U.S. President Donald Trump attends a multilateral meeting during the 80th United Nations General Assembly, in New York City, New York.
Credit: Reuters Photo
President Donald Trump’s address to the UN General Assembly was true to his reputation as a falsifier and self-promoter. Most of the claims he made would not stand scrutiny. The UN pulpit, a revered diplomatic platform, has seen many unremarkable addresses, but Trump’s was a masterclass in bombast, tomfoolery, and posturing. He made a flawed reading of the world and bashed all countries. The president told the world and the UN that they are failing, and even questioned whether the UN should continue to exist. The White House had claimed that the speech would present Trump’s vision for how America should wield its power abroad. But the address only further exposed the president’s narrow, deficient view of the world.
Trump claimed that in his seven months in office, he stopped seven wars. This is untrue – the truth is that this century’s most cruel war, in Gaza, is being waged with his support. The details he presented about the Ukraine war are not factual. His criticism of the Biden administration over immigration and trafficking was based on a misinterpretation. He said London had a “terrible, terrible Mayor” who wanted to implement Sharia law, again, with no proof to back the claim. He repeated his argument that global warming is a hoax and dismissed renewable energy as unworkable and expensive. Much of the speech was spent attacking the global efforts to fight climate change.
It was a tirade against the real world – countries, organisations, and individuals – for unreal reasons. Trump blamed India, China, and NATO for the Ukraine war, and projected a skewed understanding of the world. The stature of Trump’s office makes its occupant influential and impactful. It is concerning that the world’s top economic and military power has at its helm a man guided by values and ideas that cannot be described as rational or even civilised. Trump’s is a contradictory worldview that claims to be based on an aspiration to greatness without an understanding of what makes a nation, or an individual, great. Trump has articulated bits and pieces of this faulty worldview in the past, but it is the first time he has put them together, mixing the trivial with the ludicrous, ignorance with assurance, and abrasiveness with arbitrariness. Unfortunately, the House applauded the president for his show. Countries are cutting bilateral deals with him, and the multilateral global order is being challenged. Trump’s speech showed that the world’s leading power has thrown to the winds the global consensus that formed the very basis of that order.