Transcription
Now, I think many countries that have previously been close to the United States regard the Trump administration as fundamentally hostile. You have European leaders who have said this on a number of occasions. Certainly, countries in Asia have real doubts, not just about America's commitment, but about America's willingness to bully them.
Welcome, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. I'm your host Iliana Petrova with a new episode of World Affairs in Context. Today, I'm honored to be joined by Dr. Stephen Walt, one of the world's leading scholars of international relations and a professor at Harvard University. Professor Walt is widely known for his groundbreaking work on realism, great power competition, and US foreign policy. He is the co-author of the influential book The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, which I read and can highly, highly recommend. It is eye-opening. And he's also the author of several acclaimed works, including The Hell of Good Intentions, which examines the successes and failures of America's role in the world. Professor Walt, it's such an honor. Welcome to the program.
Yeah, it's nice to be with you.
It's great to have you. Professor, in your recent Foreign Affairs article titled The Predatory Hegemon, you argue that the Trump administration's foreign policy reflects a form of predatory hegemony, where the United States treats international relations as effectively a zero-sum game, and it uses its power to extract concessions, tribute, and, of course, political compliance or submission from both rivals and allies. What are the core principles of this framework, and how does it differ from previous US approaches to global leadership?
Right. Well, so to be a predatory hegemon means using your dominant position to try and extract concessions from others and constantly improve it. As you said, it's a predatory hegemon views the world in a completely zero-sum way. All bilateral relations are supposed to rebound to its benefit. You know, if both sides benefit, a predatory hegemon wants to get more. It's always looking for the lion's share of any deal. And it's, I think, a real departure for American foreign policy. Now, you know, all great powers are predatory to some degree, but in most cases, you're predatory towards your adversaries. You always want to do better than they do, and that makes perfect sense in a competitive world. What distinguishes a predatory hegemon from a more benign one is that a predatory hegemon acts that way towards its allies as well, tries to take advantage of them wherever possible. And that's, I think, a real departure for the United States. The the United States has always played hardball with other countries, especially adversaries, and it's sometimes, you know, twisted arms of its allies, pushed them to do what it wanted. But, by and large, it wanted its allies to do well because it saw those partnerships benefiting and being in America's interest. So, America would would be better off if our allies were stable and prosperous. We didn't try to exploit them at every turn. What, I think, made the Trump administration—the second Trump administration, I should be clear—really different is that they started to adopt that policy towards everyone, towards allies and adversaries alike. And you could argue even more so with respect to some of our allies because the United States has more leverage with them. And I my my basic argument was that because the United States has built up these relations of dependence and leverage over many years, uh, will work in the short term, but it's likely to fail in the long-term because our partners will start making other arrangements. They will start distancing themselves in a variety of ways, and that leverage will gradually be lost, leaving the United States and many others worse off overall.
Uh, Trump seeks to be, sort of, the most powerful man in the world, and he doesn't even try to conceal that. Um, and and many argue that those are quite imperial or, sort of, neo-imperial ambitions. Instead, he's very proud of this, and and he, sort of, wants everyone to see that he's ready, and he he wants to be, sort of, that, you know, the the the the most powerful person. How does Trump's foreign policy change how the world views the United States, and how has it already changed the role of the United States in the world since Trump began his second term last year?
