As America threatened to return Donald Trump to the presidency, and then did, the world braced itself for a return of “America First.” For supporters, this was Trump’s selling point: the “peace through strength” president, putting U.S. interests first, unconstrained by conventions or norms, and uninterested in expensive foreign entanglements. For the rest, this “America First” offered a kind of salve: Trump could be unpredictable in his whims or obsessions, but he was, above all else, transactional. He liked deals, which meant he could maybe be convinced, or humored, or flattered into one, as long as he could come away and call it a win, whether or not it really was.
“America First” was about breaking the international systems and rules that Trump personally felt screwed America over. Though it’s somehow, only week two, Trump has revised the earlier version of “America First” for something more opportunistic. Now, Trump seems to want to break things just because America can – it is strong, and it is rich, and except for a few geopolitical rivals, he and his administration don’t see much use in pretending that anyone can stop them.
What was once an isolationist mantra – take care of ourselves first– now sounds terrifyingly expansionist: America should get Greenland or the Panama Canal or maybe send in troops to Mexico. It doesn’t have to be the option of last resort, and it doesn’t even have to be particularly good for Americans first. Trump threatened a trade war with Colombia in a dispute over migrant flights and then bragged about the largest economic power in the hemisphere, and the world, somehow, winning it. “This signifies peace through strength is back,“ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters, as if the U.S. needed to remind Colombia, and the rest of Latin America, of American might. The Trump administration’s decision to freeze foreign aid and suspend the refugee program caused mass chaos. But the goals were clear and coherent, chillingly so. Trump wants to finally act like the leader of a powerful country, unconstrained, and apparently out for revenge against the world order America itself built.
Some of this was baked into his candidacy and expected upon his return to office. He dismantled the U.S. refugee program in his first term, so of course he would tear it apart again. He pulled out of the Paris Climate Accords once, so it tracks that he would do it again, faster. Trump wanted out of the World Health Organization in 2020, so why wait to try now. Trump did tinker with and roll back foreign assistance – halting aid to Central America, reinstating the so-called “Global Gag Rule” that blocks U.S. funding to any program that also provides abortion services, a typical move of GOP administrations.
But this time the administration went at foreign aid with a sledgehammer, putting all kinds of funds – from mine-clearing to the money that pays the people guarding the ISIS prisons – in doubt. The State Department quickly moved to pay the ISIS prison guards, but it nearly created a crisis that might not have happened had the Trump administration waited to review programs before it sought to cut or defund them, rather than the reverse. But, if the goal is to break the system, what kind of message would actual planning send? As the executive order states: “It is the policy of [sic] United States that no further United States foreign assistance shall be disbursed in a manner that is not fully aligned with the foreign policy of the President of the United States.”
And the policy of the President of the United States is whatever he wants it to be, whenever he wants it to be. Trump promised to be tough on China, threatening 60 percent tariffs on goods from China during his campaign. That’s now at 10 percent, maybe, and less than the 25 percent he is threatening to place on Canada and Mexico, both of which are deeply integrated in U.S. supply chains. He is threatening to take over the Panama Canal. He is tormenting Denmark, and, by extension, the rest of Europe, over his desire to control Greenland. Somehow everyone went from wondering what might happen if Trump abandoned NATO allies, to what happens if one NATO ally goes to war with another.
Trump’s influence very likely did secure a ceasefire in Gaza, although he has since abandoned sanctions on West Bank settlers and proposed displacing Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring countries, an out-and-out war crime. Trump’s “peace through strength” approach was also supposed to solve the war in Ukraine on day one. Both Trump and Vladimir Putin are flirting with the idea of talks – though it’s not clear where Ukraine factors in. Instead, Trump has said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy should have just given into Russia. “Zelenskyy was fighting a much bigger entity, much bigger, much more powerful,” Trump said in a Fox News interview with Sean Hannity.” He shouldn’t have done that, because we could have made a deal.”
Never mind that Russia invaded Ukraine, bringing the war directly to it. That statement on Zelenskyy reveals Trump’s worldview. Peace through strength is peace imposed by the guys in power; the peace comes in acquiescing to it. Actual negotiations happen among peers – maybe China, maybe Russia – but everyone else takes what’s on offer. Trump’s critics often cite his praise of dictators, but it’s often framed in the domestic context: of having total control, of engineering popularity and power. In this second term, that has seeped into his foreign policy much more acutely. This is an America that closes its borders and looks after itself, sure. But Trump has said enough times that he’s also looking out for what’s on the take.
This is the world order that Russia and China want in part because it replaces the American-led one. Trump is not the first American president who has damaged the U.S.-led system, or sought to operate outside it while holding other leaders accountable to it. Trump’s version does shed any hypocrisy or contradiction. There’s no need to boost civil society or help poor farmers grow crops to increase American soft power and influence because the hard power works just fine.
Allies in Europe were always worried about Trump’s return, but the rest of the world was not as nervous. A recent poll from the European Council of Foreign Relations found that majorities in other countries such as Turkey, Brazil, and India bought into the idea Trump could help end wars in places like the Middle East and Ukraine. Trump’s realpolitik does have cache among many parts of the globe, even if the liberal internationalists don’t love to hear it.
But the Trump administration can’t tear away at the things it doesn’t like – giving health care to countries torn apart by our wars, or alliances, say – and expect the things they do to stay intact. It might not happen quickly, or even in Trump’s term, but elements of the American order the president and his backers probably want to preserve – from the primacy of the U.S. financial system all the way down to that passport that gets easy access to Punta Cana or Positano – do not necessarily come along in the future. This is the world America built, so if Trump wants to tear it down, he probably can, but he may not get to choose exactly what comes next.
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