Bob Beck's Foreign Policy Blog

Praise in public, criticize in private has been a core precept of good management practices for years. Based on the scene in the White House Oval Office on 28 February, it is clear that neither President Trump nor Vice President Vance subscribe to that theory. Instead, they metaphorically body slammed — a la World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) — President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine in front of a stunned world press corps. 

Using the WWE analogy is not spurious, however, as Trump and Vance virtually tag teamed the Ukrainian leader, viciously admonishing him for his putative lack of gratitude for previous American largesse and for his perceived reluctance to seek peace with Russia. For his part, Zelensky, speaking a language he’s still learning, played the lonely foil to the Trump/Vance duo, in the process suffering a rhetorical pounding of theatrical proportions. To complete the public humiliation, the Ukrainian president was banished from the ring, summarily turned out of the White House to lick his wounds.

While the WWE is not real, merely entertainment, what transpired in the Oval Office on 28 February was sadly quite genuine. Furthermore, it was the latest, and most blatant, in a series of actions by the new administration in the international arena that have simply shocked the world. The President’s repeated rebuke of Zelensky over his “lack of cards” is indicative of the administration’s world view.  Ukraine actually still does possess some cards — courage, defense of freedom, fighting at home, resisting an autocratic aggressor, support from most of Europe, and technological innovation, to name a few.  The U.S. president, in contrast, appears to value different cards — public shaming, an aversion to facts, sycophantic loyalty, and above all power, preferably of the autocratic variety. 

From cutting virtually all US foreign aid to withdrawing from the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Agreement to threatening territorial aggrandizement in our hemisphere to proposing the unlawful displacement of two million Palestinians, Trump 2.0 has announced its presence with maleficent determination.  By riding roughshod over potential adversaries, erstwhile allies, and international organizations the Trump administration has modified Make America Great Again in the foreign policy realm to Make Everybody Hate Us. In fact, it could be strongly argued that the only countries that still view Washington favorably are Russia, Hungary, and Israel.

Speaking of Moscow, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the United States is now firmly on the side of the Russians in the current conflict in Eastern Europe.  If that assumption is correct, expect Washington to either freeze or cut off U.S. support to Kyiv in the near future.  The great unknowns in this scenario are why we have ostensibly changed horses mid-stream and what the Trump administration will receive from the Kremlin in exchange for throwing the Ukrainians under the proverbial Russian bus. Regardless of Trump’s proclamations of Tsar Vladimir (I want to be) the great’s peaceful intentions, Russian actions over the past dozen years confirm the country’s revanchist designs. 

Pursuit of international policies of revenge may lift the spirits of the Trump faithful in the short term. The verbal beatdowns, threats, and coercive tactics employed will in the medium to long term, however, only weaken America as the fear they engender across the globe will mutate into dangerous loathing. Among our heretofore allies in Europe, for which Trump has particular disdain, moves are already afoot to move away from the alliance with Washington.  As Kaja Kallas, the European Union (EU) foreign policy chief, commented after the Trump/Vance/Zelensky meltdown, “The free world needs a new leader.” Her words and criticism from other EU leaders may ring hollow in Trump’s world, but they signal a stark realization that America can no longer be trusted.

More importantly, by alienating an overwhelming majority of the global citizenry, the administration risks a level of geopolitical isolation that will be difficult to escape. The country that stands to gain the most from Trump’s “might makes right” worldview is China, as much of the vacuum caused by America’s global retrenchment will be filled by Beijing. The Middle Kingdom, our primarily global competitor, will logically gain new partners from Washington’s former network of alliances, particularly in Europe, no doubt increasing China’s power vis-a-vis the United States.

Of comparable salience, when in the future Washington faces a serious threat to its interests abroad — and at some point it will — and needs support from former allies, one can anticipate that our one-time associates will tell us to “pound sand.”  Thus the likely endgame of the Trumpian foreign policy of America First will more aptly resemble America Alone.

Note: This article was published on 6 March by the Brattleboro Reformer and on 13 March by the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript.