Donald Trump’s bruising return to the White House has sent many longtime foreign allies scrambling to get their distance, and according to a new piece from The Atlantic, that distance will last long after Trump is gone.
Trump’s second term as president has been marked by notable and widespread disrespect toward nations once seen as close U.S. allies. Between his attempts to level massive tariffs against nearly every nation in the world and his frequent breaches of diplomatic norms, Trump has created a hostile global environment in which allies no longer feel safe trusting in the stability of the U.S.
In a new piece for The Atlantic on Tuesday, staff writer Vivian Salama argued that this new dynamic, in which the nations of the world are working to establish a safe distance from the U.S., is bound to become the new normal for years to come, even after Trump leaves office and is potentially replaced by a more traditional, dependable administration.
Because it’s not trump.
The whole damned US framework facilitated this little shitheel. And its shown you are not to be trusted, and unfit to operate on an international stage
The end of an empire ?
Delegating your security to any other country, like much of the world has done for decades with the US, is never a good idea. Europe did this after WW2 because so much of it was destroyed by war. Allowing the US to continue as their sugar daddy for so long is at least partially on them. Canada is feeling the sting of this too right now.
If a country can’t provide for most of its own needs in terms of goods, services and energy, it has no real sovereignty.
Look at him salute. He’s an embarrassment and no one has the courage to tell him to stop saluting like a drunkard. Plus it’s a disrespect to the military and I’m not even a military guy.
The average American citizen wont understand or care about this, and yet I do imagine there are pretty negative long term implications for them, along with all the other garbage being piled onto them.
I brought up that the cost of diesel has gone up massively (particularly at the start of the Iran conflict) and has started to rapidly balloon again to a co-worker at my 2nd job said he did not care about the price of diesel because he doesn’t use diesel…
I carefully explained to him that everything is shipped over land is using diesel and this will cause the price of everything to go up and he pushed back again saying “Well everything is going up in price anyway.” Its like dude WTF do you even do with people like this? I did not even touch on the expense of using heavy construction and farming machinery also increasing costs of everything…
He described himself once as someone who agrees with democrats on social issues but thinks republicans are better on the economy and I internally was like DUUUUDE THIS IS THE FUCKING REPUBLICAN ECONOMY RIGHT NOW YOU FUCKING TROGLODYTE AAAHAHHAHAHA WE FUCKING DESERVVVVE THIIIIIIIISSSS.
I always knew conservatives (regressives) would destroy America. I just didn’t think it would be so fast and so aggressively stupid.
In 2000, the Simpson’s episode “Bart to the Future” predicted a Trump presidency that left the economy in shambles for Lisa. It’s funny how mild it’s foreboding prediction when compared to what his actual presidency has become. I realize his support is tanking, but it’s still way too high, specially for a now severely compromised federal system.
America First? America Alone.
In the end, the world will thank Trump for freeing them from American shackles. I hope that this is the beginning of the end of US dominance.
You deserve it for by ing an evil empire
The only permanent aspect of politics is that nothing is permanent. In the modern age it seems to mean 2-10 years
The only way we can even begin to fix this is if the entire Trump crime family & their enablers are indicted & incarcerated. The entire cabinet belongs in prison or in RFK Jr’s case, executed for innumerable counts of Depraved Heart Murder.
No. Trump is just a symptom .
We desperately need the US Empire to fall. They lead war all around the world for decades and most conflicts are born from them or our two precedent empires : Russian and English.
They simply have too much power and absolutely 0 ethic.
As an American, won’t the US falling affect us too?
Will affect the whole world and, of course, people living in the US first.
I’m not saying that lightly. I live upstairs (Canada) and we would be highly impacted too.
Yet, I’m persuaded the US empire will and should fall. We need to move away from neo liberalism or we’ll simply all die and/or live miserable lives. AI, ecology, war, choose your poison.
Be careful what you wish for.
We desperately need the US Empire to fall.
I dunno, like I see where this is coming from, and partially even would agree, but the power vacuum would also be disastrous.
