TRUMP AND MUSK: THE ODD COUPLE OF BILLIONAIRES PROMISING A NEW CYCLE OF AMERICAN GREATNESS

Foreword

November 5, 2024 has demolished the illusion that the figure of Donald Trump was a passing meteor in the sky of American politics.

The re-election of the tycoon has revealed that the concept contained in the slogan "America First" did not represent a form of political deviance as his ideas have assumed an increasing centrality in the American public debate.

Elon Musk will occupy a prestigious position in the top tier of Trump staff. His official role leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) comes with the grandiose goals of cutting $2 trillion from the US federal budget. DOGE’s influence will rely on Musk’s ability to use his access to intervene in the US government by persuading Trump to selectively cut government programs and personnel.

Background

Trump strategy interprets the need to redefine the purpose of American power by contesting the assumption that the indiscriminate pursuit of global supremacy is the only way in which America can guarantee its own security and well-being.

The new strategic concept is intended to mark the end of the historical parable that began eighty years ago, during the Second World War when the US elites chose to pursue military primacy («armed primacy») as the ultimate aim of American foreign policy even after the victory over the Axis.

Since then, American hegemony has been considered an indispensable instrument to keep the world in shape: a Messianic task, rather than strategic. Thus, when the Cold War ended with the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the idea of American supremacy expanded its influence all over the world regardless of the signs of cultural rejection and geopolitical concern that such boundless ambitions aroused in the rest of the globe.

In the Old Continent, first of all, with the program of absorbing Central and Eastern Europe and the fragments of the former Soviet empire into the US security system. And then in the Greater Middle East, where it was thought that democracy could be spread with more hasty methods (military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, among others).

Such world order contained the seeds of its own ruin

The first cracks were evident at the beginning of the 2000s. In Iraq, with Saddam Hussein removed, the United States had no idea how to stem the conflict that their intervention had uncovered. The almost contemporary war in Afghanistan dragged Washington, forgetful of the British and Soviet lessons, into an invincible conflict against the Taliban guerrillas, the longest in the entire history of the United States. A quagmire from which the Americans would withdraw ingloriously after twenty years of inconclusive violence, confirming the old adage that Afghanistan is the tomb of empires.                                                                                     

Driven to widen the hole, without being able to fill it, the United States launched in 2011 a regime change campaign in Libya, with the removal of Gaddafi, and the defenestration of al-Assad in Syria (realized last December 8), contributing to fuelling bloody civil wars in both countries and precipitating them into a reign of chaos.
Meanwhile, while they were busy destabilizing Iraq and Syria, the Bush and Obama administrations were more or less inadvertently promoting the creation of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria  (ISIS), against which the United States then went to war in 2014.
In Eurasia, the persistent attempt to transform the countries that sprouted from the disintegration of the USSR, integrating them into the US security system had the predictable effect  of progressively poisoning relations with Moscow, distancing it from the prospect of peaceful cooperation with the West in the name of a shared conception of order, progressively reorienting Russia towards China.                       

America First

“America First”, the platform of the Republican Party  that led to Trump’s re-election, reflects an acknowledgement of the perverse effects - geopolitical, social and economic - that the attempt to build an American-led liberal international order has generated.  The bitter fruits of that orthodoxy have revealed to Americans the unsustainability and irrationality of its pursuit. The strategy of primacy has in fact been consumed by its contradictions: instead of bringing global peace, it has condemned America to perpetual war, entangling it in a thicket of conflicts from which Washington does not know how to extricate itself.

Trump's election therefore reflects the awareness of the need for a radical change in America's position towards itself and the rest of the world. In the awareness, matured in the bitterness of disillusionment and collective suffering , that an authentic world order cannot be achieved by a single power, but can only be achieved by returning to practice the forgotten art of diplomacy.

The way ahead

Trump will also work to reduce the weight of the deep state and the hypertrophy of federal bureaucratic apparatuses that, if excessively detached from political influence, risk emptying the meaning of democracy.

This will lead to the search for a reasonable solution to the strategic conflict with Russia, with the aim of ending the ongoing bloodbath in Ukraine, originating from the reckless attempt to absorb Kiev (which would have had every interest in remaining neutral, as a bridge between East and West) into the Euro-Atlantic security system.

The resolution of the conflict in Ukraine and the gradual reintegration of Russia into the new international order could help prevent the consolidation of the alliance between Moscow and Beijing while seeking a new relationship with China that allows for a reasonable balance of mutual interests, starting with the correction of the macroeconomic imbalance, which is harmful not only to American economic but also strategic interests.

Trump will not withdraw support for Israel, but will also try to stimulate a broader strategic vision, pushing Jerusalem to look beyond the current conflict and seize the opportunities that will emerge from the ashes of the bloody military operations underway.

