How ‘America First’ Became ‘America Alone’

Adam Serwer: “Those allies aren’t exactly jumping at the chance to join Trump’s war on Iran—not a single one has taken the offer. That leaves the president trapped in a needless war of choice that he started and is unable to finish. Iran’s leverage over the global economy is increasing as oil prices rise and the strait remains closed to the U.S. and its allies.”

“Now, basically anyone could have told Trump that spending the past few years antagonizing allies with aggressive tariffs, belligerent arm-twisting, and imperial dismissiveness would hurt him when the time came to ask those same allies for help.”

“But this isn’t a simple strategic miscalculation or even a typical Trumpian incompetence—it’s the result of a particular ideological fantasy of American independence from foreign alliances, one that is oblivious to how those alliances long served American interests. Americans are learning the hard way that the economic costs of the autarky pursued by Trump are far worse than those of the ‘globalism’ he opposes.”