Unpacking a Trump Twist of the National Security Strategy

On December 4, the Donald Trump administration released a new National Security Strategy (NSS) that criticized U.S. allies in Europe and pledged to assert U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere. The document’s principles—which emphasized non-interventionism and putting “America First”—signal a sharp change from the previous 2022 NSS that outlined the United States’ role in strengthening democracy and preserving peace under the current world order.
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The strategy [PDF] says resolution of the Russia-Ukraine war is a central interest of the United States but directs stronger language at longtime U.S. allies in Europe than Russia, which had been called out in the first Trump administration as a chief geopolitical rival. Among other priorities, the White House called for a readjustment of U.S. military presence, moving troops away from the Middle East to focus on security and combating drug trafficking from in the Western Hemisphere. The strategy also calls on allies in the Indo-Pacific to increase its burden-sharing in deterring conflict with China in the Taiwan strait.
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To break down the strategy and its pivot from past norms, CFR convened seven of its regional and conflict experts to discuss the global implications of Trump’s new security doctrine.
Polemics Over Policy: Trump’s New National Security Strategy
Rebecca Lissner is a senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the Council on Foreign Relations and a Brady-Johnson distinguished practitioner in grand strategy and lecturer with the Jackson School of Global Affairs at Yale University.
Trump’s second NSS is a radical departure—in both substance and tone from past strategies—including the NSS he released eight years ago in his first presidential term. That document, along with the accompanying National Defense Strategy, set a new course for U.S. foreign policy, elevating the concept of great power competition with China and Russia. While neither perfect nor predictive of policy during Trump’s chaotic first term, the 2017 NSS is a serious document that laid out a comprehensive picture of and methods to address the challenges facing the United States.
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That strategic clarity is entirely missing from the new NSS, which is more polemic than policy. The north star of great power competition with China and Russia—around which the first Trump administration built bipartisan consensus—is gone. Rather than describing the scope and scale of China’s systemic challenge to the United States and our allies and partners, the 2025 NSS makes clear that economics are “the ultimate stakes.” The new paramount objective of Washington’s China policy is a “mutually advantageous economic relationship with Beijing.” The discussion of Russia is mealymouthed at best: The document declines to characterize the threat Moscow poses to U.S. interests. It instead opts for the bizarre formulation, “many Europeans regard Russia as an existential threat.” And while the 2017 NSS highlighted Iran and North Korea as second-tier threats, the new NSS does not mention North Korea at all and downplays the danger posed by Iran after Operation Midnight Hammer.
In place of that great-power-competition focus is a highly ideological frame that reflects the president’s domestic priorities. The Western Hemisphere is elevated as America’s highest priority, with an emphasis on arresting migration, combating so-called “narco-terrorists,” and assuring U.S. dominance through a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine. The call for U.S. military posture to reflect “urgent threats in our Hemisphere” is a strong signal of what is to come in the National Defense Strategy. And far from the grave tone struck by all its predecessors, this NSS veers at times into screed. It reserves its greatest vitriol for U.S. “foreign policy elites” and European allies rather than those who could truly threaten the United States.
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A close read of the NSS reveals myriad baseless assertions and internal inconsistencies. But no written document can truly guide, capture, or discipline Trump’s often impulsive, erratic, and opportunistic foreign policy. Further, the unceremonious rollout—a late-night release seemingly without an accompanying speech by the president or national security advisor—suggests the White House could see the NSS mostly as a box-checking exercise, rather than a binding statement of strategic intent. Its many audiences, from Capitol Hill to allied capitals, should discount it accordingly.
A Plan to Dominate the Western Hemisphere: Bold Aims, Dubious Methods
Will Freeman is a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
As China rose to the status of a “near peer” U.S. competitor, Asia often topped the list of recent NSS priorities. But this year, the Western Hemisphere comes in first—as it previously did in 1987, 1990, and 2006. While some will see this adjustment as prudent after years of U.S. overcommitment to far-flung parts of the globe, others will argue the NSS represents an isolationist retrenchment and an unnecessary sacrifice of influence to an emboldened China and Russia.
Whether or not it should top the list, there is a strong case for greater attention to the Western Hemisphere now and in the future. Hemispheric organized crime claims more U.S. lives than any other national security threat. Recent years have exposed a troubling incapacity to control our southern border, unsettling U.S. domestic politics. The Western Hemisphere is rich in natural resources and well-positioned to help the United States strengthen critical supply chains, but China is competing in this domain by expanding its influence in trade and digital infrastructure.
