2026 has barely begun and US President Donald Trump is on a rampage. On Saturday, January 3, he shocked the world by ordering the military invasion of Venezuela and the kidnapping of its president Nicolas Maduro and his wife, and, thereafter, announcing the takeover of the oil-rich country.
On Monday, the dust had barely settled on that when White House adviser Stephen Miller said on TV that Greenland rightfully belonged to the US and that the Trump administration could seize Danish territory if it wanted. Asked whether the US would rule out the use of force, Miller said that "Nobody's going to fight the United States militarily over the future of Greenland."
On Thursday, Trump directed his government to withdraw the country from 66 international organisations, which he felt were contrary to the interests of the United States. The list included 35 non-UN organisations and 31 UN affiliated outfits, the most important of which is probably the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) of 1992, the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change, UN Women, UN Population Fund and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
'My Own Morality'
A day earlier, on Wednesday, cool as a cucumber, he reached out to one of his principal media adversaries, The New York Times, which had criticised the Venezuela action as an "imperialist venture". In a wide-ranging, two-hour interview, he declared that his powers as Commander-in-Chief were constrained only by his "own morality" and international law and other checks had no effect on his ability to invade and coerce nations around the world. The morality bit was a bit rich, coming from a man who has been accused of sexual misconduct arising from his association with Jeffery Epstein.
Trump said in the interview that the US would remain "in charge" of Venezuela for as long as he wanted, and that could be many years. He also confirmed plans to take and refine 30-50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil worth some $2.8 billion, adding that he would control the money and use it for the people of Venezuela and the US.
As for Greenland, it was true that the US already had a base there and could expand its facilities without any problem, but Trump is unlikely to be happy with anything short of ownership of the island - because he feels that physical possession of the territory "was psychologically needed for success", something that a lease or a treaty would not provide.
On Saturday, he doubled down on this and declared "If it affects NATO, then it affects NATO," adding that "But you know, they need us much more than we need them." As for Iran, things are still on balance. But you never know if and when Trump will strike.
Trump's bottom line assessment seems to be that he alone could be the arbiter of any limits to his authority, and that he had the liberty to use any instrument to cement American supremacy military, economic or political. This tells us a great deal about his world view. At the core of his belief is that national strength, and not laws and treaties, were the deciding factors in global politics.
The Tariffs Train
All this comes after a year when he had liberally used his power to impose tariffs on most countries of the world. He has also joined Israel in making war against Iran and, by his own account, destroying its nuclear programme.
Many of the organisations that the US is leaving are mainly marginal or have been moribund for a long time. This was clear genuflection to the MAGA base, a substantial portion of which is annoyed by the January 3 US military intervention in Venezuela. Midterms are coming and Trump has recently said that big losses might lead to him being indicted.
But many of the other organisations relating to environment, renewable energy, development, education and the promotion of human rights, democracy, counterterrorism, anti-piracy, social rights and trade are important in terms of global governance and even American soft power. But that is clearly not a concern for the President.
The 66 Organisations Trump Withdrew From
Trump withdrew the US from the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2020, alleging mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic. The withdrawal was retracted by the Biden Administration in 2021. So, among the flurry of executive orders signed by Trump the day he took office on January 20, 2025, was America's withdrawal from WHO again, with the causes given being its alleged mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic, failure to adopt reforms and inappropriate political influence of some member countries. In February 2025, the US had announced a withdrawal from three UN organisations - the UN Human Rights Council (UNHCR), the UN Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), and the US Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
Among those bodies listed on Thursday is also the International Solar Alliance, an intergovernmental organisation headquartered in Gurugram, mooted by India and France in the wake of the COP21 Paris Climate Summit in 2015. The aim of the alliance is to scale up solar energy and reduce the cost of solar power generation. It's not surprising that the Trump administration is withdrawing from the ISA because in the US itself, Trump has turned his back on renewables and has sought to boost the use of fossil fuels like oil and gas. Actually, the fact is that the US was not a full member, it had merely an observer or partner status in the ISA.
India is a member of many of these organisations that the US is withdrawing from, especially those linked to the United Nations. New Delhi, which has a pronounced globalist outlook that favours multilateralism, is active in bodies that focus on climate, development, trade and the environment.
What Multilateralism?
In its current "America First" phase, the US is declaring that multilateralism is strictly for the birds. As far as the US is concerned, it will live and breathe with its own rules and discards what it believes is the fiction that international law is supposed to bind the weak and powerful in a common purpose of promoting global governance. The Americans are now saying that they are more comfortable in working with rules that they write unilaterally, rather than those which have to be negotiated through the machinery of global consensus. No doubt the US believes that given its economic and military power, smaller countries will fall in line behind rules that it lays down.
As we have noted earlier, this move has been motivated by a desire to please the MAGA fan base and the organisations chosen are often small and of little consequence to the US.
For all its bluster against world government and the United Nations, Trump has chosen not to withdraw from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) or the UN General Assembly (UNGA), neither has it done so from two other powerful UN-linked institutions - the International Bank of Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) or the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). It has not done so because membership of these institutions provides the US with significant strategic, economic and geopolitical advantages which far outweigh the costs or criticism of the MAGA base.
(The writer is Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
