Addressing The Top-Three Criticisms Head-On
Trump’s decision to pick freshman Ohio Senator JD Vance as his Vice President (VP) has riled some members of the Alt-Media Community (AMC), who claim that it represents a step backwards for the MAGA movement. They point to his history as a US Marine in Iraq, as a venture capitalist after that, and then finally as a former Never Trumper to claim that he’s a neocon, which his hawkish positions on China and Iran confirm in their minds.
The reality though is that Vance isn’t someone whose worldview can easily be pigeonholed. His history as a US Marine in Iraq taught him, in his own words, that “I had been lied to – that the promises of the foreign policy establishment were a complete joke.” As for his time as a venture capitalist, it led to close friendships with leading elites like Peter Thiel, who’ve been instrumental in turning some Silicon Valley power players against the Democrats. This could ultimately prove to be a game-changer in the election.
Likewise, the same can be said about him formerly being a Never Trumper, which can appeal to millions of on-the-fence voters who used to despise Trump until they were “red pilled” like he admits he was and are thus now seriously considering supporting him. He argued that “I said some bad things about Donald Trump 10 years ago. I can make a good case to the American people, people who may have been skeptical of the president back in 2016, who could be skeptical now, that we’ve seen the results.”
Vance’s hawkish positions on China and Iran are to be expected. The first is the US’ systemic rival while the second threatens its regional hegemony. Nevertheless, what he’s said about Russia and Ukraine proves that he’s not an ideologically driven warmonger, which suggests that he’ll pragmatically manage the US’ competition with them. He’s no doubt a hegemonist, but that comes with the territory, and he’ll never forget what he learned about the establishment during his time with the US Marines in Iraq.
Clarifying China & Russia’s Roles In The MAGA Worldview
His worldview is that the US should be selective with its engagements abroad, both militarily and in terms of foreign aid, and he’s a proponent of Trump’s reported plan for NATO. This would see the bloc become “dormant” as its European members are coerced to step up their involvement in containing Russia while the US “Pivots (back) to Asia” to contain China. Members of the AMC claim that this makes him a “sell-out”, but it’s unrealistic to expect a leading member of MAGA to not be hawkish on China.
After all, Trump was extremely tough on the People’s Republic, which he justified on the grounds of rebalancing their astronomical trade deficit that reached several hundred billion dollars a year before his election. His problem though was that he was too influenced by his son-in-law Jared Kushner during his first term and fell under the sway of neocons, but he’s since learned his lesson judging by how he reportedly took his son Don Jr’s, Steven Bannon’s, and Tucker Carlson’s advice to pick Vance as his VP.
Trump and Vance share the vision of redirecting the US’ containment focus away from Russia and towards China, with a view towards preventing the first’s potentially disproportionate dependence on the second that could turbocharge its superpower trajectory and thus seriously challenge the US. The resultant system of Sino-US bi-multipolarity would comparatively favor China since it would amount to them practically being equals on the world stage, hence why those two want to avoid this if possible.
The means to that end is to relieve some pressure upon Russia so that it can rely more on India and other Global South states, particularly those from its “Ummah Pivot”, as export markets for its natural resources instead of being forced by circumstances into funneling most of them towards China’s rise. From Russia’s perspective, any reduction of pressure would be welcome, especially if it results in some of its national security interests in Europe finally being respected through a compromise in Ukraine.
Russia’s Grand Strategic Interests
Preemptively averting potentially disproportionate dependence on China is also important, not for any politically Sinophobic reasons, but for simple pragmatism since no strategically autonomous country like Russia wants to be reliant on a single partner for the bulk of its foreign export earnings. This explains why it’s recently recalibrated its Asian balancing act from its hitherto Sino-centricity through Putin’s trips to North Korea and Vietnam as well as his hosting of Indian Prime Minister Modi.
