U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos on Jan. 21, 2026. Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
Commentary
Because of President Trump’s technique of opening almost any negotiation with outrageous threats and claims and then slowly retreating as the other side makes concessions, his entire presidency can easily be presented as fundamentally disruptive. In fact, there is ample evidence that he is negotiating towards adjusted American relationships with the world in a way that more closely reflects both the U.S. national interest and the end of a bipolarized global power structure, along with the emergence since the end of the Cold War of a great many countries exercising more freedom of action and a greater level of economic development than they previously enjoyed.
