Duplicitous Synchronicity

When two events occur at the same time and appear to be related but aren’t, we call it a coincidence. Swiss psychologist C.G. Jung called it synchronicity. But the world is full of silly and superstitious people who will perceive a connection between completely unrelated events just because they happened at the same time.

This caused special distress for poor President Donald J. Trump because his two very active sons, Don Jr., 47, and Eric, 41, kept committing synchronicity all the time, and the silly world kept believing their remarkable successes had something to do with their remarkable father, who happened to be president of the United States. This was very unfair, because there were so many things presidents weren’t allowed to do and, if you fell into Jung’s synchronicity trap, President Trump seemed to be doing all of them. 

True, Trump was immune from criminal prosecution for performing core duties as president, which so frequently require a president to commit criminal acts. But the Supreme Court had not yet said he could sell American policy for a couple of Trump golf courses in the Middle East. The Supreme Court had not yet said he could endorse a pipeline streaming Russian gas through Bulgaria for a few Trump towers in Eastern Europe. It hadn’t yet said he could provide tariff relief to a Southeast Asian country in exchange for a sumptuous Trump golf resort. But why worry? President Trump wasn’t doing any of those things. His pesky sons were. It was only the stupid world that thought it had anything to do with him. 

Unfortunately, as soon as Trump got reelected president, his rambunctious boys exploded with commercial ambition.¹

In comparison to the father’s great transactions, who would have remembered the son’s wimpy deals anyway?

Just consider Eric’s frenetic sweep through the Middle East in late April to seal humungous real estate deals. He targeted the very countries his father was to visit just two weeks later. Why did he have to do that? It might have been awkward, but Eric was at the top of his game. Within days, he had whipped through the area like a spindly hurricane — closing on Trump Tower Jeddah in Saudi Arabia; Trump International Hotel & Tower in Dubai; and Trump International Golf Club & Trump Villas in Qatar² — and was gone. By the time his father showed up with his own package of deals, no one remembered Eric had been there. 

In comparison to the father’s great transactions, who would have remembered the son’s wimpy deals anyway? Eric’s Trump Tower Jeddah in Saudi Arabia was peewee next to the $600 billion-dollar package President Trump cinched, a figure a dealmaker in chief could respect. 

President Trump’s triumphs in Qatar and UAE were similarly spectacular, again consigning Eric’s meager efforts to oblivion. So proud, in fact, was the president of his rash of great deals that he had them listed in three fact sheets, one for each country.³ Only an idle observer might notice that those deals conflicted with standing U.S. policy addressing green energy, environmental protection, and development of fossil fuel infrastructure. But that’s neither here nor there.

With the gleam, charm, and penetration of a billiard ball, Don Jr. presented himself at the office of Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić. 

Don Jr.’s mission was tricker, and he sort of didn’t get it. His agenda had him visiting four countries in Central and East Europe on a whirlwind tour of his own at the very same time that his brother cleaned up in the Middle East.

Although there were no big deals to close and nothing for Don Jr. to sign, he was to show up at the offices of the highest officials of state who would receive him, shake hands with them, look at whatever stuff they wanted to show him, then leave as if something had happened. Because the participants were so important and their time so costly, these encounters were to take no more than two minutes.

Don Jr. aced a tryout in March when, with the gleam, charm, and penetration of a billiard ball, he presented himself at the office of Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić as a crew member filmed.⁴ Just as planned, the president and Don Jr. shook hands and exchanged stilted cordialities. Don Jr. walked around and looked at stuff Vučić pointed out to him. Within two minutes, Don Jr. left as if something had happened, which the film clip clearly shows had not.

Filming that mysterious meeting had been a no-option part of the arrangement, but it backfired slightly. Its purpose was to show that nothing untoward, nothing with any hint of corruption, no trade secrets, promises, deals, or requests of any kind passed between Vučić and Don Jr. during those two minutes. While extinguishing that doubt, the clip kindled another: why hold a meeting where nothing happens? The answer is evident to those who understand the recondite use of the carrier pigeon: sending it with no message. The bird’s mere arrival at the designated place suffices. Sender and receiver know what the bird’s appearance signifies; the carrier pigeon — Don Jr. in this case — usually doesn’t.

After passing his rigorous test in March, Don Jr. was launched on visits to Hungary, Bulgaria, and Romania under the pretext of speaking about “Trump Business Vision 2025.” Serbia was included because it had gone so smoothly the first time. At the end of his tour, Don Jr. felt exceedingly well about his delivery, his charisma, his competence, and the little pile of cash he made. As for the host countries, the appearance of the bird elated them: It meant they could count on big-gun support as they crafted tactics to oppose the tighter sanctions the EU was preparing for that single remaining pipeline, BalkanStream, flowing Russian gas into the EU through Bulgaria. There was nothing here to tax the lazy imagination of an inquisitive observer. No synchronicity whatsoever was involved. Don Jr.’s tour was neatly planned.

By 2023, Vietnam’s trade surplus had swelled to $104 billion, and Trump was on the campaign trail again blustering about tariffs.

Aware of Trump’s obsession with wealth, one country engineered some synchronicity of its own, snaring the Trump family in order to snag the allegiance of the Trump administration. It worked beautifully. 

In 2019, when its trade surplus with the U.S. was only $55 billion, Trump railed against Vietnam as the “worst abuser” of trade practices and initiated sanctions against the communist state for alleged currency manipulation. A timely switch in administrations halted the process. But Vietnam was alerted. By 2023, that trade surplus had swelled to $104 billion, Trump was on the campaign trail again blustering about tariffs, and Vietnam would be in a precarious situation should he be reelected. 

