Ukraine, the US, and the AI State

According to Subhash Kak, Zelenskyy is the mouthpiece for the current AI State, also called the Deep State in the US, and he has hit the Brick Wall of Trump’s common sense.

This article first appeared in my Sunday Guardian column Chicago Diary

Brawl in the Oval

Before the Trump-Vance-Zelenskyy blowout, the Clinton-Lewinsky blowjob scandal was probably the most embarrassing Oval Office story of its cherished past. For the Clinton-Lewinsky story, we had to rely on secretly recorded tapes of Linda Tripp, a long-time American civil servant. The Zelenskyy fiasco, however, unfolded live on TV screens and tens of millions of streaming devices worldwide.

The beleaguered Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was in Washington, DC, on Friday, February 28, to sign a deal with US President Donald Trump to give the US access to rare earth minerals in Ukraine. Mr. Trump and his advisors claimed that American economic involvement was a good enough security guarantee for Ukraine. US investment and American citizens' participation in Ukraine work as a deterrent against any Russian misadventure in the country.

The first 40 minutes of the meeting were cordial. Mr. Trump repeatedly praised the Ukrainian people for bravely fighting Russian aggression. However, the meeting went south around the 40th minute when diplomatic protocol was broken. Mr. Zelenskyy decided to turn into an interviewer and TV anchor and started asking Mr. Vance direct questions. Mr. Vance did not like what he thought was a public "litigation."

"He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office," posted President Donald Trump on his social media platform Truth Social, recounting the Oval Office exchanges earlier in the day. Mr. Trump sent Mr. Zelenskyy and his team home without signing the deal. "He can come back when he is ready for peace," Mr. Trump continued.

By Tuesday, March 4, Mr. Zelenskyy apologized for his heated exchange with Mr. Trump and his deputy, Mr. Vance. Taking to X, he called the Oval Office incident "regrettable." Mr. Zelenskyy's behavior wasn't an aberration. He often makes "cheap" and "improper" comments about other international leaders, as the former Indian ambassador Kanwal Sibal described Mr. Zelenskyy's meeting with the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.

The Waning Support For Ukraine

Support for Ukraine has eroded over time, especially among GOP voters and lawmakers in DC. At a press conference held by the members of the Congressional Ukraine Caucus to mark the third anniversary of the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war, only 1 GOP and 18 Democrat lawmakers were in attendance. Three years ago, there were over a hundred in attendance. At the start of the conflict in 2022, only 7% of Americans thought the US was doing "too much" in Ukraine. That number now stands at 41%, over 60% among Republicans.

The fact that Mr. Trump campaigned on the promise of ending the war is not lost on anyone. Even some of the most ardent GOP supporters of Ukraine, including Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, called the White House exchange between Messrs. Trump and Zelenskyy "a complete utter disaster" and wondered if the US could ever do business with Mr. Zelenskyy. Graham also suggested that it was time for Mr. Zelenskyy to quit.

"Unfortunately, until there is an election, no one has a voice in Ukraine," Graham posted on X. Mr. Zelenskyy's 5-year term expired in March 2024. However, he has refused to hold elections. US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has accused Mr. Zelenskyy of undermining democracy in Ukraine by cracking down on his political opponents and media. Christian groups have alleged religious persecution by Mr. Zelenskyy's regime. The neo-Nazi Azov battalion has been fighting alongside the Ukrainian military. Azov has also been involved in training civilians through military exercises in the run-up to Russia's invasion. Forced conscription of Ukrainians into the war wasn't Russian propaganda, either.

The Collapse of the Liberal Consensus

If COVID exemplified pro-government propaganda and censorship in the West, the Ukraine war was another instance of it. Western liberal democracies banned and de-platformed several anti-establishment voices on the pretext of pro-Russian propaganda. The biggest Russian collusion story of our times turned out to be a hoax created by the former First Lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's campaign, who was also a political rival of Mr. Trump in the 2016 presidential elections.

Mr. Trump's first 100 days in office have been a whirlwind that has upended the liberal consensus both domestically and internationally. A diplomatic and Executive Order blitzkrieg combined with the reinstallation of the Diet Coke button in the Oval Office has signaled the arrival of a new sheriff in town.

