Paul Craig Roberts
Gilbert Doctorow has given up on Donald Trump, a convincing illustration that Trump is losing the support of the few intelligent people who thought there might be some hope in him. I also have found my hopes that Trump would repair at least some of America’s crumbling foundation disappointed.
By all appearances, Trump places pleasing Netanyahu above all other considerations. To accommodate the Israel Lobby, Trump sacrificed the support of his two strongest supporters in the House of Representatives – Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Thomas Massey. Greene resigned from Congress and Massey faces a Trump-Israel Lobby effort to defeat his reelection.
When I was young, and the United States and Europe had a semi-independent media, concern for truth resided only in the Western world. The rest of the world was accustomed to the rule by power and to governments lying for their own convenience. Respect for truth was a Western thing. In the last 30 or 40 years I have watched the Western media take on the attribute of lying for the convenience of advertisers, monied interests, and governments in exchange for “scoops,” that is, planted stories serving hidden agendas.
As far as I can tell, Western education has succeeded in discrediting the concept of truth. Educators, as they are called, teach that truth is just an expression of self-interest, or one’s preferences, or in the case of white gentiles expression of racism and antisemitism. With truth, discredited, appeals to its authority are weak. Trump’s kidnapping of Venezuelan president Maduro and his wife and Trump’s cooperation with Netanyahu in destabilizing Iran in preparation to attacking the country are based on lies and orchestrated events. Few in the United States or Europe, have the intelligence and knowledge to see what is happening, and those few who do are dismissed as “conspiracy theorists.”
In other words, truth is impotent because people are unable to recognize it. This leads me, and no doubt others who try to deliver truth or something closer to truth than official narratives, to wonder why I attempt to bring truth to people who cannot recognize truth or even acknowledge that truth exists.
It is doubtful that many can recognize the seriousness of a situation in which the bulk of mankind have no alternative to official narratives. Controlled media sets out the truth, and those who disagree are terrorists, conspiracy theorists, racists, antisemites, Nazis, white supremacists, religious bigots, and whatever words are used for demonization at the current time.
At the very time that Trump is allegedly supporting a peaceful agreement that not only ends the conflict in Ukraine, but also the conflict between the West and Russia–negotiation that requires more Russian trust in the word of the West then can be justified–Trump has unleashed the United States as the principal rogue nation in the world.
As a Doctorow put it:
“Let us remember that ‘rogue state behavior’ was precisely what one of the chief popularizers of Neocon ideology, Robert Kagan, husband of the notorious Victoria Nuland, urged upon the United States in books and speeches. That is to say, scorn for all legal constraints on how foreign policy is conducted for the sake of maintaining U.S. global domination.”
Zionist neoconservatives who have controlled American foreign policy since the Clinton regime believe, as did Karl Marx, that violence is the only effective force in history and that violence committed by the United States in the interest of Israel is completely justified.
Doctorow says that Trump’s behavior sends a message to President Vladimir Putin that he does not have, and cannot have, a partner in Donald Trump. Putin’s dream of achieving a mutual security agreement between Russia and the West is nothing but the dream of a 19th century Western liberal. Trump has shown Putin that Putin’s dream is an impossible one. Will Putin wake up before it is too late for Russia? Or will Putin also, with US organized protest in Moscow’s Streets, be snatched from Russia and delivered to Washington for trial as a war criminal? If Putin has any intelligence, he will realize that Russia’s demise is the dream of the Jewish neoconservatives that control Donald Trump’s foreign policy.
As evil as the world is, is the world prepared for the evil that resides in Washington and Israel?
Time to impeach Trump
GILBERT DOCTOROW
January 3, 2026
The attack on Venezuela and snatching of President Maduro puts an end to my flirtation with Trump. He has just trampled on the National Security Strategy that he rolled out 3 weeks ago in which he abjured regime change operations. He has proven that the Neocons control the government and he is nothing more than a figurehead.
I call for his impeachment so as to install JD Vance and give Vance two-three years to do what has to be done, namely to purge the Pentagon, the CIA, the State Department of the Neocons who constitute the decision makers and implementers in the ‘power ministries’. This accomplished, Vance could then hope to carry out the NSS and position the USA as a major world power among peers, rather than a hegemon and Cold Warrior.
