Trump's Symbiotic Relationship with Terrorists

From most reports Donald Trump's Muslim travel ban was crafted in the White House without any input from the Pentagon or the Justice and State departments. Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham blasted Trump and his ban with both barrels in a joint statement issued two days ago.

The ban was the baby of Steve Bannon, Trump's propaganda minister and political strategist. And there's been wide speculation about why Bannon made such a mess of it. 

There are two schools of thought: incompetence and malfeasance.

My first inclination was to blame the incompetence of the Trump administration. My second inclination was that the chaos was intentional and malicious, as elucidated by Kevin Drum:

In cases like this, the smart money is usually on incompetence, not malice. But this looks more like deliberate malice to me. Bannon wanted turmoil and condemnation. He wanted this executive order to get as much publicity as possible. He wanted the ACLU involved. He thinks this will be a PR win.

My third inclination is that the intent is far more sinister. Trump loves saying "I told you so." Every time there's an attack by a Muslim terrorist anywhere in the world he says he predicted it and that it proved him right about banning Muslims.

But terrorist attacks by Muslims have been going on for decades, pretty much non-stop since the state of Israel was created and Arab states have been exporting oil. Their grievances with the West started long before ISIS and Al Qaeda existed, since before Osama bin Laden was even born.

Perhaps Trump and Bannon intentionally crafted a faulty travel ban with the ulterior motive of having it be struck down. Then, when the inevitable terrorist attack happens, they can claim credit for "predicting" it, and whine that all those lives would have been saved if only the travel ban had been in place.

What makes this so sinister is that the Trump administration has absolutely no motivation to stop terrorist attacks. Every attack that occurs will actually strengthen his case for a ban and even more stringent restrictions on Muslims.

This is why Trump is creating so much chaos. The more chaotic the country is, the greater the demand for order. Trump is intentionally making a mess to provide the pretext for giving himself broad authoritarian powers to destroy the media, silence his opposition and crush dissent.

It's a classic fascist tactic.

Now, what happens if no Muslim refugee steps up and attacks Americans for Trump? Will one of those ratfucking New York FBI Trump supporters who torpedoed Hillary Clinton's candidacy entrap some refugee Muslim schlub with a phony sting operation?

Or does Trump actually need American blood to get what he wants? Will Trump's FBI mooks let an attack they know about go forward in order to sow fear and give Trump his pretext?

Or will they actively recruit and supply an attacker with weapons, with the justification that by killing a few innocent Americans today they will save thousands tomorrow?

As conspiracy theories go, it's a lot more compelling than John Podesta being involved with a pedophile ring that kept kids in the nonexistent basement of a pizza restaurant.

Or maybe the Russians will do it for Trump: Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov provides this sort of service to Vladimir Putin whenever he needs a fall guy. For example, a Chechen comes to the United States seeking asylum and blows up a public place.

Oh, wait: that already happened with the Boston Marathon bombing. (Lest you blame Obama for the bomber coming to the US, the Tsarnaevs first gained entry to the US in 2002 and obtained green cards in 2007, during the Bush administration.)

So here's my prediction: Trump's Muslim ban will falter because it was designed to. Trump supporters will be outraged. While it's in judicial limbo, some Muslim somewhere will hurt someone. Trump will crow that he predicted it and issue angry tweets demanding Congress pass a Muslim ban and give him special powers to fight terrorism.

Trump is intentionally inciting Muslims to hate the United States. He's giving them the pretext to commit terrorist acts, so that they will give him the pretext to turn the United States into a fascist dictatorship.

Trump, like so many other tyrants, has a symbiotic relationship with the terrorists: if they succeed, he succeeds. That is, unless congressional Republicans and the American people see through the lies, and hold Trump accountable for creating an atmosphere of chaos and hatred that spawns violence.

If any Americans are killed by terrorists on Trump's watch, their blood is on Trump's hands.