Trump’s national insecurity

President Trump has made a big show of Tik Tok’s threat to US national security and is forcing its owner to sell the app to an American company. But its data collection on mostly American teenagers is not unusual or particularly threatening. It is not even clear that Tik Tok is worse than Facebook in kow-towing to Beijing’s political preferences.

So how is Donald Trump doing on real threats to American national security? Here are a few:

• The Russian offer of bounties to the Taliban to kill Americans: Trump is still denying the fact, even though his Secretary of State claims to have belatedly protested to the Russian Foreign minister.
• Russian efforts to affect the outcome of the November election: Trump appears to be helping more than hindering them, mainly by avoiding any effort to counter Moscow. The Russians are on his side, and he knows it.
• The North Korean nuclear and missile threat to the US: Kim Jong-un has told the Americans to forget about economic incentives to get him to give up nuclear weapons. There is no progress at all on limiting them or his missiles.
• The Iranian nuclear program: It is closer to having the materials and technology to build a nuclear weapon than it has ever been previously. Trump has begged the Iranians to come back to the negotiating table, which they refuse to do without sanctions relief that is far more likely in a Biden administration. Tehran will bide its time.
• Al Qaeda and the Islamic State: While the former has not had any recent spectacular successes lately and the latter has lost its territorial caliphate in Iraq and Syria, both are still active jihadist threats to the US. Al Qaeda has burrowed into a dozen or more states in one form or another. It is only a matter of time until they try again to hit the US.
• Taking down Venezuelan President Maduro: Admittedly its a stretch to say he is a threat to the US, but the Trump Administration views him as one. They have failed to displace him. Having failed Trump named the person in charge to handle the Iran failure as well. There is a kind of logic there, but not a productive one.

Where I would rate the Administration partly effective is in responding to China’s technological espionage, but in ways that are so clumsy and self-serving that most of the world is not supportive. Nor is it clear that Beijing is reducing its intellectual property theft.

In trying to block Huawei from selling 5G technology, the Administration has also had some modest successes, like the UK’s decision to roust out Huawei technology. But even the threat of not allowing connections to the US has not bullied many other countries into cutting Huawei off from their telecomms.

The sad fact is that the US is far weaker on the international scene than it was four years ago. President Trump has offended allies, taken little or ineffective action against adversaries, and failed to reduce or contain real threats. Making America great again internationally has meant making America less safe, less respected, and more vulnerable.