D.Trump and the illusion of non-interventionism
Donald Trump was re-elected on a clear promise: to stop engaging the United States in conflicts that would benefit neither security nor the American economy. Yet the facts seem to contradict this discourse. Strategic involvement alongside Israel in the face of Iran, increased pressure on Venezuela, actions in Africa against groups affiliated with the Islamic State, military signals in the Indo-Pacific: never has the United States seemed as present for years. Can one see a denial, or on the contrary, the emergence of a new assumed interventionism?
The contradiction is only apparent. Trump is not an isolationist in the strict sense. It does not advocate the withdrawal of the United States from the world, but the rejection of an ideological interventionism inherited from the post-Cold War era: one that “wants to ‘transform societies, export democracy, and rebuild states by force.'” What he fights are long wars, politically incomprehensible to American opinion, and “strategically” unprofitable.
Instead, Trump imposed a different doctrine: ‘selective,’ ‘transactional,’ but above all pragmatic interventionism. The United States does not intervene to defend a universal liberal order but to protect specific, identified, and prioritized interests. This change is paramount.
Three criteria structure the American commitment. First of all: direct strategic interest. (Facing Iran), to prevent a regional shift and ensure the security of a central ally, Israel. In Venezuela, the interest is geopolitical and energy: maintaining pressure in what Washington still considers its strategic backyard. In Africa, the fight against ISIS responds to a preventive logic: preventing the emergence of terrorist sanctuaries likely to threaten, ultimately, Western interests.
The second criterion is the American human cost. Trump refuses troop deployments. The second criterion includes targeted strikes, indirect support, intelligence gathering, and special operations. The war must be effective and fast. Especially the allies are highlighted, with America maintaining the ability to climb without assuming the main weight of the fight.
The third criterion is the result. Restore deterrence. The objective is to send a clear message: there are red lines, and crossing them leads to an immediate response. The demonstration of force takes precedence over reconstruction.
Israel, Iran, Venezuela, and Nigeria are therefore not isolated files but ‘variants’ of a common strategy. Trump does not want to govern the world; he wants to prevent his opponents from questioning American credibility. So ‘restraint’ is not moral; it is accounting. The intervention is not ideological; it is conditional.
Can we then speak of a «new order»? Yes, but a new world order is not for the liberal. It is an order of deterrence based on credible force, alliances, and weakened multilateralism.
Donald Trump is neither an isolationist nor the ‘savior of the free world’. He is the president of a world that has entered an era of self-imposed confrontation, where power is exercised without moral justification, and where American commitment does not disappear—it changes form. America did not withdraw from the international game. She now plays according to her own rules, without any promise of reconstruction, but with a renewed determination to ensure that her red lines are respected.