Yeah. Well, there's a couple of features to it. I mean, certainly, the United States now appears to be more of a problem, uh, for its allies than it was in the past. Uh, again, there were often disagreements between the United States and other world capitals, but we, by and large, treated allies with respect, listened to their concerns, tried to work things out. Uh, now, I think many countries that have previously been close to the United States regard the Trump administration as fundamentally hostile. You have European leaders who have said this on a number of occasions. Um, certainly, countries in Asia have real doubts, not just about America's commitment, but about America's willingness, uh, to bully them. And a a closely related part of that is, you know, Trump loves being unpredictable, and his view is, you know, whatever deal I made last week, I'll change it next week if I don't like it anymore. And again, you can't keep doing that without it leading others to say, "This is just not worth it. It's not worth trying to negotiate with this guy. He keeps changing the rules on us. Anything we agree to, he may not live up to." And and so, over time, others start looking for relationships that might be somewhat less beneficial in the abstract, but are more attractive if they're likely to be sustained, likely to be predictable, and reliable. And I might add, this is the same thing that ultimately damaged Trump's business career long before he got into politics. Uh, he, you know, he went bankrupt several times. He had trouble getting loans because he kept stiffing everybody that he worked with. And again, I think the United States has a position of leverage that allows you to do this for a while, but we're starting to discover that other countries, you know, won't put up with this forever.
I'm sure our viewers would love to hear your thoughts on the most recent developments in the US and Israel war against Iran. Both sides, the United States and Iran, signed signed the MOU, and I I would love to hear your thoughts on, sort of, the the aftermath of the war. Because if if a predatory hegemon relies on coercion and dominance to extract concessions from weaker states—and Iran, of course, is a weaker state, you know, economically, politically, in some, in different ways—what does it really mean when the strategy fails to compel an adversary, Iran in this case, to accept Washington's preferred outcome? Does the recent US-Iran confrontation suggest that predatory hegemony is becoming effectively less of a tool in a multipolar world where regional powers have much greater capacity to actually resist American pressure to an extent?
Well, the key point here is that this event, this really foolish war, shows the limits of American power and the limits of military power in certain circumstances. Uh, it's worth noting that, you know, Trump has been unable to bully China as well. You know, he, uh, when he announced his new tariff policy, he slapped, you know, I think a 145% tariff on China. The Chinese is responded immediately by cutting off rare earths, um, and Trump basically, uh, backed down, uh, ran up the white flag, uh, went to Beijing a month or so ago and made nice with, uh, with Xi Jinping because he realized he couldn't push the Chinese around in this way. Iran is not in the same league, right? Doesn't have Chinese capabilities. But what we were asking Iran to do and the way in which we went about it was not something Iran was going to accept, and they did have an extremely potent piece of leverage, uh, as many people had warned before, which was their ability to cut off shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, you know, cut off roughly 20% of oil and gas exports, plus the exports of fertilizer, naphtha, and a bunch of other, uh, industrial precursors, which means that they really had a stranglehold on the world economy. Um, and the reason why Trump has now essentially surrendered, uh, to Iran was because he understood, finally, that the damage this was going to do to the American economy, to other economies around the world, was going to be extraordinary if he didn't get the war, uh, to stop, and he had no way of ending it other than doing this MOU. Now, I'm glad he did it because the economic consequences and subsequent political consequences would have been, uh, horrific. So, I'm glad he, uh, caved in as he did, but, of course, he should never have started the war in the first place. Um, and that's the other lesson to learn here: that there are just real limits to what even the most powerful country in the world can do when it's putting a gun to the head of others and trying to get them to essentially surrender. In the case of Iran, he was trying to overthrow the government, and when that, uh, failed completely, as was, I think, predictable, um, then he was left with really no cards to play.
Uh, let's turn to the war in Ukraine. Um, in your article, you wrote, and I will quote, you wrote, "Predatory hegemon's course of power depends on keeping other states in a condition of permanent submission." And this sentence really stood out to me. Um, Professor Walt, if predatory hegemony rests on the assumption that the United States can use its superior power to compel others to comply with its objectives, how do you explain how do you explain Washington's inability to end the war in Ukraine after years of military aid, uh, sanctions, and, of course, diplomatic pressure? Does this failure actually highlight another fundamental mismatch between, um, sort of, America's self-image under Trump as a hegemon, and then the realities of an emerging world where great powers such as Russia and China can actually set the terms and not feel, you know, not feel the necessity to serve the US interests?
Um, that's a great question. I mean, I think, again, it goes back to a point I made earlier: that there are limits to what even great powers can do. And in the case of Ukraine, of course, you're dealing with, uh, another, uh, major power, Russia, that's not easy to push around, uh, even though it's substantially weaker than the United States. Uh, you're dealing with, obviously, Ukraine, which sees its existence, uh, on, you know, on the table here, and therefore is very resolute in a variety of different ways. So, even there, the United States has somewhat, uh, limited leverage, or not absolute leverage. We can't simply pick up the phone and tell people what to do. They have interests. They're going to want to make sure that whatever the final settlement in Ukraine is is one that safeguards everyone's interests at least adequately. Um, I've been emphasizing a point: that, you know, with predatory hegemony, what's unique about it is the attempt to take advantage of allies as much as adversaries. And that's, in some respects, easier to do because your allies are dependent on you. You have substantial trade relations with them you can threaten to cut off. Many of them are dependent on American protection and don't want to lose it; are dependent on American weapon supplies, don't want to lose those. So, you've got some real leverage with them. When you're dealing with a country like Russia, you just don't have that much leverage. Uh, we've already sanctioned Russia about as heavily as we possibly could, uh, before Trump came into power. We're not going to threaten them militarily because they're a nuclear-armed country as well. So, in a sense, there's real limits to what you can do. Now, having said all that, I think the other problem here is that the Trump administration has not had a clear strategy for what it wanted to do with respect to Ukraine and has turned the problem over to a couple of amateur diplomats who don't know what they're doing. I'm referring here to Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. So, you put a combination like that together and you're not likely to get a deal. Seems to me, the United States could have made much more progress here had it adopted a position of, sort of, not quite even-handed pro-Ukrainian mediation. Said, "Look, we think this war needs to come to an end. We think it is unrealistic for Ukraine to be able to get back all of its lost territory. That might be regrettable, but they don't have the military capabilities to do so. We also don't want Russia to conquer anything more. So, we're going to keep supporting Ukraine, right, to give Russia an incentive to settle, and we're going to also put pressure on Ukraine to have realistic expectations going forward, and hopefully try to work out an arrangement that's minimally acceptable to both Ukraine and to Moscow." That is not the approach that the Biden administration took, and that's not the approach the Trump administration took, and neither was able to actually bring the war to an end, which I think has been a tragedy, especially for Ukraine.
Um, you've mentioned that one of the key, sort of, features of a predatory hegemon is attempting to extract concessions from allies and adversaries alike. And with the EU being such a important player in the war in Ukraine—which many argue, of course, is a proxy war against Russia via Ukraine—um, how how is the United States changing the role of of Europe as a global player, as a global political player, in the course of this war? Um, I've I've seen some opinions that say, "Well, Europe is effectively a a vassal of the United States now, and it has transitioned to purchasing LNG from the United States, which is, of course, much more expensive than the source that they gave up." So, how has the Trump administration changed the role of Europe or the posture of Europe when it comes to international politics?
Um, well, I think the the simplest way to answer that is to say that the Trump administration has taken a number of steps that are pushing Europe to try and speak with a clearer, unified voice and be less dependent upon American protection, less dependent on American guidance. I mean, Trump has never liked NATO very much and he's never liked the European Union. He referred to the European Union as an enemy, you know, said it was created to screw the United States, which, of course, is not true. He's never been friendly towards that. I think he would love to see a world where the EU broke up entirely so the United States could deal individually with each separate European country. I should add, by the way, while we're talking about Europe is, let's not forget that Trump has also said the United States should take Greenland from Denmark, which is a classic act of predation, right? That's what a predatory hegemon does. I want Greenland; I'll just take it if I possibly can. Um, you put all of that together, and I think Europeans have gotten the message that the United States is no longer the first responder they can turn to when there are security problems, and it's going to be an increasingly aggressive economic competitor through through tariffs or such. Now, when Trump came back into office in 2025, I think the initial European response was, "Well, let's see if we can do business with him." Let's see if the bark is worse than his bite, and, you know, he'll be okay. And I think gradually over time they have become disabused of that idea. Whether it was through Vice President J.D. Vance's speech at the Europeans the Munich Security Conference back in 2025, the ways in which Trump has treated, you know, President Zelensky in Ukraine, the tariff policies we've inflicted on them as well. I mean, Europeans should be getting the message at this point that the United States is not the same United States under this president that it has been in the past, and that's why you're seeing European countries greatly increase their defense spending, start to talk more about strategic autonomy in a more serious way. It's why Finland and Sweden have joined NATO, you know, in response to the invasion of Ukraine, etc., etc., etc. I think all of this is just learning that if you're dealing with a predator, trying to appease it and accommodate it is only going to take you so far.
