Wherever one looks, the United States is ceding ground to China. From foreign aid to foreign trade, and from reorganizations to organizational guidance, the Trump administration has embarked on a stunning effort to hobble itself in grappling with what his own secretary of state calls “the most potent and dangerous near-peer adversary this nation has ever confronted.”
The problems start at the Department of State. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has asserted that “it’s not normal for the world to simply have a unipolar power” and that the world has returned to multipolarity, with “multi-great powers in different parts of the planet” — including China. But although he is right that American dominance is not what it was during the 1990s, when potential challengers lacked the wherewithal to act on their ambitions, he also underrates American advantages. This worldview feeds into President Trump’s inclination to treat Russia and China as equals. Already, there is evidence that the American president believes it is right and proper for Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to exercise hegemony in their respective neighborhoods, which bodes ill for the likes of Ukraine and Taiwan. Why Washington has willingly ceded this bit of rhetorical high ground to Beijing is unclear.
Problems at the State Department, unfortunately, go beyond the rhetorical. At first glance, Rubio’s reorganization of the department is sensible. The agency had undoubtedly grown “bloated, bureaucratic, and unable to perform its essential diplomatic mission,” as the secretary described. There is a logic to his decision to fold functional bureaus into their regional cousins: The greater integration of democracy and human rights concerns into regional policy development could lead to more effective diplomacy, and in some cases it likely will. But the more likely outcome is that values-based concerns, which Rubio mistakenly describes as idealistic rather than geopolitical, will be diluted. Rather than make for a more hard-nosed approached to American foreign policy — one that supposedly prioritizes interests over values — it will hobble America’s ability to shape a world that is safe for democracy and thus for the United States. It will also neuter the one aspect of American foreign policy that Xi perhaps fears more than all others: democracy and human rights promotion.
Rubio’s complicity in the gutting of American foreign aid is likewise an own goal. Certainly, many of the aid initiatives the administration has targeted failed to adequately advance US interests and were overdue for pruning. But for the moment, at least, the Trump administration appears to have thrown the baby out with the bathwater. Foreign aid is a key tool for competing with China for influence in regions that are important to American interests — notably Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America. But rather than pivot to using it effectively, the Trump administration has pivoted to not using it at all. China will benefit, as it will get greater bang for each of its foreign assistance bucks now that the United States has vacated the field.
America’s chief rival likewise benefits from President Trump’s assault on the international trading system. Although he has, for the time being, frozen “Liberation Day” tariffs on all but China, his reckless disregard for the economic health of the United States and for that of America’s overseas trading partners threatens to push those partners into Chinese arms. Already, Japan and South Korea have relaunched trade talks with China and Europeans are considering deeper trade ties with China to diversify away from the United States. It is possible that America’s tariffs on China will reduce Beijing’s economic capacity to compete with the United States. But it is just as likely that the international response to America’s newfound trade nihilism will be to further integrate China into the global trading network, thus boosting Chinese influence and Chinese leverage at America’s expense.
Problems in the Trump administration’s approach to China also extend to the Department of Defense, where Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s bark exceeds DOD’s bite. The new defense secretary may be intent on cosplaying cold warrior — hence his department-wide order that the People’s Republic be referred to as “Communist China” — but theatrics only get you so far.
Some might see DOD as a bright spot. Congress is making progress on a bill that will approve US$11 billion to enhance Pacific deterrence and another US$87 billion on a variety of other areas crucial to maintaining America’s military edge over China. These are positive developments.
But what is known of DOD’s strategy is concerning. According to Washington Post reporting, Secretary Hegseth’s Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance orders the department to focus narrowly on preparing for an invasion of Taiwan and to accept greater risk in other regions. The guidance is based on two beguiling but faulty assumptions: first, that the primary Eurasian theaters (Europe, the Indo-Pacific, and the Middle East) are politically distinct. They are not. Peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific, and at home in the United State, is not possible if war and disorder characterize the other major theaters.
The second errant assumption is that US vital interests are not at play outside of the Indo-Pacific. But of course, they are. The United States has a deep and abiding economic and security interests in developments in Europe and the Middle East and will find it difficult to sit idly by if turmoil mounts. Indeed, Hegseth’s approach will encourage China to midwife that turmoil, with the aim of forcing the United States to disperse its forces — should his plans be carried out, narrowly tailored to fight in the Pacific and ill-prepared for contingencies elsewhere — and thus dilute American power.
Put simply, this latest attempt at a pivot to Asia and the Trump administration’s approaches to trade, aid, and diplomacy threaten to cede the rest of the world to China. It is a choice that America will soon come to regret.
Michael Mazza is a senior director at the Institute for Indo-Pacific Security (formerly the Project 2049 Institute) and a senior non-resident fellow at the Global Taiwan Institute.
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