An interesting geopolitical aspect was introduced by Trump, taking up old ideas in recent weeks, that is, the idea of building a whiter and safer North American fortress than before by buying Greenland, bringing Canada home and then of course ensuring that Panama is an American canal. Thus he would build
this famous Fortress: a sort of reduced Monroe doctrine, but taken very seriously, which serves on the one hand, the northern front, to prevent Russian and Chinese penetration through the Arctic towards the Western Hemisphere, on the other, the southern front, therefore the Rio Grande and the Panama Canal, to send back a good number of Mexicans or in any case to prevent the Latinos or others who cross the border with Mexico from arriving, entering the United States and therefore altering the American racial climate. So this bigger, stronger America would  enter into a negotiation with the Russians and the Chinese, letting the rest of the world do something that perhaps once the Americans would have tried to prevent.

Elon Musk

Almost ever since Elon Musk emerged as a high-profile financial supporter and advisor to US President-elect Donald Trump, skeptics have gloried in predicting that the two headstrong men will inevitably fall out. In 2025, the more interesting question will be what happens if they work ever more effectively together.

Musk, billionaire owner of some of the world's most prominent technology companies, including carmaker Tesla, social media platform X and aerospace company Space X, has seen his political influence cemented with a powerful appointment in the administration of Trump as head of a new "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE) aimed at slashing government expenditure, bureaucracy and regulations.   

The appointment potentially gives Musk enormous power over government policy. Though there are few details about what plans DOGE has, Musk promised on X that its work would be transparent, and it would "have a leader-board for most insanely dumb spending of Americans tax dollars."

The 53-year-old's intervention in politics, unprecedented in its openness and visibility, highlights how a few private tech companies and their executives hold increasingly unchecked power over decisions traditionally reserved for governments. 

Musk's possible courses of action

Elsewhere, Musk will continue to shape public debates, not least via his social media platform X, on topics ranging from the US culture wars to support for right-wing political parties in Europe, as seen in December, when Musk published a stream of endorsements for the far-right, pro-Russian Alternative for Germany in that country’s upcoming national election. Also last month, Musk entered a war of words with anti-immigrant Trump supporters over the merits of H1-B (hi-level engineering technicians) worker visas: a feud he appeared to have won, at least for now, when Trump subsequently came out in favour of the visas.

Perhaps the most interesting question is how the world’s richest man might shape Trump’s foreign policy. He is already turning up in unexpected places; in November, for instance, he met with Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations. In early December, he joined Trump in a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at Mar-a-Lago.

Musk’s views on China and Russia will also be important. Tesla's factory in Shanghai, can produce nearly 1 million cars a year.  Musk's influence hints at a more potentially warmer approach to Beijing, which is in line with Trump’s decision to invite Chinese President Xi Jinping to his inauguration this month.

In China Musk is treated like a god. When he arrives there, is received by Xi Jinping or by his deputy. Also his mother was treated like a goddess when recently went in China and was welcomed like a Hollywood star.  Moreover, Chinese kids are starting to dress like Musk so, in short, he is a character who has his own ecumenical capacity that Trump objectively cannot have: but a compromise can surely be found.

Musk's frequent channelling of Kremlin talking points on Ukraine will be a second area of focus, as Trump prepares plans to bring the war to a rapid close. Indeed, Musk is reported to have been in contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin since late 2022, and he also took part in Trump’s first phone call post-election win with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, of whom Musk is often publicly contemptuous.

The cutting edge industry of technology and the US government

For at least twenty years now a marriage of interest has been taking place in America between the US government and the cutting edge industry of Musk' space technology industry,  big players like Bezos and Zuckerberg and many other Silicon Valley (global centre of technological innovation) cutting edge industries. But Musk, more than any other, has penetrated the whole of the American apparatus. At times the apparatus has tried to reject Musk (with the Pentagon he had problems) but a synergy has now been created between the structures of US government and the engineering structures, the technological capabilities of the cutting-edge industry of Silicon Valley and everything else that is the best that America can offer today on the market of global power.

But this is also changing American democracy. First of all because if you are not a multimillionaire not to say a multibillionaire you hardly have a role in the new administration. Only for these very strong and very rich personalities a system of selection of the American ruling class, inevitably very different from the past, is being created.  Meanwhile, in the field of the technological and also military industries, large industries like Lockheed or Boeing are starting to feel a little breath on the heart also because Musk and others are taking away the best of their engineers.

Musk and Trump

For Musk’s influence to grow, his chemistry with Trump must remain strong. The risks of a clash of two egos remains clear. Yet for now there are no signs of discord as the two men seem to revel in one another’s power. The outcome may depend on the way this new duopoly treats the institutions they will soon control.

If the aim is to sharpen them into leaner and more effective tools of governance, the public could benefit from the remaking of a system that has long been weighed down with bureaucratic flab.  
Musk has a lot to gain from that arrangement. As long as he sticks to the role of “First Buddy”, he might expect an easy ride from the regulators Trump appoints throughout the government. 

But apart from watching the spectacle of his success, what benefit will trickle down to everyday Americans? The institutions that give health care, keep water clean, and educate kids are not meant to be run like businesses. They are not built to make a profit, but that does not make them any less valuable, especially for the citizens who can least afford to pay.

