In the late 1800’s, with the Civil War behind them, the Americans were on the way to becoming a truly great power. By this time the “Wild West” had been won and fully occupied with the native indigenous population reduced to an inconsequential minority. Historians estimate that the indigenous population in what is the present day United States, prior to the arrival of Columbus was approximately 100 million. Disease from exposure to European settlers and conflict reduced this population to around 18 Million by the early 1800’s and to 250,000 by the 1890’s. This was ethnic cleansing on a truly unimaginable scale.

History once again seems to be repeating itself as Trump calls for this generation of European settlers to make America great again. The “Land of the Free and Home of the Brave” just got tagged as a nation that as Jennifer Rubin, a columnist for the Washington Post, wrote “puts its babies in cages, toddlers taken from their mothers, children separated with no plan for reuniting them with their parents.” Over two thousand three hundred children, some as young as three months, have already been incarcerated, before the President temporarily halted the action through an Executive Order because of protests.

These iron cages are eerily reminiscent of the concentration camps that Nazi Germany established less than a hundred years ago. Incidentally, it was the British who first established concentration camps to intern the Dutch speaking Afrikaans during the Second Boer War, but that is another story. Moreover, the narrative being promoted by President Trump of illegal migrants and minorities being “infestations and rapists”, too, is no different from the hate-filled garbage that the Nazis so zealously propounded in their time. All that seems to be missing is the identification tag, the ‘yellow Star of David’ equivalent, to identify and segregate migrants from the rest of the population and reinforce their inferior status. But, in the digital age such tagging is more efficiently done by other means. Even an ersatz copy of the infamous Gestapo is to be found with the US Immigration and Enforcement Agency (ICE) behaving no differently picking up innocent law abiding citizens in the middle of the night.

This is an unimaginably monstrous and brutal act on the part of a people who have long prided themselves as champions of human rights and democracy around the world. Besides, all of this just doesn’t end there as the President now plans to hand over all illegal aliens to the US Army for confinement while simultaneously ensuring that they can no longer avail of “due process”, the very bedrock of all democracies, to ensure speedy deportation. No doubt following their scandalous treatment of detainees from Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, not forgetting Camp Cropper in Baghdad and the other “dark prisons” run by the Special Forces around the world, the US military is surely well qualified and no less competent for the task than the German Gestapo was in their time.

Fortunately, there has been growing blowback and a vocal community of politicians, activists, media personnel, and increasingly, decent ordinary people, like those of Red Hen restaurant that controversially refused to serve the President’s spokesperson, have gone on to actively oppose these draconian measures. However, despite that what do President Trump’s actions tell us about a society that though fully aware of his crass and ugly bullying ways, his blatant unashamed lying and his contempt for moral values best reflected in his dalliance with porn stars still went on to elect him? Especially, since this kind of behaviour was not unexpected, given his family’s history of alleged misogyny, racial bias and corruption. It is a matter of public record that his father was arrested in 1927 for allegedly being a member of the Ku Klux Klan, though finally not charged. He then faced investigations for war profiteering in 1954 and subsequently a US Department of Justice civil rights suit for discrimination in 1973. Incidentally at that time while his father was Chairman of the Trump Organization, Donald Trump was President of the Trump Organization.

While those embarrassed by his antics attempt to highlight the fact that Mr. Trump was elected by a flawed electoral system that rewarded him despite Hillary Clinton getting more votes, the stark fact remains that he is there because vast swathes of American society wanted him. This is best exemplified by the Supreme Court that is now stuffed with judges appointed by Trump and therefore have had no hesitation in giving legal constitutionality to his ludicrous bill that has banned immigration from six Muslim Majority nations selected, as some have suggested, on the basis that the President’s business interests are not harmed by his actions.

So, how is all of this important to us? Obviously for a nascent democracy such as ours, we all need to be extra attentive to thwart any attempts to impinge on our rights or on the institutional checks and balances in place. While an America can well survive a Trump, may be even a second term, we will certainly not be able to do so. In our context we already see that politicians of every ideology are bent on perpetuating the status quo. In that manner they can never be held accountable for their misdeeds whilst continuing to remain, along with his kith and kin, guests of the tax payer till eternity. The recent legislation by the Rajasthan Assembly that provides government accommodation and staff to former chief ministers is an example of their mindset. Therefore, crafty attempts to subvert and politicize such institutions as the judiciary, Election Commission and even the Armed Forces must not be allowed to succeed.

Secondly, we must call out western democracies for their double standards and hypocrisy. They have no hesitation in slamming sanctions on Russian oligarchs for ostensibly lending their support to Mr. Putin, who they allege indulges in systematic abuse of human rights. There is no reason, therefore, for them not to hold Mr. Trump’s rich friends and business associates accountable for his recent actions, which are as much an abuse of human rights, by any standard. For that matter should not our government be looking to take a principled stand on the issue, given that Indians too are at the receiving end of Mr. Trump’s actions? May be subjecting Trump Towers, being constructed in some of our cities, to enhanced scrutiny would be just the medicine to curb President Trump’s enthusiasm for mendacity.

Finally, joint training with the US Military, especially training in the US or its territories, requires the concerned Service to provide the US with a list of personnel attending so that they can be vetted for human rights violations. Surely, it is time we incorporated similar provisions when inviting US military personnel for participation in training within our borders as well.

(The writer is a military veteran and Consultant)