Is Nothing Happening? Or is Trump Channeling Sun Tzu?
By Brian C. Joondeph
AmericanThinker.com
I’m impatient, as I expect most American Thinker
readers are as well. We have been promised a coming
storm that will be biblical, or a Kraken released on
Deep State conspirators. Despite Attorney General
Barr acknowledging spygate as “one of the greatest
travesties in American history,” there has not yet
been a reckoning.
A mid-level FBI attorney, Kevin Clinesmith, pled
guilty to falsifying a document which became one of
the lynchpins of a FISA warrant on Carter Page and
subsequent spying on Donald Trump and his campaign,
but he has yet to be sentenced. His co-conspirators
are writing books, teaching at prestigious
universities, and bashing President Trump on cable
news shows.
A presidential election was stolen, and Trump’s own
executive agencies say ho-hum, roll over, and go
back to sleep. The same FBI that sent 15 agents to
investigate a garage door handle that Bubba Wallace
claimed was a noose, can’t seem to find any reason
to investigate a host of election irregularities.
Republican members of Congress, who happily rode
Trump’s coattails to their elections, are telling
him to “accept the results” and “move on,” oblivious
to the fact that if they get their wish, their party
will become as irrelevant as the Green Party. Media
stalwarts that were once “fair and balanced,” have
tilted to the left, becoming “unfair and unhinged,”
rivaling the standard left-wing cable news gabfests.
Perhaps more is going on than I can see, but what is
visible to 75 million Trump supporters, those who
have endured ridicule and scorn for supporting their
president, is that nothing is happening. This is
Trump’s administration and he’s the boss. He hires
and fires, just as he did in the real estate
development world and on “The Apprentice.”
The buck stops with him. If nothing is happening,
then that’s on him. Is he flailing away in a vain
attempt to win a second term? After all that he has
been through and overcome, not only to get elected
in 2016, but also to stay in office for four years,
accomplishing more in one term than most presidents
do in two, is he about to lose it all to a senile
grifter no more qualified to be president of the
United States than a manager at a bowling alley?
At one level it sure seems that way. The clock is
ticking with important electoral dates breezing by,
getting ever closer to the final date of Jan. 20? On
the other hand, President Trump may be playing a
different game, one not obvious to most observers,
certainly not the media or even his supporters.
Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general and
strategist, author of a treatise on military
strategy known as “The Art of War.” Trump is a fan,
as this book which made his short list of “best
leadership books.” Trump quoted Sun Tzu in this 2012
tweet, long before Twitter was fact-checking his
every utterance and attaching warnings and
disclaimers to each tweet.
Image credit: YouTube
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Can Sun Tzu’s ancient wisdom and strategy explain
the current apparent “nothing is happening”
perception for those who, like myself, are becoming
increasingly impatient over “all hat and no cattle”
promises coming from Team Trump? Is Trump following
the Sun Tzu battle plan? Look at some of his quotes.
Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night,
and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.
If Trump has a master plan, it’s safe to assume that
few outside his small inner circle know anything
about it. An example would be Secretary of Defense
Chris Miller speaking to Vice President Mike Pence,
thanking him for “his steady hand and leadership”
during “some of the [most] complex military
operations this country’s ever conducted.”
Why haven’t we heard of such operations? Or were
they “dark and impenetrable as night”? And executed,
like “a thunderbolt”? This is not faint praise.
Pence is not a military guy, but Miller certainly
is, a former special forces operator and commander.
Miller was close to tears acknowledging Pence’s
assistance and leadership. Something is happening.
All warfare is based on deception.
Trump is a master of chaos, with strategic media
leaks and disinformation. Is VP Pence a white hat or
a black hat? The SecDef says Pence is a white hat.
Attorney Lin Wood says Pence is a black hat. What
about the rest of Trump’s inner circle – Mark
Meadows and Pat Cipollone – friends or foes? Patrick
Byrne calls them serpents. Trump hired them and
keeps them on. Deception and confusion. Classic Sun
Tzu.
In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.
Trump tweets in one direction and signs executive
orders in another direction. He complains about the
GOP Senate while hundreds of conservative judges are
confirmed by the same senate. He creates chaos then
uses the opportunity to advance his agenda. Trump
distracts the media with tweets and comments and
while they are in meltdown mode, he is running
circles around them.
Victorious warriors win first and then go to war,
while defeated warriors go to war first and then
seek to win.
Has Trump gone to war against the Democrats and the
left? Did he send in the military to reclaim
American cities under siege by Antifa and BLM? Has
he declared martial law, as the Twitterverse assured
us he would? Or has Trump gamed this out, knowing
electoral fraud was coming when he signed the 2018
executive order regarding election interference?
Has Trump already won, now waiting for the optimal
time to go to war? The defeated left has been at war
with Trump for six years, unsuccessful in their
efforts to win? And finally,
The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy
without fighting.
As of yet, there has been no storm, no Kraken. Trump
has followed the Constitution, making legal
arguments up to and including the U.S. Supreme
Court. What Vice President Pence does when it is
time to again follow the Constitution and certify
the Electoral College votes is to be determined.
Will a massive declassification of criminal and
seditious activities subdue the Democrats? Will
Trump win without a bloody battle? Time will tell.
At this point, it’s a binary choice. Either Trump is
in over his head and will be dragged out of office.
Or he is executing his plan, on his terms and
timing, as he has done since his famous escalator
ride at Trump Tower in 2015.
Trump knows the stakes for himself, his family, and
America if Kamala Harris and Joe Biden get the keys
to the kingdom and promptly hand them over to China.
Want to bet against Trump? How has that worked out
in the past?
Ponder these words from Trump’s inspiration, Sun
Tzu,
He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the
enemy unprepared.
Mystify, mislead, and surprise the enemy.
He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the
enemy unprepared.
Is Trump unprepared? Au contraire. Listen to Oprah
interviewing him in 1988, more than thirty years
ago. He looks younger but sounds the same as he does
now, speaking of China, immigration, and electoral
politics. Trump has been preparing for this moment
most of his adult life.
Buckle up for an interesting few weeks ahead.
Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a physician and
freelance writer. Follow him on Facebook, LinkedIn,
Twitter, Parler, and QuodVerum.