Trump is Leading America’s Global Collapse (w/ Robert Kagan) | The Bulwark Podcast

The United States played an unusual and historically unprecedented role after World War II, where other major powers willingly accepted US leadership and entrusted their security to America. This arrangement created a stable international environment highly beneficial to the US, preventing the frequent great power conflicts seen in earlier multipolar eras.

Kagan states, 'How unusual the way other powers have responded to the United States... they've been willing to let the United States be the strongest power in the world to put the place their security in American hands. That's just unprecedented in history.' He contrasts this with the pre-WWII multipolar world where 'everybody's fending for himself,' a much more dangerous scenario for the US.

The 'America First' vision of a multipolar world with defined spheres of influence, often romanticized as a 'Concert of Europe,' is historically inaccurate and dangerous. The 19th-century 'long peace' still involved major conflicts every decade, costing hundreds of thousands of lives. In a modern context, this model would grant economically powerful regions to rivals while leaving the US with less developed areas, and would mean the end of independence for nations within Russian or Chinese 'natural' spheres.

The host notes, 'the concert of Europe and the multipolar world and the great powers all work it out,' but Kagan counters that the 19th century saw 'a major conflict involving two or more great powers... pretty much once every decade.' He details how Russia's historical sphere includes the Baltic states and Poland, and China's includes all of Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea, meaning 'they're basically selling out all kinds of very significant populations of people who currently enjoy their freedom and independence.'

US allies, including Western Europe, Canada, Australia, and Korea, are experiencing 'stages of grief' over the US's strategic abandonment and hostile policies, such as tariffs. They will not remain subservient but will be compelled to prioritize their own security, potentially leading them to become adversaries of the United States as public opinion turns 'incredibly hostile to the United States.'

Kagan states, 'some of the more astute of them understand that it really is over with the United States and they need to start taking care of themselves.' He adds, 'we are going to lose these allies and they are going to they're going to go from being in the allied column in many cases to adversaries to the United States because... public opinion is incredibly hostile to the United States right now.' Tariffs are cited as 'infuriating' and historically 'an act of war.'

China's leadership, particularly Xi Jinping, views the current American retreat and internal turmoil as a 'brief window of opportunity' to achieve major Chinese objectives, including a potential takeover of Taiwan. This perception is influencing internal purges within the Chinese military, aimed at removing cautious generals.

Kagan speculates, 'Xi Jinping may well believe that the United States is not going to be like this forever... which means that there is a brief window of opportunity to really accomplish major Chinese objectives.' He references 'cyinologists' speculating that generals were purged for 'being too cautious on the Taiwan scenario' and Xi's stated goal to 'be ready to move in 2027.'

The current administration is actively working to dismantle the federal government and politicize institutions like the Justice Department. Concerns exist about deliberate strategies to disrupt future elections, such as using federal agencies like ICE to intimidate non-white voters, provoke riots to invoke the Insurrection Act, and 'nationalize' elections, potentially leading to a refusal to seat a new Congress.

Kagan asserts, 'in one year they destroyed the federal government... The Justice Department is now a wholly owned legal service for going after Trump's enemies.' He describes ICE's purpose as 'to create protests and riots so that Trump can invoke the insurrection act and send the military in to protect our the ballots.' He warns of 'undecided elections because the federal government thinks that something was done... and you don't ever actually seat a new Congress.'

The shift towards protectionism and reduced foreign engagement is not solely a Trump phenomenon but reflects a broader, bipartisan national consensus that has been developing since the end of the Cold War. Both Democratic and Republican parties have shown increasing hostility to foreign trade and a desire for less 'foreign adventurism.'

Kagan notes, 'the national consensus on foreign policy in both parties had gotten to the point where everybody thought we're doing too much out there.' He points out that 'it was the Democrats who began the major hostility to foreign trade' and that 'Biden had was a pretty protectionist president' by post-war standards.