More to the point, in what diplomatic universe is it a good idea to recharacterise a nation once hailed by a US Secretary of State as America’s ‘‘very, very, very good friend’’ as a ‘‘freeloader’’?
Foolish question. In the diplomatic universe inhabited by United States Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth and his master, President Donald Trump, history is still what Henry Ford labelled it a century ago — ‘‘bunk’’.
Putting to one side the moral and philosophical affinities that drew them together in the great global struggles of the 20th century, the strategic necessity of hemming-in the US’s only serious military and economic competitors — the Russian Federation, and the Peoples Republic of China — more-or-less requires the US to be the very, very, best of friends with both Europe and Australasia.
And yet it is ‘‘bunk’’ that defines the Trump Administration’s relationship with history.
Neither the man at the top, nor his underlings, can afford to allow anything other than a Hollywood version of history to intrude upon their political project.
The president dreams of building a ballroom to rival the gilded ostentation of Louis XIV’s Palace of Versailles, and a triumphal arch to surpass (in size if not in splendour) Paris’s Arc de Triomphe.
Lost to him entirely are the compelling historical narratives to which these treasures of the French nation continue to give material expression.
If Trump had even the slightest knowledge of the achievements of the French monarchy or the French Republic, then his own paltry contributions to the strength and grandeur of his own republic would paralyse him with embarrassment.
Who could possibly consider the murder of alleged drug-smugglers on the high seas worthy of a triumphal arch?
Or the criminal abduction of another nation’s head-of-state? Or an unprovoked and illegal war against Iran that not even the military might of the US and Israel combined can win?
But if Trump’s grandiloquent criminality and cultural vandalism teeters between tragedy and farce, Hegseth’s methodical erasure of American history reflects a malice as old as the republic itself.
What else could the Liberty Bell do but crack when sounded across a nation that proclaimed freedom while upholding slavery?
Hegseth has dismissed most of his African-American generals. Most of his female generals have suffered the same fate.
No promotion pathway now exists for either group to join the key military decision-makers.
Even more disturbingly, Hegseth has made it clear that he expects the US officer corps to pledge its loyalty to their commander-in-chief, rather than to the Constitution of the United States — as required by law.
If he could, Hegseth would most certainly imprison the small group of former officers who released a video reminding all serving military personnel that they are not bound to follow illegal orders.
Imagine the level of concern required to produce such a video. It is not misplaced.
Since January 2021 there has been a determined effort by Hegseth, acting for the president, to purge the armed forces of every senior officer suspected of holding the country’s democratic traditions more dearly than the executive powers currently being exploited to destroy them.
But, in fairness to Hegseth, he is not entirely lacking in historical sensibility. No man who has the battle-cry of Christendom in arms — Deus Vult! (God wills it!) tattooed into his flesh can be called contemptuous of all history.
What can be said, however, is that an enthusiast for the medieval crusades against Islam may not be the best person to prosecute a war against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
By the same token, the United States of America may not be the best country in whose cause New Zealanders should be invited to empty their treasury.
Not while President Trump and Secretary of War Hegseth are the Americans issuing the invitation.
• Chris Trotter is an Auckland writer and commentator.
