Two months ago President Trump announced his ambitions to enlarge the United States.
Specifically;
In Latin America, Trump wants to retake the Panama canal, rename the Gulf of Mexico and bring Mexico to heal. This superficially evokes the Monroe Doctrine but more cogently involves controlling South America with its economic, political and migration problems.
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Parenthetically a lack of rain in Central America may make the Panama Canal become unusable for modern navigation. In recent years hundreds of ships wait daily to cross between the Pacific and the Atlantic side even as they are unable to carry a full load. Maybe US technology and money might help.
The Chinese are buying up portions of South America and gaining economic sway in that area. Trump frets.
The coast of the United States roughly equals that of Mexico on the Gulf. I suppose Trump’s meaningless change in wordage is harmless.
To the north, the Greenland and Canada annexation schemes mention acquisition of natural resources like oil, minerals, lumber and fishing. Greenland is on the shortest route between Europe and the USA. The island can be used to spy on the Russian Northern Fleet as it enters the Atlantic.
All of these formulations are boilerplate and usually accompanied by maps which are crimped to support the author’s position. I found a number of contradictions among them and wanted to see the big picture. Accordingly, I invested seven bucks and bought two beach ball globes, inflated one, studied it and found a vaster vision that might or might not color the president’s eruptions. (The second one goes to some grandkids.)
1) What’s obvious is that South America is by and large to the east of North America. I had not appreciated how wide the Pacific Ocean is. It requires a ship to travel almost halfway around the World to get to the Panama Canal from Japan or from China, in part because the two American continents slope away from Asia as they go further south.
2)The USA control over commerce to and among Central and South American countries at Panama allows China to invest money but always under the eye and control of the USA.
3) If central America continues its drought, the Panama canal will become unusable no matter what planned improvements are accomplished. Other routes between the Pacific and Atlantic will become necessary. And that’s an overlooked geopolitical twist to Trump’s northern yen.
4) There is a theory that the globe is warming and melting arctic ice will allow shipping in the Arctic. The Northeast passage along Russia’s northern coast is already operational. Russia is building a nuclear powered icebreakers fleet to fully develop this passage. It is already allowing Chinese and other ships to bypass the Suez and to shorten their journey to Europe. It is operational for 8 months a year.
5) This northeastern passage will encourage development of Russia’s far north. It also goes through the White Sea where Russia’s north fleet is stationed. The attached White Canal allows barge traffic to get to the Bay of Finland via St. Petersburg, and to the Caspian and Mediterranean Seas via the Volga and Don Rivers. Eastern Europe/Western Asia might bloom.
6) The Northwest passage has been a storied part of the American mythos, think Henry Hudson and the Lewis and Clark expeditions. It has now been developed on the American and Canadian side of the Arctic. The passage is being used in exploratory ventures by cruise ships and some commercial shipping during the summer. It starts in the Labrador Channel between Greenland and the Maritime provinces, navigates an archipelago of sparsely inhabited Canadian islands, hugs Alaska’s northern shore and exits at the Bering Strait. Shervin House is a Canadian Youtuber who has illustrated the Northwest passage potential in an interesting way.
7) An unappreciated potential for this Northwest passage evident only on a globe shows that this passage passes by Hudson’s and James Bays, bodies of water that would let ocean shipping go far south into North America without going into the Atlantic. Ocean shipping might get to within 400 miles of Lake Superior.The area to the west of these two bodies of water seems to be flat and uninhabited. Building a canal or railroad is feasible. Might shipping into the great lakes rejuvenate that entire region?
8) At the Pacific end, both the northeast and northwest passages begin at the Bering Strait which is 51 miles wide. There are two islands in its center: Big Diomede is owned by Russia while Little Diomede is owned by the US. The stretch of water between these two islands is only about 2.5 miles wide. Technically both countries could plausibly claim that any shipping into the Arctic from the Pacific invades their sovereign territorial waters and needs to obey their demands.
9). The Kremlin, addressing Trump’s northern ambitions, worried about conflict but also talked about preserving peace and stability in the arctic. Putin sees the arctic as a commercial corridor as well as a place for resource recovery.
10) My evaluation of the two passages as seen on the globe seems to show that the Northwest passage on the American side is shorter than the Russian but that both extend to about the same degree of latitude north.
11) If the USA develops the icebreakers and support facilities for a northwest passage, ships would have to choose between Russian and USA routes. Ultimate destinations and costs would of course be decisive but at some level the two routes and countries would compete. But competition is not war and duopolies almost invariably lapse into collusion.
12) If China (which is referring to itself as a “near Arctic power”) and others want to enter the Arctic from the Pacific to recover minerals, oil or other resources it must pass through the Bering Strait owned by two of its tough competitors.
13) Russia and China seem to be good buddies lately. But this has been the case on several previous occasions only to revert to mild hostility at other times.
14) Why would either Russia or the USA want to let China partake in the stripmining and environmental degradation? The Russians will justifiably worry about China’s taking over their Eastern Siberian wasteland. The US would want to retain control over the raw materials and political influence that allowing passage between the Atlantic and Pacific would give it.
15) The north edge of Greenland is really not necessary for the development of a northwest passage but owning it would deny China a roost. This makes Trumpian ambitions seem almost reasonable as a way to keep China tame.
16) Norway is the only other Nation that has ready access to the Arctic. Norwegians, as judged by the politics of their cousins in Minnesota, tend toward addled. But Norway shares a border with Russia and its northern fleet is offshore. (Ditto for the negligible fronting of Finland and Sweden.) All are in NATO for what it’s worth. None would defy the USA or Russia and allow China to get a perch from which it could launch mining or drilling ventures.
17) Our elites seem to be bothered by China’s economic success which they want to abort by inciting a war over Taiwan. The US seizure of Canada and Greenland would cancel this claim.
18) The Chinese are smart, hardworking people who love to make the money which they use to buy other people. They seldom make war. They will certainly try to exploit the Arctic’s resources and use the new transportation routes. Their work will be subdued if entry and establishing a beachhead are restricted by the USA and Russia.
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19) Another effect of the establishing of a northwest passage and of exploring for oil and minerals might cause another Sputnik effect among American youth.
20) Among American weapon systems that have been shown to be useless are the surface fleet of carriers, battleships and the like. Might these be converted to ice breakers instead of being sunk by Houthis?
I, as a libertarian, purposely spun my contemplation of a plastic globe to hint at world peace. Should it work out that way, Trump would be catapulted into being one of the immortals.
But he’ll hear only from the brainy guys in our national policy circle jerk who repeat endlessly the now trite “natural resources recovery” drill to condemn Trump’s enlargement of America.
My contribution may be flawed but the primal observations are solid.
I don’t approve of President Trump’s national aggrandizement or of using politics to thwart enterprises like those of the Chinese that increase human wealth and comfort that I’ve projected in this article, but maybe others seeing my look at the plastic world might develop other, more hopeful scenarios.
