The clash of ideals and realities in the mind of a madman

Some analysts in the field of international relations insisted that Donald Trump’s return to the pinnacle of power in Washington would be tantamount to America’s voluntary return to the centralist doctrine of former U.S. President James Monroe. In 1823, James Monroe unveiled his doctrine, which went on to become one of the major strategic and behavioral foundations of U.S. foreign policy for decades.

Contrary to what is often claimed, the Monroe Doctrine was not “isolationist” or aimed at “limiting U.S. interventionism,” but rather had a purely “centralist” nature. Under this doctrine, Latin America, along with the newly independent Caribbean and Central American nations, became the “primary spheres of U.S. intervention,” while the rest of the world was prescribed only “minimal and limited intervention.”

Trump’s repeated emphasis during the 2024 presidential campaign on the need to reduce the costs of foreign interventionism and focus on America’s borders created a false impression among U.S. citizens — that the White House would voluntarily decentralize from interfering in the affairs of other nations.

Now, in mid-2025, about six months into Trump’s presidency, not only have U.S. intervention costs around the world not decreased, they have risen exponentially. The combination of military and economic conflicts across various strategic and geographical arenas bears no resemblance to the Monroe Doctrine; instead, it represents an asymmetric and imbalanced hybrid in U.S. foreign policy.

Understanding the foreign policy of the Trump administration is not possible by measuring the president’s decisions and behavior against established or conventional U.S. doctrines. In this regard, attention should be focused on the concept of Trump’s America as a “crisis-based existence.” This is even evident in analyzing the nature and function of Trump’s trade wars.

The question is: does the deliberate creation of chronic economic crises in the international system — aimed at undermining multilateral trade and dismantling the World Trade Organization’s structures and laws — stem from a coherent doctrine, or is it simply a “method” of existing within crises? The answer could largely illuminate the likely course of future conflicts that Trump will generate under various pretexts, both for specialized and general audiences of U.S. foreign policy.

Anything but a doctrine!

The debate is no longer about which historical U.S. governance doctrine Trump’s political approach aligns with. The real question is whether we are facing a “doctrine” at all in Trump’s America — or merely a “tactic and behavioral formula.” Developing a doctrine depends on the existence of certain assumptions, principles, and strategies in a policymaker’s mindset.

In the economic realm, one might point to principles such as “economic protectionism” or “departure from institutionalism in international economics” as elements of Trump’s thinking. Yet these mental constructs are more the product of Trump’s pragmatic approach to economics and trade than of a structured economic philosophy.

This pragmatism is less a result of America’s initial agency and more a reaction to the actions of other players toward Trump’s moves. Accordingly, we see Trump’s frequent changes in tariff policy toward other countries, as well as his oscillating positions on sensitive foreign policy issues. “Transactionalism,” it must be stressed, is not a doctrine — it is a “method.” It’s no coincidence that even Trump’s closest associates describe him as unpredictable and torn between “costs” and “benefits.”

The certainties of Trump’s American governance

There are certain undeniable constants in assessing Trump’s economic and international policy. He directs his decisions and actions within two frameworks: the creation of chronic crises and the maintenance of strategic ambiguity. In regional and global issues, he often plays the role of a “politician without logic.” However, Trump faces an Achilles’ heel he has yet to calculate — the question of how much of his international crisis-making (manifest in political disputes, military conflicts, and economic battles) will remain under permanent White House control.

Many Western strategists believe that Trump’s false sense of self-confidence will soon form the basis for the collapse of his political and economic governance, because creating crises is not the same as being able to control and manage them. This will become evident in critical cases such as developments in West Asia, the surrounding environment of China, and the war in Ukraine. For example, Trump’s utter inability to end the war in Ukraine — despite his pre-White House claim that he could solve the crisis in 24 hours — demonstrates the depth of the gap between Trump’s “idealized visions” and “external realities.”

A hybrid doctrine or anarchism?

There is another view among Trump’s supporters that portrays him as a disciplined and systematic politician with an extraordinary ability to combine past domestic and foreign policy doctrines. This assumption, however, is so clichéd that even figures like Secretary of State Mark Rubio and Secretary of Defense Peter Hegst in the current U.S. administration do not actually subscribe to it.

It is impossible to consider Trump the creator of a new hybrid doctrine in U.S. foreign policy because when “grand strategic principles” hold no authenticity or relevance in a politician’s mind, no doctrine — even a hybrid one — can emerge. It may be more accurate to regard Trump as the embodiment of an anarchist in U.S. domestic and foreign politics.

The incoherent overlap of populism, anarchism, and pragmatism in Trump’s mindset and behavior has stripped him of the ability to even “describe past and present phenomena” in international relations. When a president resists accepting the obvious realities of his country’s past and present in international economics and foreign policy — effectively rejecting them — the fate of his foresight and future planning in confronting these crises becomes all too clear.