Abstract                                                                   

This article examines the trajectory of United States foreign policy during Donald Trump’s second presidential term. Drawing on the 2025 National Security Strategy and recent scholarly literature, it argues that Washington is moving away from the liberal-internationalist model of global leadership toward a more selective, transactional, and coercive form of realism. The central claim is that the Trump administration is not pursuing isolationism; rather, it is reconfiguring American hegemony by narrowing universal commitments, shifting security burdens onto allies, prioritizing economic security, and establishing a hierarchical system of regional spheres of influence. The article concludes that this strategy may enhance U.S. leverage in the short term but risks weakening alliance cohesion, institutionalized multilateralism, and the predictability of the international order.

Keywords: U.S. foreign policy; Donald Trump; America First; National Security Strategy; transactional diplomacy; realism; NATO; China; Russia; Ukraine; international order.

Introduction

U.S. foreign policy under Donald Trump’s second administration marks a significant departure from the liberal-internationalist paradigm that has shaped American grand strategy since the end of the Cold War. The 2025 National Security Strategy (NSS) explicitly rejects the notion that the United States should assume responsibility for maintaining a global order and instead defines U.S. foreign policy through a narrower understanding of vital national interests.

The central question addressed in this article is whether this shift represents a retreat from global leadership or a transformation of American hegemony into a more selective and coercive form. The article argues that the Trump administration is pursuing neither isolationism nor a simple return to traditional realism. Instead, it is developing a model of selective hegemony, in which the United States seeks to preserve its military, technological, and economic primacy while reducing the costs associated with global commitments and transferring greater responsibility to allies [1; 2; 6].

Methodologically, the article employs a qualitative interpretive approach grounded in neoclassical realism, balance-of-power theory, and the concept of transactional diplomacy. The empirical basis consists primarily of the 2025 NSS, together with recent academic and policy-oriented analyses of the second Trump administration [1; 3; 4; 5; 6].

Theoretical Framework: From Liberal Internationalism to Flexible Realism

Since the early 1990s, U.S. grand strategy has generally rested on three assumptions: the preservation of a liberal international order, the promotion of democracy, and the maintenance of an extensive global military presence. The 2025 NSS challenges all three assumptions. It argues that previous administrations artificially expanded the concept of the national interest, diluted strategic priorities, and engaged in costly military interventions that did not serve core U.S. interests.

The new strategy instead emphasizes sovereignty, economic competitiveness, border security, industrial capacity, and the maintenance of a favorable balance of power. In scholarly terms, this approach can be described as a form of flexible realism or transactional realism. It treats international politics primarily as a competitive environment in which states pursue material interests through bargaining, leverage, and coercion rather than through shared norms or institutionalized cooperation [3; 6].

Transactional diplomacy, however, should not be reduced to short-term deal-making. As Denoeux and Springborg argue, it involves a preference for bilateral arrangements, skepticism toward multilateral institutions, and an evaluation of diplomatic success based on immediate and measurable gains rather than long-term institutional commitments . Under Trump, this logic is reinforced by personalization, public performance, and the use of economic statecraft as a central instrument of diplomacy [3; 6].

 “America First” as a Strategic Doctrine

“America First” functions in the 2025 NSS not merely as an electoral slogan but as a strategic doctrine. It calls for a clear distinction between vital and peripheral interests, a rejection of “forever wars,” and a more restrained approach to military intervention. The strategy identifies several core priorities: the protection of U.S. territory and borders; the restoration of industrial and technological capacity; energy security; the preservation of military superiority; and the reduction of dependence on foreign supply chains . Economic security is thereby elevated to the status of national security. Reindustrialization, protectionism, technological sovereignty, and access to critical minerals are presented not merely as domestic policy objectives but as preconditions for sustained global power [1; 2].

Equally significant is the diminished role of democracy promotion. The strategy does not present the spread of liberal democracy as a universal objective of U.S. foreign policy. Instead, Washington is prepared to cooperate pragmatically with states whose political systems differ substantially from its own, provided that such cooperation advances concrete American interests [1; 3]. This shift reduces the ideological dimension of U.S. diplomacy and increases the importance of reciprocity, bargaining, and material incentives.

Burden-Shifting and the Transformation of Alliances

One of the most consequential features of the new strategy is its emphasis on burden-sharing and burden-shifting. The 2025 NSS argues that the era in which the United States carried the principal responsibility for maintaining global security has ended. Wealthy allies, particularly in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, are expected to assume greater responsibility for their own defense .

In Europe, this translates into sustained pressure on NATO members to increase defense spending and develop autonomous military capabilities. The strategy also rejects the perception of NATO as a perpetually expanding alliance and calls for the reestablishment of strategic stability with Russia [1; 6]. This represents a substantial change from the post-Cold War consensus, in which NATO enlargement was widely regarded as a central instrument of Euro-Atlantic security.

In the Indo-Pacific, the United States retains a strong commitment to deterring Chinese aggression, particularly in the Taiwan Strait and the first island chain. However, Washington increasingly conditions its security commitments on allied contributions to deterrence, military modernization, and regional defense capacity [1; 4]. Allies are thus no longer viewed primarily as recipients of American security guarantees; they are expected to demonstrate their strategic value through investment, capability development, and alignment with U.S. priorities.

This approach strengthens the bargaining position of the United States but may also weaken trust within alliances. If security guarantees become conditional and transactional, allied states may respond by diversifying their security partnerships, accelerating military buildups, or pursuing greater strategic autonomy [3; 4; 6].

Regional Hierarchy of U.S. Interests

The 2025 NSS establishes a new hierarchy of regional priorities. The Western Hemisphere is elevated to the top of the agenda through what the document calls the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine. This doctrine seeks to restore U.S. primacy in the hemisphere, restrict the influence of external powers, control migration, and combat transnational criminal networks [1; 2; 6].

The Indo-Pacific remains the principal external theater of strategic competition. U.S. policy focuses on preventing Chinese regional hegemony, maintaining freedom of navigation, protecting critical supply chains, and preserving the capacity to deter or defeat aggression in the first island chain [1; 4]. Yet the strategy frames this competition primarily in geoeconomic rather than ideological terms: the central issue is not democracy versus autocracy, but economic advantage, technological supremacy, and control over strategic resources [2; 6].

Europe occupies a more ambiguous position. Although the United States continues to regard Europe as strategically important, the NSS criticizes European allies for insufficient defense investment, economic weakness, and policies that the administration associates with migration, demographic decline, and the erosion of national identity [1; 6]. This rhetoric signals a shift from partnership based on shared democratic values toward a more conditional relationship based on burden-sharing and ideological alignment.

The Middle East and Africa are assigned lower priority. In the Middle East, the United States seeks to avoid prolonged military engagements while promoting selective diplomatic initiatives and expanding the Abraham Accords framework [1; 6]. In Africa, the emphasis shifts from development assistance and democracy promotion toward investment, resource access, energy cooperation, and trade [1; 2].

China, Russia, and the Ukraine War

China remains the principal long-term strategic competitor of the United States, but the 2025 NSS reframes the nature of that rivalry. Rather than presenting China primarily as an ideological adversary, the strategy emphasizes trade imbalances, industrial subsidies, technological competition, supply-chain vulnerability, and the need to preserve U.S. economic primacy [1; 6].

At the same time, the strategy retains a strong military dimension. It stresses the importance of deterring conflict over Taiwan and maintaining sufficient military capacity in the Indo-Pacific to deny China the ability to achieve regional dominance [1; 4]. The resulting policy combines economic pressure, technological restriction, alliance-building, and military deterrence.

