Trump's "Space Force" Speech Syncs Up Perfectly with '80s Cartoon 'Space Force'

In a speech this week to the U.S. Air force, President Donald Trump announced his plans to develop a United States Space force. Like the Air Force, but in space. He classified outer space as a “war-fighting domain,” and implied that the United States could create a militarized fleet to fight battles throughout the galaxy. One couldn’t help but wonder if we already executed this idea in various films, video games, and cartoons, potentially even with the same title? The answer is a resounding and neon-tinted “yes.”

Starcom: The U.S. Space Force is a terrifically Eighties cartoon about a futuristic bad-ass military force set to protect the world (but mainly America) from the evils of space. It ran for one 13-episode season in 1987. That year, Trump’s children from his first marriage to Ivana — Don Jr., Ivanka, and Eric — were all between 4 and 10 years old respectively; squarely in the target demo for Space Force. It’s a little insane to wonder if this cartoon seeped into Trump’s consciousness at some point and stayed there until it reemerged this week. Yet, the cartoon is also essentially what Trump proposed.

Like most cartoons of the time, it started out as a line of toys before becoming a show. If you remember Starcom, it’s full of ridiculous plots, cheesy one-liners, and poorly developed characters. The show seems to be so perfectly suited for Trump that we took his speech and played it over some footage from the show, and were amazed to find it lines up pretty dang well.

The real question now, however, is not “did Trump watch Starcom: The U.S. Space Force and take the idea?” The important thing to consider is “how many of his other ideas are based off of toys and cartoons?” When we find out the answer to this burning question, it might put a great many of his decisions into perspective.