Trump
reveals what he wants for the world
The
National Security Strategy, which presidents usually release once each term,
offers a formal statement of U.S. global priorities.
By Nahal
Toosi
12/05/2025
03:22 AM EST
President
Donald Trump intends for the U.S. to keep a bigger military presence in the
Western Hemisphere going forward to battle migration, drugs and the rise of
adversarial powers in the region, according to his new National Security
Strategy.
The
33-page document is a rare formal explanation of Trump’s foreign policy
worldview by his administration. Such strategies, which presidents typically
release once each term, can help shape how parts of the U.S. government
allocate budgets and set policy priorities.
The Trump
National Security Strategy, which the White House quietly released Thursday,
has some brutal words for Europe, suggesting it is in civilizational decline,
and pays relatively little attention to the Middle East and Africa.
It has an
unusually heavy focus on the Western Hemisphere that it casts as largely about
protecting the U.S. homeland. It says “border security is the primary element
of national security” and makes veiled references to China’s efforts to gain
footholds in America’s backyard.
“The
United States must be preeminent in the Western Hemisphere as a condition of
our security and prosperity — a condition that allows us to assert ourselves
confidently where and when we need to in the region,” the document states. “The
terms of our alliances, and the terms upon which we provide any kind of aid,
must be contingent on winding down adversarial outside influence — from control
of military installations, ports, and key infrastructure to the purchase of
strategic assets broadly defined.”
The
document describes such plans as part of a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe
Doctrine. The latter is the notion set forth by President James Monroe in 1823
that the U.S. will not tolerate malign foreign interference in its own
hemisphere.
Trump’s
paper, as well as a partner document known as the National Defense Strategy,
have faced delays in part because of debates in the administration over
elements related to China. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent pushed for some
softening of the language about Beijing, according to two people familiar with
the matter who were granted anonymity to describe internal deliberations.
Bessent is currently involved in sensitive U.S. trade talks with China, and
Trump himself is wary of the delicate relations with Beijing.
The new
National Security Strategy says the U.S. has to make challenging choices in the
global realm. “After the end of the Cold War, American foreign policy elites
convinced themselves that permanent American domination of the entire world was
in the best interests of our country. Yet the affairs of other countries are
our concern only if their activities directly threaten our interests,” the
document states.
In an
introductory note to the strategy, Trump called it a “roadmap to ensure that
America remains the greatest and most successful nation in human history, and
the home of freedom on earth.”
But Trump
is mercurial by nature, so it’s hard to predict how closely or how long he will
stick to the ideas laid out in the new strategy. A surprising global event
could redirect his thinking as well, as it has done for recent presidents from
George W. Bush to Joe Biden.
Still,
the document appears in line with many of the moves he’s taken in his second
term, as well as the priorities of some of his aides.
That
includes deploying significantly more U.S. military prowess to the Western
Hemisphere, taking numerous steps to reduce migration to America, pushing for a
stronger industrial base in the U.S. and promoting “Western identity,”
including in Europe.
The
strategy even nods to so-called traditional values at times linked to the
Christian right, saying the administration wants “the restoration and
reinvigoration of American spiritual and cultural health” and “an America that
cherishes its past glories and its heroes.” It mentions the need to have
“growing numbers of strong, traditional families that raise healthy children.”
As
POLITICO has reported before, the strategy spends an unusual amount of space on
Latin America, the Caribbean and other U.S. neighbors. That’s a break with past
administrations, who tended to prioritize other regions and other topics, such
as taking on major powers like Russia and China or fighting terrorism.
The Trump
strategy suggests the president’s military buildup in the Western Hemisphere is
not a temporary phenomenon. (That buildup, which has included controversial
military strikes against boats allegedly carrying drugs, has been cast by the
administration as a way to fight cartels. But the administration also hopes the
buildup could help pressure Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro to step down.)
The
strategy also specifically calls for “a more suitable Coast Guard and Navy
presence to control sea lanes, to thwart illegal and other unwanted migration,
to reduce human and drug trafficking, and to control key transit routes in a
crisis.”