What to do? 

Aware that Trump couldn’t resist milking cash cows grazing in foreign pastures, Vietnam got busy. By September 16, 2024, Comrade Tran Quoc Van⁵ was able to welcome senior leaders of the Trump Organization at Hung Yen party headquarters.⁶ Talk was lively if redundant: Tran Quoc Van described all the advantages Hung Yen province would offer The Trump Organization if it chose to develop there. For it to develop there, The Trump Organization listed the conditions Tran Quoc Van had just enumerated. Trump leaders added that treating them well would go a long way toward advancing diplomatic relations between Vietnam and the United States, sort of exactly what the chairman of Hung Yen province was tasked to seek. 

Because the exchange satisfied everybody, the Trump delegation was transferred to another room within party headquarters where Party Secretary Nguyen Huu Nghia⁷ assured them that Hung Yen province would “assign relevant departments and branches to closely coordinate with central agencies” to expedite a Trump Organization project . . . “with the highest efficiency.”⁸

By this time, everyone was super happy. 

By the end of that week, General Secretary and President of Vietnam To Lam⁹ was in New York City to address the United Nations Assembly. Traveling with him was Nguyen Huu Nghia to attend the September 25 signing of the Memorandum of Understanding between Hung Yen’s provincial government and The Trump Organization. The project had blossomed quickly since September 16. The $1.5 billion development project now comprised a 54-hole golf course, hotel, villa complex, and modern urban area in Hung Yen province, requiring the appropriation of 3.8 square miles of farmland that had been continuously cultivated for centuries, currently supported a farming community of 14,000, but was now slated for more lucrative use. One photo during the flurry of deal-sealing events shows a beaming Donald Trump — Republican presidential candidate — sitting between his son Eric and Vietnamese realtor Dang Thanh Tam. He was not holding their hands, but he looked as if he would like to.¹⁰ Within months of President Trump’s inauguration, the Vietnam government¹¹ had approved The Trump Organization’s plans for the glorious project. On May 21, Eric Trump attended a gala ground-breaking ceremony. The fact that Vietnam was concurrently in trade negotiations with the United States had nothing to do with it.

Way back in January 2024, U.S. Representative Jamie Raskin had described Trump’s penchant for “lining his pockets with cash from foreign governments seeking policy favors over the interests of the American people.”¹² Yes, indeedy. And Vietnam was pleased to be among those governments. It knew that a consumptive businessman like Trump would never hobble a country hosting one of his sumptuous golf resorts with 46% tariffs. While the man might be unpredictable on many matters — like dropping 30,000-pound bombs on Iran — and unsure of whether he, as U.S. president, was bound to uphold the American Constitution, Vietnam felt very sure of the man regarding the care he took to protect his properties. And, thanks to Vietnam’s savvy slickness, the man now had property in Vietnam.

Nonetheless, Vietnam was loathe to call it synchronicity. It had been far too much work. 

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1. Don Jr. had acquired for himself at least seven new roles as advisor or executive since his father had been reelected, one that paid $45,000 a month. And he didn’t need any laptop. Don Jr. carried all his knowledge in his head, opting to travel light. No brain, no pain. As for Eric, he was lapping up real estate deals in the Middle East due to nothing more than his brilliant salesmanship.  https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2025-trump-family-presidency-wealth/ ↩︎
2. With all due respect to Don Jr.’s candor in slamming the idea that his or Eric’s businesses capitalized on their father’s name, one must apologetically point out that the Trump name was all Eric was selling in the Middle East — not Don Jr.’s name, not Eric’s name, but their president father’s name. Yes, a key part of those billion-dollar Middle East development contracts was the multimillion-dollar cut The Trump Organization would get for leasing the Trump name, with advanced payment due the moment the deal was closed. ↩︎
3. Fact sheet for Saudi Arabia: https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/05/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-secures-historic-600-billion-investment-commitment-in-saudi-arabia/ 
   Fact sheet for Qatar: https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/05/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-secures-historic-1-2-trillion-economic-commitment-in-qatar/ 
   Fact sheet for UAE: https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/05/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-secures-200-billion-in-new-u-s-uae-deals-and-accelerates-previously-committed-1-4-trillion-uae-investment/ ↩︎
4. https://youtu.be/ZHpUxjvm4lg?si=Pc3IsgdmjhsU9AqN ↩︎
5. Comrade Tran Quoc Van is Chairman of the People’s Committee and Chairman of the People’s Council of Hung Yen, a province in the Red River Delta of Northern Vietnam. One might note that the advantage of the exceedingly long titles of communist officials makes reading official news accounts next to impossible. Hence not much news gets picked up by the communist public, which is all for the best. ↩︎
6. No. 10, Chua Chuong street, Hung Yen City. ↩︎
7. Mr. Nguyen Huu Nghia is secretary of the Hung Yen Provincial Party Committee. ↩︎
8. https://www.vietnam.vn/en/tap-doan-the-trump-organization-trao-doi-hop-tac-dau-tu-tai-hung-yen ↩︎
9. At the time, To Lam was the 13th president of Vietnam and the general secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam. He continues to serve as general secretary, the most powerful figure in Vietnam’s political system. He visited New York City from September 22–25, 2024. ↩︎
10. https://theinvestor.vn/vietnam-ip-builder-kbc-the-trump-organization-to-build-15-bln-golf-hotel-complex-d12688.html ↩︎
11. Approval was announced by Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha. ↩︎
12. https://oversightdemocrats.house.gov/news/press-releases/oversight-democrats-release-report-proving-trump-pocketed-millions-from-at-least ↩︎