Politics
US allies already worried about another round of Trump
Most of America’s allies would like Joe Biden to win the US presidential election in November. He has been an excellent president. His foreign policy team is first-rate. But what if Donald Trump wins instead? After Biden’s poor performance in the debates, concern is growing in allied capitals.
Allied leaders know that Trump does not view their countries as friends but as profiteers. As president, he has discredited the principle of collective defense and mishandled intelligence provided by allies to Washington. He has threatened to withdraw U.S. troops from the Korean Peninsula and Europe.
So what should America's allies do if the leader of the free world does not care about the free world or does not want to lead it? In this dire scenario, they should maintain their independence and balance and demonstrate pragmatism.
Trump’s instincts run counter to the worldview of most of America’s allies. If he is not an isolationist, he is certainly curious about the environment. America’s allies, on the contrary, favor internationalism. He is fiercely opposed to free trade, even though most of his allies benefit from it. He enjoys the company of autocrats like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un, even though most of his allies are democracies. Finally, Trump is skeptical of alliances themselves, even though China and Russia would love to have alliance networks as powerful and profitable as the United States’.
The last time Donald Trump was president, allied leaders fell into three categories: critics, supporters and pragmatists. Angela Merkel was a prominent critic who never seemed comfortable with Trump and publicly contradicted him on refugees, tariffs and other issues. At the 2018 G7 meeting in Canada, Merkel posted a striking photo on Instagram that appeared to show her and other leaders confronting Trump, who sat in a defiant pose with his arms crossed.
But it’s not always wise to pick a fight with the most powerful person in the world. Allies rely on the United States, which has the ability to project military power anywhere on the planet, to protect them from adversaries like Russia and China and to provide them with essential public goods. It’s rarely in an ally’s interest to end up at loggerheads with Washington. Merkel’s poor relationship with Trump, for example, contributed to her decision in 2020 to withdraw 10,000 troops from Germany, a decision that President Joe Biden later reversed.
The second model of Trump administration allyship was the sympathizer. Former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison was a sympathizer: he identified politically with Trump, even going so far as to join the then-president in Ohio in 2019 to address a crowd of Trump supporters. Trump told the gathering that Morrison was a great gentleman; Morrison responded, “Together, we make jobs great again.”
In May of this year, during the criminal trial in which Trump was convicted on 34 counts, Morrison visited him at Trump Tower. It was nice to see him again, especially given the pile of cases he is currently facing in the US, Morrison later wrote on X. Good to see you DJT and thanks for the invitation to stay in touch.
Supporters believe they must get close to Trump to influence him. True, the Trump administration was driven by self-centeredness and narcissism, and Trump loves flattery. Praise can lead to gifts such as investments, political support, and decorations. But intimacy with Trump is unlikely to be popular at home or good for the soul.
Among the pragmatists was former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Japan operates in a difficult environment, facing security threats from China and North Korea and having difficult relations with South Korea and Russia. Tokyo is dependent on Washington, so Abe has worked hard to improve his personal relationship with fellow conservative Trump. In November 2016, Abe became the first world leader to visit the president-elect at Trump Tower. Over the next four years, he had dozens of conversations with Trump in meetings, on the phone and on the golf course. In 2019, he arranged for Trump to be the first foreign leader to meet Japan’s newly enthroned Emperor Naruhito.
Abe was courteous and attentive without sacrificing his dignity or blending into Trump’s political identity. He stayed in close contact with Trump to avoid the unpleasant surprises that other allied leaders had to endure. Rather than immediately contradicting Trump’s misstatements during their conversations, Abe tended to deflect the topic and return to the subject later. As a businessman, Trump was a fierce critic of Japanese trade practices and took out newspaper ads accusing Japan and other allies of taking advantage of the United States by not paying for protection provided by Washington. But through his skillful negotiations with Trump during his term, Abe managed to mitigate this hostility. As president, Trump was well-disposed toward Japan and even signed a trade agreement between Washington and Tokyo.
Another former Australian prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, was also a pragmatist. Whether in the Oval Office or on the playground, giving in to bullies emboldens bullies to persist, Turnbull recently wrote in Foreign Affairs. The only way to earn the respect of people like Trump is to stand up to them. So when Trump threatened to tear up an Obama-era US-Australia deal on asylum seekers and impose tariffs on Australian steel and aluminium imports, Turnbull stood up to him. He did so mostly in private, resisting the temptation to talk down to Trump in public. In their meetings, Turnbull also made much of their shared business experience.
Criticizing Trump is risky for an ally’s national interest. Sympathizing with him is risky for self-esteem. The best way to sort it out is to be pragmatic. Don’t sneer, but don’t get carried away either. Assemble your arguments carefully and make sure they are relevant to Trump’s interests. Make your case when necessary, preferably in private. Find common ground with Trump when you can, without betraying your values or doing something you’ll regret later.
Many leaders will find the prospect of fraternizing with Trump distasteful. But they must grimace and accept it. The alternatives—turning away from the United States or hugging Trump—are worse.
Allied leaders will also need to work closely with other parts of the American system, including Congress, agencies, and the military. And they should work much more closely with each other. Trump is right when he says that many allies have become too dependent on the American security umbrella. They should build their own national capabilities and work with each other to strengthen the liberal international order that Trump denigrates even as it is undermined by Moscow and Beijing. As beneficiaries of that order, America’s allies will need to serve as its bodyguards.
Trump’s plans to make America great again ignore a fundamental pillar of American greatness: its system of global alliances. If he is reelected, allied leaders will need to maintain their autonomy, balance, and perspective. Like everything else in life, the Trump era is over.
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Sources 2/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2024/07/us-allies-donald-trump/678910/ The mention sources can contact us to remove/changing this article |
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