Trump’s foreign policy threatens to unravel the global order
The Second World War brought Europe to its breaking point. Conflict touched nearly every corner on the continent, reducing industries to rubble and killing, wounding, or displacing millions. The fighting bankrupted most nations. Bleak would not begin to describe prospects for the average European.
The United States, spared from the carnage, refused to sit idly on its hands. $13.3 billion dollars flowed into Western and Southern Europe, roughly equivalent to $133 billion in today’s dollars.
Then President Harry Truman said the Marshall Plan “will go down in history as one of America’s greatest contributions to the peace of the world.”
Truman did not lie. As a result of American investments, European industries flourished. Trade barriers collapsed. Hostility gave way to diplomacy and, eventually, camaraderie among nations who, only a decade prior, waged total war.
I write this because President Trump has evidently forgotten that America’s strength doesn’t lie solely in its weapons or technology. When the United States came to Europe’s rescue, the world witnessed America’s commitment to freedom, prosperity, and justice.
The United States didn’t just export cash−we sold the world an ideal. An image of American leadership. Now, I am afraid that Trump’s behavior threatens a reputation that took 80 careful years to cultivate.
Considering Trump’s history with casinos, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that he treats diplomacy like a game of poker. For Trump, you’re either the winner who takes it all, or the out-of-luck loser, and anyone who has ever listened to Trump knows just how much the guy likes to win.
But it’s exactly that mindset which threatens America’s reputation. Our closest allies are frightened. From Canada to Denmark and Japan, close friends of the U.S. worry about what Trump will do next. Meanwhile, enemies leap with joy as Trump’s erratic behavior corrodes the nation’s standing.
How can the United States claim to uphold freedom when it aggressively pursues Greenland? What is just about imposing a 32% tariff on Taiwan, the lynchpin of our defense against China? At a time when the United States should be standing with its allies against Russian warmongering, it retreats.
Anyone who has worked in public relations will agree: It’s much easier to ruin an image than to build one. And with Trump in the White House, we are witnessing the most goodwill that has ever been burned before.
This isn’t to say the United States hasn’t been taken advantage of. Europe, the frontline in a hypothetical Russian conflict, shelters itself underneath America’s defense-umbrella. There is also reason to decouple from China and its unfair trade practices. But settling these issues requires productive conversations and intelligent policy.
What Trump is doing is essentially taking a sledgehammer to the rule-of-law which has benefitted every generation of American since the Second World War. This wild behavior makes the United States look vindictive and not worthy of trust.
Late in March, the new Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, said “The old relationship we had with the United States…is over.” This view is not exclusively Canadian, either. While Secretary of State Marco Rubio touted the “strong” relationship the U.S. has with Denmark, the Danish Prime Minister bluntly rebuked Trump’s imperialist ambitions: “You cannot annex another country.”
That a NATO ally even needs to challenge the American President on such matters as annexation boggles my mind. What happened to the America that funded the Marshall Plan? Today, millions of people around the world depend on U.S. foreign aid. They look for the red, white, and blue stickered crates that declare: “USAID from the American People.”
But Trump shuttered USAID. As a result, 95 million people will lose healthcare access. 30 million children will go without an education. According to the Institute for Development Impact, 800 million people will experience increased food insecurity.
Trump hurts our allies and empowers our enemies. He imposes tariffs on uninhabited islands, and the U.S. looks cruel and stupid as a result. He coddles Russia and punishes Ukraine.
I’m afraid that the United States that rebuilt Europe is gone. The rules-based order born from the horrors of the Second World War is unraveling. In place of leadership, the President throws tantrums.
“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born.” Antonio Gramsci wrote those words inside a fascist prison. A century later, the world America helped build is being replaced by something dangerous and erratic. If the U.S. continues to abandon the ideals that held the postwar order together, Gramsci’s warning will come to pass: “Now is the time of monsters.”