Russia is treated more cautiously. The 2025 NSS does not characterize Russia as the principal adversary of the United States. Instead, it prioritizes ending the war in Ukraine, preventing escalation, stabilizing Europe, and restoring a measure of strategic stability between Washington and Moscow [1; 6]. The document affirms support for Ukraine’s continued existence as a viable state, but it does not articulate a clear long-term strategy for achieving this objective [1; 6].

For Ukraine, this approach implies that U.S. support may become increasingly conditional and linked to negotiations, European responsibility, and American economic interests. For European states, it raises concerns that Washington may prioritize de-escalation with Russia over the security requirements of Ukraine and the wider Euro-Atlantic region [4; 6].

Discussion: Isolationism or a New Grammar of Hegemony?

Scholarly assessments of Trump’s foreign policy remain divided. Some analysts interpret the new strategy as a retreat from global leadership and a weakening of the liberal international order [4; 6]. Others argue that transactional diplomacy may be better suited to an increasingly multipolar world, in which states seek flexible partnerships rather than rigid alliance commitments.

This article argues that neither interpretation fully captures the strategic logic of the second Trump administration. The United States is not withdrawing from world politics; it is changing the grammar of its hegemony. Instead of universal leadership based on institutions, norms, and broad security commitments, Washington is developing a model based on selective engagement, coercive bargaining, economic leverage, and regional primacy [1; 3; 6].

This model offers certain advantages. It allows the United States to conserve resources, concentrate on the Indo-Pacific and the Western Hemisphere, and compel allies to invest more heavily in their own defense. However, it also carries substantial risks. Conditional alliances may reduce trust, weaken deterrence, and encourage allies to hedge. The devaluation of multilateral institutions may further erode the predictability of international relations and increase the likelihood of miscalculation during crises [3; 4; 6].

Conclusion

The foreign-policy trajectory of the second Trump administration represents an attempt to adapt American hegemony to an era of constrained resources, domestic polarization, and intensifying great-power competition. Its core logic is not isolationism but the transformation of U.S. global leadership into selective hegemony.

The principal features of this strategy include the prioritization of economic security, the transfer of defense burdens to allies, skepticism toward multilateral institutions, personalized and transactional diplomacy, renewed emphasis on the Western Hemisphere, pragmatic engagement with Russia, and sustained strategic competition with China. For the international system, this implies a more hierarchical, less institutionalized, and potentially less predictable world order.

For Central Asian states, including Tajikistan, the implications are likely to be increasingly pragmatic. U.S. engagement may focus on energy, transport corridors, critical minerals, regional security, and infrastructure, while reducing emphasis on civil society support and democracy promotion. This shift may create new opportunities for economic and strategic cooperation, but it also requires regional states to navigate more carefully between competing centers of power.

Dr. Shamsiddin KARIMOV,

Chief Researcher of the Department for US and Canadian Studies,

Institute for Asian and European Studies of the

National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan

References

1.     The White House. National Security Strategy of the United States of America. Washington, D.C., November 2025. https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2025-National-Security-Strategy.pdf

2.     Márquez de la Rubia, F. The United States National Security Strategy (2025): Analysis and Comparison with the NSS 2022. IEEE Analysis Document 84/2025. Madrid: Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies, 2025.

3.     Denoeux, G., and R. Springborg. “Trump’s Transactional Diplomacy: Breakthrough or Breakdown?” Middle East Policy 33, no. 2 (2026): 24–40. https://doi.org/10.1111/mepo.70074

4.     Mori, S. “The Second Trump Administration’s Denial Defense Along the First Island Chain.” Asia-Pacific Review 33, no. 1 (2026): 26–46. https://doi.org/10.1080/13439006.2026.2694250

5.     Grieger, G. The 2025 US National Security Strategy. European Parliamentary Research Service, At a Glance PE 779.261. Brussels: European Parliament, December 2025.

6.     Council on Foreign Relations. “Unpacking a Trump Twist of the National Security Strategy.” Council on Foreign Relations, December 5–6, 2025. https://www.cfr.org/articles/unpacking-trump-twist-national-security-strategy