Trump began his second term saying that the war in Ukraine is not his war. And now we're in the second half of June 2026, and it is fair to say that it has become very much his war. Um, it's and it's interesting because, following the coup in 2014, the Maidan coup, it might be fair to say that Ukraine has lost its sovereignty then. Of course, we all heard Victoria Nuland effectively saying in a phone conversation that was leaked that the United States and and and, um, its partners were selecting Ukrainian politicians at the time, and, you know, if you go deeper into Ukrainian politics, such individuals as Yatsenyuk, for example, clearly didn't pursue Ukrainian interests during that time, during the 2014 coup, as they welcomed Nuland and then, of course, McCain, who urged Ukrainians to, to sort of, you know, go against what they previously thought was very much not in in their interest because prior to 2014, the Ukrainian population was very much against joining NATO. They didn't see that as a as an attractive option if it meant a confrontation with Russia, and and there are ample reports and surveys, um, to prove that. And so, is the Trump administration effectively, um, an extension of of the Biden administration's foreign policy toward Ukraine, where, you know, Russia being, sort of, the near-peer competitor, is still seen as an adversary and inflicting harm or, uh, damage, whereas, you know, economic or political damage to Russia is still a priority, um, and and and ending the war is seen, sort of, not as important in comparison to that priority?
Um, I'm not sure about this. I mean, I think there are the real divisions, I think, here even within the Trump administration as well. I mean, um, uh, Trump himself, you know, has always had a soft spot for President Putin in Russia, seems to admire him, so he thinks he's a great guy. Uh, they did have that summit meeting in Alaska, where there was, sort of, a little bromance, uh, going on as well. And do you recall the Oval Office meeting, uh, the first one with Zelenskyy, where Trump and Vance basically lectured him, uh, for not being grateful and all of that? So, there's a there is a view within the administration, uh, that, you know, that you Russia really is our friend, which, I think, is not the case. Uh, but, um, uh, and and that Ukraine was the problem. Uh, they unfortunately faced several different difficulties at that point. I mean, problem number one is that there are still Republicans who strongly disagree with that view. And some of them, you know, they have want to keep on board. Uh, second, if, uh, they sided with Russia and Ukraine completely collapsed—which, I think, people were more worried about a year, year and a half ago—then Trump was going to get blamed for this. And this was going to, um, uh, be, you know, politically costly, uh, for him as well. So, I think there was a sort of divisions within the administration, and they didn't ever have a clear strategy, a clear destination of what they wanted to do. Trump had made all these boasts in the campaign about how he could solve the war in 24 hours, which was a silly thing to say, because even if both sides genuinely wanted to end the war tomorrow, there are lots of details, lots of problems that have to be worked out. That's not something you could ever try to do in in 24 hours. And I think then Trump was embarrassed when he made a a few efforts, sort of, half-hearted efforts at the beginning, and he got completely stiffed. He got stiffed by the Ukrainians, he got stiffed by the Russians. And this this, I think, ticked him off to some degree. So, he's perhaps not as quite as fond of Putin as he once was. Now, the the final part of this, of course, is that the war, you know, has gone better, I think, from the Russian point of view than from the Ukrainian point of view, but it's hardly a stunning victory. All right, they've now been fighting in Ukraine for longer than World War I, and they've gotten about 20% of the country, right, at enormous cost, economic and personal. And Trump, you know, famously always likes winners. And so, a year two a year or two ago, he might have said, "Well, you know, Vladimir, he's he's a winner here. He's going to This is going to turn out well for him. I want to be on his side." Now, I'm not sure Trump is so convinced of that; that he's not entirely sure that maybe the Ukrainians are doing better. Um, I think the one mistake