There are a few who wonder what US President Trump has happened :. It interrupts American aid in Ukraine, offers a victory for, imposes duties on allies and weakens it. How are all this interpreted? Where does it go?
Some argue that the strategy of the new US government is non-orthathological and without consistency. They argue that Trump’s hobby is to negotiate agreements, agreements on the agreements, but they have nothing to do with each other. This interpretation does not stand.
It is a fact that the new foreign policy is governed by a different logic than the foreign policy of previous governments. This makes American politics different, but not non-orthological: both the strategic goals and the means used to achieve goals have just changed.
Others again argue that the Trump government is characterized by a return to isolationism, that is, it wants to get away from the international system, to focus on the western hemisphere and US internal problems. To prove their allegations, they refer to the attempted reflection of the US by and protectionism, as expressed by tariff policy. Nor is this interpretation confirmed by the facts.
The new US government shows an unprecedented diplomatic activism and involvement on all open fronts on the globe. The US is not distracted by the international system, but is trying to change the existing balances in their favor and create a new geopolitical order of things.
My interpretation focuses on this geopolitical rearrangement that the new US government is trying to achieve. The strategic logic of this venture is as follows:
The US president – and the team that surrounds him – believes that the US has lost their strategic orientation in recent decades. They were directly or indirectly entangled in secondary wars (Iraq,, Ukraine) and thus neglected the main threat, which is none other than the rapidly emerging.
The Trump presidency believes that the US no longer have the comfort of providing the goods of security and economic stability to their allies, as they did after it, because they do not have the power they had.
After 1945 the US controlled 50% of world GDP, and now controlled 25%. He considers in particular that European allies are weak and politically unstable and therefore cannot contribute to US security. In other words, the Trump presidency considers Europeans as a burden, from which the US must get rid of.
They also consider Ukraine as a bob. According to Trump, reckless American support in Ukraine is at risk of US -based involvement in world war with Russia, which Trump himself reiterated to the Ukrainian president at their episodic encounter at the White House.
At the same time, the Trump presidency believes that the war “by representatives” against Russia that worsened the US strategic position because it turned Russia into China’s arms.
This practically unified Eurasia, as the Beijing -Moscow axis became a magnet for many Central Asian countries.
The integration of the huge Eurasian mass under the US hostile forces is considered a threat over time: there is an opponent awe that can threaten US primacy. Therefore, for the US, the weakening of China through the split of the China -Russia axis has become a matter of high priority. But how can this axis break down?
This axis also tried to break up by the Presidency Biden by approaching the strongest pole (Beijing) to isolate the weaker (Moscow). The argument he used was that Russia’s revisionism in Ukraine destroyed the post -war order of things, which did not contribute to China, which had benefited from this class.
The Biden government’s effort was doomed to failure because the Chinese had no reason to facilitate Americans to dismantle a axis that strengthened China, so that the Americans would then turn around against a relatively weakened China.
The Trump Presidency tries to achieve the breakdown of this Eurasian axis in a different way, approaching the weak side, that is, Russia. To entice Putin offers Russia something that Moscow wants a lot, but China is unable to offer: victory in the war against Ukraine.
This practically means that it “sacrifices” Ukraine on the altar of approach to Russia (Realpolitik). The same strategy was followed by Nixon and Kissinger in 1972. They approached the weak side of the Moscow -Beijing axis, which was then China, and to entice the Chinese decided to sacrifice it: they recognized that it was part of China, withdrawing the US troops from the island and ended the treasury.
The Ukrainian president, of course, reacted when the dilemma of “capitulation or defeat” was put in place and this led to the unprecedented public confrontation in the White House. In Russia, it seems that a gift that deserves more than the capitulation of Ukraine: the weakening of NATO itself (due to the designed American disengagement by Europe) and the recognition of a Russian sphere of influence, the size of which will be determined after being determined.
A possible weakening of the Beijing -Moscow axis does not mean, of course, that Russia will ally with the US against China. In Washington they do not have such illusions. It is enough for Russia to begin to maintain equal distances between the two geopolitical competitors. But there are other reasons that Washington wants to approach Moscow.
The most important US alliance today is the “Quad” on the perimeter of Eurasia with its participation, and. This alliance aims to halt China. The big -term Trump government’s long -term bet is to strengthen India to become China’s regional embankment.
The fact that India has a close strategic relationship with Russia over time is an additional reason that the US is trying to get Russia from the Chinese orbit. Russia can also be useful in the US to manage issues related to strategic stability in the nuclear program.
The above geopolitical rearrangements are natural to have frustrated Europeans who feel betrayed: The US has been unexpectedly turned from ally to strategic competitor. Shock, however, can work positively, depending on how Europeans manage it.
Today’s European breakdown allows the US, Russia and China to use the strategy “divide and rule” strategy. To gain influence on the international chessboard, Europeans are forced to work together, to be autonomous by the US and, in particular, to create “hard power”. The shock of American disengagement creates convenient conditions for this. Whether they will do it remains to be proven.
Mr. Athanasios Plati He is a peer professor of strategy at the University of Piraeus and President of the Council of International Relations.