…and personally I’d just like to know what the hell to do about it in the grand scheme of things, so me and the rest of my peasant family and the rest of us aren’t stuck suffering and holding the entire bill on account of a handful of monsters bent on ruining the world.
A reminder to study how people pushed through the collapse of their homelands in the past…
Edit: lmao at the downvote like “you aren’t people, USAmerican, get fked 🖕” LOL
Yeah, I feel you.
If there is ONE thing I can give to Trump, it’s that he’s preparing the world for it.
He’s destroying NATO as it exists, ruining the petrol dollar, destroying the US soft power world-wide. I don’t think anyone did more for EV and solar than him the last year…
But yeah, it will be a mess. From my pov, the natural filler would be China. It as pros, it has cons. EU could gain a lot too but I really fear they won’t have the wisdom to move away enough to net get caught by the blast.
We’ll see I guess ^^
At least from my perspective there is a big party that said they are on board with it so there need to happen a lot of things but going back to have America so deeply integrated should never be done.
After WW2 the us wanted Germany to not be armed and now they complain. America wanted eu not be armed. Now to say we are abusing usa? NA there is a lot of stuff you guys need to change but I’m the meantime we need to get rid of our dependence and cut some ties.
No argument here. I think the EU was stupid for allowing any of this to continue this long. Those ties should have been cut in 2016.
At the same time, you’re very much about to have your own set of fash problems between Ruzzia, the AfD, Meloni & LePen. Good luck.
It’s like this. No shade to Americans, but you guys can do this shit in any four year period. You elected him TWICE.
No hard feelings, but you’re on your own.
IDK where you are typing this from, but far-right populism is surging in the EU and some other parts of the world.
In other words, you aren’t wrong, but take the situation more as a warning for yourself. Take a hard look in your own back yard, with wide eyes.
The fact that the rest of the world isn’t perfect, doesn’t change the fact that the rule of law in the USA is completely dead and presidents can now do whatever they want.
You are right about the far-right in the EU, but
- EU is not one country and has a lot of institutions, that is a huge weakness when you need to react to a changing world, but in that context it’s actually helping (people might get disappointed with far-left in some parts of EU, before other parts will fully adopt it), and even if Nazi admirers take over more than half of EU countries, it’s enough for one with veto powers to make their life extremely difficult.
- A lot of “far-right” in the EU seems to be promoted by ruzzia and now also by the US big tech (twitter is owned by Nazi, Facebook found that hate sells better than other emotions) and the US government does what they can do to block any effort by the EU to control them. So basically cutting ties with the US can help with this
I’m in Australia, and yes, far right idiocy happens here too. But in this country our electoral system keeps the wackos contained. We have compulsory preferential voting. Elections here are decided by the middle, not the extremities.
That’s what we thought too…
Our two electoral systems couldn’t be more different. For a start in ours the politicians aren’t allowed to draw electoral boundaries.
We all thought our constitution had some pretty good checks and balances too. But boy…money talks
Those mostly turned out to just be gentleman’s agreements. As an Americsn, it seems Australia and other countries may have actually put these things into laws with consequences. Sounds nice
Ah, the cockiness.
US also has laws and this administration simply ignores, because there’s no one to enforce them. The reason for it is that people who could enforce them are either on board with the new world order or are blackmailed, the ones that would stop it were purged from the government during DOGE stage (they likely also found more blackmail material, through use of LLM).
It is crazy what can be done with help of foreign governments and the richest people on earth.
They are interested in changing the world not just the US, seems like biggest attention right now is put on Germany and France, but this effort is placed everywhere.
People born in a democracy take it for granted as if this is something inevitable, when in reality democracy is very fragile and requires constant work to blossom.
Thinking “we are safe” is how it happened in US, Hungary, Poland, Turkey. And historically Weimar Republic was a democracy until Hitler took over.
No constitution can protect you from voting for an absolute buffoon.
The constitution is a piece of paper. It’s the ones in power that enforce it, and you gave all the power to a clown.
