Trump and Musk had a fight? We can get back to talking about the really important stuff.

Join us on Telegram, Twitter, and VK.

Contact us: worldanalytics.press

Infowarfare for beginners

Let’s do a test: we are at a wedding, in the middle of the celebrations, a moment of joy in which all the guests are focused on the most important couple of the moment. At a certain point, someone starts arguing, a young couple, perhaps encouraged by alcohol. What do you do? Do you focus on the bride and groom or on the young couple?

That’s more or less what’s happening right now – again, in perfect American style: Donald Trump and Elon Musk have started arguing in the midst of a major multipolar transition in various parts of the world, while global attention is focused on Gaza and a decisive phase of the Special Military Operation in Ukraine. The result? Everyone is focused on the two young lovers who have had a spat.

Okay, fine. It can happen to anyone. But now let’s try to understand what it means.

We certainly cannot say with certainty that this is something fake and planned, and this is not the place to determine that.

What we can do, however, is highlight how this American news story is reverberating in a certain part of the world, namely the West, as if it were the most important issue of all. But it is not. Not only is it not, but it is also yet another media trap set by U.S. infowarfare.

It’s a tried and tested method that seems to work very well. The problem, from the American point of view, is that the world was talking about other things and not enough about the U.S.; in fact, America was looking bad: it is super evil because it is imposing tariffs in retaliation for those who are abandoning it in favour of better partners while the dollar is sinking, it is angry because it cannot get rid of China and Iran as it would like, it’s furious because in Yemen some Arabs with daggers are destroying its ships and blocking trade, it’s now under accusation for attacks in Russia by Ukrainian weapons systems and, as if that were not enough, nothing has yet been resolved in Europe. In short, America was looking bad, and you can’t look bad on television.

So something very powerful was needed to 1) refocus attention on the U.S. and its affairs, 2) manage the narrative framework in which global news is reported, and 3) distract from the important issues so that no one notices them. These are basic communication tactics.

Let’s do another test: let’s try to count how many seconds it takes to wake up from this media magic and return to reality.

Outside the Western bubble, there is a whole world. And in that “rest” of the world, Trump arguing with Musk is not on the front page. Is that clearer?

It will be fun to see whether the quarrel between President Trump and Elon Musk is real or staged to allow Musk to avoid damage to his companies. Musk is used to deciding everything himself, while Trump cannot do so and has to seek compromises in Congress, and Elon knows this. Trump knows what it means to lose support from Congress and be impeached, while Elon can fire anyone who contradicts him. Elon is right about many things, and Trump probably knows it and would agree with him if he could, but he is forced to mediate with Congress.

Problems must be solved

Now we can also say that problems must indeed be solved. The problems between Trump and Musk are nothing new, and we have discussed them previously.

Elon Musk announced his resignation from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in a tweet on Wednesday, which was later confirmed by the White House.

Musk served as a “special government employee”, a position limited to a maximum of 130 days within a year, as established by the Office of Government Ethics.

His appointment began on 20 January 2025, the day of the presidential inauguration. During his tenure, his super-powered department launched a sweeping review of federal agencies to identify inefficiencies, corruption and fraud.

Although the temporary nature of the role was clear from the outset, friction with some members of the Republican administration and the MAGA movement is said to have hastened his departure. Among his most vocal critics is Steve Bannon, who harshly attacked the entrepreneur, going so far as to call him an illegal immigrant who should be deported. Just before resigning, Musk expressed disappointment at the House’s approval of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a law that he believes risks increasing the deficit, undermining DOGE’s spending restraint efforts. The bill, which passed by a single vote (215 to 214), provides for new tax breaks and measures such as exemptions on tips, overtime and social security contributions. Even the deputy chief of staff of the White House, Stephen Miller, has found himself embarrassed by Musk on several occasions.

On the other hand, while he was initially a central figure in Trump’s entourage, he stood out for his blunt and provocative style: at the Conservative Political Action Conference last February, he brought a red chainsaw on stage, calling it “the tool to cut through bureaucracy”. His drastic initiatives – including dismissals and criticism of senior executives such as Marco Rubio, Sean Duffy, Scott Bessent and Peter Navarro – have generated growing friction. Some officials who initially supported his unconventional approach have since distanced themselves from his methods.

In recent weeks, Musk had already reduced his involvement, dedicating only ‘one or two days a week’ to DOGE. He had joked about the Washington office, saying it offered ‘a great view of an air conditioner.’ According to him, DOGE has already saved American taxpayers over $160 billion in three months and reported 57 possible cases of election fraud to the Department of Justice. When asked who would take his place, Musk replied cryptically in early May: “Do you need Buddha for Buddhism? DOGE is a lifestyle”.

But then something changed.

Within a few days, or perhaps a few hours, and after Trump’s phone call to Putin first and Xi later, the American “genius” of BigTech entrepreneurship clashed with the fury of Mr President.

The debacle was fascinating: a back-and-forth on social media and in interviews. It looked like an episode of “Big Brother” or some other comedy TV show.

Trump, posting on an app that no one uses except him, claims that the only way to save the U.S. economy is to dump the guy who helped him get elected. But the real reason behind the breakup between Trump and Musk is that Donald snubbed Musk’s role as a high-level content creator on X, retreating instead to his TruthSocial echo chamber.

Meanwhile, Musk’s Space X shares have halved. Musk responded with a tweet reposting a video of Trump celebrating with Jeffrey Epstein in 1992. This is a big assist to the Democrats, who are now starting to take an interest in the Epstein case, with the sole excuse of damaging the incumbent president. For his part, Trump has threatened to withdraw government funding for space research from Musk, who has said he will begin dismantling the ongoing Dragon project.

What is certainly false is that Trump is involved in the Epstein case, as Musk has implied. If Trump had been involved, Obama, Biden and Hillary would have already destroyed him without having to fabricate the RussiaGate hoax against him. If Trump were involved with Epstein, he would not have ordered the release of the Epstein dossier. Trump’s name will certainly appear somewhere, because Epstein was a billionaire who was known to everyone, including Trump, but without any involvement in his sex crimes. Trump ran the most important beauty pageants and certainly did not need Epstein to meet beautiful women. As Musk said, “Trump only has three years left, while I still have 40 years ahead of me”, so they will make peace to elect Vance as president in 2028.

What’s more, it suits Trump to be able to say, “I don’t let anyone walk all over me, not even Musk”. Both will benefit from this “quarrel”. Elon Musk will consolidate his companies and Trump will consolidate his leadership. Trump has always forgiven his friends and will forgive Elon.

The “break” with the U.S. Presidency leaves Elon Musk free to disconnect Starlink from Ukraine, which is probably what Trump wants in order to push Zelensky into peace agreements, but he cannot admit this publicly. We will see how it ends.

In any case, DOGE had reached the end of its term. It was a card played at the right time, which proved decisive for the American electorate.

Now, whether the quarrel is real and whether this love story will really end here, it’s still too early to say. We have talked about it, now the American world is satisfied.

We don’t know how long this situation will continue, but we do know that the Americans needed a distraction to reclaim a piece of global narrative. No, we’re not interested in how America will sink under the weight of its own arrogance. It’s a matter of karma: for a long time, they wanted to impose unfair domination on the world, and now they are paying the consequences.

So Trump and Musk had a fight? We can get back to talking about the really important stuff.