When he found his generals too rash, Emperor Augustus doused their fervour with the cautionary phrase festina lente: make haste slowly.
So spoke a sage man who knew that good deeds can be undone, and bad deeds exacerbated, if rushed into impetuously. A great believer in visual aids, the emperor left behind any number of images to that effect on coins and earthenware plaques, with his favourite thought represented by dolphin and anchor, or else a rabbit jumping out of a snail’s shell.
Shifting the scene from warfare to statecraft, and fast-forwarding some 18 centuries, Edmund Burke singled out prudence as a principal political virtue. He often repeated the adage of an earlier political thinker, Viscount Falkland, who encapsulated the conservative view of change neatly: if it’s not necessary to change, it’s necessary not to change.
And, as the combined wisdom of Falkland and Burke could have added, even if it is necessary to change, don’t rush it. It’s not just waste that haste makes, but often also failure.
When Donald Trump moves back into the White House on 20 January, he should have Augustus’s injunction inscribed on his wall so prominently that it’ll always be in his line of vision. For if he acts on some of his campaign promises too rashly, he can do much damage – even if the ideas behind the promises are sound.
Some of them, such as the intention to slap huge tariffs on imports, including 60 per cent on all Chinese ones, aren’t especially sound even if put into practice at a leisurely tempo. This is the only issue on which all economists agree, regardless of whether their guiding light is Adam Smith or John Maynard Keynes.
Sometimes things like stiff tariffs, sanctions or even boycotts are necessary for strategic reasons, but making a purely economic argument for them, as Trump does, is hard going. One almost instant effect of such penalties on the US consumer will be a steep rise in inflation, which would clash with another promise he makes, that of lowering the cost of living.
This will happen even if other countries follow David Ricardo’s advice and don’t retaliate in kind. But that sort of economic vision has dimmed since Ricardo’s time, and most countries will slap similar levies on US exports, a cost again ultimately borne by the consumer.
And of course Trump’s friend Elon would be upset to see his Teslas priced out of the market. After all, China supplies nearly 40 per cent of the materials for batteries that go into Teslas worldwide. If they become 60 per cent dearer, well, do your own arithmetic. Car buyers certainly will.
Trump’s other ideas are commendable, but only if realised the Burke way, prudently. For example, deporting up to five million illegal aliens, most of them Spanish-speaking, ticks every box of sovereignty, justice and fairness:
Sovereignty, because it presupposes control of national borders; justice, because anything illegal must be stamped out for the law to be upheld; fairness, because illegal immigrants working for coolie wages drive down the income of the indigenous population.
But take it from a former long-time resident of a border state, Texas: throwing all those migrants out in one fell swoop will be hugely recessionary. When the economy is doing well, and the current US growth of almost three per cent is the envy of Europe, the locals don’t want to work as brick layers, dishwashers or farm hands, jobs mostly taken up by migrants.
It’s only when the economy takes a dive and any jobs are at a premium that the locals start fuming about the ‘wetbacks’, ‘greasers’ and ‘beaners’. So yes, by all means, illegal aliens must be expelled, but this ought to be done at a slow and steady pace, making sure the holes left behind are filled up as they appear.
Deporting millions of welfare recipients is hugely beneficial, but deporting millions of workers isn’t, certainly not if it’s done quickly and with little foresight. Alas, the nature of US politics is such that Trump has to be in a hurry: he’ll only have four years at his disposal. Hence he’ll either have to moderate his appetite for change or risk higher inflation first and recession second.
Speaking of Elon Musk, Trump has appointed him to head the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. The intention is to cut $2 trillion of spending, which splendid idea is long overdue. But then comes that dread ‘how’ question, known to have taken the wind out of many a billowing sail. ‘How fast’ is its companion also demanding an answer.
The talk inside the Beltway is about cutting some 100,000 public sector jobs to begin with, and billions out of the budgets of most departments. If done over a number of years, such measures aren’t just sound but essential. However, they’ll become neither if carried out as impetuously as Trump has been known to act.
Acting on his economic premises too energetically may make inflation head for double digits within a year, followed by a slow or even negative growth in the economy. One hopes that Scott Bessent, Trump’s nominee for Treasury Secretary, can put his Wall Street experience to good use and justify his reputation of having a good economic head on his shoulders. Some Trump loyalists may be suspicious of Bessent’s links with George Soros, but this is a separate issue.
Trump’s refusal to follow Augustus’s advice is also evident in his pronouncements on Russia’s aggression against the Ukraine. That was made clear months ago, when Trump first said he’d end the war within 24 hours of taking over the presidency.
The only conceivable way of doing so would be to twist Zelensky’s arm by threatening to cut off supplies to the Ukraine. And in fact Trump’s Republican stooges in Congress have been known to act in that spirit long before their man even won the election.
Yesterday Trump met Zelensky in Paris, at the re-opening of Notre-Dame. After that, Trump posted a statement I found worrying:
“Zelensky and Ukraine would like to make a deal and stop the madness,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. They have ridiculously lost 400,000 soldiers, and many more civilians. There should be an immediate ceasefire and negotiations should begin. Too many lives are being so needlessly wasted, too many families destroyed, and if it keeps going, it can turn into something much bigger, and far worse. I know Vladimir well. This is his time to act. China can help. The World is waiting!”
The presidents of both Russia and the Ukraine are called Vladimir, but it’s clear from context that the one Trump was referring to was Zelensky, not Putin, and we’ll ignore the illiterate capitalisation of ‘World’. But yes, so many confirmed Ukrainian losses are indeed tragic, and yes, it’s time to end the war as quickly as possible.
But not more quickly than possible, and that distinction seems to be lost on Trump. The Vladimir he should be putting pressure on is Putin, not Zelensky.
This isn’t a case of two countries deciding to fight it out, with both equally culpable. This is a case of a transparently fascist aggressor, our existential enemy, pouncing on a pro-Western neighbour, our existential friend. It’s true that America has the greater leverage dealing with the Ukraine, but Putin is also vulnerable to pressure – especially now that his claim to being a world leader has been blown to smithereens in Syria.
Trump’s America can indeed act as peacemaker, but she must not act as an agent of the Ukraine’s re-enslavement. And following or spurning Augustus’s adage may make the difference between the two.
The idea of the Ukraine trading territory for peace is widely mooted, but it ignores the other side, the aggressor. Putin doesn’t give two flying hectares about territory: he has already ceded to China five times the area he could possibly grab in the Ukraine.
Putin started the war to re-colonise the Ukraine and extinguish any pro-Western aspirations spreading there. His oft-stated goal is to restore the Soviet empire, and he wants to go down in history as another “gatherer of the Russian lands”, the title originally given to Ivan III (d. 1505).
The West – which also means the US – has a vested strategic interest in nipping such ambitions in the bud. That objective can indeed be served by ending the war, but doing so in such a way that Russia won’t be able to renew her offensive for a long time, ideally ever.
If Trump can achieve that objective quickly, I’ll be the first to praise him. But if he sacrifices long-term strategic considerations for scoring a quick propaganda coup he can pass for victory, then he’ll be laying the groundwork for future tragedy.
Let’s wait and see, and I for one wish Trump every possible success, that being our success too. I’m just worried that Trump’s idea of what constitutes success may be very different from mine, or from that of any elderly gentleman blessed with a conservative disposition. Which is the human type created by God to tell impetuous leaders to hold their horses.