The Kansas City shuffle

It was probably around the end of 2006. I was serving as a Captain as Aide-de-Camp to Australia’s Vice Chief of the Defence Force — a Lieutenant General, a three-star officer, who also served as Chief of Joint Operations. Operational tempo was high. Iraq and Afghanistan were live, demanding and immediate. We travelled frequently. There was not much downtime. What little I had was usually spent reading, thinking, or caring for my then-toddler daughter.

But when we travelled abroad, there were small moments of cultural indulgence. A few hours on an aircraft. A meal tray. A glass of wine. An inflight movie. A chance to watch someone else tell a story while the world below disappeared beneath cloud.

One such movie was Lucky Number Slevin.

Released in 2006, it was a stylish crime thriller starring Josh Hartnett, Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, Ben Kingsley and Lucy Liu. On the surface, it was clever, violent, witty and slightly absurd. But beneath the surface, it was really a film about deception. Not simple deception. Not merely a lie. Something more elegant. Something more strategic.

Its central idea was the Kansas City Shuffle.

The Kansas City Shuffle is a deception in which the target is not just fooled. He is fooled because he thinks he understands the game. His confidence becomes the trap. He is shown one thing, encouraged to focus upon it, invited to react to it, and then defeated by what he failed to see.

As the line from the film explains it:

“They look right, and you go left.”

That idea has stayed with me.

Because in politics, diplomacy, war and information operations, what is most loudly discussed is not always what matters most. What is most visible may be camouflage. What appears chaotic may be purposeful. What looks like provocation may be cover. What sounds like madness may sometimes be method.

I believe this may be one of the better ways to understand much of what is said, reported, amplified and misunderstood in relation to the 47th President of the United States, President Donald Trump.

This is not to suggest that every utterance is genius. It is not to suggest that all his language is admirable, measured or statesmanlike. Plainly, it is not. Nor is it to pretend that every controversy is part of some master plan. Life is rarely that neat.

But it may be that much of the political and media class has repeatedly made the same mistake. They take the bait. They denounce the bait. They analyse the bait. They moralise about the bait. They then congratulate themselves for their superior understanding of the bait.
Meanwhile, the real strategic movement is somewhere else.

Greenland and the Art of Steering Attention

The first example is the renewed discussion around Greenland.

Greenland is not irrelevant. Far from it. It is strategically significant. It sits in the Arctic. It has mineral wealth. It matters for sea lanes, missile warning, air routes, the North Atlantic, Russian activity, Chinese interest and American defence planning. The United States already has a long-standing military presence there. In a serious strategic conversation, Greenland matters.

But that is not quite the point.

The point is that the proposed acquisition of Greenland by the United States was never likely to be the main event. It was not the question on which the fate of Western civilisation turned. It was not the operational issue that needed to be discussed in detail at a NATO leaders’ gathering. It was not Venezuela. It was not Iran. It was not the actual use of force. It was not the management of escalation. It was not the question of who could be trusted with sensitive information before decisive action.
And that, I suspect, is precisely why it was useful.

At a summit of allied leaders, the United States may well have had several serious matters in mind that it did not wish to discuss openly or collectively. Venezuela may have been one. Iran may have been another. Gaza may have been a third. Lebanon may have been a fourth. Cuba a fifth. Matters involving the possible use of American power are not always best explored in a large room full of leaders, ministers, staffers, interpreters, aides, officials and people with complicated domestic political incentives.
This is not because allies are unimportant. They are important. But alliance management and operational discretion are different things. There are times when allies should be consulted. There are times when they should be informed. There are times when they should be reassured. And there are times when too much discussion simply produces risk.

Put simply, collectivity between European leaders and the United States is not always likely to produce a succulent three-course meal recognised by Michelin-starred chefs. One nation brings the meat. Another brings the vegetables. Another brings the sauce. Someone else arrives with a soufflé, pistachio crumbs, sorbet and a speech about process.

What is more likely to occur is that the whole thing is placed in a blender and the result is something green, grey and undrinkable.

Worse still, on the off chance that anything genuinely meaty was discussed, the odds of it leaking would have been high. Perhaps incompetently. Perhaps maliciously. Perhaps through that familiar species of official who believes his preferred newspaper is a more legitimate venue for policy than the elected government.

So what does a leader do in that context?

He must talk about something.

Nature abhors a vacuum. Other leaders — those reacting to events rather than shaping them — need something to take back to their people. Journalists need a story to file. Commentators need a provocation to denounce. Allies need a position from which to distance themselves.

Opponents need something to misunderstand.

So let them go to town on Greenland.

Let them argue about maps. Let them laugh about buying ice. Let them invoke Denmark. Let them posture about sovereignty. Let them produce panel discussions, newspaper columns, European outrage, late-night comedy and diplomatic tut-tutting. Let the entire Western commentariat spend a week discussing whether Donald Trump is serious about acquiring Greenland.

