On Sunday, President Donald Trump whipped Colombian President Gustavo Petro into compliance by threatening 25% tariffs on Colombian goods and other economic measures for refusing to accept a U.S. military aircraft carrying illegal migrants whom Trump wanted deported back to Colombia.
The Colombia case provides a glimpse into Trump’s mindset and how he will conduct his foreign policy from now on.
Economic warfare and ‘disabuse others from being tempted’ will be the key tenets of Trump’s playbook for his foreign policy during his second term. And that is a stark difference from the foreign policy approach used by the Biden-Harris team and other previous administrations.
Traditionally, before Trump, Washington has relied on ideology, appeasement, foreign aid and thoughtless use of military power when it came to international relations. This misguided albeit bipartisan approach that guided U.S. statecraft for more than a quarter of a century has made America poorer, less safe and disrespected on the world stage. Moreover, it destabilized some parts of the world, such as the Middle East.
Gone are the days when American servicemen and women will be casually deployed to democratize every nook and cranny of the world and giving their lives for someone else’s freedom. The ultimate realpolitik-minded statesman, Trump adheres to the ‘respect equals fear’ philosophy underpinned by a purely transactional approach. The Donald is not afraid of being perceived as a bully. He seems to prefer it.
Beware Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, the ‘Rocketman’ and the ayatollahs.
To understand Trump’s ‘disabuse others from being tempted’ doctrine, let’s take a look at Russian Czar Peter the Great, who in 1718 tortured to death his own son for allegedly conspiring against him. Seeking to modernize Russia into a European country, Peter in 1698 introduced a tax on beards, to make Russian men look and act more like Westerners.
The Russian authoritarian, who ruled Russia from 1696 until his death in 1725, also issued a series of imperial edicts, which mandated capital punishment conducted publicly for certain crimes, to deter criminal acts. The edict on trade mandated that ‘one merchant is hanged each year to disabuse others from being tempted.’ ‘Trade [in fish, sugar, and gold] is an affair of thieves,’ was the justification used in the decree, implying that everyone involved in trade was a thief, so to reduce theft, others must be deterred by punishing someone publicly.
By executive order, Trump has already put all foreign aid on hold, worldwide, including to Ukraine. Only Israel and Egypt were exempted. He threatened tariffs on China, insisted on buying Greenland, suggested making Canada the 51st state, and told Putin to end his ‘ridiculous’ war in Ukraine or face more sanctions. The bombastic commander in chief warned Hamas and implicitly its backer Iran that ‘all hell will break loose’ if the hostages in Gaza are not released.
All of this rhetoric is intended to unbalance our enemies and make clear that America is serious about its own security and prosperity first. It will no longer lecture Putin how to treat Russians or Xi Jinping how to govern China. But it will unleash the full force of economic warfare, if they don’t fall in compliance.
Trump is also signaling to U.S. partners, such as some NATO members who haven’t fully paid their membership dues, that America will no longer be taken advantage of. He will likely enforce his request that NATO dues are raised to 5% of GDP instead of 2%.
Trump is thinking big. He wants to transform the way America conducts its foreign affairs and even military strategy. Thinking is Trump’s lifelong credo. ‘I like thinking big, I always have. To me, it’s very simple. If you’re going to be thinking anyway, you might as well think big,’ he declared in 1987, well before entering politics, when promoting his book ‘The Art of the Deal.’
What kind of deal Trump will be able to make depends on how well Trump and his team understand how Putin, Xi and the ayatollahs think and what drives them. For most of them, their national interest, goals and ambitions surpass economic concerns. Let’s hope that Team Trump understands how these foreign leaders and their people think. They don’t think like Americans.