Trump’s Achievements

No president has divided public opinion more than Donald Trump. Many find him personally obnoxious, irresponsible and harmful to the U.S. and the world. His supporters however, see him as a breath of fresh air who is “making America great again”.

Personally, I am not an admirer of Trump but I think that it is beneficial to play the “devil’s advocate” and try to look at his record in his first two years in as positive light as possible.

His impact on four areas needs examining:

• U.S. economy
• Immigration
• Foreign affairs
• Trade

U.S. Economy

The big action was the reduction of taxes in the U.S., particularly the base corporate tax rate was reduced from 35% to 23%.

At 35%, the U.S. corporate tax rate was the highest in the developed world. One consequence of this is that many large U.S. corporations were left sitting on vast piles of cash offshore which could not be brought back to the U.S. because then it would trigger a massive tax bill.

The result of the tax reduction was a sharp rise in the stock markets, growth up to 4% per year, billions of dollars of off-shore money returned and the lowest unemployment rate in a long time.

Admittedly, much of the re-patriated money was used in share buy-backs, but this freed capital for other uses.

Immigration

The uncontrolled illegal immigration across the Mexican border has been a concern for many Americans for a long time, but no previous administration has tackled this issue to any meaningful extent.

Presidential candidate Trump promised to build a wall all along the border to physically prevent illegal crossings. There are precedents for this approach:

• Hadrian’s Wall (122 A.D.)
• Antonine’s Wall (142 A.D.)
• Great Wall of China (1368-1644 A.D.)
• The Wall (Game of Thrones – fictional)

Note that the Berlin Wall is not included in this list since it was meant to keep people in, not keep them out.

At present, this is still under discussion, with the Democrats not releasing the funds required to build it.

Apart  from the Wall, illegal border crossers have been discouraged by increasingly severe consequences if they are caught. A recent “refugee caravan” from Honduras has been stopped – the Hondurans are currently being re-settled in Mexico.

Foreign Affairs

Since coming to the Presidency, Trump has made a number of moves internationally where others have feared to tread.

Nato

In Europe and other NATO countries (including Canada) he has threatened not to honour the treaty obligations (i.e.  the concept that an attack on one country is treated like an attack on all) if the allies do not pay their fair share of the costs. At present, only a few countries (including Britain, Poland) fulfill their obligations to spend at least 2% of their GDP on defence. This issue has been treated delicately in the past with no result. Trump’s threat has seen a number of countries pledging to increase their contributions. Germany’s Angela Merkel has even suggested the creation of a pan-European army.

Russia

Trump’s close contacts with Vladimir Putin of Russia, including a number of private meetings may temper Russian aggressiveness, though the details of the talks have not been made public.

North Korea

His most significant breakthrough was with Kim Jong-Un of North Korea. No previous U.S. President has met with a North Korean leader. Although the interaction involved heavy threats from both sides, the net result was that North Korea promised to halt its nuclear weapon development program.

“Against the backdrop of the chaotic, mercurial and capricious tone of U.S. foreign policy, the relationship between U.S. President Donald Trump and Mr. Kim progressed from the language of “fire and fury” to a historic summit in Singapore and then “falling in love.” Now, both leaders are publicly anticipating another summit this year.” (Tina Park, “Why 2019 holds the key to peace in the Korean Peninsula”, Globe and Mail, Jan 6, 2019).

Iran

President Trump abruptly pulled the U.S. out of the multi-national agreement with Iran on the grounds that the Iranians were covertly flouting the agreement. Although he was roundly condemned internationally, including U.S. allies, he was probably correct in his assessment of Iranian compliance. Note that much of the disapproval from allies was motivated by the valuable trade links which they had with Iran – their disapproval smacks of extreme hypocrisy.

Syria

Trump’s recent announcement of the withdrawal of all U.S. troops in Syria and most from Afghanistan took the world by surprise. Condemnation was nearly universal in the democracies of the world.

The Syrian involvement lasted 9 years, with no end in sight. The aims were confused – toppling Assad and defeating ISIL were not clearly separated. ISIL is a spent force, and the fight against Assad has developed into little more than trying to protect groups which the U.S. had allied, in particular several Kurdish groups. By pulling out, the Kurds are being sacrificed but this will please Turkey, which is a NATO ally (whose allegiance has been wavering). Iran and Russia will benefit but a ruined country is a poor prize.

Afghanistan

U.S. involvement in Afghanistan has lasted 19 years, with the Taliban back in control of much of the country. Afghanistan has a long history of wars involving foreign powers:

• Alexander the Great 330-327 BC
• Islamic conquest 637-709 AD
• Mongol conquest 13^th century
• 1^st Anglo-Afghan war 1839-1842
• 2nd Anglo-Afghan war 1878-1880
• 3rd Anglo-Afghan war 1919
• Soviet-Afghan war 1979-1989
• Current war 2001- present

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Nobody has been able to control Afghanistan for long. When foreign powers were not involved, there were numerous civil wars e.g. Communist insurrection 1978, collapse of communist rule 1992-1996, Taliban control 1992-1996. It looks like the Afghans like fighting and will never stop. Someone needed to stop U.S. involvement in this mess and Trump has started the process. Some might criticize this saying that the withdrawal leaves a power vacuum. However, a good analogue is the British withdrawal from Palestine in 1948 without leaving any government behind – this led to the creation of Israel, whose armed units were the strongest.

China

Although Trump enjoys cordial relations with Chinese President Xi, he is attacking Chinese trade practices (for more, see next section), in particular the hacking of American businesses and stealing industrial and military secrets. This is clearly an issue which cannot be allowed to continue. By using the pressure of a trade war, Trump is forcing China to make concessions.

Trade

Nafta

Trump called for a re-negotiation of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), which he called the “worst trade agreement ever” and made statements like “the Canadians are very clever”  and have effectively cheated the U.S. (can’t remember the exact quote). The agreement was re-negotiated, with significant concessions made to the U.S., particularly by Mexico, though Canadian concessions were relatively minor. The agreement itself has been renamed the “United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA.

Steel and Aluminium

Trump imposed tariffs of 25% on imports of steel and 10% on imports of aluminium on May 31, 2018. This applies to all countries except Australia and Argentina. This was to boost U.S. production since these commodities are regarded to have strategic and defence value so are a national security issue.

TPP

The Trans-Pacific Partnership was signed by Barack Obama but was never ratified. Soon after coming into the presidency, Trump unilaterally pulled the U.S. out of the agreement, saying that it would result in the loss of U.S. jobs as production moved to low cost countries such as Vietnam. This is in keeping with his preference for b-lateral agreements (where the U.S. always has the upper hand) to multi-national agreements.

The original motivation for the deal was to counter China’s influence in South East and East Asia. Trump’s approach seems to be to take on China directly.

China

China has a massive trade surplus with the U.S. To even the balance, The Trump administration set a tariff of 25% on 818 categories of goods imported from China worth $50 billion (Wikipedia). China retaliated with tariffs on U.S. goods, but offered a number of concessions and talks will be held to come to an agreement. Although Trump was widely criticised for starting a trade war, it does seem that his unorthodox approach is bearing results.

CONCLUSION

It really is too early to tell whether Trump will have a lasting positive effect. However, he does seem to have kept (or tried to keep) most of his promises.

• Will the boost to the U.S. economy prove to be transitory?
• Will illegal immigration stop for good?
• Will North Korea stop being a destabilising force?
• Will manufacturing return to its previous (1950’s) status in the economy?