Do Americans care who controls eastern Ukraine?

Fear, Honor, and Self-interest: The three reasons countries go to war, as identified by Greek historian Thucydides.

Peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine are underway. The U.S. is in the center of it.

Trump understands an important thing about the American public: Few Americans know much about this part of the world.

Could Americans locate NATO countries on an unmarked map? Test yourself: Where is Latvia? Where is Estonia? Where is Lithuania? Which is which?

Belarus is tucked between Russia and Poland. Do you know where? Does it change anything for Americans if Belarus is independent, but aligned with Russia, as opposed to being part of Russia? Would it matter if it were independent of Russia but aligned with the West, like Poland? And Kaliningrad, that part of Russia off on its own; where is it? 

Unmarked map

Here is a marked map, but with the countries unlabeled. Does this help? Which one is Latvia? Where is Kaliningrad?

Trump won some support in 2016 as the no-foreign-wars candidate. Americans feel self-sufficient. The electorate truly cares about foreign policy only if it is a matter of fear or honor. We don't want to go to war for oil; that is the charge opponents of a war make against people who support the war. Trump says that the primary threat to the personal safety and national identity of people in the U.S. and Europe is invasion by immigrants from the global south: Latin America, Muslim countries, and Africa. Not Russia. Whether something is Russian or Russia-adjacent or Russia-aligned in Eastern Europe doesn't affect us. Muslims are the enemy, not Russians.

And since Russia isn't dangerous, then no honor is lost by letting them consolidate their own region. This is a Slavic civil war. There could be glory in it for Trump. He might be known as a better peacemaker than Barack Obama, who got the Nobel Peace Prize. Trump wants that.

All this makes sense in light of the new world order under Trump. Trump doesn't think that the rule-based order, exemplified by the United Nations has ever been anything but hypocritical window dressing. The post-WWII world order was always leadership by the powerful. Russia did not concede power in Eastern Europe because they loved democracy. They gave it up because they lost the economic and military power to continue their domination.

Trump is a peacemaker in the sense that he thinks that great regional powers ought to mind their own business. The Western Hemisphere is ours. Mexico and Canada are ours to bully. Venezuela is in our neighborhood, so we are going to stop pretending we respect the sovereignty of pip-squeak countries. We don't want to own them -- they are too much trouble to own. Look at Puerto Rico. But we are entitled to manage them.

And all this makes sense of what China is doing right now. China is displaying possession while Trump is demonstrating his position on regional power.

Huffington Post landing page

They understand Trump, and they think Trump understands the American public. We are willing to pound our chests and make threat displays, but we don't want actual conflict, not over something half a world away. Taiwan is Chinese. They speak Chinese there. They were part of China. They are in China's neighborhood. 

Which one is Taiwan? Which is Hainan? Which is part of the Philippines?

Maybe Americans care if Taiwan is fully independent. Americans can be made to care if our leaders tell us it is essential to our security, Maybe, if we get to keep getting the advanced computer chips we need from them or somewhere else, we can let it go. Maybe leaders can persuade Americans that it is a matter of honor. We continued a war in Vietnam for years chasing "Peace with Honor." But I suspect all we really want is their chips.

I expect some sort of resolution in Ukraine. Trump has refocused the threat to European security from Russia to Muslim immigrants. The rise in blood-and-soil rightist parties in Europe shows that Western leaders need to adjust to stay in sync with their publics. The Brexit vote was the early warning. Trump's election was the second notice. The real enemy isn't another aggressive consolidator of ethnic groups. It is foreign ethnicities. I expect Europe to go along with carving up of Ukraine. 

None of this is what I want, but I think it is what is happening, and I expect the American public will be OK with it if Trump leads it. Eastern Europe is so far away. So is Taiwan.

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