Trending Now
We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
President Donald Trump raises a fist during a ceremony where he signs two executive orders that will lead to reciprocal tariffs against other countries that charge tariffs on US goods.
Is Donald Trump’s foreign policy … working?
What’s the old line about there being decades where nothing happens and weeks where decades happen?
Quoting Vladimir Lenin may not be the wisest move in today’s America, but it’s an apt description of the (second) first 100 days of Donald Trump’s foreign policy.
In barely three months, he’s bashed America’s closest European allies, spooked NATO into worrying about its survival, taken a chainsaw to US foreign aid programs, pulled the rug out from under Ukraine, threatened to expand US territory for the first time since the 19th century, and started a global trade war that’s pushed protectionism to its highest levels since the Great Depression.
Not bad for 100 days! But is there a method to what seems – to horrified defenders of the “US-led world order” – like so much madness? “Method” is a risky word to use with a figure as famously capricious as Trump, but there are a few basic aspects of his worldview and commitment to “America First” that are consistent and worth understanding.
No new friends (also no old friends)
First, Trump believes that the world is a place where all countries are just trying to “screw” each other. This is true not only of adversaries but, especially, of allies. (Tell me you’re a New York real estate developer without telling me you’re a New York real estate developer.)
The mutual screwing occurs in an endless chain of zero-sum transactions between countries in which hard power and cold cash are all that matters. Deficits or defense umbrellas are ripoffs. Alliances based on “values” are silly. Soft power is a useless conceit, a virtue signal, a kind of “Geopolitical wokism.”
It’s a (multipolar) jungle out there
Second, there are various great powers in this world, and each has its own sphere of influence. The largest of these are the US and its chief rival China, but Russia is up there as well. You do not, in Trump’s view, mess with another power’s sphere of influence, and you do not waste time trying to win over countries of marginal economic or strategic value beyond your neighborhood. You put your country, to borrow a phrase Trump uses a lot, “first.”
Once you grasp that, for Trump, the world is a transactional and increasingly multipolar jungle, it actually explains a lot about his foreign policy.
It tells you why he doesn’t seem to care that much about Ukraine (he sees it as Russia’s sphere) or Taiwan (ditto for China) or why he’s OK slashing foreign aid (soft power is silly). It explains why he wants a piece of Greenland, Canada, and the Panama Canal (all have immense strategic and economic value within Washington’s own sphere of influence, especially if conflict is coming with other powers.) And of course, it tells you why he loves to love tariffs – a crude but effective tool for unleashing America’s immense economic power
Hard power dreams, soft power missteps
All of this is a big rupture with the longstanding idea that the US, as a hegemon, gets more than it gives by providing security, market access, or development assistance to vast parts of the world.
But taken on its own terms, is Trump’s foreign policy ... working? The evidence is mixed. Many of his objectives – restore America’s lost manufacturing capacity, confront China, and force Europe to carry its share of the defense burden – can make sense on their own. But, taken together, the overall policy is still a mess of conflicting impulses.
Trump wants to isolate and pressure China, but he’s simultaneously wrecking relations with Europe, Washington’s most natural ally against Beijing. He wants to maintain technological supremacy over China, but his immigration and education policies are scaring the world’s best minds away from America.
He wants to use tariffs to restore manufacturing – which, by definition, almost requires leaving them in place for a long time. But he also wants to use them to extract tactical concessions on trade and defense – which means not leaving them in place for a long time. Which is it?
And while he is right to force the West to confront the problems of Biden’s well-intentioned but poorly defined Ukraine policy, his pledge to end the war “within 24 hours” is already 2,376 hours overdue. Browbeating Ukraine while pleading with Vladimir Putin on social media is not exactly a foreign policy to be reckoned with.
It’s still early days to be sure. But whether the decades that have happened in these 100 days are a real revolution against the long-established order of US foreign policy, or a a tangle of disruptive but ultimately confused impulses remains to be seen.
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, seen here in Berlin, in 2015.
Henry Kissinger: Towering (and polarizing) figure in US foreign policy dies at 100
In memoriam: Dr. Henry Kissinger (1923-2023)
From America to China to the social media universe, the world marked the passing of diplomat and presidential adviser Dr. Henry Kissinger, whose realpolitik approach to foreign policy definitively shaped the course of international relations in the 20th century.
Born in Germany in 1923, Henry Alfred Kissinger emigrated to the United States in 1938 and became a citizen in 1943. He served three years in the US Army and later in the Counter Intelligence Corps, earned a Ph.D., and became a professor of international relations at Harvard before embarking on a diplomatic career in the service of three American presidents – John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, and Gerald R. Ford.
At the time, America was mired in conflict: The Vietnam War seemed intractable, the Cold War raged white hot, and the Middle East was a tinderbox. Kissinger’s realpolitik approach helped the United States navigate all these conflicts. As national security adviser and later as secretary of state, Kissinger was instrumental in opening diplomatic relations with China in 1972 and negotiating the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT I) with the former Soviet Union. He defined the term “shuttle diplomacy” for his mediation work in the Middle East during the Yom Kippur War in 1973.
That year, Kissinger was also awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in brokering a ceasefire to the Vietnam War, together with Vietnamese diplomat Le Duc Tho (who refused to accept). Admirers lauded him as a skilled tactician in a time of great peril. Nixon’s daughters, Tricia Nixon Cox and Julie Nixon Eisenhower, said their father and Kissinger enjoyed “a partnership that produced a generation of peace for our nation.” Former US President George W. Bush said "America has lost one of the most dependable and distinctive voices on foreign affairs.”
Kissinger was not without controversy, however. Detractors blamed him for the deaths of millions of Cambodians during the Vietnam War and for supporting repressive regimes including that of Augusto Pinochet in Chile. Upon his death, Rolling Stone Magazine ran the headline, “Henry Kissinger, war criminal beloved by America’s ruling class, finally dies.” On X, "RIP BOZO," referring to a meme celebrating someone's death, trended in the top 10 together with "IT FINALLY HAPPENED," while "War criminal" reached the top 25.
Kissinger would have likely met these criticisms with the same sangfroid that marked his diplomatic career. Shortly before his 100th birthday, he told CBS that such comments are “… a reflection of their ignorance.”
After leaving the US government, Kissinger continued to provide counsel to world leaders until the last days of his life. In September, he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York; in July, he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. The Chinese Ambassador to the United States Xie Feng said he was “deeply shocked and saddened” by Kissinger’s death. “He will always remain alive in the hearts of the Chinese people as a most valued old friend.”
Kissinger was also a prolific author, penning 21 books on topics as varied as politics in the nuclear age, the rise of China, the art of diplomacy, and most recently, the promise and perils of artificial intelligence. He leaves behind his wife of nearly 50 years, Nancy Kissinger, his two children from a previous marriage, Elizabeth and David, and five grandchildren.
WATCH: On Henry Kissinger's 100th birthday in May, GZERO's Ian Bremmer reflected on his legacy.