Columns

Tragedies happen now and then, sometimes too often, as many around the world today would sadly confirm. There are some that could have been avoided and others that were too late to have been saved by human intervention or interception so that nations and their peoples would survive to pursue the glorious futures embedded in their minds.

But there is another kind of tragedy which is really ‘’tragi-comedy’, the product of some who consider themselves comedians that could make the world laugh.

Still, there are another lot who seem to consider themselves to be of the calibre of old Roman orators such as Marcus Cicero or Gaius Gracchus. So intoxicated are they with their own verbosity that they forget this modern world has even outdone its predecessor, creating a day—on the Julian calendar—now known as “April Fool’s Day”, which falls on April 1st.

Now most fools know that April Fool’s Day is largely a day of fun-cracking of jokes, misleading people with comic stories or made-up promotions to higher echelons in political or bureaucratic ladders, etc.

So when a journalist friend of mine called me to say that April 1 was Poya, a day of religious significance to Buddhists, I must admit that I was already absorbed with what was certainly turning out to be a question of global concern to man and mammal, not to mention some donkeys that have made their way to the stables of a refined breed called the horse.

What drew my attention was a TV announcement that America’s global leader, now threatening to play Hercules, was to address the American nation on April Fools’ Day. For a few moments I was wondering whether this could be true, whether there would be a national leader determined to rule the world who really thought that April Fool’s Day is the appropriate occasion on which to try and do a Mark Antony act.

Having listened to Donald Trump on several other occasions—not that I found Trump’s oratory such scintillating speech-making that it made Winston Churchill seem second grade—I asked myself what kind of political leader with obvious global intentions to grab every piece of land he could set his eyes on would choose to speak on a day dedicated to fools of one kind or another but reduce his nation to his own, which almost won him a special Nobel Award for his geostrategic acumen in having his stormtroopers abduct a ruling president while he sat excited at his “intellectual” judgement and his military prowess that saw the Venezuelan president lose his seat and presumably his wallet.

Trump is no mix of brain and bravado, though he makes himself out to be so, showing a demeanour that is expected to cow his enemies down into surrender. Trump’s unruly manner might well frighten his staff into resigning or accepting sackings or transfers to less important positions in the administration.

But what he did not expect is that his allies and his enemies would tell him in polite language that American cowhands would never fathom: Are there enough national leaders to take him on when the time comes?

It was Trump’s international gangsterism of abducting the Venezuelan president and his oil wells by pushing American companies to take over the oil institutions that provided the first physical sign he was on the march and ready to move into military action to prove to the world that his eyes are searching the horizon and beyond.

Trump’s mistake was that he moved very soon, turning against Iran, thinking that it was a soft touch. But all Trump’s trumpeting failed to understand that other Gulf states lie open to military retaliation and more of a horizontal retaliation because that is where American and British investments lie exposed.

Even Trump’s American support is wearing thin because his disgusting use of language when addressing other world leaders and in public too makes leaders, Trump’s allies as well as others, ask themselves whether this is the man who hopes to make America great again. If America cannot produce a civilised leader, how can nations expect to engage in bilateral and multilateral negotiations in a world that is fast becoming one of increasing global confusion?

This man lacks taste and cannot be counted on for civilised dialogue. What he called a speech to the nation, I would prefer to nail down as an address that insults the nation.

It is scant wonder that the trump card sections of the American population have had to suffer in recent times mainly due to his thuggery and vulgarity. Trump has a habit of insulting or denigrating presidents before him. If that is the civilisation that he wants the American people to absorb and grow into, he might leave the people to return to their pre-Trumpian days and at least earn the endorsement of the world.

Those who spent a couple of minutes listening to the tempestuous Trumpian balderdash might have heard him telling the world that he will bring Iran to the Stone Age. For a country that has dragged itself, killing people or sending its people to battle to satisfy the personal ambitions of these self-appointed leaders.

Just the other day I saw a YouGov poll that showed Trump’s net approval has fallen to minus 23 per cent. That should teach him not to engage in matters that should concern him, like trying to steal the territory of other nations just to satisfy his delusions.

The fact is that Trump’s whole military shenanigans are quietly coming apart. But there is another part to the distasteful episode, and that is the involvement, by word or by deed, of Sri Lanka’s foreign policy now trying to make it work, a new neutrality. This part of the story that has been gathering dust either in our foreign ministry or some archival hole needs to throw our foreign policy history before this too disappears down under like the Iran ship, which should be taken for an airing with MoUs and other whats and nots.

(Neville de Silva is a veteran Sri Lankan journalist who was Assistant Editor, Diplomatic Editor and Political Columnist of the Hong Kong Standard before moving to London, where he worked for Gemini News Service. Later he was Deputy Chief of Mission in Bangkok and Deputy High Commissioner in London before returning to journalism.)