The Monroe Doctrine is back to hype the tech bros (and many others)
date
Feb 15, 2025
slug
2025-the-monroe-doctrine-is-back-to-hype-the-tech-bros-and-many-others
status
Published
tags
technology
disruption
US
Trump
type
Post
summary
Technology is one of the arms of Trumpian foreign policy to reestablish a new order to the world - and the former innovators are eager to help.
It was shocking, even by Donald Trump's standards. The speech by US Vice President, J. D. Vance, at the Munich security conference last Thursday was perhaps the most jaw-dropping official statement in global foreign policy in over a decade. Vance, a tech billionaire aligned with Trump's Voldemortean return, lashed out at Europe with accusations that would fit perfectly with the continent's far-right parties. The United States made it clear they are reviving the Monroe Doctrine to pursue their interests everywhere, treating other nations not as friends but as vassals. The tech bros' spineless adherence to Trump's cause becomes more understandable: amid the destruction the "Great Leader" intends to cause, data giants see endless opportunities for profit.
The Monroe Doctrine was a significant U.S. foreign policy framework articulated by President James Monroe 202 years ago. This doctrine addressed America's security and commercial interests in the Western Hemisphere, particularly regarding newly independent Latin American nations and European powers. In essence, Monroe granted the U.S. the right to wage war against anyone threatening American interests across the continent—and beyond. The Trump-aligned vice president's speech made it clear that the hostilities have not even begun and much more should follow.
We must, for a moment—if it's possible—leave aside the mayhem that American voters unleashed in domestic and foreign policy to focus on what the US is unrivaled in: military and tech. Trump knows that Europe was caught with its guard down and will need to adopt a bellicose mindset immediately to avoid being left defenseless. The European options are limited. With Russia commanding attention in the East, Trump prepares to step in everywhere to launch a policy of annexation—at least in Greenland, Panama, and Gaza. But equally important is what he hasn't mentioned so far: how the US wants to free tech giants from unwanted regulation elsewhere.
Global IT spending is projected to reach $5.61 trillion in 2025, a 10% increase from $5.11 trillion in 2024 (a pace that should not slow before 2030 at least). This industry, on which all sectors of the economy are critically dependent, is massively dominated by the US. The neo-tech-Trumpists who were in the first row to applaud Trump at his inauguration had a massive year in 2024 alone, in terms of growth under the Democrat management of Joe Biden—Amazon (Jeff Bezos): 11%, Microsoft (Satya Nadella): 16%, Meta (Mark Zuckerberg): 21%, and OpenAI (Sam Altman): 248%—and they foresee unimaginable heights for the next four years.
Post-war Europe has foundations set on stalling economic growth in exchange for security, freedom of speech, and welfare. Critics in the continent lash out at the sluggish economy that fails to produce Googles, but they leave aside the stability the continent has maintained without a multi-state war since the fall of the Third Reich. Regulation is the mechanism of choice to keep corporations in their place, even if their profits are staggering. The growth that the US tech counterparts achieve is not feasible in the long term, and it brings massive popular immiseration.
Trump managed to, well, trump all his voters by promising a miracle that billionaires are unlikely to give. American GDP grew 879% between 1980 and 2024; the country's financial services industry multiplied 10-fold in the same period, while the minimum wage is now 37% shorter in values adjusted for inflation than when Jimmy Carter left the White House. This would be shameful by itself, but tech went berserk when it came to making money, giving the finger even to the devious financial services industry.
Since 2000, the "Magnificent Seven" (Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Tesla) combined values went up more than 6,000% to reach US$15.4 trillion in July last year (with Tesla and Nvidia not even existing by then). And that's even before Trump. Half of the revenue of the 500 biggest American corporations comes from them. In the last 12 years alone, their combined share had increased to 27% of the U.S. market capitalization, from 6%. These numbers cannot accept regulation—and therefore, cannot deal with Europe's current status quo (which is by no means anti-capitalistic by any decent standards).
As it stands, corporations of this size routinely evade taxes through multiple schemes: flexible allocation of profits and losses, carried interest provisions, blocker corporations in tax havens, offshore loopholes, and profit shifting to low-tax jurisdictions. We're talking about trillions in potential tax revenue never reaching public budgets (which, though poorly managed, operate mostly within legal bounds). Those responsible for this financial assault have taken over a colorblind America by claiming that migration and tariffs are the real problems—not the nearly half-trillion dollars in unpaid taxes globally each year.
The libertarian rhetoric used by the new administration in Vance's speech is the first firewall of a much more aggressive rationale that is set to come to justify the voice given to hate-speakers preaching hatred against immigrants and Muslims, vaccine denialists, and other extremists. Whatever deal Trump has imposed on the tech bros must have promised significant support for them abroad in exchange for domestic loyalty. Led by Elon Musk's Twitter, the foreign policy coming from the data management giants is a policy of unrivaled hostility. The European Union and the UK are well protected in their basic civil rights, but expect a storm of attacks coming, both legal and illegal. The election in Germany, where the far-right AfD is set to make most of the gains, is supported by Elon Musk. Vance lashed out against UK court decisions he is too ignorant to understand. Meta's content management policies have been atomized, and new algorithms are more likely to push further Trump's extreme views about everything, from immigration to drugs. Make no mistake: it's war that is being declared here. And very soon, war will also literally be happening in multiple places.
To make things worse, the political oligarchy in Europe seems numb, too comfortable after decades of peace. The only dissenting voice comes from an unlikely people's hero. Emmanuel Macron, the elitist jupitérien leader of France, has advocated for greater continental commitment to military and technological investment—virtually alone. Domestically, he is treated by the far-leftist Mélenchon as a new Hitler, which only proves how little Mélenchon knows of history (even if Macron is a blatant, unapologetic elitist). A troubling scenario looms: EU countries may need to deploy soldiers in Eastern Europe while simultaneously defending critical infrastructure from cyberattacks with insufficient resources. Though Macron represents the elite—a bank-friendly, liberal, and often arrogant figure—his foresight surpasses that of other political leaders. A digital war has been raging for some time, evidenced by the rise of an aggressive far-right movement enabled by US tech platforms. Now, conventional warfare appears inevitable. Fate is ironic: the heroes of the Arab Spring are set to become the Horsemen of the Apocalypse.