Because while they look right, perhaps the United States goes left.
That, to my mind, is the genius of the move. Not necessarily that Greenland itself does not matter. It does. But the public controversy over Greenland mattered far less than the strategic matters from which it may have diverted attention.

Trump did not have to silence the room.

He gave the room something noisy to talk about.

The Confected Rupture with Netanyahu

The second example is the alleged rupture between President Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.

For months, sections of the media appeared determined to discover, amplify or invent daylight between Washington and Jerusalem. Every phrase was parsed. Every delay was interpreted. Every change in tone was converted into a geopolitical divorce. The storyline was irresistible: Trump had grown tired of Netanyahu. Netanyahu was isolated. Israel was out of favour.

America was stepping back.

Perhaps.

Or perhaps that story was useful.

In strategic terms, an apparent rupture between two allies can be extremely valuable. It may reassure an adversary. It may encourage complacency. It may delay dispersal. It may suggest that the window for diplomacy remains open. It may lead the enemy to believe that the more dangerous course of action has been contained by political disagreement.

If Iran believed Washington and Jerusalem were divided, that belief itself may have shaped Iranian behaviour. If Tehran believed Trump was restraining Netanyahu, perhaps it thought it had time. If it believed negotiations were still meaningful, perhaps it delayed emergency procedures. If it believed the Americans were posturing and the Israelis were constrained, perhaps key figures behaved differently than they might have behaved under conditions of maximum alarm.

That is the point of deception.

The purpose is not theatre for its own sake. The purpose is to shape the enemy’s assumptions. It is to manipulate tempo. It is to collapse decision cycles. It is to produce a condition in which the adversary understands the truth only after the decisive moment has passed.

The mark looks right.

The blow lands left.

In this case, the blow landed on the Ayatollah himself, along with much of the senior architecture of his regime. In the opening strikes of what Israel called Operation Roaring Lion — and what Washington called Operation Epic Fury — Israeli reporting stated that 40 key Iranian military commanders were killed in the first wave. Other subsequent reporting placed the broader number of senior Iranian officials and commanders killed during the campaign even higher.

This is not to say that I believe President Trump’s desire to resolve the matter peacefully was insincere. Quite the contrary. He had been very clear about what he wanted. He conveyed it publicly. He conveyed it through intermediaries. He conveyed it through official channels. He gave the regime a way out.

But, as the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.

President Trump’s leadership style, however, is not merely to lead the horse to water. It is to dunk the horse’s head in the river. Even then, if the horse refuses to drink — even when the water is life-giving and sustaining — there comes a point when persuasion gives way to consequence.

When the offer was rejected, offensive action followed.

Or, to put it more bluntly, the necessary onslaught began.

Strategically, the ground had already been prepared. The misinformation environment had been shaped. The apparent rupture between Washington and Jerusalem had served its purpose. The public theatrics had created doubt. The diplomatic channels had created delay. The media had been given one story to chase while another story matured in the shadows.
Iran may have believed there was still time. It may have believed Trump was restraining Netanyahu. It may have believed that negotiation remained the main event. It may have believed that the Americans were posturing, the Israelis were contained, and the regime still had room to manoeuvre.

And then the shuffle.

Again, if this was part of the design, it was not chaos.

It was craft.

“Two Weeks” and the Performance of Indecision

A third example is President Trump’s repeated use of delay language — the familiar “two weeks” formulation.

To journalists, such language sounds like indecision. It provides an easy frame. Trump is wavering. Trump is buying time. Trump does not know what to do. Trump is performing for his base. Trump is seeking a way out. Trump is all talk.

But in operational terms, ambiguity has value.

Delay language may create complacency. It may influence diplomatic channels. It may slow an adversary’s dispersal. It may buy time for final preparations. It may reduce premature escalation. It may encourage the enemy to believe that danger is not immediate.

Not tonight.

Not tomorrow.

Not yet.

And then the aircraft are already airborne.

The public sees hesitation. The media sees drama. The adversary sees a negotiating window. The military sees timing.

That, too, is the Kansas City Shuffle.

The mistake is to assume that every public statement is primarily intended to inform the public. Sometimes a public statement is aimed at an adversary. Sometimes it is aimed at allies. Sometimes it is aimed at domestic opponents. Sometimes it is aimed at the media itself. Sometimes it is simply designed to occupy the information space while something else matures.
In an age of instant commentary, this is an underrated skill. Attention is now a battlespace. Outrage is predictable. Journalists are often easier to manoeuvre than armoured formations. Give them a provocative sentence, and they will chase it for days. Give them a strange enough object, and they will build an entire cathedral of analysis around it.

Meanwhile, the real work continues.

Taking Trump Literally, But Not Seriously

One of the great mistakes made by President Trump’s opponents is that they often take him literally but not seriously. His supporters, by contrast, have often taken him seriously but not literally.

That distinction is not always morally satisfying. It is not tidy. It does not sit comfortably in a seminar room. But politics, diplomacy and war are not seminar rooms.

