America Waves Farewell to its Old World Order

The Trump administration's recently released National Security Strategy represents the most fundamental departure from American foreign policy doctrine since 1945. For the first time in eight decades, a sitting United States (US) administration has explicitly rejected the premise that undergirded both Democratic and Republican foreign policy: that promoting liberal democracy globally serves American interests and contributes to a more stable world.

The document's most revealing line captures this shift: "The days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over." What replaces it is a framework organised around three principles: cultural nationalism, strategic restraint, and economic self-protection. Each marks a dramatic break with consensus thinking.

Cultural Confidence as National Security

Perhaps most striking is the elevation of cultural cohesion to the level of national security concern. The strategy explicitly links American resilience to "the restoration and reinvigoration of American spiritual and cultural health" and emphasises the importance of "traditional families" alongside military and economic power.

This represents a fundamental shift in how American strategy conceives of national strength. For decades, US strategic documents maintained a secular, universalist tone, treating democracy as a set of institutional arrangements rather than cultural commitments. The new approach treats cultural confidence as a strategic asset and frames domestic renewal in explicitly traditional terms.

Analysts note that this framing echoes themes associated with Christian nationalism, a once-fringe movement pushed into the mainstream by figures such as Charlie Kirk. The movement’s core idea is that national strength depends on protecting a shared Christian cultural heritage, and that social fragmentation threatens security as much as economic or military weakness. By grounding security in cultural particularity rather than universal values, the strategy weakens the ideological basis that has long justified American alliances and global engagement.

Europe: From Partner to Problem

Of particular note is the strategy's treatment of Europe, America's closest ally and co-architect of the liberal world order. The document warns that Europe faces potential "civilisational erasure" driven by demographic change, regulatory overreach, and migration policies. It suggests the continent may become "unrecognisable in 20 years or less" without major course corrections.

On Ukraine, the strategy argues that European governments maintain "unrealistic expectations for the war" despite widespread public desire for peace. The goal is no longer to support Ukraine until victory or to contain Russian aggression indefinitely, but rather to negotiate "an expeditious cessation of hostilities" that stabilises European economies and restores balance.

Russia itself is treated not as an ideological adversary but as a destabilising power to be managed within a traditional balance-of-power framework. The document notes Europe's significant conventional military advantage over Russia and suggests the continent should assume primary responsibility for its own defence.

This reframing transforms America's most successful alliance from a partnership of shared values into a transactional relationship where burden-sharing matters more than common purpose.

Asia: Economics Over Ideology

In Asia, the strategy abandons ideological competition with China in favour of economic protection and military deterrence. The document notes matter-of-factly that "China got rich and powerful, and used its wealth and power to its considerable advantage”, then calls for trade relationships that are "balanced and focused on non-sensitive factors".

On Taiwan, deterrence is justified not by democratic solidarity but by hard economic logic: one-third of global shipping passes through the South China Sea annually. Even here, allies are expected to shoulder more of the burden, as "the American military cannot, and should not have to, do this alone".

The shift is telling. Rather than framing competition with China as a contest between democracy and authoritarianism, as both previous administrations did, the new strategy treats it as a straightforward great power rivalry where economics and military capability matter more than political systems.

The Western Hemisphere: Sphere of Influence Returns

Only in the Western Hemisphere does the strategy articulate a directly interventionist stance. The "Trump Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine declares that the US will actively deny non-hemispheric powers the ability to position forces or control strategic assets in the Americas.

This represents an explicit return to sphere-of-influence thinking, backed by military force, economic leverage, and targeted action against cartels. It's classical geopolitics without the liberal wrapping.

A Post-Liberal Framework

In the Middle East and Africa, the strategy completes its pivot away from democracy promotion and humanitarian concern. Middle East policy refocuses on technology partnerships in energy, artificial intelligence, and defence. Africa policy shifts explicitly "from a foreign aid paradigm to an investment and growth paradigm," repositioning the continent as a commercial arena rather than humanitarian theatre.

What's at Stake

The liberal world order, whatever its flaws, provided the framework for unprecedented peace among great powers, the most successful alliance system in history, and institutions that, however imperfectly, channelled competition into managed forms. American leadership of this system was justified not merely by power but by the claim that American governance represented universal aspirations worth defending.

By abandoning this premise, the new strategy does more than change tactics. It removes the ideological foundation that made American global leadership politically sustainable and morally defensible to democratic publics at home and abroad.

This is a historic pivot. It is a deeply divisive strategy that will likely split President Donald Trump’s Republican Party between those who still believe in the old liberal-order model and those who support the new cultural-security framework.

The world that emerges from this reorientation will look remarkably similar to the pre-1945 international system: multipolar, transactional, and organised around competing spheres of influence rather than shared principles.