Trump's Speech to the United Nations General Assembly: Does It Help to Insult and Threaten People?

Trump at UN General Assembly, White House image

President Donald Trump spoke to the United Nations General Assembly today. News reports focused on his threat to destroy North Korea. Writing about this speech, never-Trumper Jennifer Rubin talked about Trump's "incoherence" and his "unintelligible" policy. Conservative writer Ed Rogers thought that Trump's presentation was reassuring. Rogers was, however, careful not to quote Trump's threat to destroy North Korea, which might have contradicted his thesis. Mr. Trump's speech falsely claimed that United States job growth had reached remarkable highs. Well, of course, careful research has never been Mr. Trump's strong point. He praised his own "America First" policy, and recommended nationalist policies to all of the other nations. To my surprise, this got some applause.

In this post, however, I just want to focus on Mr. Trump's language, which flipped between elegance and, well, nastiness. Most of the speech was carefully crafted in good, standard English, and made useful points. For example, he praised the United Nations in reasonably stirring language: "This institution was founded in the aftermath of two world wars to help shape this better future. It was based on the vision that diverse nations could cooperate to protect their sovereignty, preserve their security, and promote their prosperity." So far, so good.

Some of Mr. Trump's language, however, seemed very un-presidential. Consider his threat to destroy North Korea:

The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.  Rocket Man is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime.  The United States is ready, willing and able, but hopefully this will not be necessary.  That’s what the United Nations is all about; that’s what the United Nations is for.  Let’s see how they do.

North Korea, CIA image

A threat to destroy another country cannot be taken lightly. Nevertheless, the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction, rightly abbreviated as MAD, has been the cornerstone of America's nuclear policy since the 1950s. Calling a world leader who is armed with H-bombs and guided missiles "Rocket Man" seems not only excessive, but very colloquial. Usually, a United Nations speech aims at some sort of dignity. Calling a world leader names is unorthodox. Notice that the press exaggerated Mr. Trump's threat: he did not promise to destroy North Korea if they failed to discontinue their weapons program, but only if it became necessary to defend the United States or its allies, and he called for peaceful UN action. When a speaker makes threats, an audience may perceive the worst.

As he has before, Mr. Trump once again referred to terrorist as "losers:"

The United States and our allies are working together throughout the Middle East to crush the loser terrorists and stop the reemergence of safe havens they use to launch attacks on all of our people. 

Was Mr. Trump's unorthodox use of colloquial, insulting language a benefit or a harm to his speech? To some extent, time will tell. There is a long-standing history of speakers who deliberately violate cultural and historical traditions to draw attention to their cause. Maybe many of Trump's supporters, who want to "drain the swamp," would welcome Trump's frank language. That's one point. Another point is that it does not always help to make your enemies angry. Angering people who have hydrogen bombs can be especially unwise.

Finally, the bellicose language only occurred in a few parts of the speech. Nevertheless, that's almost all that people talked about. Much of the speech reaffirmed the United Nation' traditional values, but this was overlooked because so many pundits only wanted to talk about the threats and the insults. Consider, for example, this quite thoughtful passage:

For the diverse nations of the world, this is our hope.  We want harmony and friendship, not conflict and strife.  We are guided by outcomes, not ideology.  We have a policy of principled realism, rooted in shared goals, interests, and values.

That is not a bad thought, is it? But no one paid attention to it, because other parts of the speech were more dramatic.

In some ways, the speech reminded me of Yasser Arafat's UN speech, which my student Mary Anne George wrote about for her master's degree research in the 1980's. Arafat also combined the promise of peace with threats of war: "Today I have come bearing an olive branch and a freedom-fighter's gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand. I repeat: do not let the olive branch fall from my hand." Of course, that has not worked out very well for the Middle East, where olive branches continue to be in short supply many years later.

So, Trump's bellicose language: did it detract from the speech's real message, or was it the speech's real message? Did Trump hope to promote peace by reminding the audience of the consequences of war? Was this a speech of unity or division? Or both?