In our case, it’s not the constitution. It’s a result of long running electoral reform. in essence, political parties nor politicians can fuck with the electoral system nor boundaries. It’s run by an independent commission. Parties are welcome to make a submission suggesting change, evenake a case for change, but if it doesn’t match the set criteria, they get shut down. Unlike your states who can redraw boundaries to pick their voters.
But in this country our electoral system keeps the wackos contained
does it ? As an Australian i’d call this take woefully misguided. We elect an endless litany of wackos and nut jobs.
For example, many pundits are suggesting an ONP electoral win and we have our wackos in Government including the LNP.
Remember those asshats holding a lump of coal and laughing about the outcome for the Pacific Islands? we elected one of them as Prime Minister, the same one that then shit in France’s pocket, like Trump is doing to his “friends”
Our talk on immigration is as tough as the US BUT its across ALP, LNO and ONP so most voters are obviously Ok with it, we place refugees in off shore detention centres, many commiting suicide, like the much maligned Alligator Alcatraz in the US. The ALP has literally said they are going to hunt down visa overstayers, like ICE do in the US now. Our phones can be searched anywhere, Americans are in horror about phone searched at the border that’s just a small sample.
the only difference is the size of the stage, ours is insignificant in the world and no one pays any attention, (including apparently Australians) to our endless hate and stupidity.
As to our electoral system, calling bullshit on that, the US has primaries where they vote on candidates and have some say, we have precisely zero choice in that respect. The US has the state base electoral college, that supposed to be there stop big states bullying smaller states by having more representatives ie more people = more votes (aka democracy), we have something similar with our senate having the same number of senators for each state, Tassie (with less population then the the Gold Coast) having the same number of senators as NSW. They do have issues over donor contributions (PACs etc) but so do we, who do you think is bank rolling the ONP? The Greens have long warned of this (and climate change) and been ignored by voters.
We are not good, we’re a petro state hell bent on destroying the planet with our greed and most everything we do makes Australia and the world a worse place.
That’s a positive, but IMO the fundamental issue is engagement-driven social media stoking extremist populism. If voters radicalize, especially in one direction, no voting system will protect you from that.
We… well, I was gonna was we realized it too late in the US, but we never really figured it out, and now we never will.
You folks need to neuter US social media as fast as you can. Cut the undersea cables, if you have to.
But in this country our electoral system keeps the wackos contained.
For now, but far right ideology shouldn’t be contained, it should be quashed. The US is a great example of what happens when it isn’t.
Also, the rise in far right ideologies across multiple countries should be a global concern. If one country under fascist control can cause significant damage to Australia imagine the effect of 4 or 5 scattered across the world.
Can’thappen here, also what we thought.
Thanks for the tip, but get your own house in order before lecturing everyone else. To date, we are good.
To date, we are good.
This is dangerous thinking. This is exactly what I’m talking about.
Complacency and overconfidence is precisely how fascism rises, historically.
Don’t be proud, be afraid. Look at the tire fires overseas as motivation to squash the embers in Australia now. Your election system alone will not protect you from it.
but far-right populism is surging in the EU and some other parts of the world.
Why is the typical American response always “No U!” ?
The problem is not that Republicans are far-right. Nowhere in the article does it say former allies are distancing themselves because of the far-right in America. The problem is the actions of the administration: a single person constantly threatening allies, tearing up agreements from previous administrations just because, tearing up agreements from his own administration just because, and zero resistance from the other branches of government or the citizens for doing so.
Former allies are distancing themselves because the word of the US means absolutely nothing. It doesn’t matter what they promise, the US has shown no deal or agreement will ever be honored, and there are no mechanisms in place to make sure previous agreements are honored. Why would anyone make a deal with someone who will ignore it the next day?
It’s typical American learned helplessness: “The far right exists everywhere in the world so there’s nothing we can do about it.”
That is precisely the opposite of what I meant.
Ideology is what gives Trump the power to do what he wants, what put him there, what enables him and stokes him. He is a symptom.
I am arguing the exact opposite; not that there is nothing that can be done, but that other countries should take the exact opposite approach the US took and take immediate, drastic action before it’s too late.
