13 Jun What “America First” Means to Allies and Enemies
“It’s about ‘Fortress America’…, and much more.” – The Lonely Realist
Hypothesis: Both Donald Trump and Xi Jinping understand that the Thucydides Trap would represent a disastrous outcome for each country. President Trump appreciates that a Thucydides outcome would be inevitable should America continue its efforts to demonstrate global hegemony – that is, America cannot win the economic competition with China and would be unable to overcome China’s military advantages in Southeast Asia (in part because of distance, in part because of the Chinese military build-up, and in part because of depleted American munitions). As a consequence, President Trump is retreating from global entanglements and refocusing America on the Western Hemisphere, his goal being to build a 21st Century “Fortress America.” Trump 2.0 foreign policy therefore is Ukraine +Venezuela +Iran +Cuba +Greenland +the Panama Canal +Taiwan = the New World Order.
Post-WWII America enjoyed 80 years of global hegemony. During that period, America presided over a world order grounded in free trade, democratic values, and American-led alliances that included >40 nations in Western Europe, East Asia, the Middle East, etc. President Trump has redefined that world order. “America First” policy in 2026 means that America no longer honors its far-flung alliance obligations and is in the process of decoupling from decades of economic and geopolitical connections. “America First” now means America Alone. America’s economic withdrawal – “deglobalization” – is characterized domestically by Statist policy-making and the Americanization of strategic manufacturing and supply chains via tariff taxation and unilateralism. Its foreign policy is embodied in the “Donroe Doctrine,” a Trump 2.0 declaration of America’s determination to dominate the Western Hemisphere. The Doctrine is a warning to China and Russia (and others) to stay out of the Western Hemisphere, and also a statement of America’s intent to withdraw from global geopolitics and focus on its innate hemispheric interests. As such, it implicitly concedes that other superpowers have their own “spheres of influence,” namely China’s in Southeast Asia/the near-Pacific and Russia’s in the former Russian Empire. Examples of America’s foreign policy refocus are found in America’s withdrawal from its NATO obligations and from the defense of Taiwan. While “America First” is not an application of classical “isolationism,” it shares a rhyming quality with the American foreign policy of the 1930s by treating the two oceans that separate the Western Hemisphere from the rest of the world as security barriers.
The Trump Administration’s Ukraine policy has been described as one of benign economic neglect which, when combined with overt encouragement of Russia’s territorial claims, is an accurate manifestation of “America Firstism” that has the effect of putting Eastern European security at risk. Presidential statements and actions further undercut America’s commitment to NATO and its Article 5 mutual defense clause. Consequences include Europe’s accelerating efforts to rearm and build its own defense manufacturing and military leadership capabilities, Russia’s increasingly belligerent actions against Poland, Latvia, and other NATO countries, and the refusal of Vladimir Putin to meaningfully negotiate with Ukraine.
President Trump’s elegant removal of Nicolas Maduro and the subsequent increase in American economic participation in Venezuela’s economy was an impressive demonstration of America’s Western Hemispheric hegemony. That triumph led the President to believe that a similar campaign against Iran would be equally successful, removing a global threat while profiting both militarily and economically. The President miscalculated. Although Candidate Trump ran on a promise of “Peace through Strength,” President Trump is not a follower of Theodore Roosevelt’s Big Stick Diplomacy (“the exercise of intelligent forethought and of decisive action sufficiently far in advance of any likely crisis”) or of Ronald Reagan’s stick-and-carrot balancing of militarism and diplomacy, the traditional Republican Party application of “Peace through Strength.” As TLR noted in March 2019 and as Candidate Trump pledged to voters in 2024, Donald Trump’s foreign policy model is the politicized essence of “America First”: “I will not send [Americans] to fight and die in stupid foreign wars that never end. I will not send our sons and daughters to go fight for a war in a country that you’ve never heard of. We’re not going to do it. We’re going to bring our troops home, and we’re going to focus on America First.” As President, he has practiced what he preached.
Hemispherically, the President has made it clear that, unless Cuban leaders make a deal, America will squeeze until Cuba breaks. He is pursuing a similar strategy with respect to control of the Panama Canal and soon again will return his attention to Greenland.
The President’s words and deeds make it clear that America does not intend to dominate outside the Americas and, accordingly, President Trump has demonstrated a reluctance to directly challenge China. An example is President Trump’s recent statements disclaiming support for Taiwanese independence, a material departure from 5 decades of American foreign policy. Until his visit to China on May 13-15, America’s Taiwan policy had been artfully ambiguous and thoughtfully supportive of Taiwanese self-determination. No more. On May 15th, the President told Fox News that “I’m not looking to have somebody go independent. And, you know, we’re supposed to travel 9,500 miles to fight a war. I’m not looking for that.” In adding that America will defer the sale of arms promised to Taiwan in return for (transactional) concessions from China, the President made it clear that American support for Taiwanese independence is at an end. China now has the green light to pressure Taiwan into an “accommodation” (perhaps following the Hong Kong precedent) and has ~2-1/2 years (the remaining term of Trump 2.0) to make that happen. Because Japan receives >90% of its fossil fuel imports, and South Korea receives ~23% of its total imports, from ships that pass through the Taiwan Strait, Japan and South Korea now are likely to take a more enlightened view of their relations with China…, and a less enlightened one with respect to America.
What will that mean? TLR notes that Taiwan, South Korea and Japan are major suppliers of American technology (with Taiwan Semiconductor producing ~90% of the world’s most advanced computer chips and South Korea’s Samsung being the world’s largest producer of memory chips and smartphones). Taiwan, South Korea and Japan also use the proceeds from their substantial trade surpluses to purchase American weapons and US Treasuries, the latter supporting the US Dollar as the world’s reserve currency. Those three countries (and others) are now discovering what happens when the free flow of oil stops, when America ceases to be the global sovereign, is unsuccessful in projecting its military power and walks away from its treaty obligations, and when their neighbor, China, starts flexing its muscles.
The Lonely Realist now can be found on Substack at https://substack.com/@thelonelyrealist?utm_source=global-search.
Finally (from a good friend)
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