While Mr. Trump's predecessor thought that holding NATO together was consequential in containing Russian aggression, Mr. Trump and his advisors believe the EU should be able to carry on its own against Russia. If US Vice President JD Vance's speech at the Munich Security Council was any indication, America's friends and allies suddenly found that the ocean between the two Atlantic coasts grew further apart. Several of Mr. Trump's intellectual allies, such as Mr. Trump's nominee to serve as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, have argued for a retreat from European and Middle East engagements. Instead, they want to redirect their focus to the Asia-Pacific region.

Europe and the AI State

Subhash Kak is a computer scientist, philosopher, and author of The Age of Artificial Intelligence. In his book, he delves deep into the philosophical, cultural, and geopolitical implications of Artificial Intelligence (AI). In an exclusive communication with this author, Kak frames the present conflict in Ukraine and the recalibration of US policy in the context of AI and the emerging new world order.

Kak considers the EU an AI State. In his conception, an AI State is "a bureaucratic state on a steroid" where algorithms decide policies until a crisis emerges and a reset is needed. He contends that in EU countries, the "Algorithm" of the AI State has pushed bizarre and self-destructive policies such as deindustrialization, mindless climatism and resistance to fossil fuels, unrestricted migration, and the need to fight a war with a neighboring nation for the sake of extending a "security treaty [NATO]."

Ironically, while the Europeans are concerned about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, they have willingly invited the invasion upon themselves through unchecked mass migration that affects the peace and stability in their country and Europe as a whole.

With the embrace of transgenderism, racism, Islamism, and other woke agenda, both the US and EU have breached the response threshold of their citizens. The election of Donald Trump and the rise of the so-called "far-right" political parties indicate the resistance. "The reset in the AI State [EU or USA during the ascendancy of Obama and Biden with its 73 genders]," explains Kak, "will be done by people who, like the child who said the emperor had no clothes, use common sense and say, "hey, This doesn't make sense."

According to Kak, Zelenskyy is the mouthpiece for the current AI State—also called the Deep State in the US—and he has hit the Brick Wall of Trump's common sense. "Actually, Trump had a very nuanced proposal for Zelenskyy—by collaborating on minerals, the power of the US State would have already reached the frontier of Russia. But AI /Deep State typically lacks true intelligence, hence the disaster," said Kak.

Kak calls Trump "a disruptor," pushing common sense and challenging notions considered "settled" for decades. Based on the first 100 days of his second term, Kak declares Trump "the most consequential president of the US since the Second World War [WWII]." Kak also hopes that Trump's sweeping internal reforms and bold attempt to remake the world order will inspire Mr Modi, the Indian Prime Minister, to make similar bold reforms in India. With the destabilizing Biden regime gone, Mr. Modi "wouldn't be hobbled by opposition NGOs funded by USAID."

A Break from Europe

Europe-centered US policy has been the legacy of WWII and the Cold War. However, Europe has changed significantly over the past several decades. Many in the Trump camp, for example, Trump's under-secretary of defense for policy nominee, Elbridge Colby, believe that the US should retreat from commitments in Europe and the Middle East. The US needs more resources in the Indo-Pacific to counter China. Mr. Trump does not want America to be dragged into an extended commitment to Ukraine.

Many in the US also realize that one of the reasons Europeans can enjoy their lavish lifestyles, such as a 4-day work week and 3-month paid vacation, and dish out virtue signals on liberty, freedom of speech, and their woke agenda is that American taxpayers underwrite much of Europe's security guarantee.

Standing with Ukraine for "as long as it takes" is not a strategy. It is certainly not a winning strategy around a negotiating table or battlefield. It only spells doom for those involved. Mr. Trump's approach is a necessary break from the years of passivity of the Biden- Harris Administration, whose plan to support Ukraine "for as long as it takes" hardly amounted to a real strategy and resulted in thousands of deaths in a bloody stalemate.

Ending the conflict in Ukraine and resolving the bloody stalemate is the most pragmatic approach, not a blow to American power. It would save billions of dollars for hard-working Americans, prevent thousands of Ukrainian casualties on the battlefield, and help us better support our allies in Taiwan and Israel. Most importantly, it would allow Mr. Trump to focus on the domestic issues that matter most to Americans.