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Your guide to what the American elections mean 2024 for Washington and the world

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The most exciting moments in Donald Trump’s opening speech last month was his pledge that the United States “will consider itself a growing nation – increasing our wealth, expanding our lands.”

Amal that Trump’s talk about regional expansion is the prosperity of an empty discourse that has faded. The president’s references to the foreign regions he wants to obtain are very frequent so that they cannot be ignored or rejected.

Trump confirmed with confidence that America “will get Greenland.” He pledged to “restore” the Panama channel. It often says that Canada should become the 51st American State. Last week, he has even submitted a claim to Gaza.

His magic was amazed by the acquisition of lands even some of his supporters. But Trump’s expansionist ambitions are easier to understand, if they are seen as part of a Global trend. The other world leader who seems to see their original peers – Vladimir Putin and Jinping – see regional expansion as a major national goal and part of their personal demand for greatness.

National security speakers often cite a justification for the war on Ukraine. But Putin himself is concerned about the idea that Ukraine is not a suitable country, but it is part of the “Russian world”.

Sergei Lavrov, Russian Foreign Minister, told one of the close associates that before the invasion of Ukraine, Putin listened to Three consultants: “Evan, the terrible. Peter the Great. Catherine is great.” These rulers presided over the vast expansion of Russian territory, as Catherine advanced deep into Ukraine.

It is clear that Putin loves to leave the historical stage after re-establishing Russian control over the heart of his ancient empire-Ukraine-Perma in the west as well.

She sees similarly controlling Taiwan as a key to the national fate of China and its historical heritage. In a recent speech, he stressed: “Taiwan is the holy lands of China.”

Xi said that the Taiwan case could no longer move from generation to generation. The completion of “La Lamta” will be a signature achievement that can allow it to demand a similar situation to the situation of Mao Zaidong, the founder of the People’s Republic.

Trump’s interest in the Empire recently appeared. His advisers are struggling to rationalize his statements retroactively on Greenland, Panama and even Gaza – a process that has become known as “washing the sauce”.

As with Putin, the initial asylum to reach Sanwashers is access to a rooted explanation in national security. Greenland has critical minerals. The Chinese are inhaled about the Panama channel. But Canada? Gaza? Here rational interpretations give way to ignoring – or even assimilation.

With the absence of a convincing strategic logical basis for Trump’s regional ambitions, the clear alternative interpretation is that this is related to personal bone. If the Nobel Peace Prize is not incomprehensible, Trump can at least be obtained on the side of Jabal Rushmore through expansion American province.

The idea that the president simply wants to enlarge the American square footage is more logical after his famous phone now Call With the Danish Prime Minister, Metty Friedrixen. It is believed that it has offered Trump more or less anything that he might want, which is less than sovereignty over Greenland. The United States can have more military bases or metal rights. But he was not troubled. Greenland wanted itself.

Trump’s hopes of controlling Canada or Gaza are still unreasonable. But the Panama and Greenland channel is more at risk: the American military force will be overwhelming if it was deployed against the Banmeans or Danish.

With the United States, Russia and China, led by men with expansionist ambitions, the effects of the current international system. The world may move from an era in which smaller countries can claim to protect international law to a summit, and Thosidis has placed, “The power does what it can and the weakness is the suffering of what they must.”

Such a world may be compatible with an unstable peace between the great powers, based on the areas of influence – with the United States focusing on the Western hemisphere and Russia in Eastern Europe and China in East Asia. During the nineteenth century, the great powers held conferences to divide the world-such as the Rally 1884-1885 in Berlin, which took place at the height of the “stampede for Africa”.

But any such sculpture will be unstable by nature. Understanding the superpower in the nineteenth century collapsed in the end of the global wars of the twentieth century.

The rise of imperialist ideologies has effects on local policy. Empires tend to have emperors. Putin’s handicraft policies are running with personality worship at home and political repression. Trump’s ambitions are combined abroad with a strong focus on “enemy inside”.

Elon Musk, who does a lot of crushing, said he is thinking about the fate of the Roman Empire every day and suggested that America need the state reform. You have been warned.

Gideon.rachman@ft.com