How Trump’s resource imperialism is undermining America’s future
When Donald Trump’s narcissism is reaching new geopolitical hights, it might be the moment to think about the damage being done, not only to the hard-hit international order, but to the United States itself; to look at the President not as the harbinger but saboteur of America’s future; and to focus on the characters and influence peddlers who are thriving under his erratic, contradictory and at times brutally honest tutelage. Trump’s most recent bout of backward-looking energy imperialism will hopefully teach the rest of the West what the grandiose promises and retrograde policies of the radical right will finally amount to: namely to a weakening of the nation in the “Great Game” of global competition.
This was a tempestuous start of the year, even by the destructive standards of Donald Trump. He took out the never elected dictator of Venezuela and declared control of the country’s oil in violation of international law. He threatened Cuba, Columbia and even Greenland with military invasion, notwithstanding Denmark’s NATO-membership. His administration withdrew from 66 UN- and international organisations many of them addressing the need for a more sustainable energy policy.
And he defended the murder of an innocent demonstrator in Minneapolis by a member of his migrant-chasing Immigration Police Force (ICE). Tough luck for the mother of three who had addressed her body armoured killer through her open car window by saying “I am not mad at you” before the ICE agent called her a “fucking bitch” and shot her. So much for spreading of violence at the beginning of 2026 instigated by the President of the United States.
This emphatic start to the year left the world in shock and Donald Trump in a triumphant mood constrained only by “his own morality” as he proudly told the four reporters of the New York Times whose submissive questioning was as shocking as the President’s hyperbole. “I don’t need international law”, Trump intoned. “Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me”.
The explanations why Trump does get away with it all have been listed many times: A leaderless and shellshocked Democratic Party plus supine Republicans rule out the US-Congress as a mitigating force. The archconservative majority on the Supreme Court tends to overrule injunctions and opposing judgements by some courageous judges in the lower courts. Then there are the many weak spots in the outdated constitutional order of the United States which no political party has hitherto addressed allowing the power of the president to increase term after term - until Donald Trump came and showed an astounded public what a President can do by bending rules and regulations.
And finally, the total helplessness of the so-called “legacy media” illustrated in the mentioned interview of Donald Trump by the most renowned media institution in the country. Just sad to see this example of missing fighting spirit in a once proud liberal journalism. Whilst it should be clear to all that - where arguments have long ceased to count - approaching Trump requires a performance of resistance to register in the today’s media environment.
A tougher attitude is also needed in dealing with Trump’s violations of the international order. Insisting on its rules is laudable, but lamenting its demise as if such order could come back tomorrow is not enough; because part of the international backlash against the rule-based order has been caused by the hypocrisy of Western nations in applying those rules only when it suited them. Today we are back to spheres of influence, if we like it or not.
One can argue about the question if the German Chancellor’s careful assessment of the kidnapping of Nicholas Maduro as legally “complex” was a tactical necessity or ill-advised cowardice. But it is not such a radical breach of the international order as some commentators would make us believe, rather a return to traditional American geopolitics in the region.
And if we are already living in world of influence spheres it seems only logical that we do not want non-hemispheric competitors controlling our backyard, be that in Venezuela or Greenland. Instead of “shouting “bastards” at our closest allies”, the Cambridge historian Brendan Simms suggests in the “New Statesman”, “London and Brussels would be better advised to proclaim a European Monroe Doctrine, which would declare the democratic parts of our continent off-limits to outside powers such as the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China”. Indeed, lecturing the US on how to deal with its backyard does not solve Europe’s problems.
In its annual forecast of global political risks in 2026 the Eurasia Group names “The US Political Revolution” as risk Number 1, where “the United States is itself unwinding its own global order”. According to this analysis neither America’s competition with China nor the tensions between the US and Russia, but America itself provides the most imminent risk “in a time of great geopolitical uncertainty”.
And what about the risk Donald Trump poses to the US itself? The Report of the Eurasia Group argues that the “Rule of Don”, began as tactical norm breaking but has evolved into “a system-level transformation …qualitatively different from what even the most ambitious American presidents have attempted”. So, what does the “Rule of Don” look like as regards to US foreign policy at the beginning of 2026?
