is allocated to the US state department and USAID just becomes x billions of dollars is allocated to the US state department only. I don't see why those NGOs can only cash checks send by USAID and not by the US state department since USAID, even right down to the name, is obviously part of the US government.

      USAID wasted millions of dollars on

      and I know we like to joke about him, but there's no way Rubio, one of the more competent imperialists, wouldn't know how much of a fuckup Guaido is. Perhaps it was the straw that broke the camel's back along with some politicking on Rubio's part since USAID technically isn't being dismantled but folded into the US state department. It's mostly through Musk's incompetence that they're losing personnel instead of transferring USAID employees to the state department instead.

    • Its transformation into a more direct vassalage system, one more common of history - we are entering the final end to the end of history aka "the revenge of history"

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