America comes first
‘America First;’ those two words said by US President Donald Trump in his inaugural speech were quoted by many major foreign newspapers. They simply mean prioritizing American interests over those of the rest of the world, as if this was new to American policies and has never been a fact throughout the American history, particularly since US emerged as a major power by the end of World War I. ‘America First’ was the core of president Theodor Roosevelt’s ‘Big Stick foreign diplomacy policy’ of ‘speak softly and carry a big stick’. It was the base of Monroe’s Doctrine, in warning ancient European colonial countries; UK and France, that any intervention by external powers in America’s politics is potentially a hostile act against the US. Later on, the US intervened and toppled several regimes that showed rebellion against the American control.
‘America First’ was also the base of Eisenhower’s Doctrine for the Middle East, which in itself was an extension of the Truman’s doctrine, by toppling the Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, conspiring against Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, the CENTO Alliance, endless backup for Israel, disciplining Libya during Ronald Regan’s presidency, intervening in Iraq and unlimited indirect support to Arab autocrat regimes against the possibilities of the Arab Spring expanding to include them. I might not have enough space to explain and define the meaning of America First and its impact on the American prevalence and intervention.
What scares European countries and China is that the US might go back to its historic isolation before World War II in terms of international economy, trade, globalization and reviving economic mandate wars through imposing taxes and fees on US imports with the aim of supporting US industries and labor. America First also means spreading the spirit of nostalgia among the American middle class white families, who were the driving power behind Trump’s victory and wish to move things counter clockwise to the 1940s and 1950s; to images from the romantic past as seen in old movies despite its irrelevance today, according to Anna Bloom in the Washington Post.
With the ‘America First’ slogan, president Trump vows to get rid of Islamic extremism, which was overwhelmingly quoted by some of our newspapers. This slogan ignores the ones actually responsible for creating such extremism, as if it was 100 percent made by Arabs and Muslims without endless support from the Carter and Regan administrations to Jihadists’ struggle in Afghanistan, where Regan called them ‘Freedom Fighters’ then. Now, Trump will launch military campaigns against Islamic extremism but will ask Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states to pay the war’s bills regardless of their economic situations and the possibility of falling one after another because of the fall in oil prices. There is nothing about this coming war against extremism or policies that nurtured and encouraged it in the first place and got Arab states up to ears in religious sectarian wars.
Reading between the lines and trying to understand what those two words actually mean, it seems that for the Middle East, in addition to rejecting Iran’s agreement with Obama and seeking reasons to reactivate sanction against it, American First also means Israel First, and that by supporting more settlements, confiscating more Arab territories and moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, erasing the two-state dream in Palestine as well as putting an end to US nominal opposition to the policy of confiscating lands in Palestine. Nothing calls for rejoicing and pleasure in Trumps rein. Yet, things will, at least, be clearer about perceiving US policies in the region, that is if any of our regimes are capable of such perception.