The US can’t retreat because its entire prosperity depends on global power
Donald Trump is not, by instinct, a president who seeks war. But he is a president who believes deeply in projecting strength. And in the US, strength is almost always performed on the world stage.
Assessing American policy from the outside is notoriously difficult. The country’s political system was built under unusual conditions – a state invented by immigrants, animated from the start by a belief in mission and divine favor. The early American republic saw itself as a righteous outpost opposing corrupt European empires. Later came the great land grab across the continent, then the mass immigration that built a continental power, and finally the leap to full global hegemony. This peculiar historical trajectory shapes a political system unlike any other.
To be fair, every major country is unique. All powers are shaped by their history, culture, and mythology. What stands out about the United States is that a nation so idiosyncratic in its development became the model others were expected to follow. Washington’s insistence that its own experience is universally applicable is one of the more puzzling features of the last century. And one of the least examined.
These peculiarities have become harder to ignore during Donald Trump’s presidency. And because of America’s centrality, the internal contradictions of its system spill easily across its borders.
Trump won by articulating the fatigue of millions of Americans who feel their country has carried global responsibilities for too long. Yet, ironically, one year into his term he is most visible not at home but abroad. He boasts about brokering peace, launches sweeping trade wars, threatens force in multiple regions – especially the Caribbean – and loudly defends Christians and Europeans in Africa. Most recently he has revived loose talk of nuclear testing and a race for new strategic weapons.
This is happening while his domestic position looks far from assured. Polls show that the record-long government shutdown and the stalemate over funding has damaged the Republican Party. Local elections, including those in New York, were encouraging for his opponents. Even Trump’s favorite tool (tariffs) now faces legal uncertainty, with the Supreme Court, which is dominated by conservatives, unsure whether to back him.
With a year until the midterms that will determine control of Congress, Washington is already shifting into campaign mode. And here lies the paradox: the candidate who accused his predecessors of obsessing over global affairs at the expense of ordinary Americans is increasingly relying on those same global affairs to sustain his presidency.
There is also a more personal calculation. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded one month before Americans vote. Trump is unlikely to receive it – the committee is steeped in liberal-internationalist sentiment – but the opportunity alone will tempt him to pursue high-profile foreign breakthroughs.
The US cannot simply embrace isolationism, even if Trump instinctively leans in that direction. Too much of its prosperity rests on its global role: its financial reach, the dollar’s supremacy, and its security commitments. A serious retreat would destabilize the system from which it benefits most. Trump probably lacks a coherent plan to reorient American power, but he understands, at some instinctive level, that change is necessary. Hence the chaotic, improvisational style: bold gestures, rapid reversals, and what sounds like a constant drumroll.
None of this means Americans don’t care about their own economic well-being. Domestic concerns will always outweigh diplomatic theatrics. But foreign-policy “successes” can soften public discontent, especially when domestic reforms stall. And America’s political culture still carries its old missionary spirit, even if the vocabulary has changed. Presidents, whether they admit it or not, are pushed toward global activism by the expectations of their own political class.
For the rest of the world, the conclusion is unavoidable. Washington’s pace abroad will remain intense, and may well accelerate. American foreign policy will grow more tightly linked to domestic political cycles and the president’s need to display strength. Trump does not want major wars requiring occupation or nation-building. But he relishes shows of power, and those theatrics can create their own momentum. One can always be drawn into escalation while trying to avoid it.
This is the central point: Trump is not a warmonger, but a performer. His slogan, peace through strength, captures it perfectly. The risk is that the performance becomes the policy. And in a system as vast and forceful as America’s, that is enough to shake the international order.
This article was first published in the newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta and was translated and edited by the RT team