The
strategy says the U.S. should enhance its relationships with governments in
Latin America, including working with them to identify strategic resources — an
apparent reference to materials such as rare earth minerals. It also declares
that the U.S. will partner more with the private sector to promote “strategic
acquisition and investment opportunities for American companies in the region.”
Such
business-related pledges, at least on a generic level, could please many Latin
American governments who have long been frustrated by the lack of U.S.
attention to the region. It’s unclear how such promises square with Trump’s
insistence on imposing tariffs on America’s trade partners, however.
The
National Security Strategy spends a fair amount of time on China, though it
often doesn’t mention Beijing directly. Many U.S. lawmakers — on a bipartisan
basis — consider an increasingly assertive China the gravest long-term threat
to America’s global power. But while the language the Trump strategy uses is
tough, it is careful and far from inflammatory.
The
administration promises to “rebalance America’s economic relationship with
China, prioritizing reciprocity and fairness to restore American economic
independence.”
But it
also says “trade with China should be balanced and focused on non-sensitive
factors” and even calls for “maintaining a genuinely mutually advantageous
economic relationship with Beijing.”
The
strategy says the U.S. wants to prevent war in the Indo-Pacific — a nod to
growing tensions in the region, including between China and U.S. allies such as
Japan and the Philippines.
“We will
also maintain our longstanding declaratory policy on Taiwan, meaning that the
United States does not support any unilateral change to the status quo in the
Taiwan Strait,” it states. That may come as a relief to Asia watchers who worry
Trump will back away from U.S. support for Taiwan as it faces ongoing threats
from China.
The
document states that “it is a core interest of the United States to negotiate
an expeditious cessation of hostilities in Ukraine,” and to mitigate the risk
of Russian confrontation with other countries in Europe.
But
overall it pulls punches when it comes to Russia — there’s very little
criticism of Moscow.
Instead,
it reserves some of its harshest remarks for U.S.-allied nations in Europe. In
particular, the administration, in somewhat veiled terms, knocks European
efforts to rein in far-right parties, calling such moves political censorship.
“The
Trump administration finds itself at odds with European officials who hold
unrealistic expectations for the [Ukraine] war perched in unstable minority
governments, many of which trample on basic principles of democracy to suppress
opposition,” the strategy states.
The
strategy also appears to suggest that migration will fundamentally change
European identity to a degree that could hurt U.S. alliances.
“Over the
long term, it is more than plausible that within a few decades at the latest,
certain NATO members will become majority non-European,” it states. “As such,
it is an open question whether they will view their place in the world, or
their alliance with the United States, in the same way as those who signed the
NATO charter.”
Still,
the document acknowledges Europe’s economic and other strengths, as well as how
America’s partnership with much of the continent has helped the U.S. “Not only
can we not afford to write Europe off — doing so would be self-defeating for
what this strategy aims to achieve,” it says.
“Our goal
should be to help Europe correct its current trajectory,” it says.
Trump’s
first-term National Security Strategy focused significantly on the U.S.
competition with Russia and China, but the president frequently undercut it by
trying to gain favor with the leaders of those nuclear powers.
If this
new strategy proves a better reflection of what Trump himself actually
believes, it could help other parts of the U.S. government adjust, not to
mention foreign governments.
As Trump
administration documents often do, the strategy devotes significant space to
praising the commander-in-chief. It describes him as the “President of Peace”
while favorably stating that he “uses unconventional diplomacy.”
The
strategy struggles at times to tamp down what seem like inconsistencies. It
says the U.S. should have a high bar for foreign intervention, but it also says
it wants to “prevent the emergence of dominant adversaries.”
It also
essentially dismisses the ambitions of many smaller countries. “The outsized
influence of larger, richer, and stronger nations is a timeless truth of
international relations,” the strategy states.
The
National Security Strategy is the first of several important defense and
foreign policy papers the Trump administration is due to release. They include
the National Defense Strategy, whose basic thrust is expected to be similar.
Presidents’
early visions for what the National Security Strategy should mention have at
times had to be discarded due to events.
After the
9/11 attacks, George W. Bush’s first-term strategy ended up focusing heavily on
battling Islamist terrorism. Biden’s team spent much of its first year working
on a strategy that had to be rewritten after Russia moved toward a full-scale
invasion of Ukraine.
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