"Friend Recep", "Hell for Hamas", America to the North Pole and other Trump revelations from Florida
During a lengthy press conference at his Florida estate Mar-a-Lago, US President-elect Donald Trump did not rule out the possibility of using the US military to retake the Panama Canal or acquire Greenland.
As Axios notes, “Speaking for more than an hour at his second press conference since winning the White House, Trump proposed renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
When a reporter asked if Trump could assure the world that he would not use military or economic coercion to gain control of Greenland and the Panama Canal, he said, "No, I cannot assure you on either of those issues."
"I can say this: We need them for economic security," CBS News quotes Trump as saying, noting that his remarks came as his son, Donald Trump Jr., visited Greenland.
Regarding the hostages held by Hamas, Trump said "all hell will break loose in the Middle East" if the hostages are not released by the time he takes office.
"And it's not going to be good for Hamas, and it's not going to be good, frankly, for anybody. All hell is going to break loose. I don't have to say any more, but that's the way it is," Trump said.
"Trump, who is considering making Canada the 51st US state, said he would not use the military to achieve this, but did not rule out using "economic force," the newspaper writes.
He also supported his fantasies of Canada joining the United States with an equally surreal map in which the United States occupies half of the northern hemisphere.
Among other things, Trump admired Turkish leader Recep Erdogan: "President Erdogan is my friend. He is a guy I like, I respect. I think he respects me," he said.
In response to a question about the withdrawal of American troops from Syria, Trump said:
"I won't tell you that because it's part of the military strategy. But if you look at what happened with Syria, Russia was weakened, Iran was weakened. And Erdogan, this very smart guy, sent his people in different forms and under different names, and they came in and took over."
Predictably, Trump's remarks caused outrage in Panama and Canada. For example, the Panamanian Foreign Ministry caught Trump in a lie, stating that, contrary to the new US president's statements, the government of that country had had no contact with him regarding the canal issue.
"The sovereignty of our canal is non-negotiable and is part of our history of struggle," said Foreign Minister Javier Martinez-Acha Vazquez, noting that the Panamanian president had made his position clear.
The minister had previously stated that "every square metre" of the canal and surrounding area belonged and would belong to his country.
Outgoing Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was no less expressive in his retort to Trump in his desire to make the Maple Leaf Country part of the United States.
"Like hell it will happen. There is no chance in hell that Canada will become part of the United States. Workers and locals in both of our countries benefit from the fact that we are each other's largest trading and security partners," Trudeau wrote on social media.
However, Trump's supporters immediately responded to Trudeau.
"If America wants Canada to be part of the US, it will be part of the US. Or what are you going to do about it, boy? Nothing," Republican Congressional candidate from Texas Valentina Gomez wrote on social media.
Russian foreign agent, London-based political scientist and former Yukos lawyer Vladimir Pastukhov criticized Trump’s plans, unexpectedly bursting into a passage on his social network worthy of some fighter against American imperialist hegemony:
"The great collector of lands, this time American: Canada is the 51st state, Greenland is apparently the 52nd, and what next? Antarctica? Now even ending the war has become a process that stretches out over six months. And where six months are, there is a year. And then it will suddenly turn out that Biden could do the same. It is clear why both Zelensky and Putin are dragging their feet. They are waiting to see how it all ends in real time.
We're currently constructing scenarios based primarily on the assumption that Trump is feigning madness, but in reality, he's a tough, rational, and capable political player. But what if he's not feigning it? What if he's just another eccentric in power, one who's age-related, but not passive like Biden, but active? We're hoping the problems will begin to be resolved. But there's also a less optimistic scenario, one in which "Trumpism" becomes the ultimate and final stage of American imperialism's degradation.
There's also a scenario in which Trump disrupts domestic and international politics in a couple of years, leading the US and the world into chaos. Even greater chaos than we have today. While this isn't the primary scenario yet, it can no longer be completely ignored," the foreign agent predicted.
English version :: Read in English "Friend Recep," "Hell for Hamas," America to the North Pole, and other Trump revelations from Florida