I did not mean to drag specific US politics into this at all, but to use it as an example when one assumes their country is on a better trajectory than it actually is. The EU is not in a good place, Australia and Canada are not on good trajectories, and if they don’t act as if they are one election away from populist fascism, other countries will find themselves with leaders trashing alliances, too.
In other words:
This article ^ could be your future.
If you’re confident your voter base is “above that,” you should take a closer look.
I did not mean to drag specific US politics into this at all,
Which is part of my issue. The article is specifically about US politics, and you don’t want to talk about US politics, instead you go on a tangent about other countries.
A contributing factor to the issues in the US is that Americans seem to be unable to stay on topic about anything long enough to take action. Trump does something that would have ended the political career of any other president, but before anything is done about it you’re taking about the next thing, and then the next thing, and the first thing is already forgotten.
Here we are talking about the impact of the actions the US government is currently taking, and Americans start taking about how other countries might start doing it in the future. On another article that was about a far right party in another country I saw Americans talking about “all the people who told us to take action…” Making it about America. It’s never about the actual topic.
Yes, I realize it’s “not all Americans”, but it is “always an American”. And I don’t mean when it happens it’s an America doing it, I mean every time an article is posted about the shitstorm happening in the US there is always an American pointing out that the far right exist elsewhere. It gets so fucking old and it isn’t helpful. People know. Pointing out the nightmare happening in the US does not mean people are unaware of the far right in their own countries, and talking about what is happening in the US is more helpful to encourage people to prevent it happening in their own countries because they can see where it leads.
I was responding to this comment:
It’s like this. No shade to Americans, but you guys can do this shit in any four year period. You elected him TWICE. No hard feelings, but you’re on your own.
I see this “it’s not the same here” attitude a lot, because it is. I think it’s dangerous to write it off as “America did this to themselves,” like the same thing isn’t in progress all over the globe.
I’m specifically not trying to belittle other places, or look down upon them; I have no leg to stand on. I am trying to WARN them to not get comfortable. I am yelling “this exact same shit is cooking in Canada, and Australia, the EU, all over the world, so burn it out with fire while you can.”
They re-elect him every day they sit on their asses and allow MAGA to feel safe in public. PLENTY of shade.
It’s not even Trump, they gave him the Congress and Senate too. They REALLY went all in on the Republicans for some fucked up reason.
You’re right, we need a lot of reform.
You’re not wrong to feel that way and you’re not wrong that it is a common opinion, specifically among Europeans. That said, I don’t think your politicians are nearly principled enough to stick to that stance. Some of them say it now because people want to hear it but the moment it becomes less awkward to do so they’ll go back to relying on America for all sorts of things that you don’t want them to. Hell, many of them won’t even make an attempt to distance themselves now, or worse, actively praise many of Trump’s actions.
The ones that make a fuss now won’t go back because of American exceptionalism but because it is economically in their interest to do so in a myriad of ways. This is why Europe has been content to rely on American military assets for so many decades. It was never a particularly good idea but it was economically expedient. The same is true of American media, tech companies, and financial institutions. It’s easier to let someone else have a bit of control in order to simplify things and politicians love simple sounding solutions.
Maybe I’m wrong and this is the moment that the EU usurps the US for good. That’s probably the best case outcome. I just don’t think there’s enough agreement between European nations on what needs to happen to get to that point in order for it to become a reality.
There is a great deal in what you say that I heartily agree with, and a few things that I don’t. I’m not European, although I do visit annually, so I have no horse in that race.
I would say that you repeat a tired American trope that has been outdated for at least 35 years now. That Europe gets more out of the NATO than America does.
The US gets a great deal out of NATO, arguably all lot more than Europe gets. For a start, the US has 31 permamant military bases across Europe and free access to another 19 hosted by member countries. It doesn’t really need to ask permission on how it operates on any of them. It also maintains another 275 smaller units and installations for free. This is not a one-way deal for Europe. For the US, a country that insists on projecting power to influence national policy objectives, the ability to operate like this is incredible. Does it pay rent? No. Does it seek agreement with the host country? No. It bombs first and informs later.