The NSS gives these challenges long-overdue emphasis. At the same time, it puts forward a controversial, threat-oriented vision of the United States’ southern neighbors: Latin America is a region of risks first, and one of opportunities second. The NSS says that U.S. foreign policy will focus largely on containing three threats: mass migration, organized crime, and “hostile foreign incursion.”
Halting mass migration—which isn’t defined as legal or illegal—tops the list. Granting citizenship “only rarely” to foreigners is described as the ideal. Doing otherwise strains “social cohesion,” increases crime, and distorts labor markets, says the NSS. (There is plenty of evidence to question these claims.) Expect governments that cooperate on border enforcement—especially those geographically close to the United States—to see less pressure in other areas, as has been the case for the last decade or more.
The NSS then calls for “neutralizing” “narco-terrorists” and “cartels” using lethal force and U.S. military assets in cooperation with regional partners. It adopts a purely military understanding of organized crime and implies that conventional law enforcement has been and will be ineffective. Although lethal force could have some deterring effect, criminal groups are ultimately businesses—powered by U.S. and global demand for their products, supply (of drugs, illegal gold, migration routes), and a business environment made favorable by widespread corruption: a word the NSS never mentions. Fighting them like insurgencies will likely prove ineffective.
Finally, the section discusses “enlisting” regional partners to jointly develop strategic sites and resources, buy U.S. goods, welcome U.S. private investment, and shrink “hostile foreign influence” through a mix of aid-conditionality, diplomatic pressure, and undefined “rewards.” It briefly discusses strengthening incentives for U.S. businesses to pursue such near-shoring, a challenge for other recent administrations, without offering many specifics.
Interestingly, the NSS is less ideological in its discussion of the Western Hemisphere as opposed to Europe. Among neighbors, “we must not overlook governments with different outlooks with whom we nonetheless share interests,” the NSS reads. Can regional partners include autocracies? The NSS leaves space for this. The goal is a “reasonably stable and well-governed” hemisphere; not, explicitly, a democratic one. The United States will advocate respect for self-government and other basic liberties in countries that “share our values,” but it will not insist on shared values as a precondition for partnership.
The NSS envisions “enlisting” like-minded regional partners. But the Western Hemisphere is overwhelmingly democratic. What if foreign voters decide they don’t want to be enlisted and choose leaders who oppose U.S. preferences? Can they then be obliged? The NSS doesn’t say, but the administration’s use of tariffs to pressure compliance on drugs and migration, and recent attempts to tip the scales of Latin American elections, suggest the answer is yes.
In short, the NSS’s emphasis on neighbors is defensible, the vision largely threat-oriented, and the tactics for getting from A to B seemingly dubious.
The Death of Great-Power Competition with China
David Sacks is a fellow for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Eight years ago, President Trump, in his first national security strategy, inaugurated an era of “great-power competition” with China. That NSS described China as a revisionist power that attempts to “shape a world antithetical to U.S. values and interests” and “displace the United States in the Indo-Pacific region.” It was clear-eyed about the complex, long-term challenge that China poses to the United States.
With this NSS, that era has come to an end. Trump’s new strategy relegates geopolitics to a supporting role, while positioning economics as the “ultimate stakes.” China is not mentioned until page nineteen of the twenty-nine-page document. It is envisaged primarily as an economic competitor, and thus the need to rebalance bilateral economic ties is prioritized above concerns with Beijing’s strategic intentions. China is no longer framed as a systemic challenge with a vision of world order that is incompatible with U.S. interests. Trump’s first NSS starkly noted: “A geopolitical competition between free and repressive visions of world order is taking place in the Indo-Pacific region.” Such language is now entirely absent. While China has feared that Trump would seek to decouple the U.S. and Chinese economies, this NSS holds out the prospect of a “genuinely mutually advantageous economic relationship with Beijing.”
There is far more emphasis on Taiwan in this NSS than in previous documents, with a particular focus on deterring Chinese aggression against the island and a welcome emphasis on maintaining the ability to defeat aggression anywhere in the First Island Chain. The statement that “deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, is a priority” should help ease fears in Taipei about U.S. commitment and convey a seriousness to leaders in Beijing.