If those institutions get culled amid the Muskian push for efficiency, the hardship will not be temporary for those who rely on government support. For them, the pain could be devastating, and none of Musk’s promises of an interplanetary future will help them get through the problems of today.

Americans are disillusioned, disappointed, depressed and declining

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the peak period of US hegemony began. The country was dominant in many spheres of power such as military, economic, political and cultural.

Francis Fukuyama, a bureaucratic functionary at the US Department of State declared, with much pomp and ceremony, that history had ended and US was the triumphant trophy of liberal democracy. 

Since the 1990s, Americans have found themselves maintaining the world alone. Almost 8 billion human beings live on the planet today. Holding a planet like this, of this population size, in a hegemonic order is impossible.  US as an experiment is in fact declining. The greatest country on Earth (or so its leaders still liked to believe), the one pouring dollars into a military like no other, the one unable to win any war since 1945, is losing world hegemony.

The US are essentially depressed, deeply depressed. And even more complicated, it is as if there were two Americas that react to the same depression in opposite ways. Instead of focusing on human development, the US is busy creating, promoting and fighting imaginary enemies abroad. Also, America is funding, supporting and fighting illegal wars around the globe leaving not enough resources for human development at home.

For decades, the American “ruling class” has turned a blind eye toward wide-ranging issues at home including inflation, rising levels of poverty, homelessness, unemployment, health care, gun shootings, drugs, policing and racism.

This is how a superpower has utterly failed to protect its own people, democracy, and American values including the freedoms and liberties of ordinary people. Many political pundits, media experts, academics and researchers have offered hundreds of opinion pieces, articles, short films, documentaries and written books that carry a warning shot: “America is on the brink of revolution and breakup”.

The point is to see if the country will not reach a sort of collapse due to internal conflict, because these two different Americas, which react in such opposite ways to the depression, inevitably do so against each other.

While Americans are busy looking at their own navels and arguing among themselves, they perceive themselves to be in deep decline. Americans feel depressed. So, either an external event will push them to react, or they will continue to implode.

Or, again, they will continue to get by, but generating chaos around them. Americans are disappointed in having discovered that the world doesn't want them; their malaise is then due to the effort of maintaining a system with too many inhabitants within it who don't want them, and with the need to constantly wage war.  By combining these dynamics, a dysfunctional system is created where both sides are convinced that it's a zero-sum game, that it's the end of the country.

It's the end of democracy if the other side wins. If both sides are hammering into people again and again that losing an election is the end of the world, then it's not a surprise that eventually people are willing to take the law into their hands and to engage in violence.

Considerations

Before Trump, the last liberal America seemed to have decided to risk total war with Russia, possibly also with China, following the neocon doctrine (military interventionism and peace through force) practised by Clinton (via NATO enlargement) and Biden (attempted regime change in Moscow by bogging it down in Ukraine). Trump opts for the tactical retreat necessary to make America great again. He acknowledges that the world is no longer embracing American ideals as before. Worse: the Americans themselves are not so convinced of their own national creed. While Afro-Asian autocrats are often more popular than Western democrats, humanity is not and will not be stars and stripes.
The unshakeable liberals who still prevail in the Western media ecosystem paint the very strange Trump/Musk couple as a marriage of convenience between two madmen who will be condemned by history. Maybe. But something will remain from these years, because the fate of America and the Earth does not involve only a couple of eccentric leaders.

The golden America is no longer present in a world witnessing the painful birth of an America marked by the intertwining of socio-cultural and strategic mutations that condition each other and draw paths until now interrupted towards new, unexplored horizons. From liberal democracy to governance via the fusion of State and civil society. From the globalist impulse to national-protectionism.  

Conclusion

Trump and Musk are the vehicles of a heterogeneous rebellion against some pillars of established power: economic, political, cultural and imperial. There is popular anger towards decades of unbridled neoliberalism that have made the American dream inaccessible to most. There is the rejection of the liberal-progressive cultural model, embraced by the bulk of the establishment, based on a claim of moral, educational and class superiority and perceived as increasingly extreme and un-American.
The revolt is against some pillars with which the United States has functioned since the Second World War. There is the fight against the administrative state, that is, against technocracy, the government of experts, today accused of weighing down the country. There is the explicit rejection of America's redemptive mission: the empire without limits has translated not into final triumph but into endless wars.

Will the revolt succeed? There is no going back. The old America is dead, a new one is coming to light, Trump and Musk will build a part of it. The two billionaires are certainly better able than their rivals to interpret popular inclinations. But society and institutions are fragmenting. The founding values of the nation, from freedom of expression to common sense, are the subject of very bitter dispute. The consensus on the American way of life has broken down. Many are emerging, fighting among themselves. 

There is the need to agree on an agenda of national renewal.  Trump and Musk want to make their agendas the new national canon. Their demands are destined to remain and to contribute to reshaping America. If they succeed in this endeavour, they will change America, the world, and Americans in the world.