For those in the Community who may be puzzled by my turning against Trump, I recommend that they read the first chapter in my 2019 collection of essays entitled A Belgian Perspective on International Affairs: “Time to Impeach Trump,” dated 21 September 2017, pp. 1-4. You may have overlooked this book because its title was explained only in the Foreword, p. xiii: the ‘Belgian’ in question was not a collective part of this small nation that one could disregard until its Prime Minister Bart De Wever stood up to Ursula von der Leyen and Chancellor Friedrich Merz a couple of weeks ago and saved the global financial markets from the catastrophe that would have followed confiscation of Russian state assets held in Belgium. The word ‘Belgian’ in the title stood for one person, me, who had become a naturalized Belgian. My call for impeachment was precipitated by Trump’s barbaric declarations before the UN General Assembly threatening to annihilate North Korea, a nation of 22 million people.
My coddling of Trump’s vile activities in some global hotspots since taking office again, in January 2025, in particular his enabling the Israeli genocide in Gaza, was based on the reasonable assumption that that was the price to pay for him to enjoy the political capital in the heavily pro-Zionist Congress and in the foreign policy establishment in Washington necessary to pass his domestic and foreign policy programs. The same logic persuaded me to remain silent about his attack on the Iranian nuclear facilities and his enabling Israeli strikes on Teheran and other purely civilian targets in their 12-day war.
But the recent months of Trump’s superintending so-called peace negotiations to end the war in Ukraine have shown that at best his efforts are incompetent and so are condemned to failure. Holding separate talks with each of the warring parties and agreeing with each side to their entirely contradictory peace plans shows that he is posturing and that nothing of use can come out of these talks. Moreover, no peace agreement that met the Russian demands of resolving the underlying reasons for the war, namely turning back NATO expansion to Russia’s borders and getting Washington to consider revising the security architecture in Europe, will get approval in Congress now that everyone has read about Trump’s hopes to overturn 76 years of American foreign policy priorities by the language of his NSS document.
Accordingly, I view without prejudice and on their merits Trump’s attack on Venezuela and the kidnapping of President Maduro and his wife to face trumped up charges of drug trafficking in the USA. And on their merits Trump has egregiously violated international law. Sad to say, he has not set a precedent, but is following a pattern of ‘rogue state’ behavior established by President George H.W. Bush when he invaded Panama in December 1989 and seized president Manuel Noriega. Noriega then spent years in U.S. detention and died there.
Let us remember that ‘rogue state behavior’ was precisely what one of the chief popularizers of Neocon ideology, Robert Kagan, husband of the notorious Victoria Nuland, urged upon the United States in books and speeches. That is to say, scorn for all legal constraints on how foreign policy is conducted for the sake of maintaining U.S. global domination.
The difference between what H.W. Bush did in 1989 and what Trump has just down now in Venezuela must be called out. Bush was just ‘kicking ass,’ as they say in the States. Trump is implementing a farther-reaching geopolitical objective of driving all foreign powers out of the Western Hemisphere, which he seeks to maintain as Washington’s exclusive hunting preserve. To be more specific, Trump has attacked not just Venezuela. He has attacked China which is a main export market for Venezuela; conversely, China is highly dependent on Venezuelan oil and an American take-over would surely cause economic harm to Beijing. In this regard, the warm-up exercise to yesterday’s snatch operation was the U.S. capture of two Venezuelan oil tankers, one of which was carrying oil destined for and already paid for by China.
Going back still further, this American attack on Venezuela is a continuation of the attack on China’s commercial activities in Latin America that we saw still earlier in 2025 when Trump brought pressure on Panama to remove the Chinese from their control over the Canal.
What lessons can the world’s two other superpowers draw from Trump’s outrageous attack on Venezuela?
As for Russia, the message should be crystal clear to President Vladimir Putin that he does not and cannot have a partner in Donald Trump. Russia must proceed on its own path to resolve the Ukraine war, and as I have been saying in recent months, the sooner the war is ended, whether by a decapitation strike on Kiev and other decision-making centers, or by storming Kiev with ground forces, the better. Russia now has a window of opportunity that it should exploit without hesitation. If President Putin is unable to act decisively in this sense, then he should resign and pass the torch to someone in a younger generation who is level-headed, has proven experience at high levels of the government and is decisive, not wishy-washy.
As for China, this attack on Venezuela is de facto an attack on China. Generally, Chairman Xi is more decisive and has more resources to threaten the USA than does Putin and Russia. If ever there were a moment for China to resolve the Taiwan issue it is here and now. The Americans have just stolen Chinese oil and are attacking a major supplier to China. Xi will not straighten out relations with Washington now by remaining silent and failing to respond appropriately. Such reticence will only encourage further provocations and give Washington time to better prepare for armed conflict.
