Back to the future? Trump is channeling America's history of expansionism

Opinion by Edward Stourton, The Telegraph

The word “unprecedented” has become a commonplace of commentary on Donald Trump’s second term. Many of his domestic opponents condemn him as “un-American”, and from across the Atlantic he can seem maverick and even mad, certainly quite out of keeping with the style of American leadership we have grown used to all our lives. But the evidence increasingly suggests that his presidency is in fact deeply rooted in American history; almost all the shocks he has given the world – whether his trade tariffs, his apparent contempt for the rule of law or his capture of a foreign leader – have precedents in America’s past. Donald Trump is as American as apple pie.

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In 1867, the prominent American economist and politician Robert J Walker produced a report urging the acquisition of Greenland because of its “resources and geopolitical importance”. The report also argued the move could have important diplomatic consequences; British North America (which became the Dominion of Canada that same year) would find itself surrounded on three sides by the territory of the US, and would therefore feel pressured into joining the Union.

Walker’s report was endorsed by William Seward, the then secretary of state, who was an enthusiastic champion of American expansionism. In the spring of that year, Seward had successfully negotiated the purchase of Alaska from Russia, after Tsar Alexander II found himself strapped for cash following his country’s defeat in the Crimean War. Seward secured the vast territory for $7.2m dollars, less than a cent an acre. It was a real estate bargain that would surely have earned the admiration of the author of The Art of the Deal.

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(In his 2025 inaugural speech) Donald Trump stated baldly that “the US will once again consider itself a growing nation – one that … expands our territory”. And he followed that promise almost immediately with a phrase which, although he used it with reference to space exploration, takes us right back to the 19th century; “we will pursue our manifest destiny into the stars”.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/we-shouldn-t-be-surprised-by-anything-trump-does-he-s-as-american-as-apple-pie/ar-AA1TZ9V6