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The European Commission is setting up a team to prepare for a potential Trump presidency, and globally, national governments should be doing the same.
“The [US] election is far from over, so it’s about working out what the implications could be, either way,” one of the people involved in the commission plan told the FT.
While the 2024 US presidential election remains tightly balanced, many see the possible military and security consequences of a Trump victory as extremely hard to predict, and therefore prepare for.
But these concerns are misplaced. The uncertainty is limited. The focus of officials outside the US should be on how to manage the known realities of a second Trump presidency. We can say they are known because Trump has spoken clearly about them and has a presidential track record we can examine.
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The key areas around the Trump approach are: the war in Ukraine, an isolationist foreign policy, his relationship with intelligence agencies and belief in “the deep state” (his version of a secret state), and his relationship with increasingly autocratic regimes.
Ukraine
Trump has repeatedly claimed he will be able to find a resolution to the war in Ukraine quickly. Meanwhile, Trump’s vice-presidential running mate, J.D. Vance, said he “didn’t care what happened in Ukraine”.
Trump’s plan will likely be to remove US financial and military support for Ukraine, pressure European nations to do the same, and encourage Ukraine to cede the occupied and contested territories of eastern Ukraine to Russia.
It is plausible that Russia has played for time in the war, hoping Trump would regain the presidency. Trump has said he is likely to be less supportive of funding for Nato and European security. It is reasonable to conclude that European powers will need to ramp up their own investment in security.
Trump’s personal affinity with Vladimir Putin is just one of the close relationships he has nurtured with autocratic or autocratically leaning leaders. Trump’s recent comment to a Christian conservative audience that they “wouldn’t need to vote again” in 2028 has been interpreted by some critics as a further turn to autocracy and alignment with Putin’s Russia.
American isolationism
The Trump-Vance ticket demonstrates a particularly strong version of isolationist foreign and security policy. Both men are instinctive “realistic” foreign policy proponents. This means aggressively pursuing the core interests of the US, but without lending US security guarantees or making interventions abroad.
This position runs contrary to the US’s “global policeman” role, and its leading role within Nato that has underwritten European security since the end of the second world war.
Economic isolationism – with threats of tariffs on foreign-made goods – is a key plank of Trump’s Maga Republicanism. But it will probably cause traditional US partners such as France and Germany to seek to grow the European single market while also developing new economic partnerships.
Isolationism does have an established history in the US. It led to decisive but late interventions in both world wars, and to over a decade of non-intervention after the Vietnam War.
A significant withdrawal of American military and economic capabilities from Nato, in particular, will require the European powers to push more public money into defence and security – generating stronger European defence and security identities as they began to do in the early 2000s with the St Malo process, which led to the early European Security and Defence Policy, a regional security plan.
Any shift away from the US security guarantee would make countries east of Germany more vulnerable to Russia’s military threat, and sabotage, for up to ten years. Funded and coordinated properly, however, this risk can be mitigated; countries including Sweden and Estonia have already started increasing their military budgets.
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Intelligence
Trump has been deeply suspicious of American intelligence agencies in the past, stating that he trusted the word of Putin over the assessment of the CIA. He has also become increasingly attached to the idea of a hostile (and fictional) “deep state” trying to prevent him acting in the best interests of the American people.
Intelligence agencies seek to “speak best truth” to power. But Trump’s first stint in the White House shed light on a president who was apparently unusually unwilling to read his presidential Daily Brief (the premier intelligence assessment product in the US system). He also seemed to lack care with classified documents and information, and fundamentally did not trust this crucial tool of the state.
The challenge for those outside the US is whether a second Trump presidency would make American intelligence agencies unreliable partners. This will be a particular concern for the Five Eyes alliance of intelligence powers (US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand), a key pillar of western security.
Democracy
Admiration for both Russia (and Putin) and North Korea (and Kim Jong Un) featured in Trump’s first presidency. Expanding this support and turning a blind eye to international lawbreaking activities would be challenging for other nations.
Similarly, the potential loss of the US as a democratic beacon would be significant. An example is Trump’s recent “joke” about near-dictatorial powers, with him indicating that 2024 would be the last time Americans need vote in a presidential election. US allies need to be prepared for a growing misalignment around freedoms, surveillance, extradition and restrictions on free trade.
A realignment of alliances and values in the west – part of the agenda Trump has already articulated – will be particularly dangerous in the context of expansionist states such as Russia and China. The freeing of Russian assassin Vadim Krasikov as part of a prisoner swap may give Putin more confidence about his impunity from the consequences of any illegal actions ordered outside Russian borders, and could lead to more threats in the west.
Trump’s tactics should not be seen as a surprise. They need to be planned for, financed, and procured for. Pretending they are surprising because they are uncomfortable is not a plan.
Robert Dover does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