At the top stands the 45th President as a unique cross between entertainer, real estate mogul, Sun King, mafia don and premodern patrimonial leader. He is a narcissistic, unideological figure, easily put off or won over, charting his mental map into real estate to be bought and resources to be extracted. At his court with no values Trump has assembled a team of idiots, ideologues and avengers who can act out their tech-utopias, fear of migrants and revenge for personal loss.
His currently most prominent underlings are Senior White House advisor Stephen Miller and Foreign Secretary Marco Rubio. According to Miller “we live in a world, in the real world… that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power. These are the iron laws of the world.” Given this worldview and his derogatory statements about migrants you might deservedly call Miller a racist and fascist.
And then there is “little Marco”, as Trump called his once competitor during the Republican Primary Debate in 2016, now his stooge for selling “America First” to the world and for clearing up the Western Hemisphere of any foreign influence. Born to parents who fled Cuba two years before Fidel Castro took power in 1959 Marco Rubio has been willing to follow any order given by his master on the way to run for the presidency himself in 2028. He silently performs those tasks which contradict much of what “little Marco” has said before about the merits of NATO, the United Nations and international NGOs; and he eagerly takes on the tasks in Latin America which he has propagated throughout his political career, particularly regime change in Cuba.
For the former Florida senator and son of exiles applying the renamed “Donroe Doctrine” does not constitute an illegal interference into sovereign countries but a justified reclaiming of history and lost property. The latter is a promise popular among significant parts of the Latino population in Texas and Florida and might therefore deliver votes for Marco Rubio in a future presidential campaign.
While the Foreign Secretary’s motivation for retaking America’s backyard is obvious and partly personal, the economic logic for the US capturing the control over Venezuelan oil reserves is not that clear. Those reserves might be the largest in the world, but they are difficult to develop, needing high investment and at least five years to get a refurbished oil production running. “Trump’s imperial Venezuela folly will leave America no richer” headlines the Financial Times. Or worse, it might even be detrimental to America’s future economic trajectory.
The intervention in Venezuela looks like a retro imperialism running against the current logic of the oil market and the energy requirements for future technologies. With global oil supply growing faster than demand for the foreseeable future and a break-even price of $ 60 per barrel for American shale production more oil from Venezuela would run counter to the domestic “drill baby, drill” mantra of the Trump Administration. It would also perpetuate Venezuela’s “oil curse”, the very reason for the country’s continuous political instability.
As Karthik Sankaran sums up the downsides of the intervention in the online magazine Responsible Statecraft: “The economic motivations behind the military intervention in Venezuela thus seems contradictory, grounded in a misunderstanding of America’s role in global energy markets, and oblivious to a central problem of political economy in South America – the continent’s commodity dependence”. It is almost ironic that the US interference in Venezuela closely resembles the CIA-instigated coup against Iranian Prime Minister Mossadegh in 1953 which marks the beginning of Iran’s recurring instability creating today’s scenes of upheaval in the streets of Teheran.
With its oil grab the Trump Administration is betting on fossil fuels whereas competitors like China heavily invest in renewables to meet the excessive energy demands of an AI driven economy. As Bruno Maćaes calculates in “The New Statesman”, by focussing on cheaper and quickly scalable renewable energy supply China’s data centres will only be consuming around 4 per cent of total electricity use by 2030 compared to 12 per cent in the US. When future energy demands by AI companies will compete with the energy needs of private US-households rising electricity prices could lead to political upheaval.
To sum it up, it is one thing to build and safeguard your sphere of influence from your political enemies and economic competitors. But it is another thing to use your gained influence wisely and effectively which the Trump Administration in its nativist fervour and utter incompetence is failing to do. The recent wranglings in Latin America, Greenland - and soon to be Iran - might portend an unavoidable power struggle between the US and China. Yet Trump’s failure to address the challenges with the means of a liberal democracy and the rule-based rationality of geopolitical realism is clearly damaging to America’s future.
One can only hope that the dismal results of Trump’s resource imperialism will show potential voters of right-wing parties in Europe how grandiose promises and retrograde policies of a populist movement will ultimately lead to a weakening of the nation in an unstable, multipolar world.