The words of the American president are essentially a threat to commit genocide – the worst possible crime in international law. This is how international analyst Martin Tabakov commented on yesterday's statement by American President Trump that he would wipe out Iranian civilization overnight. Trump said hours later that he had agreed to suspend bombings and attacks on Iran for a period of two weeks. Here is what Tabakov wrote on Facebook.
Donald Trump's statement that "a civilization will perish tonight" should not be dismissed as another whim of a limited subject.
The connection between civilization and history is the people who carry this civilization. There is a people - there is a functioning civilization. There is no people - civilization is a page in a history textbook.
Therefore, the words of the American president are essentially a threat to commit genocide - the most serious possible crime in international law. Moreover, the very intention of genocide, even if not embodied in action, is also punishable.
The danger of Trump is materialized in the fact that he is a dangerous combination: a person with a shallow mental organization, but by virtue of his position he has the means to carry out his threats. During the last presidential election in the United States, I said somewhere, I don't remember where, that I am not worried about Joe Biden's intelligence, but the lack of intelligence in Donald Trump. After all, the previous US president functioned in an environment of experienced people and experts who corrected his deficiencies (in principle, this is one of the virtues of democracy as a system). It was not a question of whether Biden's policy was liked or not, the question was that it was implemented through rules. In the case of Trump, however, we see how he is surrounded predominantly not by people who have professional qualities and moral standards, but by ordinary suitors. Or as Trump himself said - he is limited only by his morality.
In the theory of international relations, nuclear weapons are viewed ambivalently: both as a means of establishing mutual control, when they are distributed proportionally, and as a risk, when they end up in the hands of a person whose interest does not coincide with that of "natural reason" (that is why it is dangerous when an authoritarian system has nuclear weapons - then the control mechanisms for their use are broken by presumption). Of course, I do not think that the United States will use nuclear weapons against Iran. I give it as an example of how the risks in regional security increase when inappropriate people have to make decisions that affect many people.
Do we realize what kind of signal the president of the strongest democracy of authoritarian regimes is giving with such statements? If a government that is elected by the people and controlled by the separation of powers legitimizes the destruction of a civilization, then there will be no limits for command systems.
Politician Trump is clear. He may be a maniac with seals in Greenland, but he is measured and often smooth, say, with China (how many times has he already mentioned that he has good relations with Vlad, with Xi, with Kim). I leave it to you to answer the question of what is the name of this person who "gets stronger" in front of the weak and weakens in front of the strong.