America’s Pillars of Foreign Policy

We will soon be saying adieu to the year 2025. Strife in the Middle East, war in Ukraine, terror attacks from Washington to Sydney—2025 has been a rough year, the WSJ doesn’t really have to remind readers. The Trump administration, writes Walter R. Meade, by breaking every rule in the diplomatic playbook and generally upending long-established pillars of American foreign policy, has been both confusing and exhausting to Americans.

Grounds for Concern

As we approach 2026, there is much befuddlement, leaving Mr. Mead wondering if Donald Trump has made the world better off.

Administration policy toward China tacks between what many observers think is colossal recklessness (imposing tariffs of 145% on a powerful economy that can retaliate harshly) to what others see as stupefying obsequiousness (clearing advanced computer chips for export and allowing TikTok to stay open on favorable terms). The Trump approach to Vladimir Putin so far has vexed American allies without ending the war.

Foreign governments are angry. Trump’s frenetic nature on tariff policy throws sand into the gears of commerce. Hanging over all is a miasma of corruption and suspicion, as allies suspect that American support can be bought, or, as Mead notes, at least rented.

Taking all the criticism into account and leveraging Trump’s emergent foreign policy, is “the global geopolitical situation, from an American standpoint, in better or worse shape than it was a year ago?”

Mead argues the news is both surprising and positive.

• The rout of Iran and the dismantling of some of its key regional allies reinforced the American position in the Middle East and undercut Chinese and Russian power and prestige.
• China and Russia were neither willing nor able to protect their Iranian friends has had (and will continue to have) helpful effects worldwide.
• Despite the strains that Trump-era diplomacy has placed on both trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific ties, U.S. allies in Europe and Asia show signs of reviving strategic awareness and activism.
• Jolting our allies out of their deep slumber so they can again be useful partners is fundamental to America’s fortunes in the next stage of global politics.
• After decades of appeals to democratic solidarity failed to move either European or Japanese leaders to face reality, Mr. Trump resorted to harsher methods. So far, the results look promising.
• The Trump administration’s controversial tactic of threatening to throw Ukraine under the bus hasn’t charmed Mr. Putin into accepting a compromise, but it has forced the Europeans to take primary responsibility for Ukrainian survival, pledging approximately $105 billion over the next two years.
• European politics remain fractious and difficult, but the tide has turned. For the foreseeable future, the question won’t be whether Europe should rearm, but how fast.
• Japan is also waking up, increasing defense spending, engaging more closely with Taiwan and its other neighbors and preparing to dismantle longstanding limits on arms sales and other defense-related issues.
• Beijing’s wolf-warrior attacks on Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi have backfired. Ms. Takaichi, the most hawkish Japanese leader since the late Shinzo Abe, is enjoying approval ratings around 70% in most polls.
• The focus on the Western Hemisphere is smart. Cutting off Venezuela’s shadow oil trade by seizing illegal tankers doesn’t only hurt the Maduro government. It asserts American power in a way that is difficult for China and Russia to counter.
• Beijing is reminded that in any major confrontation, the critical Western Hemisphere imports China needs would be hostages to the U.S. Many things can go wrong for American policy in Venezuela, and doubtless some of them will, but asserting American hemispheric power at a time of rising global tensions is the right thing to do.

2026, Another Difficult Year?

• With Donald Trump showing no signs of slowing down and V. Putin pressing for total victory in his war on Ukraine, Jinping continues to believe that Chinese manufacturing and engineering prowess can reshape the world.
• Iran, too, hopes to revive its power.
• From Afghanistan to Nigeria, Sunni jihadists are winning new recruits and launching new campaigns.

There’s Hope

Enjoins Meade, Don’t forget.

• European support for Ukraine could force Mr. Putin to think about how much more of his country he wants to mortgage to Beijing to wage an indefinitely prolonged war.
• As China’s structural economic crisis intensifies, Mr. Xi could rethink his approach to world politics.
• And who knows—the Trump administration may even double down on what works and learn to regulate its most dysfunctional impulses.