US Politics Mega-thread - Page 5378

On December 06 2025 21:04 Manit0u wrote:
On a more serious note the US has published it's NSS (National Security Strategy) and it's kinda terrifying. Basically throwing decades of diplomatic work out the window.

Some key takeaways:

• US is stepping away from the role of global hegemony and concentrating solely on the western hemisphere.
  
• The world is divided into three zones of influence, separated by the oceans.
  
• Europe becomes an important but secondary theater of operations that requires forced stabilization because it's unable to make decisions for itself.
  
• Middle-East becomes marginalized with minimal US presence, Africa is omitted entirely for everything except resource extraction.
  
• International organizations are evil and should be abolished. US is giving Europe until 2027 to take over most of the conventional operations of NATO and says that EU should be abolished in favor of more nationalistic and patriotic countries. Basically, cooperation is bad, strong should rule over weak and all interests should be looked at in terms of one-on-one profits instead of a wider network. Also, everything is secondary to making profit, alliances mean nothing.
  
• US soft power is no longer a thing. Going back to isolationism, peace through strength, "elastic realism", country is more important than international organizations, reorganization through peace (achieving peace through business deals, without taking into account the context of the conflict)
  
• Europe should be forced to make peace with Russia because it's unable to do so on its own.
  

There's obviously much more than that, regarding national identity and security, stopping migration etc. but it's a very lengthy document.

Sounds absolutely crazy to me and I can't stop and wonder what's going on through the current administration's heads with this. Is threatening allies you had for decades a good idea? What if EU actually takes offense and sells trillions of US debt it holds to China? What if they ban nVidia from European markets? US economy could collapse overnight.

On December 06 2025 22:26 WombaT wrote:

It’s crazy stuff.

I mean it’s not just that ideologically I don’t like it, practically as well it seems counter-productive.

It’s one thing to crack the whip and want allies to pull their weight, but this is more of a wholesale rejection of the idea of mutually beneficial alliances, to a degree that is actively self-sabotaging

On December 06 2025 23:48 Manit0u wrote:


There are even mentions in there that any deal the US makes now that would be "fair" to both parties must make the other party put in more of their investment than the US as a kind of repayment for past favors the US has been doing everyone.

In other words, US is moving on from the role of a benevolent hegemon and changing into a mobster extortionist, strong-arming other countries into doing its bidding and also encouraging other so inclined nations to do the same (Russia and China).

The Trump Administration finds itself at odds with European officials who hold unrealistic expectations for the war perched in unstable minority governments, many of which trample on basic principles of democracy to suppress opposition. A large European majority wants peace, yet that desire is not translated into policy, in large measure because of those governments’ subversion of democratic processes. This is strategically important to the United States precisely because European states cannot reform themselves if they are trapped in political crisis.

Yet Europe remains strategically and culturally vital to the United States. Transatlantic trade remains one of the pillars of the global economy and of American prosperity. European sectors from manufacturing to technology to energy remain among the world’s most robust. Europe is home to cutting-edge scientific research and world-leading cultural institutions. Not only can we not afford to write Europe off—doing so would be self-defeating for what this strategy aims to achieve.

American diplomacy should continue to stand up for genuine democracy, freedom of expression, and unapologetic celebrations of European nations’ individual character and history. America encourages its political allies in Europe to promote this revival of spirit, and the growing influence of patriotic European parties indeed gives cause for great optimism.

Our goal should be to help Europe correct its current trajectory. We will need a strong Europe to help us successfully compete, and to work in concert with us to prevent any adversary from dominating Europe.

On December 07 2025 04:18 ETisME wrote:
The NSS is well received in Asia, especially in Taiwan and Japan.

It reconfirmed the strategically important position of Taiwan and the main challenger is China.
Taiwan, Philippines and Japan in particular were talking about increase military spending already, this just gave a massive boast to go through with it.

As for South Korea and Australia, well both of them never derisk decoupled the economy with China same way Japan and Taiwan had.
Hopefully the nexperia drama shows how not to decouple with China. But that's a lesson for europe to take a decade to learn and a other to implement solution

On December 07 2025 04:51 Sent. wrote:


I'm a bit surprised with this. I read a few Western articles about the NSS and got the impression that the attitude toward China was surprisingly mild but the Asian allies should feel okay about it because the document still underlines their importance and isn't straight up hostile toward them as it is toward (western) Europe.

On December 07 2025 09:13 Billyboy wrote:
Trump is 100% the reason countries are looking for stronger relationships with China, it’s not a question but a direct line. Canada went from ruining their relationship with China for arresting some one their best ally asked them too (US). To the US messing up their trade.

The US is unreliable, our economic policy is all around finding new and more reliable markets for our products.

The US can claim they are “fighting China” or whatever, but they are helping them massively.

On December 07 2025 04:51 Sent. wrote:


I'm a bit surprised with this. I read a few Western articles about the NSS and got the impression that the attitude toward China was surprisingly mild but the Asian allies should feel okay about it because the document still underlines their importance and isn't straight up hostile toward them as it is toward (western) Europe.