Russia And China Must Be Salivating Right Now

In the last couple days, Donald Trump threw aside his aspersions for a Nobel Peace Prize and instead directed the U.S. military to oust the leader of Venezuela.

Not content with that conquest, Trump has already begun threatening Mexico, Cuba and Colombia with being “next” – specifically telling Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, that he had better “watch his ass” due to cocaine flowing from Colombia to the United States.

No only that, he is once again brining up the subject of taking over Greenland.

In short, the President of the United States is out of his mind.

The President Of Peace Is Looking For War

Trump originally began building support for actions against Venezuela by over inflating its role in the drug trade. As time has gone by, he has allowed himself to speak more freely.

Yesterday, when the dust was still settling after the capture of Nicolas Maduro, the first thing out of Donald Trump’s mouth was the take over of the Venezuelan petroleum industry. Not long after, he raised to stakes, claiming his goal was insure “American dominance” throughout the Western Hemisphere.

There is doubt that government officials throughout Central and South America are in a panic right now, but there are two countries that are probably trying to contain their glee right now.

What’s Good For The Goose…

Russia is still bogged down in the quagmire it created in Ukraine for the same reasons as Donald Trump is giving for demanding control over the Western Hemisphere: control of resources and control of countries adjacent to its own. Throughout their battle in Ukraine, rumors have abounded that Eastern Europe could be their next target.

Similarly, China has long been eyeing taking control of Taiwan with rumors that they could have longer terms for Japan as well. A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would cause absolute devastation for the U.S. and the West on so many levels (I almost said “and its allies”, but we don’t have allies anymore unfortunately).

Putting aside the potential death toll in Taiwan itself, China would gain a chokehold on the country with the most advanced microchip manufacturing capability in the world. Apple, Nvidia, OpenAI, Microsoft, AMD and Google are all heavily dependent on TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp), and all of them would be incredibly impacted by a sudden loss of chip supplies from Taiwan.

China, on the other hand, has seen its goals in the AI space get constrained due to U.S. imposed limits on the number and types of chips that Nvidia is allowed to export to them. Those limits would go away if Taiwan was controlled by China. TSMC may no longer get the latest designs from U.S. based chip designers, but there would be no cause for alarm since it will take at least a decade for the U.S. to build out similar capacity.

The Future: Destination Unknown

I have no idea what happens next. But it’s clear that there are no cooler heads in the presidents orbit that may be able to prevail and give Trump a path for deescalation.

Will the U.S. attack Cuba, Mexico or Colombia?
My guess is that Cuba will be the next target. Marco Rubio is extremely hawkish on the country that his parents are from, and his interview with interview with NBC contained a number of veiled threats.

Will the U.S. annex Greenland?
In ANY other possible timeline, this would be a firm no. But the reality we live in today, absolutely anything is possible unless the Republican Congress asserts control over the situation they have been complicity in creating.

And what about Russia and China?
Again, in a more “normal” timeline, a Russian attack against a NATO country would immediately spark reprisals from the U.S., just as a hostile action by China against Taiwan would. But these are not normal times. There is no telling what Donald Trump would or wouldn’t do. No one knows, probably not even himself.

Here’s to a happy 2026, were the entire world is crammed into the backseat of the family station wagon while a drunk Donald Trump goes careening down the highway.