here is to think of it as Trump's war. Um, he has done everything possible to suggest that it really is not his war. We haven't been actively involved in the diplomacy for a while now. We're not supplying Ukraine with lots of weapons anymore. We'll We'll sell them, but we'll sell weapons to almost anybody. We're not backing them the way they were in the Biden administration, and he has said repeatedly, of course, "This is the European problem." This is something the European. If they want to deal with it, that's fine. It's not our problem. President Vance, Vice President Vance, has said much the same thing. So, I think he understands there's not much for him to gain here, and he's trying to stay as far away from that one as possible. Now, of course, he's been distracted the last few months by this mess in the Middle East. That is going to be a continued problem because they've got 60 days now to try and negotiate a deal. That probably won't be achieved. Very difficult, which means he's going to have that hanging over his head, and I don't think you're likely to see the administration get serious about Ukraine in the next, you know, between now and, say, the midterm elections in November.
Um, yes, and and, of course, one of the key, sort of, tools of of the United States' power globally has been its vast economic resources and economic power. How does economic coercion—through sanctions, financial restrictions, and, um, control of the dollar-based system—how does that fit into the concept of, uh, predatory hegemony?
Um, it's actually pretty important, uh, pretty key to it, because, of course, the American the size of the American economy and its importance to other countries is a key source of leverage. Um, and, you know, the fact that many other countries want to be able to export to the very large American market, uh, and therefore, if they suddenly feel like their, uh, exports are going to be, uh, attached with a tariff, that leads them to think, "Well, what's some way I can get that tariff reduced, whatever." So, it is a source of leverage. You mentioned the fact that the dollar is the world's reserve currency, and an enormous amount of international trade is essentially conducted in dollars, which means those dollars have to pass through the American financial system, through Swift as as well, and that means the United States can cut other countries off and cut businesses off completely from the not just the American economy, but essentially the world economy. Um, this is a tool, uh, it's been labeled, you know, "weaponized interdependence," that we've used very effectively, uh, to some degree towards Russia, certainly towards countries like Iran in the past. But notice, like all these other forms of leverage, they are not absolute. They can be reduced over time. So, if the United States keeps threatening you with tariffs, you start making trade deals with other countries. You can't replace the United States, but you can certainly make us less important in, uh, your trade arrangements. Similarly, we're starting to see other countries—China, Russia, Iran, elsewhere—developing alternative transaction systems so that they can do business without having to do business, uh, in the US dollar. Again, another way of reducing American leverage. So, you can be a predator for a while, and America's economic strength is important in that regard, but overusing it, being a predator 24/7, just gives other countries an incentive to try and remove that leverage over time. Last point. Um, the dollar is a choke point when you think about it in this way. But, as we've learned in the last 3 months, other countries have choke points, too. Uh, they have choke points like geographic choke points, and there are other examples you could point to in the world other than the Strait of Hormuz, but also control over things that economies need. So, control over rare earths; control over other industrial precursors; control over prescription medicine supplies. Right? Those are all potential choke points as well, and if you need to import those things more than the country that exports them needs to sell them right away, then, of course, they've got leverage, and if we've seen that begin to happen in a number of ways as well. So, yes, the American economy is a great source of leverage, but it's not absolute, and it certainly doesn't allow us to dictate to others and continue to exploit them forever.