Donald Trump is a man who likes to leave his mark on things. Even when it risks being more of a stain than a mark of, well, anything of real substance. After lamenting the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and more or less promising the American people a cut-and-run in both he looks predictably set to stay the course. Indeed, the unquiet American is doing the do that George W Bush never did. The latter became seemingly bored by the sheer lack of glamour in Afghanistan and found himself rather unbothered about finishing what he had started there. Far more exciting to just go ahead and invade Iraq, just because he could. Yet far more strategic, as well, to leave both in a state of utter chaos. The same goes for Trump. He isn’t about to pack up and get out of Afghanistan. Not while there is the small matter of unfinished business there. Meaning that the inconsequential troop surge that has been announced will not accomplish anything meaningful aside from a token presence — just sufficient to blame Pakistan for the American failure to exit the Afghan quagmire of its own making. Which is, at it transpires, something rather consequential in terms of rewriting occupation narratives on the go. Over in Iraq, that other post-9/11 military invasion that also had nothing to do with those attacks, the apprentice-president, similarly, doesn’t seem too bothered about exit strategies. The pretext there is that the US is committed to flushing out ISIS. Yet media watchdogs, such as the Committee to Protect Journalists, have warned that territorial losses by the latter aren’t cause for celebration. Given the rise of the Popular Mobilisation Units (Al-Hashd Al-Sha’abi), an umbrella group of some 40 different milita outfits boasting a total capacity of 100,000 men. Though said to be overwhelmingly Shia in composition it is believed to cross some ethnic divides. The CPJ and Human Rights Watch have pointed to the PMU’s poor human rights record, extending to enforced disappearances and torture. Yet this hasn’t stopped it from being on the Iraqi state’s payroll, after Parliament last year moved to have it incorporated into the regular armed forces. Nor has it prevented American collaboration. Indeed, when the US-led coalition finally admitted to being behind the Mosul civilian massacre that left 200 dead earlier this year — it also came clean about using PMU-provided coordinates. Iraqi militia outfit the PMU is fighting ISIS. Yet it has a poor human rights record, extending to enforced disappearances and torture. This hasn’t stopped it from being on the Iraqi state’s payroll. Nor has it prevented US collaboration The world ought to have learned one lesson from the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Namely that when a US president appears to act without rhyme or reason that is when he is at his most ruthless. Because just as there is always rhyme so, too, is there always reason. It’s just true agendas are usually well concealed. Consider, PM al-Abadi is a man who has supposedly endeavoured to guarantee increased Sunni participation in the governing of Iraq. Yet he, by all accounts, doesn’t want to see the Shia militia dissolved. By contrast, we have Muqtada al-Sadr, the so-called firebrand Shia cleric, who has repeatedly called for this un-merry band of men to be disbanded. And then there is the US that has gone from relying on PMU logistics to earlier this month bombing the militia outfit. It may or may not have been significant that the latter was said to be fighting at the time in the district of Akashat close to the border with Syria. The US, for its part, has reportedly indicated that any ‘trespassing’ into Syrian territory by PMU forces is unacceptable. That al-Abadi has announced an increased budget for the group doesn’t bode well. For it recalls to mind the situation in Afghanistan when the Interior Ministry and the US military literally spent millions in futile efforts to buy off local warlords during the Karzai regime. It seems that Donald Trump might just be smarter than the average bear. In other words, just like Bush junior before him, he is strategically sowing the seeds of further chaos in the region to justify American military presence there. And he is doing so as both a signal to Russia and China that the battle for resources is not only on — so, too, is the war for regional hegemony, a hegemony that is never exclusively restricted to just one area. Afghanistan and Iraq are simply the first fall guys of the era of a new American empire. The writer is the Deputy Managing Editor, Daily Times. She can be reached at mirandahusain@me.com and tweets @humeiwei Published in Daily Times, August 30th 2017.