The Trump doctrine: A new Gilded Age of trade tariffs and territorial expansion

It has been a week of whirlwind and whiplash in President Donald Trump’s Washington, highlighted by two ostensibly opposite actions.

First, he imposed tariffs on America’s top trading partners in a muscular demonstration of U.S. power in the world; then came an order for U.S. Agency for International Development employees – the people who run U.S. emergency relief, health, education, and conflict-resolution programs worldwide – to return home within 30 days.

An assertion of international power, and then a retrenchment. But they are less contradictory than they might seem.

For Mr. Trump made it clear this week that they are both facets of a single, radically altered vision of America’s relationship with the world – abandoning foreign policy principles embraced by Democratic and Republican administrations for the past eight decades.

Gone, the president hopes, will be the “rules-based international order” largely built and led by the United States ever since World War II. Gone, too, will be the core assumption that America’s interests are best served by working with its foreign allies to promote shared security, democracy, development, and free trade.

And in their place?

Mr. Trump has been explicit about his favorite epoch: America’s muscle-flexing “Gilded Age” of the late 1800s and early 1900s, when William McKinley was president.

That era bore two major hallmarks: steep trade tariffs to protect U.S. companies and promote industrialization, and territorial expansion. Washington acquired a range of new possessions in McKinley’s time, including Puerto Rico, Guam, the Philippines, and Hawaii.

AP/File

William McKinley, seen in this undated photo, was elected U.S. president in 1897 and 1901. Donald Trump appears to be modeling his presidency on McKinley's.

Both aspects of the McKinley legacy were on show this week in Washington.

First came Mr. Trump’s standoff with two of America’s key trading partners, Canada and Mexico – prompted by his imposition of 25% tariffs. The White House, in a McKinley-esque flourish, described this move as part of “Donald Trump’s Golden Age.”

Mr. Trump and both of America’s neighbors did find a way to retreat from the brink, putting a potential trade war on hold for at least 30 days. World markets will hope that compromise can be replicated before next Monday, when China is due to take retaliatory moves against Mr. Trump’s new 10% tariff on imports from Beijing.

There have also been signs that Mr. Trump is tempted by the idea of expanding U.S. territory.

In recent days, he has mentioned his desire to exert U.S. control over the island of Greenland, an autonomous territory that is part of NATO ally Denmark; to reclaim U.S. ownership of the Panama Canal; and to see Canada join the U.S. as its 51st state.

On all these fronts, he has made it clear tariffs will be his weapon of choice. “Tariffs are very powerful, both economically and in getting everything else you want,” he told reporters.

And this week, he used a White House news conference to add to the territorial wish list. He proposed that the U.S. should take “long-term ownership” of the devastated Gaza Strip, move out its 2 million Palestinians, and build a glittering “Riviera of the Middle East.”

The question now is what Mr. Trump’s embrace of a “McKinley 2.0” vision of America’s role in the world will mean in practice: for Washington’s own interests, for the decades-old international order he would like to override, and for Washington’s rivals and allies overseas.

Among the allies, one change is already evident.

John Locher/AP

Demonstrators protest against the Trump administration near the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas.

There is a growing recognition that they can no longer rely on their record of partnership with America, on an assumption of shared aims and values, or even on written agreements, to keep relations on an even keel.

The sharpest wake-up call was sounded by Mr. Trump’s tariff move against Canada and Mexico, countries that are not only closely intertwined with the U.S. economy, but also co-signatories of a free trade agreement that he, himself, negotiated in his first term.

But there may be practical limits to how deeply the president can reorder America’s relationship with the rest of the world – not least because the world is a very different place than it was when President McKinley occupied the White House.

It is far more interconnected economically. Producing almost anything, anywhere, requires resources and components that cannot be found within the borders of any one country, even America.

That may well have nudged Mr. Trump toward compromise this week in a tariff war that was clearly going to harm the American economy.

And while major powers such as America and China still compete directly, there are other sources of wealth and power: the European Union, for instance, and rising economies in the Global South.

All have an interest in avoiding head-on conflict with America. But they have also formed regional trade groups that, increasingly, are broadening economic ties with one another.

That does not seem likely to overcome Mr. Trump’s preference for unilateral action over international engagement in remaking U.S. foreign policy.

It was on dramatic display this week with the sudden withdrawal of U.S. aid personnel, and the president’s startling proposal – uncoordinated with any Mideast allies – to redevelop the Gaza Strip.

In the vacuum left by a U.S. retreat, however, other powers could take the opportunity to step in.

And, perhaps, none more eagerly than China.