The press corps wants prose. Trump often speaks in jazz. Discordant, repetitive, improvised, sometimes ugly, occasionally brilliant. His sentences can wander. His tone can grate. His provocations can offend. But the effect is frequently to dominate attention, set the frame, create emotional overreaction, and force opponents to expend energy on terrain of his choosing.

That is not how diplomats are taught to speak. It is not how generals write orders. It is not how lawyers prepare submissions. But it may be how a particular kind of political combatant operates in an age where attention is the decisive terrain.

And here is the uncomfortable possibility: the people who consider themselves most sophisticated may be the easiest marks.
They believe they are immune to manipulation because they can identify vulgarity. They believe they understand strategy because they can condemn style. They believe outrage is analysis. They mistake tone for intent, performance for policy, and noise for movement.

Meanwhile, the shuffle continues.

What My Friend Helped Me See

A friend of mine, Jonathon, recently confided that he abhors almost everything President Trump stands for. Almost everything about him grates: the language, the manner, the ego, the theatre, the norm-breaking, and the apparent indifference to elite opinion.

And yet, Jonathon conceded something important: Trump has done some things that are very good.

That admission matters because it mirrors an arc, I once followed myself. I began with a kind of ABC-informed horror: the assumption that every departure from the approved script was evidence of stupidity, malice or democratic collapse. Over time, however, I moved to a more complicated view.

Perhaps Trump simply does not care what polite people think of him.
That may be one of the keys to understanding him. He is not seeking the approval of the class that manufactures public virtue. He is not trying to sound like their idea of a statesman. He does not appear wounded by their disapproval. In fact, he often seems to feed off it.

The contrast with President Obama could hardly be starker. Obama was adored by that class. He was polished, charismatic, charming, urbane, elegant, fluent and different. He looked the part. He sounded the part. He made educated people feel educated for admiring him. He was the kind of leader whose sentences seemed designed for magazine covers, university lecture theatres and European applause.

Yet from a policy perspective, I believe his presidency was deeply damaging; indulgent toward adversaries, naïve about ideology, corrosive of allied confidence, and too often willing to substitute moral performance for strategic clarity.

There are interesting paradoxes in politics. One familiar to many Australian readers is the observation sometimes made about two former prime ministers; Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott. The closer people got to Rudd, the less many seemed to admire him. The closer people got to Abbott, the more many seemed to respect him.

Rudd was extraordinarily popular with the public until the machinery of government exposed repeated complaints about his manner, temperament and treatment of colleagues. Abbott, by contrast, was relentlessly caricatured as a conservative throwback. Yet many who worked closely with him, including some who disagreed with him, saw decency, discipline, courage and a deep sense of public service.

The point is not that presentation is irrelevant. It matters. Character matters. Language matters. Temperament matters. But presentation is not the same as consequence. Style is not the same as strategy. Approval is not the same as achievement.

It is beyond the scope of this article to conduct a complete comparison between Presidents Obama and Trump on the only measure that should ultimately matter: policy, consequence and legacy in power. But perhaps, when viewed through a telescope from sufficient distance — far enough away that the daily noise can no longer be heard — the judgement may look very different from the mood of the moment.

President Obama, the adored 44th President, may be viewed more harshly, and correctly so. President Trump, particularly as the 47th President in his second term, may be judged more fairly and more respectably than his critics can presently imagine.

That does not make every Trump action wise. It does not make every word defensible. It does not absolve coarseness or excuse error. But it may help explain why so many of his critics have been wrong-footed repeatedly.
Perhaps he says almost anything to distract, disorient, disrupt and dominate.

Perhaps the “D words” are not incidental.

Distraction. Disorientation. Disruption. Deception. Dominance.
His opponents often think they are analysing him when they are merely reacting to him. They watch the performance and miss the movement. They obsess over the mouth and ignore the hands.

My personal assessment is that President Trump will be seen in time as truly consequential. Not merely because of the daily controversies, which will fade. Not because of the posts, insults, nicknames or provocations, most of which will one day seem like period noise. But because, when the words and methods recede, the historic achievements may stand out more clearly.
That is often how history works.

It sands back the performance and leaves the effect.

The Lesson

The Kansas City Shuffle is not only a movie device. It is a warning.
In politics, diplomacy and war, what is most loudly discussed is not always what matters most. What is most offensive is not always most important. What is most visible may be camouflage. What looks chaotic may be timed. What appears to be rupture may be coordination. What sounds like delay may be preparation.

“They look right, and you go left.”

Perhaps that is the lesson of Lucky Number Slevin. Perhaps it is also one of the better ways to understand President Trump. And perhaps, in an age of permanent outrage, the most useful strategic habit is this:
When everyone is screaming about what has been said, look carefully for what is being done.

Colonel Michael Scott CSC Ret’d is a former Australian army officer and the founder of The 2023 Foundation, an initiative dedicated to combating antisemitism.