The Washington Roundtable discusses Donald Trump's use of force in Venezuela, his desire to take over Greenland, and the historical echoes of the Administration's new imperialist projects. The panel also considers Trump's brand of "narcissistic unilateralism" and the increased risks of global conflict when foreign policy is based on one man's whims.
There was a time when American power at least felt obligated to explain itself. Even when U.S. military interventions were legally dubious or strategically incoherent, they arrived wrapped in language: humanitarian necessity, international norms, shared security. The explanations were often thin and sometimes cynical, but they served a purpose. They preserved the idea that power was supposed to answer to something beyond itself.