Less welcome, though, is how it frames Taiwan. According to the document, the island’s importance lies in its dominance of semiconductor production and its critical geographic position. This is unfortunate, as it instrumentalizes Taiwan and overlooks the fact that Taiwan was seen as a critical interest long before the semiconductor was invented. Also worrying, the NSS states, “the United States does not support any unilateral change to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait.” There has been much speculation in recent months that President Trump would shift U.S. declaratory policy on Taiwan independence from non-support to opposition. While the NSS did not address this question, the document made a counterproductive adjustment to U.S. policy on the status quo, weakening its stance from opposing unilateral changes to merely not supporting such changes. This shift is baffling.
Most significantly, the Indo-Pacific portion of the strategy is China-centric. Other countries in the region are valued insofar as they can help the United States win an economic competition with China and deter a conflict with Beijing. The Philippines, a U.S. treaty ally, is not even mentioned. Nor are the Pacific Islands or most countries in Southeast Asia. A strategy that played to U.S. strengths, though, would make U.S. allies and partners the starting point and nest China within a broader Indo-Pacific strategy.
Europe Faces an Ominous U.S. Worldview
Liana Fix is a senior fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Trump administration’s new National Security Strategy suggests a “civilizational” approach as the main lens through which it considers its relationship with Europe—a continent full of U.S. allies. This ideological framework is radically different from the first Trump administration, and really any past administration’s view of Europe. The core problem of the European continent, according to the NSS, is a neglect of “Western” values (understood as nationalist conservative values) and a “loss of national identities” due to immigration and “cratering birthrates.” The alleged result is economic stagnation, military weakness, and “civilizational erasure” of Europe.
This framework accuses Europe of censorship and suppressing political opposition, expanding on Vice President JD Vance’s much-publicized criticism at the 2025 Munich Security Conference. It characterizes the European Union in adversarial terms, claiming the body has undermined “political liberty” and “sovereignty.” Particularly worrisome for Europeans is the endorsement of far-right (“patriotic”) parties and the stated goal to “cultivate resistance... within European nations.” This will be perceived by European allies as an unacceptable attempt to meddle in their internal affairs. If the test for a good European ally is the extent to which it aligns with the nationalist conservative values of the Trump administration, as this NSS suggests, this does not bode well for the future of the transatlantic relationship. Not only does this new strategy mark the end of the transatlantic alliance based on liberal values, but also a reorientation towards an alliance of illiberals.
Russia is spared any criticism in the NSS and, strikingly, the country is not defined as an adversary of the United States. Instead, Europeans are criticized for a lack of genuine peace efforts in Ukraine and “unrealistic” expectations, which allegedly contradict the wish for peace from the European population. On Russia and Ukraine, the NSS places a priority on the U.S.-Russia great-power relationship and highlights strategic stability (New START falls in this category) as well as escalation management with Russia in Europe. The NSS does commit to Ukraine’s survival as a “viable state” and its reconstruction, but it does not spell out how to achieve this goal. While the strategy adds that the United States wants NATO to “prevent the reality” of a “perpetually expanding alliance,” the administration writes that it opposes NATO’s open-door policy.
The NSS also states that Europe remains strategically and “culturally” vital to maintaining U.S. competitiveness. This suggests some level of desired alignment on a China policy “to combat mercantilist overcapacity and technological theft.” However, this applies in particular to Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe, described as “healthy nations” with which ties should be expanded, whereas longtime allies in Western Europe, such as Germany, are specifically singled out for continued dependencies.
Vance’s speech in Munich could have been interpreted back in February as the ideological views of just the vice president and parts of the radical MAGA base. But now, these views have become the administration’s official policy, which will only accelerate Europe’s efforts to hedge against the United States and to build up its own autonomy.
A Middle East Strategy That Conflicts With Trump’s Approach
Steven A. Cook is Eni Enrico Mattei senior fellow for Middle East and Africa studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The National Security Strategy’s statement on the Middle East, which asserts that the region is no longer a focal point for U.S. policy, is entirely consistent with the position Trump staked out during his three campaigns for the presidency. It also tracks with his speech in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, last May, during which the president declared that the era of American nation-building and general meddling in the affairs of Middle Eastern countries was over.
During those remarks, he pointed to the economic development and social changes underway throughout the Gulf to emphasize that the people of the region can make their own decisions about how they choose to arrange their societies and that they are capable of significant achievements without help from Washington. There was wisdom in this statement after three decades of U.S. failure to transform the politics and cultures of Middle Eastern countries.
