Trump in the Dead Zone

In Stephen King’s novel The Dead Zone the clairvoyant Johnny Smith has a vision after touching the hand of politician Gregory Ammas Stillson. In the future, the mentally disturbed Stillson becomes president and starts a nuclear war.

Reading the news, I can’t help but compare Donald Trump to Stillson. Trump tricked the public into voting for him by promising he would end US involvement in pointless wars. After he was elected, however, Trump did the exact opposite.

Over the last couple weeks, the president has killed scores of Russian soldiers, antagonized Turkey by supporting Kurds—this resulted in a military incursion into Syria by Turkey—and given Israel a green light to bomb Syria.

Israel’s reactionary Likud government promises more deadly attacks inside Syria, using the shoot down of one of its fighter jets over the Golan Heights—stolen from Syria during the 1967 war—as a pretext.

Trump’s Nuclear Posture Review promises to spend billions upgrading and expanding the US nuclear weapons arsenal. His generals believe mini-nukes are usable in regional conflicts. Trump said the Department of Defense will be “increasing arsenals of virtually every weapon,” thus kicking off an arms race that will eventually result in new wars and mass misery.

Turkish President Erdoğan said in a speech he knows who is behind Daesh, aka the Islamic State. Meanwhile, evidence has emerged revealing the US has rebranded defeated Islamic terrorists and is training them.

The US is now illegally occupying around a third of Syria. It killed the Russians when Syria tried to retake its oil fields. When two Russian Su-25 fighter jets flew into what the US has declared to be restricted airspace, a pair of Air Force F-22 Raptor stealth fighters fired intercept flares.

Meanwhile, some in the US are calling for more shoot-downs. “To protect those under his command and U.S. national security interests, Trump should issue an unequivocal warning to his Russian opposite. He should state that he has authorized U.S. aircrews to radar lock-on and if necessary, engage, any Russian jets that threaten U.S. forces in Syria,” writes Tom Rogan for the Washington Examiner.

Russia, of course, was invited into Syria by the government, and the US is there illegally under the pretext of fighting the Islamic State, which was defeated by Syria, Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah. If defeating ISIS was indeed the mission—and the mission was accomplished—the US should pack up and leave. However, that wasn’t the mission.

The US and NATO are pushing troops up along Russia’s border and conducting military exercises—the largest since the end of the Cold War. Russia has responded by moving military assets to its western border. Between 2016 and 2017, the Pentagon spent over $4 billion on its “European Reassurance Initiative.”

“All of this—the aggressive exercises, the NATO buildup, the added US troop deployments—reflects a new and dangerous strategic outlook in Washington. Whereas previously the strategic focus had been on terrorism and counterinsurgency, it has now shifted to conventional warfare among the major powers,” Michael T. Klare wrote in July, 2016 when Obama was still in the White House.

In other words, no matter who sits in the White House, the agenda remains the same—destruction and occupation in the Middle East, further military adventures in Africa, and preparation for war with Russia.

Trump promised mutually beneficial relations with Russia during the election. This was an obvious lie. The US—that is, the ruling elite, the shadow government, the deep state—wants war to coincide with the implosion of the US economy, now on track. Trump might as well be Charlie McCarthy, the famous ventriloquist dummy.

Trump is the fall guy. He’s our Gregory Ammas Stillson.

Every week, we draw closer to a nuclear conflagration. The Russians have yet to seriously challenge the United States. The Russian people know what war is like—many remember the 25 million Russians killed during the Second World War. Stalin balkanized Eastern Europe as a buffer to make sure that never happened again.

Here in America, most of us are oblivious. That will change if our Gregory Ammas Stillson punches the red button.

Maybe—just maybe—sanity will return before that happens.