A senior analyst, who is a former cabinet secretary, has described the US intervention in Venezuela as another unpredictable act of an ‘episodic man’. India, he says, must adjust its policies to outmanoeuvre the US calculus.In the US, even some Left-wing groups were led to misconstrue Donald Trump as ‘isolationist, anti-militarist and anti-imperialist.’ Misreading his episodic and idiosyncratic style, they essentially failed to understand the forces that had created the Trump phenomenon. Consider the composition of his team of secretaries (ministerial colleagues), which is filled with US corporate leaders and business tycoons.For them, ‘Make America Great Again’ meant ‘make American economic domination great again’. This includes protection of American capital. They naturally expect Trump to look after their business interests. How long could Trump ignore the pressures from within?There has been hushed disquiet even among Trump supporters over his apparent disregard for the well-being of Americans since his second term began. While his own business has prospered by leaps and bounds, his reckless trade war has ‘crushed’ the small businesses, especially the small manufacturing industry.“Jobs and factories will come roaring back to our country,” Trump had said, announcing tariffs. But experts disagree, pointing out that it takes a long time to relocate factories and that the higher wages for labour in America makes the products costlier for consumers.A recent study by the Century Foundation found that Trump’s initiatives had begun hurting the American economy. “I will bring 90 industries in 90 days,” Trump had declared. Not only has he failed to realise the promise, Americans are paying the price for his policies.There are signs of suppressed whispers even within the MAGA camp. Lower middle class followers, who constituted Trump’s vote bank, are feeling left high and dry. An indication of this has been the losses suffered by Trump’s Republican Party in the recent local elections. While the main MAGA base remains intact, cracks have appeared. The fissures are also visible in the White House where director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was kept off the Venezuela operation. Gabbard had earlier expressed opposition to such interventions.US corporate giants, on their part, are sceptical about investing in Venezuela in its current state. “We had our assets seized there twice. Looking at the legal and practical aspects, today it is uninvestable,” the Exxon CEO told Trump at a meeting of the President with oil magnates.Four months ago, a gathering of top CEOs, those outside Trump’s cabinet but primarily Republican, expressed unease over the ‘maelstrom of chaos, fear and confusion’ in America. The dominant view was that the present administration was undermining an economic system that had taken decades to build. Two thirds of the hundred-plus CEOs said that Trump’s tariffs had hurt their businesses.Despite such sporadic stirrings, there is no credible challenge to Trump’s megalomaniac supremacy. The Democrats, still waiting and watching, are grappling with their own problems. The slogan they have coined is: Defend capitalism from Trump. However, of late he has been facing stiffer resistance from external rivals. This has forced him to be more amenable to his aides’ counsel.Earlier, the US had assiduously cultivated its friends, including the EU, as allies. Trump treats them as subordinates, never as equals. He repeatedly emphasises that he is the only super power in the world. He has no qualms in declaring, “I am acting as Venezuela’s president.” “I am restrained by my own morality,” he says. “Make a deal with me before it is too late,” he warns Cuba. Trump boasts that it was important for Modi “to make me happy.”The Economist has said this gunboat capitalism makes the world poorer. The National Security Strategy released by the US last month has been described as America Alone, with the focus shifting from global leadership and multilateralism to unilateral action.At the moment, Greenland is emerging as the main zone of confrontation. Trump views it as strategic and has said he will seize it by outright purchase or any other means. But all his efforts to divide the Europeans have so far failed. Among those who have deployed troops in Greenland are Germany, France, Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands and the UK. Furious at the European challenge, Trump instantly imposed 25% tariff. In Greenland, thousands have come out on the streets to protest against the US move.The last few months have witnessed two parallel developments. While Trump has shifted from tariff threats to direct armed intervention, his protectionist policies are finding acceptance even among his European rivals who are increasingly adopting his anti-immigration strategies. So far, nine countries, including Austria, Italy and Denmark, have pressured the European Court of Human Rights to push back on the asylum system.Apart from tighter curbs on the movement of labour, Trumpism has caused irreparable damage on two other fronts. The first has been the disruption of world trade and long-term investments. Under the present uncertainties, investors the world over are hesitant to make heavy long-term commitments. Trump heard this himself at his meeting with the big oil magnates. The second development has been the sudden reckless arms race.World powers are now spending more on instruments of war than in important areas like industry. Every day, defence and strategic journals come out with details of newer fighter and stealth aircraft being showcased by countries like the US, China, France and other arms producers. Consider the alarm at the kind of stealth aircraft Beijing had churned out. Then there was the revival of an old base near China by the Americans.Amid the renewed arms race comes another blow to peaceful coexistence. The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), the only surviving nuclear agreement between Russia and the US, will expire on February 5. If the inevitable happens, it is bound to raise the nuclear stockpile on both sides. Trump has expressed his desire to curb the nuclear arsenal but has not made any specific move. A new element is the dire need to bind China in the proliferation commitment. But so far, Trump and Putin have not made any credible moves to renegotiate START. This is entirely due to Trump’s no-other-super-leader concept.Narendra Modi hardly figures in Trump’s wider canvas for world domination. Trump has been preoccupied with capturing Greenland, punishing Cuba and sending troops to troubled Iran. Gone are the days when Modi shouted Ab ki Baar Trump Sarkar and the US President embraced him on the Howdy Modi stage. Then Trump was eyeing the large NRI votes in the US, now he has a much bigger vote base and no time for Modi. Instead, Trump keeps embarrassing Modi by repeating his claim that he stopped an India-Pakistan war. He has also imposed stiff tariffs on India. Will Modi take the cue from Europe and assert India’s strategic independence?P. Raman is a veteran journalist and political commentator.In an age of fractured mandates, personality cults and transactional alliances, P. Raman brings clarity to India’s shifting political equations. With Realpolitik, the veteran journalist peers beneath the slogans and spin to reveal the power plays, spectacle, crises and insecurities driving India’s politics.