MY columns these past weeks focused on the Ukraine war and its alternative outcomes. A case was made for Putin and Zelenskyy slugging it out over Ukraine. But overarching this is a bigger fight being played out in a geopolitical setting between the real protagonists, the placeholders in this proxy war — US-NATO versus Russia. Advocates for either side argue on the basis of perceived realities and the facts on the ground, which in any case are muddled and even distorted, as interpreted in a parallel rivalry between the two types of media platforms that shape public opinion and influence the war narratives while the dynamics of the conflicts are evolving: newspapers, television and radio directing public discourse on one side, and on the other, Facebook, Twitter (now X) and YouTube providing real-time images. Both platforms advocate conflicting results on the war.

With all the permutations, it appears that in these proxy fights, the biggest loser is Ukraine itself, with its economy devastated and land scorched, its populace driven into exile, and countless numbers of its youth dead in battle. And in this calculus, a clear winner is the emerging hegemon — China ("Postscript on Ukraine," The Manila Times, July 26-August 2).

Timeline on Trump indictment

But we have developments in America that could have some direct bearing on the Ukraine war and impact geopolitical dynamics. We refer to the upcoming presidential elections, where the former president, Donald Trump, is far ahead in the polls, auguring a comeback. He has averred blatantly that had he been president in February 2022, the Ukraine war would not have happened. Now that it is raging, he will end it on the day he reassumes the presidency. But a compelling drama is unfolding during this year-long American political season. Trump is facing several criminal indictments that may alter his re-run. Trump's four years in office had been tumultuous, eccentric, and divisive to America's body politic and these threaten to even deepen the chasm with the outcome of these indictments.

Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection case

Last week an indictment was directed against Trump, the third since he left office. The charge was conspiracy to deprive millions of Americans of the right to vote and to have their vote counted. To quote Politico's website: "In the two months between Election Day in 2020 and Jan. 6, 2021, Trump mounted a wide-ranging campaign to subvert Joe Biden's victory in the presidential election. Trump and his advisers spread false information about voter fraud, urged Republican state officials to undermine the results in states that Biden won, assembled false slates of electors and pressured Mike Pence, the vice president, to unilaterally toss out the legitimate results. The effort culminated on January 6, when a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol and disrupted the peaceful transfer of power."

These are very serious accusations, as many of the participants in that January 6 assault on the Capitol have now been found guilty and incarcerated.

The classified documents case

On June 9, 2023, the Donald was indicted on 37 felonies for retaining classified documents after he left office, which were found by an FBI search stashed in his residence at Mar-a-Lago. America's Espionage Act makes it a crime to retain records containing sensitive national security information and show these classified documents containing secrets on US and foreign military capabilities, military activities, or nuclear weapons to persons unauthorized to view them. Trump, no longer president, couldn't declassify these documents as he claimed. Furthermore, he obstructed the FBI investigation by directing his people at the residence to move the boxes of classified documents around the building and destroying security camera footage after the FBI requested the same.

Hush money case

His first indictment was on March 30, 2023. The Donald through his lawyer, Michael Cohen, paid off porn star Stormy Daniels to buy her silence to avoid a sex scandal at a sensitive time in Trump's presidential campaign in 2016. Cohen, acting as the fixer, paid her $130,000, which Trump later reimbursed in installments when he was already president. Accordingly, these payments were fraudulently disguised by Trump as corporate legal fees — a criminal violation. The charges contained 34 felony counts. Not only was the Donald accused of falsifying business records, but of using these amounts in an underlying crime — the payoff constituting an illegal contribution to Trump's presidential campaign.

Georgia state election interference

Aside from these three indictments, an investigation is ongoing in the state of Georgia on election interference, where Trump sought to overturn the result of the presidential elections. President Joe Biden won the state's 16 electoral votes, but Trump and his camp spread lies about voter fraud, even plotting to send fake electors to Washington. What could be a criminal offense for election meddling was a recording of Trump calling Georgia's secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, urging him to "find" 11,780 Trump votes to overturn Biden's win.

Implications

No American president has been charged with such serious criminal acts. Depending on where you sit, these developments are a measure of America's collective sense of decency, reflecting its ideals of justice and fairness. That these investigations and indictments are necessary to hold public officials accountable for their actions, upholding the cherished democratic-republican concept of the rule of law. That Trump, the most powerful American while he was president of the United States, is not above the law.

Or, is this simply a witch hunt as claimed by the supporters of Donald Trump, particularly the MAGA (Make America Great Again) which Hillary Clinton once described as "a basket of deplorables," putting forward arguments that from the very start of the Trump presidency "the deep state" was out to delegitimize and destabilize it? The Donald burst onto the American political scene, breaking the mold of the usual politicians who rose through elective offices and are creatures of the political party establishment or political dynasties. Trump was a maverick who never held any government position or any elective post and came from the world of business. He doesn't owe his rise to the political kingmakers from the proverbial "smoke-filled rooms." In his rhetoric, the "deep state" comes from both major political parties, the Republicans and the Democrats, and the shadowy entrenched bureaucrats and civil servants following their own agenda irrespective of the government of the day. Trump has always been apolitical and was once a Democrat and a heavy contributor to both political parties. He won the primary as a Republican, trouncing the revered names of party stalwarts. But he now owns the GOP. In a more pedestrian language, he holds the mainstream Republican party by the balls. His MAGA provides him with a base vote of 30 percent that could propel him back to the US presidency.

These indictments have not sunk his image. backfiring instead and providing a boost to his campaign. The actual trials and their results scheduled over the entire primary season towards the election itself could be decisive.

By 2024, America could have Trump the President or Trump with a numbered striped jacket at the back: the prisoner.