The strategy of Donald Trump's government is for the United States to be "great again" by strengthening the economy and closing the military breach

For about a decade, the U.S. has suffered an economic crisis from which it has not been able to recover. The trade deficit in 2017 lay at 566,600 million dollars, according to the El Economista, the largest since 2008 when it was for 700 billion dollars. In addition, the fiscal deficit forced the federal administration to remain closed for several days in January. The level of its debt ended at 108% of its GDP, according to Santander Trade; and its per capita GDP for the last quarter of 2017 was -4.3% compared to the same quarter of 2016, according to data from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).

Leer en español: El objetivo de EE.UU. es contrarrestar el avance de la influencia de Rusia y China

These figures, combined with the industrial dismantling that has been done in recent decades, mainly transferring to Asia its industry and its sources of employment, generate an internal situation of social, economic and political upheaval problems. In the international framework, they produce an economic weakening that has also manifested itself in weakness in its political and military influence.

In the midst of this situation emerge countries like China and Russia, whose growth in economic, political and military influence is contrary to the U.S. economic interests. For example, the advance of Chinese economic influence on Latin America that has shifted from the interest in raw materials to investments in infrastructure and services, or over Africa with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in almost the entire continent. In addition to Russia's political influence in the Middle East, as in Pakistan and Syria.

That is why the National Security Strategy issued by Trump's government exposes the internal and external policy that will be addressed from now on to protect its interests in the world against these two nations that are its main competitors, above terrorism as it was to the present day. This policy has the main objective, as Trump has said, to make the U.S. a great country again.

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The policy is to strengthen the economy of the country with the intervention of the state based on four pillars: the protection of the homeland, promote the U.S. economic prosperity, maintain peace through force and promote the influence of power around the world. It also includes the modernization of the trade agreements and making them bilateral, strengthening their infrastructure, modernizing and strengthening their economy and military apparatus, including the nuclear, biological, space and cyberspace component, as indicated in the security document.

In the National Military Strategy, the two countries, Russia and China, are ratified as the main threats of the U.S. It also announces the closing of the military gap with these nations by modernizing the military forces with an emphasis on the military apparatus in attack and defense, in war equipment in cyberspace, and making use of Big Data to shape the opinion of people using social networks as with the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

The National Security Strategy and the National Military Strategy are the answer that the North American power, at the head of Donald Trump, gives to the advance of the political and economic influence of Russia and China that threaten their economic and political interests in the planet. This in the midst of the political decline that accompanies it because of the internal difficulties that it is suffering a decade ago and which are manifested in the regression of its influence around the world.

LatinAmerican Post | José David Rodríguez

Translated from "El objetivo de EE.UU. es contrarrestar el avance político y económico de Rusia y China"