There’s a real Baghdad Bob feel to pronouncements from the Trump administration these days. The war is going great! We’ve been totally victorious! Also, other countries — including China! — must immediately send ships to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, which the U.S. Navy isn’t doing because it’s too dangerous.
But this has been the pattern ever since Trump returned to power. Despite repeated failures to deliver on his campaign promises — remember how he was going to cut energy prices in half? — he and his minions have continually insisted that everything is wonderful, that everything they do is a triumphant success story. And he’s still doing it. On Thursday he told a rally that
Inflation is plummeting, incomes are rising, the economy is roaring back and America is respected again.
As I and others have documented ad nauseam, none of those economic assertions are true. Today, however, I want to focus on the bolded claim. Trump constantly insists, in speeches and social media posts, that he took over a weak, despised nation and restored its international reputation. This is clearly something that matters a lot to him and his sense of self-worth.
It’s also the total opposite of the truth.
A stunning poll from Politico — just released, but taken last month — confirms what I and other observers strongly suspected: America is now widely despised, despised like nobody has ever been despised before.
I don’t mean that we’re disliked, although that too. But this isn’t a case of oderint dum metuant — let them hate so long as they fear. Instead, the world increasingly holds America in contempt.
Our former friends no longer consider us trustworthy:
And they no longer believe that being a U.S. ally offers protection, that a good relationship with America will deter potential enemies from attacking them:
At this point, a plurality of the population in every one of our erstwhile allies considers China a more reliable partner than the United States:
And outside the United States, China, not America, is widely perceived as the great power of the future:
If this is world respect, what would world contempt look like?
Why has America’s global reputation fallen so far, so fast? It’s not a mystery.
After all, why would anyone consider America a trustworthy ally when Trump keeps insulting our neighbor and former closest ally, Canada, by insisting that it must become the 51st state and repeatedly calling its Prime Minister “governor”? Why trust us when Trump tried to bully NATO member Denmark into handing over Greenland?
Beyond that, Trump’s tariffs aren’t just economically damaging. They aren’t just, as the Supreme Court finally ruled, illegal under our own laws. They are also in clear, overwhelming violation of international trade agreements solemnly signed by previous presidents. Given the way the current administration has casually ignored those agreements, why would anyone expect America to honor any future deals?
Last but not least, I don’t think Trump and company have any idea how much their betrayal of Ukraine has weakened America.
I mean, here we have a nation fighting and dying to defend democracy against a brutal dictatorship that the U.S. has long considered an adversary. Yet Trump has rewarded Ukrainian courage by completely cutting off aid:
Source: Ukraine Support Tracker
Trump has also repeatedly belittled Volodymyr Zelenskyy while praising Vladimir Putin, and made it increasingly clear that he wants Putin to win. In a way, America’s reputation has been further diminished by the fact that Trump isn’t getting his wish, because Ukraine keeps refusing to be defeated. So Trump can’t even do betrayal right.
What’s especially depressing about that Politico poll is that it was taken a month ago. That is, it reflects international attitudes before the debacle in Iran.
As everyone other than the most slavish Trump acolytes realizes, the war is going badly. The U.S. has spent billions of dollars bombing a third-rate power, badly depleting our stockpiles of sophisticated munitions, yet the regime survives and remains able to blockade a fifth of the world’s oil supply.
The Trump administration’s incompetence at war planning has been revelatory, in the worst way. The U.S. military’s lack of preparedness has also been shocking. Everyone following the Russia/Ukraine conflict, with its drone-infested battlespace, has been wondering whether American forces are ready for this new kind of war. Now we know that they aren’t. In a hair-raising article, the military historian and expert Phillips O’Brien says that this is a sign of rot in the U.S. military. I wish I were sure that he is wrong.
Now, Ukraine has learned the hard way how to fight this kind of war — and it moved quickly to help the United States and its allies in the region make use of its drone-fighting technology, despite Trump’s betrayals. Meanwhile Russia is aiding Iran. But Trump is still demeaning and insulting Zelenskyy while praising Putin.
The general public may not be aware that Trump’s America offers no reward to nations that come to its aid and does nothing to punish nations that aid its adversaries. But I guarantee that every leader in the world — very much including the leaders of nations Trump is now begging for help in the Strait of Hormuz — has taken notice and will treat the United States accordingly.
In short, Trump’s actions have drastically reduced the world’s respect for the United States. Yet Trump and his officials keep asserting that they have, well, made America great again. Why?
I don’t think it’s mainly about persuading the public. It is, instead, a desperate attempt to persuade themselves. For Trump, life is all about dominance displays; his sense of self-worth depends on believing that he’s cowing the world into submission. Others in his administration have more specific motivations. Pete Hegseth has built his brand around the notion that “warrior ethos” and “lethality” are what make a nation strong. Admitting that being smart and having allies are more important than macho posturing would be an implicit concession that he’s been wrong about everything.
The truth is that America used to be respected, not simply because we were a superpower, but because we were a different kind of superpower — a nation that stood by its allies, that mostly obeyed the rules of the system we created, that possessed an army that was professional, smart and incorruptible. Now Trump has thrown all that away. And I don’t know how or when we can ever get it back.
