Total War: A Prediction About Donald Trump

Reading about the history and origins of the Dritte Reich is fascinating because of the philosophical questions it raises. First of all, it raises the question as to whether history is predestined. For some, WWII and the Holocaust were predestined from even before Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. For others, it was predestined at the time the National Socialist grabbed power in 1934. This all assumes that history is neatly planned, predestined, or metaphysically predetermined. The trouble is that there is no way of either definitively proving or disproving such a notion of predestination.

I am personally inclined to agree with David Cesarani, in his book Final Solution, that the Holocaust was not the outcome of some Grand Master Plan. It was the by-product of a whole series of unintended consequences and accidents of history. Cesarani calls this the "cock-up theory of history".

So what about Donald Trump? Is there a predestined outcome for him too? The trouble is that this too is a grand metaphysical question to which I, as a mere mortal, am helpless to be able to say for sure. Moreover, it is like asking how many angels can dance on a pinhead. The greater trouble is that even more than Hitler, Trump is the master of the cock-up.

Yet despite all caveats, I am going to make a prediction about Donald Trump. Yet I admit it is a prediction which I cannot say is definite, for I am not so foolish as to pretend to be a Nostradamus or to assert that the future has already been decided in advance.

My prediction is for war. The greatest likelihood is for war against North Korea.

My first reason is that the United States of America has not decisively won a war since World War II. That means that the last US President to decisively win a war was Truman. Trump has already promised to "make American great again" and that we will be "tired of all the winning".

My second reason is that Trump is increasingly isolated, and a cornered animal is always the most dangerous. The more he is humiliated with defeat after defeat in Congress, the more he will be likely to lash out with his promised "fire and fury". In choosing Trump, the people of America may have already chosen the path to total war.

Wollt ihr den totalen Krieg?
Do you want total war?
"Ja!" answered the roaring masses.
Then, stated Goebbels: "Nun, Volk, steh auf, und Sturm, brich los!"
"Now, People, rise up, and let the storm break loose!"
The roaring masses chanted "Sieg Heil!" (Hail victory!)

The third reason is that Trump needs a cause to detract from all the scandal surrounding his presidency. He has the power to order a preemptive nuclear first strike, and the more angry and frustrated he becomes the greater the temptation to use the awe-inspiring powers over life and death at his fingertips.


The fourth reason has to do with parallels with the Dritte Reich. The invasion of Poland was spuriously justified as a "defensive strategy". George W. Bush came up with spurious reasons to invade Iraq as a defensive countermeasure, and given how much Trump is a psychopathic pathological liar, he would not hesitate to lie through his teeth in claiming that a preemptive nuclear strike on Pyongyang was a necessary defensive manoeuvre based on concocted intelligence data about an imminent North Korean nuclear first strike. The next parallel to the Dritte Reich is that of taking a gamble that other nations might remain neutral in the conflict. It was hoped that Great Britain might remain neutral after the invasion of Poland, and Trump might gamble on the possibility that in a supposedly "defensive" first strike against Pyongyang, China might remain neutral. Otherwise, America will be at war against China, since China has stated that if North Korea is attacked first they will support them, but that if North Korea strikes first, China will remain neutral to the conflict. It is the same gamble that Hitler took in invading Poland, and Hitler was a significantly less impulsive leader than Trump.

Hermann Göring put it nicely:

Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.

Sadly those who dismiss the possibility of the most catastrophic outcome eventuating are the exact same lot of soothsayers whose hubris led them to triumphantly pronounce that Trump would in all certainty "never" become President. With that, I am going to say that there is on aggregate about a 70% probability* that one of these days you will wake up to the news of a preemptive total nuclear strike against North Korea followed by a massive conventional invasion of the country. Those who oppose it will be called cowards who lack patriotism, and who expose their beloved country to greater danger. As Göring says, "that is easy". The question is whether you will be alive to receive the news. For if Pyongyang manages to release ICBMs armed with nuclear warheads in retaliation, and the anti-ICBM defence missiles fail to destroy them, then you might well be far too dead to care. I might well be dead. We all might well be dead.


Look on the bright side of things. At least the nuclear winter will help to mitigate the effects of climate change. And we all have to die some time.


Notes:

*There will be those who ask how this 70% figure was arrived at. The answer is that it is a rough estimate and nor does the probability of such an outcome remain fixed, predestined, and constant but changes daily according to current circumstances. The exact statistical likelihood is unknown and unknowable, for to state that would be to assume that history is totally predetermined in a rigidly deterministic manner, rather than to state that there are historical outcomes that are more or less likely to occur greater than chance. That too is an assumption that cannot be perfectly proven or disproven. But let us suppose that the chance of total nuclear war is 10%. Is that acceptable to you? You go one day or a week without a preemptive nuclear strike on North Korea, then another and another, until nine days or weeks pass, but you can't say if on the tenth day or week that this nuclear strike won't occur? Should you put up with this?