At the same time, the NSS and the president’s inclination to diminish the U.S. role in the region conflicts with the White House’s approach since Trump returned to office. The U.S. military now has a robust presence in the south-central Israeli town, Kiryat Gat, where it is overseeing Trump’s peace plan for the Gaza Strip, which has a robust nation-building component. The White House is also deeply engaged in the effort to disarm Hezbollah and forge normal relations between Israel and Lebanon. And the president has taken an active interest in Syria’s transition, lifting sanctions, calling on Congress to take further measures to aid Syria’s reconstruction, and pressuring Israel to engage in a dialogue with Syria on border security. It is true that Trump wants regional actors, particularly Saudi Arabia and Turkey, to help engineer Syria’s transformation, but it seems clear that he remains keenly interested in ensuring that Syrians have a peaceful and prosperous future.
Finally, the NSS makes the mistake of assuming that because the United States is engaged in a competition with China, Washington can de-emphasize the Middle East. China has global ambitions that include the Middle East. Although Beijing does not seem interested in providing security and stability, especially in the Gulf, China’s leaders intend to be influential actors in the region and have demonstrated a capacity to undermine U.S. Middle East policy, whether through its relations with Iran or its policies in the Red Sea—both of which made it more difficult for the United States to contain or neutralize threats to U.S. interests.
A Thin Africa Policy Covers Familiar Territory
Michelle D. Gavin is the Ralph Bunche senior fellow for Africa policy studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Africa portion of the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy is positioned as a dramatic shift from the past, but it ultimately echoes several priorities of past administrations. Conflict resolution, conflict prevention, and increasing U.S.-Africa trade and investment are not new focal points.
The text’s references to “select states” bear similarity to the “anchor states” concept of the George W. Bush administration, and the reference to opportunities in the power sector is not such a far cry from the Barack Obama administration’s effort to expand energy access. Some will find a glimmer of hope in the strategy's explicit reference to reforming the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a market access regime established under President Bill Clinton for African goods that has lapsed under the Trump administration.
But the three paragraphs this strategy devotes to the vast African continent also raise many unanswered questions. It has nothing to say about governance, while expressing a desire to work with “capable, reliable states.” Attractive investment climates cannot be established without effective governance, the rule of law, and functioning accountability mechanisms to curb corruption.
But these ideas do not appear to animate the administration’s search for “select partners.” While the strategy suggests the United States should be concerned about metastasizing violent extremism that has taken root in the Sahel and elsewhere, it has nothing at all to say about what to do about it. Overall, the scanty section is neither the dramatic pivot it claims to be, nor is it an illuminating window into planned U.S. strategy toward a continent that will soon boast one-quarter of all the people on the planet.
Reality Checking the ‘President of Peace’
Paul B. Stares is the General John W. Vessey senior fellow for conflict prevention and director of the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations. Abi McGowan and Molly Carlough—members of the center’s staff—contributed to this analysis.
The newly released NSS reiterates President Trump’s earlier assertions that he is deserving of being hailed the “president of peace” for having “settled” eight “raging conflicts” in as many months.
If only this reality were true. Like many of Trump’s claims, the facts simply don’t support the rhetoric—at least not to the extent he either believes or would have the public believe.
On the one hand, it is undeniable that Trump set out to be a peacemaker from the very start of his administration. It is also undeniable that the president and senior U.S. officials have worked hard to pursue that goal in various settings. For this, they should be given credit.
Yet, the results are mixed at best, and the claim of sole or prime responsibility for whatever positive progress has occurred on his watch is questionable. The eight cases cited as “cementing” Trump’s peacemaking “legacy” are all tendentious.
For a start, in two of them—between Kosovo and Serbia and Egypt and Ethiopia—there was no active conflict demanding to be extinguished. The underlying source of their differences also remains unresolved. In another stated achievement, bringing peace to Armenia and Azerbaijan, the conflict had effectively ended before Trump took office. As for three other putative triumphs—brokering ceasefires between India and Pakistan, Iran and Israel, and Cambodia and Thailand—Trump’s intervention does appear to have made a difference, but most observers believe these conflicts could reignite at any time. Indeed, they are already fraying. And in the final two cases—the DRC-Rwanda and Israel-Hamas conflicts—the fighting has hardly ended, despite all the fanfare.
It is also worth highlighting that President Trump has yet to bring peace to Ukraine, as he initially claimed he would do within twenty-four hours of taking office. Nor has his administration done much, if anything, significant to quell the carnage in Sudan—one of the most horrific conflicts in recent memory. Meanwhile, he continues to intimidate other countries on a regular basis, including threatening to use force.
In sum, President Trump’s desire to be known as a great peacemaker is a commendable aspiration, which one day could even be realized, but there is still much to be done—and undone—before that title can ever be conferred.