Soon after the 2024 election and months before he took office, the foreign policy priorities of President Donald Trump‘s second term began to take shape.

Noting Trump’s irredentist designs on reclaiming the Panama Canal, his revanchist lust for wresting Greenland away from Denmark, and his fantasies about making Canada the 51st state, a wag at the New York Post dubbed Trump’s dreams of the United States dominating the Western Hemisphere “The ‘Donroe Doctrine,” a portmanteau giving a nod to former President James Monroe.

As any high school teacher or artificial intelligence assistant on the internet can tell you, in his 1823 State of the Union address, Monroe effectively declared the Americas a U.S. sphere of influence. Monroe further warned that any attempt by a foreign power “to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere would be considered dangerous to our peace and safety.”

The Trump administration’s new National Security Strategy, released on Dec. 5 in a sharp departure from the past, takes Monroe’s “stay out of our backyard” warning and cranks it up to 11, calling for a “stable and well-governed” Western Hemisphere that “prevents and discourages” mass migration to the U.S., cooperates in fighting drug cartels, and “remains free of hostile foreign incursion or ownership of key assets.”

“We want to ensure our continued access to key strategic locations,” the 32-page manifesto says. “In other words, we will assert and enforce a ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine.”

The new strategy has no force other than to serve as a mission statement outlining the administration’s guiding philosophy in dealing with the rest of the world.

Nevertheless, it realigns Trump’s “America First” policy into an “Americas First” policy, demoting China from the status of a “pacing threat” to a “key economic and geopolitical” competitor, while declaring border security as “the primary element of national security.”

“We must protect our country from invasion, not just from unchecked migration but from cross-border threats such as terrorism, drugs, espionage, and human trafficking,” the strategy says.

The document commits to reinforcing the capacity of the U.S. and its allies to deny any attempt by China to seize Taiwan. However, it also calls on Japan, South Korea, and Australia to greatly increase their defense spending and shoulder more of the heavy lifting.

As for Russia, it calls for reestablishing “strategic stability” with Moscow by negotiating “an expeditious cessation of hostilities in Ukraine.”

That was well received by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who said the “adjustments,” which no longer treat Russia as a looming threat, “correspond in many ways to our vision.”

Perhaps the biggest philosophical pivot is to stop trying to impose democratic values on autocracies, dictatorships, and Middle Eastern monarchies under a policy dubbed “flexible realism.”

“We seek good relations and peaceful commercial relations with the nations of the world without imposing on them democratic or other social change that differs widely from their traditions and histories,” the document says. “But doing so will require dropping America’s misguided experiment with hectoring these nations — especially the Gulf monarchies — into abandoning their traditions and historic forms of government.”

Or as War Secretary Pete Hegseth put it in a speech at the Reagan Defense Forum, “Out with utopian idealism, in with hard-nosed realism.”

While China’s Foreign Ministry pledged to work with the U.S. to achieve a “win-win” outcome, and Russian media cheered the new U.S. strategy as a sign that the U.S. was siding with Russian President Vladimir Putin over Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Europe was infuriated by language in the treatise that drips with disdain for America’s European allies.

It accuses the European Union and other “transnational bodies” of undermining political liberty while supporting migration policies that are “transforming the continent and creating strife,” as well as “censoring free speech and suppressing political opposition, cratering birthrates,” all leading to a “loss of national identities and self-confidence.”

Europe, it says, is facing the “real and stark” prospect of “civilizational erasure.” As such, if current trends continue, “it is far from obvious whether certain European countries will have economies and militaries strong enough to remain reliable allies.”

“This is the giant middle finger to Europe by this administration,” retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, a former U.S. Army in Europe commander, said in a video on X. “I think the happiest person in the world with this document is Vladimir Putin, because this strategy cedes Europe to the Russian sphere of influence.”

The U.S. strategy pledges to support allies while working to “restore Europe’s civilizational self-confidence and Western identity.”

A visibly irritated German Chancellor Friedrich Merz dismissed the criticism as patronizing and untrue.

“Some of it is understandable, some of it is comprehensible, and some of it is unacceptable from a European perspective,” Merz said. “I see no need for the Americans to now want to save democracy in Europe. If it were necessary to save it, we would be able to do so on our own.”

“In my discussions with the Americans,” Merz added, “I say, ‘America First’ is fine, but ‘America Alone’ can’t be in your interest. You need partners in the world.”

In an interview with Politico, which just named Trump the most influential person shaping Europe, the president stood by his harsh criticism of America’s closest NATO allies, including Britain and France.

“Most European nations, they’re decaying,” Trump said. “If it keeps going the way it’s going, in my opinion, many of those countries will not be viable countries any longer. Their immigration policy is a disaster.”

“If you take a look at Paris, it’s a much different place. I loved Paris. It’s a much different place than it was,” he said. “London’s a different place. I love London … and I hate to see that happen. This is one of the great places in the world, and they’re allowing people just to come in, unchecked, unvetted.”

“Europe, they want to be politically correct, and it makes them weak,” Trump continued, suggesting that with the influx of immigrants, many countries will not make strong allies anymore, raising questions about the health of the 32-nation NATO alliance.

“They should be freaked out by what they’re doing to their countries. They’re destroying their countries,” Trump said. “The people coming in have a totally different ideology. It’s gonna make them much weaker … much weaker, and they’ll be much different.”

Trump’s trash talk has already prompted one member of Congress, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), to introduce legislation to withdraw the U.S. from NATO.

“NATO is a Cold War relic,” Massie said. “We should withdraw from NATO and use that money to defend our own country, not socialist countries.”

The Europeans are not the only ones freaking out; so are Democrats on Capitol Hill.

“Sadly, President Trump’s misguided hectoring of our closest partners risks irreparable damage that will only limit our ability to protect America’s security interests,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

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“The president’s harsh attacks, in word and deed, towards our closest allies are nonsensical when compared to his kind words and sweetheart deals for autocrats like Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin,” she said.

“The Trump administration’s National Security Strategy is built on a false choice: that America must retreat from the world to protect its people at home,” Shaheen argued. “The opposite is true. America is stronger when we use our alliances, our diplomatic tools, and our influence to advance America’s national interests and values.”

, 2025-12-12 09:58:00, , Washington Examiner, %%https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/cropped-favicon.png?w=32, https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/feed/, Jamie McIntyre