PARIS (AP) – For America’s allies and rivals, the chaos unfolding during Donald Trump’s last days as president is the logical consequence of four years of global instability created by the man who promised to change the way the world views the United States, to change.
From the outside, the United States has never looked so vulnerable – or unpredictable.
Generations that have lasted for generations have broken to a breaking point under Trump – from his decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement and the nuclear deal in Iran to the cessation of the World Health Organization amid a pandemic.
And then, by trying to overthrow his loss to Joe Biden, Trump raised the fundamental principle of democratic elections that the United States has tried – and sometimes even succeeded in – in running around the world. How long those aftershocks can last is unclear.
“This is one of the greatest tasks of the future for America and Europe – to fight the polarization of society at its roots,” said German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. “We will only be able to preserve the belief in togetherness, democracy as the most humane form of state capture and the conviction in science and reason if we do it together.”
But in many ways, Europe has already entered into, entered into the agreement with Iran, negotiated a trade agreement with China under the leadership of Germany and arranged global actions to protect the environment.
On the same day, an angry mob stormed the Capitol trying to overthrow Biden’s presidential election. A record number of Americans have died from coronavirus. Another recent event also showed the vulnerability of the US: the cyber espionage operation is still being worked on by a myriad of government computers and the Russian elite hackers are being blamed.
World leaders who have seen the deadly violence in Washington ‘will have to consider whether these events are an extraordinary event – a’ black swan ‘- and whether these extremist white supremacist groups will still have a significant influence. “Towards the end of the Trump administration,” the Soufan group, a global intelligence and security firm, wrote on Tuesday about the direction of U.S. foreign and domestic policy.
“People tend to think of fragile countries ‘in terms of war as the biggest problem, rather than violence, and in thinking in terms of state collapse as the biggest problem rather than states that are crumbling internally,'” Rachel Kleinfeld said. a scholar of democracy and violence, said. at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Kleinfeld, like many others, said that the assault on the American Capitol may have come to an end within a few weeks, but that it was years in the making.
And the American ability to fight for democracy was already compromised before the mob tried to overthrow Trump in his election loss. For many, these events were merely a confirmation.
Opponents, including Russia, China and Iran, have used the violence to question American democracy more generally.
In an internal note on the State Department’s ‘dissident channel’ obtained by The Associated Press, U.S. diplomats said Trump’s actions made their job more difficult. “It is critical that we communicate to the world that no one, not even the president, is above the law in our system or immune to public criticism,” the note reads. “It would be a first step in repairing the damage to our international credibility.”
However, Trump showed no remorse and said Tuesday that his ardent remarks to supporters were “completely appropriate.”
In Iraq, a country still struggling with the controversial legacy of a US-led invasion in the name of democracy, many people followed the events in Washington with a mixture of shock and charm.
The then US President George W. Bush boasted that Iraq would become an example of democracy in a region ruled by dictators. Instead, the country fell into a protracted war between Sunnis and Shiites in which tens of thousands of people died. Although it has an active parliament and regular elections, it is a dysfunctional democracy based on a sectarian power-sharing agreement, with corrupt parties negotiating ministries and posts, allowing them to give jobs to supporters while laying their own pockets.
Ahmad al-Helfi, a 39-year-old Iraqi political cartoonist, said what happened at the US Capitol was a blow to the democracy he was trying to bring to Iraq and other countries.
“By mobilizing his followers in an attempt to overthrow the election result, Trump has confirmed that America is destroying the chaos, the non-peaceful transition of power and the failure to accept the election results, instead of democracy for Iraq. to carry out, “Al-Helfi said. .
Anahita Thoms, a German lawyer and trade expert who has lived and worked in America for years, said the events of last week would indelibly mark America’s image abroad. Thoms is a board member of Atlantic Bridge, a think tank that promotes cooperation between Europe and the US – the kind of organization that was founded in the aftermath of World War II when the US helped the economies of many countries in Western Europe to rebuild. destroyed by the war.
Germany was one country that benefited most from the US financial and democracy-building efforts.
Looking ahead, she said U.S. officials may have a harder time promoting democracy abroad.
“The United States remains a country that upholds its democratic values. But this pursuit, which is very strongly presented to the outside world, must not get too many cracks, ”said Thoms. “I think a lot of diplomatic skills will be needed to counter the photos.”
The International Crisis Group, which normally focuses on world war zones, wrote its first ever assessment of the risk of election-related violence in October in the United States. Stephen Pomper, who led the work on the report and lives in the DC area, said that in the best of circumstances, the United States could finally point to Congress’ decision to resume certification of Biden’s election after the offense. as a first step in successfully protecting his democracy.
‘Look, we’ve created these settings. They have become a source of resilience for us. They helped us get through this very difficult period. Let us help you develop the same kind of resilience, ”he said, describing a hypothetical future conversation between the US and a struggling government. “It would be a positive story to be able to tell at some point, but I think the pieces are not quite there yet.”
Pope Francis was more optimistic and told Italian broadcaster Mediaset: “Thank God it exploded in public” because “we could see why it is, and how it can be rectified.”
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Associated Press writers Kirsten Grieshaber and Frank Jordans in Berlin, Abdulrahman Zeyad in Baghdad, Matt Lee in Washington; and Frank Bajak in Boston contributed.