Trumpism is the lowest stage of imperialism. “We’re not going to invade Greenland. We’re going to buy it,” Donald Trump reportedly told the annual black-tie dinner on 1 February of the private Alfalfa Club, an assemblage of prominent Washington figures, a number of whom he had publicly humiliated, and others he was investigating or suing. “It’s never been my intention to make Greenland the 51st state. I want to make Canada the 51st state. Greenland will be the 52nd state. Venezuela can be 53rd.” The room greeted several of his remarks with dead silence. His cosplay as the Pirate King was not received as a good-humored takeoff from a Gilbert and Sullivan opera. He went on. “So many people in the room I hate,” he said in a display of honesty. “Most of you I like,” he claimed. Then, at his peak euphoria, he flew off to Mar-a-Lago to plan his attack on Iran, which took place 27 days later.

Trump’s imperialism of piracy and plunder is less of a system even than that of the earliest imperialism of 17th century privateers raiding the Spanish Main, the divine right of kings, and monarchs dividing up the spoils as favors to create their lords and earls. His schemes of aggrandizement operating by threat and force are justified by no larger rationale, nothing as exalted as “the white man’s burden”, marauding wherever and however he can to seize resources.

Describing his actions as some version of colonialism grants him a more orderly and coherent method than he possesses. His pillaging bears not the slightest resemblance to the highly organized administration of Queen Victoria’s British empire. Trump’s predation is calculated to wreck the long-established arrangements of international trade, law and cooperation created after the second world war and the fall of colonial empires, whose guidelines he sees as obstructing his own profit and power. Obsessed with his fortune hunting, he couldn’t care less about the political consequences for ill-fated Republican candidates in the midterm elections who must face the music for the harm he is doing to their states. They are the least of his collateral damage.

Mark Carney, the Canadian prime minister, offered the most succinct critique of Trump’s intent to usurp the sovereignty of countries in order to make them turn over their wealth to him. Carney said: “Canada is a sovereign, independent nation. We are not a target to be bullied, nor are we a client state to be subordinated … We will not sign an agreement that sacrifices our basic sovereignty, undermines our legal system, or cedes control over our foreign trade to Washington.” He called Trump’s demands a “last-minute power play intended to reduce Canada to an........

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