In the weeks leading up to his (second) inauguration as President of the United States of America, the bombastic Donald Trump spoke numerous times about his desire to annex more territories in North America.
While these claims might seem outlandish, they are steeped in the historical precedent of American Imperialism. Two important points to understand here are “Manifest Destiny” and the Monroe Doctrine.
Manifest Destiny is an idea that the United States of America would dominate all of North America under the pretense of spreading liberal democracy. This colonial concept would become codified as official foreign policy and extended in its scope later with the Monroe Doctrine.
The Monroe Doctrine (1823) was a declaration of hegemony over the American hemisphere with the stated intent to remove the influence of the European monarchies on these continents and guard over the emerging republics of Latin America and the Caribbean. In practice, the Monroe Doctrine was used to consolidate American Imperialism.
For example, following the Spanish-American War (1898), many of the remaining Spanish colonies, such as Puerto Rico and the Philippines, switched hands to the Unite States. This happened without consent of the governed under the premise of their protection from the Spanish Monarchy.
Some parallels can be seen here with the same sort of calls for “liberation” through annexation of Canada and Greenland which are under the formal jurisdiction of the British and Danish Monarchies, respectively.
Since waging its own Bourgeois revolution against the British Crown in 1776, the United States has primarily played a reactionary role on the world stage, seeking to suppress the sovereignty of others, consolidating its own interests and imperial ambition, often in the name of “liberty.”
Both the concept of Manifest Destiny and the Monroe Doctrine would serve as the basis of the image of American Imperialism being branded as “globo cop” defending the “free world.”
This is the same language being spoken by Trump today when discussing taking Panama, Canada, and Greenland. American annexation is not about bringing "liberty," but is about establishing control over natural resources and geostrategic positions for the American Empire.
Panama has been invaded before by the United States, most notably under the Bush Sr. administration with the help of Junta leader Manuel Noriega in 1989. The Monroe Doctrine has also already been invoked around Greenland with American military bases remaining there to secure the position in the North Atlantic since World War II through the Cold War to the present day. Likewise, the idea of Manifest Destiny was applied to Canada with the first attempted annexation during the War of 1812.
All of this seems to be back on the menu for Uncle Sam in 2025.
The proposed annexation of Panama would be centered around securing control of the Panama Canal which connects the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. The proposed annexations of Canada and Greenland today would be about acquiring critical minerals, key to the modern high-tech economy, and as well as securing geostrategic positions around the North Pole.
All of these annexations are highlighted in the below map outlining each country as an essential part for post-war hegemony of the American Empire:
Consolidating power in the American hemisphere would be advantageous for the American Empire to regain its strength on the world stage, especially after some of its more recent setbacks with its ventures abroad.
Since 2022 in Ukraine, the American-aligned forces have been checked by the Russian Federation. Trump has claimed that he would “end the war on day one,” but the fact of the matter is that the Russo-Ukrainian theater of conflict has already been exhausted as a viable option for the American Imperialists.
A major pivot in shift under the Trump Presidency will be diverting more resources towards East Asia, seeking to contain the People’s Republic of China around the question of Taiwan and the South China Sea.
Trump also should not be given credit for the Israel-Hamas ceasefire in Palestine, as the Zionist hardliners have achieved most of their immediate regional goals in the Levant since October 7th in Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria. While there may be a pause for now, Trump’s second term will likely be used to wage the next war in the Middle East against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
All of this calls into question the false notion promoted that President Trump would be an authentic “anti-war” alternative to the establishment, he is the establishment now, as his presidency will be used to effectively pivot the global strategies of American Imperialism. While many #Resistence types may fixate on solely analyzing Trump as an individual bad actor, systemically, we must understand that the American Empire was not created in a day. What we can call “MAGA Imperium” is only a new chapter of American Imperialism, rooted in the centuries-old idea of Manifest Destiny.
“Canadian annexation” is no longer just an internet meme.
The silver lining here is how Trump’s aggressive rhetoric has fortified the Republican position in Canada. The whole pretense of the Monroe Doctrine being invoked to oust the British Monarch on our behalf would be a moot point if we already had our own republic by-and-for the people of Canada. This would give us ground to rebuff any the claims of American Imperialists like Trump seeking to annex our country.
The necessity for asserting our own popular sovereignty has just as much to do with Uncle Sam, as it does with the British Crown, for countless people, this has been made more clear than ever in the face of MAGA Imperium.
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