Chaos, Power, and Diplomacy: What Kissinger and Trump Teach Us About World Order

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If Henry Kissinger had a superpower, it was his profound empathy for how states calculate their interests. Kissinger believed that, underneath the politics, ideology, and notions of morality that seem to divide states, they are at core rational actors that are both empowered and constrained by the resources at their disposal. Diplomacy is full of signaling, bluffing, and testing, and it can easily descend into conflict and war. Statesmanship, in his mind, is being able to cut through superficial distractions to find compromises that meet the needs and, sometimes, the ambitions, of other states. 

His deep understanding of national leaders’ calculations helped render a potentially chaotic world more predictable. That made him an honored guest in Washington, Moscow, Beijing, and virtually anywhere he traveled. Chaos is costly to businesses and states alike, and thinkers like Kissinger helped leaders lower the cost.

For President Donald Trump, that kind of world is a rigged one. If U.S. behaviors can be easily calculated, countries can just take advantage of the United States. Setting clear limits and red lines gives license to adversaries and allies alike to come right up against them and test them. The United States becomes endlessly embattled and becomes preoccupied with the minutiae of enforcing myriad limits in a completely reactive way. 

But there is an alternative in Trump’s mind. If the United States acts powerfully and in occasionally unpredictable ways, countries pull back. Because the United States is more powerful than any other country, fear of conflict with the United States pushes them to limit their own behavior. Rather than continually fighting small battles—and endlessly co-opting allies—in ways that drain U.S. resources, countries shy away from battles they know they will lose. In this scenario, the United States wins time and time again without having to fight.

We have already seen some signs of this at work. While Trump’s statements were not the only factor behind finally striking a hostage exchange and ceasefire deal in Gaza, they contributed to it. Similarly, the Iranian leadership seems to be exploring ways to open a dialogue with the United States, European leaders are talking about increasing their defense spending, and both Russia and Ukraine seem to sense that the conflict is at an inflection point because of the changes in Washington. 

The Trump administration seems to have little patience for the traditional patterns of diplomacy, full of scripted formality and hidden meanings. It seeks to demonstrate power, and for others to demonstrate their subservience.

Trump’s early successes will not necessarily become an enduring pattern, however. Businesses and states alike are deeply risk averse, and they will seek to insulate themselves to the sorts of risks that the United States now creates. At least on a superficial level, most will seek to comply with the United States. The costs of obvious defiance not only seem high, but they often seem unnecessary.

Some states will seek to quietly defy the United States without arousing its ire. An outward attitude of deference may be enough to satisfy U.S. demands and provide cover for an actual response of partial or delayed compliance. When the United States has myriad priorities and shifting demands, that provides an opening for countries to escape the spotlight without doing exactly what the United States wants.

Some states will quietly seek to insulate themselves from reliance on a mercurial United States. They can do this by joining together in alliances and agreements independent of the United States by diversifying their relationships—including with U.S. adversaries such as Russia and China—and generally finding ways to balance against the White House, perhaps while seeming, superficially, to bandwagon with it. 

No doubt Russia and China will seek to quietly encourage this behavior, which profoundly serves their own interests at the U.S. expense. We should see an increase in efforts to bolster solidarity in the Global South, with portrayals of a hegemonic United States and its G7 allies seeming to threaten countries with 85 percent of the world’s population and by some measures, a majority of its GDP.

Finally, some states will seek to merely run out the clock on the Trump administration. Term limits in the U.S. Constitution, combined with Trump’s age, mean that many leaders expect Trump to leave the scene well before they do. By avoiding drawing attention to themselves and making small, short-term concessions, they can wait for the waves of Trump policies to crash around them and hope for a more conventional U.S. policy to follow after U.S. midterm elections in 2026 render Trump a lame duck.

The challenge for President Trump is how to ensure that short-term wins turn into long-term gains. That will be difficult, because of the deep desire of most governments to manage risk. They will seek to limit risks, and when they take them, they want two things: to be able to quantify them and to take them at the time of their choosing. That will mean seeking less reliance on the United States in the near term and finding robust alternatives to a close U.S. partnership in the longer term.

The consequences will reach far into the future, as countries internalize the idea that the United States is a less reliable protector and a more vigorous competitor. Whether this works out to a U.S. advantage is likely to be more dynamic than many on either side of the debate are willing to admit. 

Yet one thing is certain: World orders change. In Kissinger’s view, two things drive that change. The first is a redefinition of legitimacy, and the second is a significant shift in the balance of power. Each is a gradual process and not an event. Even so, such shifts are often punctuated by acute phenomena, such as a major war or dramatic economic dislocation.

While people can differ on whether a less predictable United States will advance U.S. interests or not, they should not differ on the depth of the shifts we are likely to see, and their importance to U.S. interests for decades to come.

Jon B. Alterman is a senior vice president, holds the Zbigniew Brzezinski Chair in Global Security and Geostrategy, and is director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

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Jon Alterman
Senior Vice President, Zbigniew Brzezinski Chair in Global Security and Geostrategy, and Director, Middle East Program