With President Trump’s MAGA supporters in full rebellion over his refusal to release all the records relating to the Jeffrey Epstein pedophilia investigation, get ready for a big crisis in foreign affairs designed to distract attention from the Epstein scandal.
It certainly wouldn’t be the first time a ruler engaged in such a strategy. In fact, it’s a time-honored way to get people to set aside their rebellion and instead “rally ’round the flag.”
Consider the immortal words of James Madison, the father of the Constitution: “The means of defense against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended.”
Madison was saying that in the old Roman Empire the populace would periodically go into rebellion mode, rebelling against things like exorbitant taxation or monetary debasement at the hands of their rulers.
Whenever that would happen, the emperor would simply instigate a war against some scary foreign enemy, which would stir up both fear and patriotism within the populace. People would forget their rebellion in order to be kept safe from the new official enemy with which they were now at war.
Recall that at the end of the Cold War, most Americans were calling for a “peace dividend.” What they meant was that they were protesting the enormously high amount of money that was still being spent on the national-security establishment. They were demanding a “peace dividend” that would entail a massive reduction in national-security-state spending, which would have meant an equally massive reduction in taxes.
But notice what happened as soon as the 9/11 attacks took place. Most everyone put their “peace-dividend” demands aside and, amidst a climate of great fear and patriotism, called on the federal government to do whatever was necessary to keep them safe. The demands for a “peace dividend” disappeared permanently. The national-security establishment has been flooded with taxpayer largess ever since.
Let’s not forget what brought about those 9/11 attacks. No, it wasn’t hatred for America’s “freedom and values,” as U.S. officials maintained. It was instead what Madison said. Faced with demands for a “peace dividend,” U.S. officials had gone into the Middle East on a spree of death, destruction and humiliation, which ultimately generated so much anger and hatred that it produced retaliation in the form of the 9/11 attacks.
What might U.S. officials do this time to distract people away from Jeffrey Epstein? The Ukraine-Russia war provides an excellent opportunity to do that. All that needs to be done is furnish Ukraine with long-range missiles that are used to attack Moscow, St. Petersburg, or other big Russian cities. In that case, Russia will be tempted to strike at NATO countries that are providing such missiles and obviously using Ukraine as a proxy to destroy Russia. What better way to create a diversion away from Jeffrey Epstein than producing the prospect of all-out nuclear war between the United States and Russia?
Of course, there is also China, especially given the mindset of hatred for China that has been inculcated in the American people in the recent past. Ginning up a crisis with nuclear-armed China, say over Taiwan, would be another excellent way to cause people to stop thinking about Epstein.
There is also, of course, nuclear-armed North Korea. As we learned in the first Trump administration, it is fairly easy to stir up a crisis with that communist regime. Even if North Korea might not be able to strike the U.S. with its nuclear missiles, it can certainly strike South Korea and Japan. Would that prospect be enough to get people’s minds off Jeffrey Epstein? I would think so.
Needless to say, Iran is always available whenever a scary official enemy and a big foreign-policy crisis is needed. All that needs to be done is to proclaim that Iran is still producing nuclear weapons and plans to use them against Israel or the United States. Voilà! A big, scary official enemy and another big foreign crisis that would easily cause all those MAGA people to forget Jeffrey Epstein.
One thing is certain: Given the fact that Epstein obviously had very wealthy and very powerful clients — and, more important, given the very real likelihood that Epstein had connections to either Israeli or U.S. intelligence or both — there is no reasonable possibility that Trump is going to order the release of all the federal investigative files in the Epstein case. Will his MAGA supporters simply accept the inevitable and give up? If they don’t, then everyone should prepare himself for the prospect of a big foreign crisis in the near future.
Reprinted with permission from Future of Freedom Foundation.