The preceding five hyperlinked analyses explain this strategy in detail, the gist of which was just reflected in Valdai Club Program Director Timofei Bordachev’s article about how “Russia has redefined its Asia strategy”, which was released after those pieces and then republished by RT on their front page. This insight is relevant with regards to Trump’s decision to pick Vance as his VP since it strongly suggests that Russia would be receptive to those two’s envisaged endgame of swiftly resolving the Ukrainian Conflict.
Alt-Media’s Activist Problem
Despite recognizing how easily that proxy war could spiral out of control into World War III, and thus appreciating the need to bring about a diplomatic end to it as soon as possible exactly as Vance has promised that he’ll seek to do, some in the AMC are still displeased with him. A lot of these disgruntled folks are activists at heart, which makes them ideologues for the causes that they support, which in this case are world peace in general and less US pressure on China and Iran in particular.
They therefore can’t approve of Vance as VP because of his hawkish positions towards those two, hence why they’re now agitating against him by fearmongering that he’ll risk sparking World War III with them instead of with Russia like Biden and his team are dangerously flirting with by miscalculation. They’re entitled to their views, but observers should remember that they’re being shared by ideologues, no matter how well-intentioned they may be.
These people are purposely being hyperbolic for political reasons related to the causes that they passionately support. They’re also naïve if they truly thought that Trump wouldn’t pick someone who shares his worldview, which is pragmatic towards Russia but adversarial towards China and Iran. It’s possible to raise awareness of the risks that a theoretical Vance presidency could bring if something happens to Trump without going overboard by fearmongering about him and discrediting him.
Exposing The Frauds
Some of these folks aren’t being sincere with their concerns, however, since they have ulterior motives. There are those who have a unique interpretation of what MAGA is, which is at variance with what it objectively is, and are thus very angry that Trump’s pick of Vance as VP shattered their expectations. The resultant cognitive dissonance explains some of their furious posts on social media after having previously supported the movement.
Then there are those who never truly supported MAGA, but sought to establish “alliances of convenience” on certain causes like those related to China and Iran, and are deliberately trying to discredit MAGA as revenge since it’s clear that Trump 2.0’s policies wouldn’t align with their views. This is especially true for hitherto seemingly MAGA-friendly foreigners who are now trying to manipulate voters’ perceptions about emotive issues like the ones that they support after Vance’s pick as VP.
These people can’t vote in US elections, yet they’re exploiting social media to have an outsized role in influencing those who can, with the common narrative being that they imply one way or another that this decision supposedly proves that Trump has betrayed MAGA. The truth though is that Trump is paving the way for a successor who’ll carry on what MAGA has always been about on the foreign policy front, and that’s being tough on the US’ top rivals in order to decelerate its declining unipolar hegemony.
MAGA’s Role In The Global Systemic Transition
To be sure, the way in which Trump and Vance envisage doing this is by first alleviating the risk of World War III with Russia, which is a net positive for peace and would bring humanity back from the brink if it’s successful. The global systemic transition to multipolarity has also unprecedentedly accelerated so much since the start of Russia’s special operation that restoring the 1990s-era unipolar system is now impossible, thus meaning that MAGA’s foreign policy is really about responsibly managing this moment.
The best that the US can now hope to achieve is to preserve its privileged position as long as possible through creative – and ideally peaceful – means. It’ll never enjoy the unparalleled dominance from the post-Old Cold War period, but it also won’t become a so-called “normal country” anytime soon either, let alone collapse in the near future like many in the AMC have predicted. A Trump-Vance presidency would be all about slowing the pace of its decline and regaining some ground wherever possible.
The difference between them and Biden-Harris is that MAGA wants to improve socio-economic living standards at home while keeping World War III at bay abroad while the Democrats care less about Americans and more about their fellow liberal–globalist elite even at the expense of risking World War III. Few activists will ever be fully pleased with any presidential ticket, but comparatively speaking, the Trump-Vance one is much better for world peace as a whole than the Biden-Harris one.