Secondly, wherever possible it forces US military hardware onto European countries by way of ‘interoperability’. Those F35s provide jobs for US workers. Same with parts, same bombs and weapon systems. All that hard cash flows back to the US. There is a reason why US administrations bitch and moan about Europe not pulling it’s weight on NATO but still won’t pull out of the region. It’s because the US gets a massive indirect benefit from the deal.
But what does Europe get in return? It’s supposed to be security guarantees. But the only country that has triggered NATO’s Article Five has been the US following 9/11. Hundreds of Europeans died in defence of what happened in far-off New York. Not that this has been appreciated by Trump.
Lastly, the biggest threat to Europe is Putin. And what has been the US response? Not great. All of Europe has been watching and wondering has all this been worth it. The one reason Europe has been tolerating America taking over much of its foreign policy is for a security trade-off. Now it seems the arrangement is worthless.
I’m not European, but I’m watching events. Nothing dramatic will happen in the short term. Spain cancelled it’s F35 contract. European countries have universally increased their defence budgets, not from US pressure, but from the realisation that security is unlikely to arrive from America. Countries have failed to support the US openly. First time since WW2. The whole world turned their back on the stupid Iran war. Things have changed irrevocably. However, they will only visibly change over time. You guys are sleepwalking into isolation.
Let’s revisit the subject in 10 years and see how things have turned out?
I appreciate your response both in quality and in tone. Thanks for that.
To be clear, I never meant to imply that the US gets nothing out of NATO. It is clear that we do for the reasons you mentioned and countless others. I was simply saying, in much the same way you did, that EU nations allowed that situation to exist because spending less on defense was good for them domestically in an economic sense. It was not a good decision beyond the short term from a security perspective unless the US could be guaranteed to be a righteous actor forever and that is obviously not something that can ever be guaranteed. Treaties and alliances are great. Dependence is not.
It is true that some countries have taken action to distance themselves from the US under Trump. It is also true that many of the citizens of the EU want their governments to take more action on that front. As an American, I would rather the EU lead the world in most respects as I trust most of their governmental systems to represent their people better than ours does.
Still, money rules the world and the US has a lot of it. Greed is a powerful motivator and I would bet that it is going to entice a lot of European politicians to make unpopular deals with the US and it’s corporate representatives under the next administration. Despite the EU as a whole better representing it’s people there are still too many instances of their governments manipulating or outright ignoring popular sentiments for me to believe that something like sidelining the US is within the realm of possibility, even if most of their citizens wanted to do so.
As a last note I would add that I believe eliminating reliance on the US is something the EU absolutely should do as much as possible. It is the only reasonable answer to the insanity taking place in our government. Nothing I’ve said should discourage action towards that goal. I’m just trying to be realistic about how I see that playing out.
Great reply!
Putin
this is exactly what putin wants, plus hes pretty much bankrolling most of eus far right gonvernments, to this end. needs a divisive west, so he cant take over former soviet bloc with much resistance.
As long as china, india doesnt get in his way, and they dont seem to mind that russia is a useful tool for them.
the global historical situation, does feel a bit like [we the world] obiwan wailing at the birth of darth vader, “you were supposed to be the chosen one”, [at america] where the hope was.
maybe we should cease looking for a strongman saviour on the international/global stage, as well as domestically/nationally.
[ happen to be playing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyO08j_JEps while writing this. ]
… anyway, that’d be foolish to think it something special and unique to Trump. He’s their boy. Puppet does its job.
even after Trump leaves office and is potentially replaced by a more traditional, dependable administration
and wont that be a pleasant placatium to passify the people [in USA?~ agnotological inducement deep enough into insular oblivion sufficient to not be aware that; in the rest of the world?~ no. like the article’s main point. But the people there wont likely be sufficiently aware… and so the injustice machine that is the military industrial complex shall continue. unless… … unless… that “unless” is so tenuously thin now. c’mon americans, you can do it… ]
Designed by the bastard Muscovites and used by the MAGA circus. Throw in Project 2025 too.
