“Our strength as a nation is inextricably linked to the strength of our unique and comprehensive system of alliances … We cannot protect our interests effectively without maintaining strong alliances and showing respect to those allies.”
So wrote Gen. James Mattis, Donald Trump’s first Defense Secretary, in his 2018 resignation letter to the President. It’s a sentiment that’s been expressed by many American leaders, particularly in the post-World War II period. Put simply: On the global stage, friends matter.
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I thought of this last week, as world leaders gathered in New York for the 80th U.N.G.A., and as tensions appeared in unlikely places. Trump 2.0 has upended some of America’s strongest global friendships, and in the process taken a wrecking ball to the notion espoused by Mattis and many others.
It’s a transactional approach in the name of “America First”—reflected in his vitriolic speech at the U.N.G.A.—but too often it looks like an own goal. And—to take three now-strained relationships as examples—it’s already hurting the U.S.
A “rupture” up north
Canada’s U.N.G.A. delegation isn’t usually a place to go for fireworks, but in New York on Monday, Prime Minister Mark Carney was blunt. “This is not a transition,” he told the Council on Foreign Relations. “This is a rupture.” Carney didn’t mention the U.S. by name, but everyone knew what country he had in mind, and he sounded like a leader girding for battle. Canada will “build strength at home,” Carney said. “We have a determination to rise up and meet this.”
Historically, Canada is about as good a friend as the U.S. has had. The two nations are major trading partners, they have jointly operated the North American Aerospace Defense Command for nearly 70 years, and Canada has been an outsized contributor of troops to U.S.-led wars, though the 2003 Iraq war was a notable exception.
Read More: How Canada Got Hooked on the U.S. Economy
Since Trump returned to office, Canada has been hit with punitive tariffs and repeated threats to make it the “51st state.” While it is true that Canada maintains a small trade deficit with the U.S., largely because of energy purchases, the accompanying White House claim that Canada is a “massive” trafficker of fentanyl is certainly not. U.S. Customs reported that just 43 lbs. of the opioid entered the country from Canada last year; the figure from Mexico was more than 21,000 lbs.
U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra didn’t help matters when he told the Halifax Chamber of Commerce this month that he was “disappointed” with Canada’s “anti-American” reaction to the tariffs. “A Canada that it would be very easy to target with 500% steel tariffs, or one patriot missile aimed at Parliament Hill,” he added, rather incredulously.
“I think we’ve passed the Rubicon on this,” Richard Fadden, a former Canadian National Security Advisor, told me earlier this year. “It’s going to take a long time for the U.S.’s traditional allies to appreciate the way the world has changed, to adapt to it and come to a new relationship … This is not going to help the United States’ long-term interests.”
The tariffs will mean higher costs for U.S. car manufacturers and construction companies, and potentially for American consumers, but longer-term consequences loom. Campaigns have sprouted to boycott U.S. products, and according to a new Ipsos poll, 60% of Canadians believe they can no longer trust their southern neighbor. Some 82% say they’ll keep avoiding U.S. goods even if the crisis abates.
In New York City, Carney spoke of a “strong consensus” among Canadians to seek other trade opportunities. “The country,” he said, “does not want to wake up and look, with all due respect, on Truth Social or X to see what the latest change is in U.S. policy, but wants to get on with what we can control.” Just prior to the U.N.G.A. meetings, Carney was in Mexico to meet with his counterpart Claudia Sheinbaum. A Canada-Mexico summit is hardly unusual, but their agenda was; a bilateral effort to reduce trade reliance on the U.S.
As for security issues, an obvious question arises: in the next global crisis, when the U.S. seeks a new coalition or military deployment, will any Canadian leader be quick to raise its hand?
“Is this what you do to an ally?”
On the other side of the world, another American friend is fuming.
Only a month ago, the Trump Administration’s relationship with South Korea looked sound. President Lee Jae-myung met with Trump at the White House in late August and pledged $350 billion in U.S. investments—money for LNG, car manufacturing, and a sorely-needed boost for American shipbuilding. Among companies making commitments was carmaking giant Hyundai, which upped a pledge of $21 billion in U.S. investment to $26 billion. It was exactly the sort of transactional diplomacy Trump favors, and he said as much. “We’re going to get along great (with South Korea) because … we really sort of need each other.”
Read More: 5 Takeaways from TIME’s Conversation with President Lee Jae-Myung
Ten days later, ICE agents descended on a Hyundai EV battery factory in Ellabell, Georgia. Some 317 South Korean workers were detained for questioning about their visa status. They were shackled—the video was shown across South Korea—their cell phones were confiscated, and they said they were never informed of charges against them.
It took high-level diplomacy to free the workers, at which point they were told they could pursue their cases here or return to South Korea. They chose to go home. “My main takeaway is that America is not a safe place to work,” one of the workers, Park Sun-kyu, told The New York Times.
South Korean lawmakers condemned the raid and questioned the wisdom of further investment in the U.S. The conservative Chosun Ilbo newspaper lamented “a breach of trust,” while the liberal Hankyoreh posed a question many Canadians were asking: “Is this what you do to an ally?”
John DeLury, an American scholar at Seoul’s Yonsei University and not someone given to bluster, posted on X: “South Korea is ground zero of the Great American Alienation of the Indo-Pacific.”
The raid miffed American officials as well. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp had promoted the Hyundai investment as the largest economic development project in his state’s history, and a source of thousands of new jobs. Now, Hyundai is advising employees to reschedule business trips to the U.S., the South Korean government has put a hold on future investments, and officials have warned of security ramifications. South Korea is home to 28,000 American troops and a bulwark against both North Korea and China.
“We’re in an age of new normal in dealing with the United States,” presidential chief of staff Kang Hoon-sik told reporters. “The standard changes every time and constantly there has to be deal-making, not only on tariffs, but it’ll also be the case with security issues.”
When friends look elsewhere
The case of India is different because, to borrow a metaphor Trump has used vis-a-vis the Ukraine-Russia war, India holds lots of cards.
India’s relations with Washington looked good at the start of the year. The Trump Administration appeared keen to leverage relations with Delhi as a counterweight to China, and Trump himself enjoyed a close relationship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who came to the White House in February, agreed to a new economic and military partnership, and said the Trump Administration would “make India great again.”
Then it was India’s turn for a “rupture.” The White House hit Delhi with 25% tariffs, then called India’s economy “dead” and doubled the figure, citing India’s purchases of Russian oil. The president also veered sharply towards India’s archrival, offering Pakistan a more generous tariff rate (19%), hosting Pakistan’s army chief at the White House, and inviting Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif for a visit during U.N.G.A. week.
“The Trump administration is depleting the reservoir of trust that both nations have painstakingly built over a generation,” said Richard Rossow, India Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The U.S.-India wider strategic relationship is at serious risk.”
For his part, Modi used a Sept. 21 national address to urge “Swadeshi,” a push to buy made-in-India goods, and his supporters have launched Canada-like boycotts of American brands that are hugely popular in India. And in August, Modi paid his first visit to China in more than seven years, where he was seen laughing with Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin. Just prior to his China trip, Modi dispatched his foreign minister to Moscow, to boost overall Russia-India trade.
Read More: How Modi Is Sending Trump a Message
Trump’s bullying was meant to drive a wedge between China and India and pressure India to stop buying Russian oil—but Modi is warming to both China and Russia. And his “Swadeshi” may bring real pain to U.S. exporters.
What comes next
In each of these cases, Trump has been willing to risk a longstanding U.S. alliance for unclear economic benefits. These jilted friends are now starting to look elsewhere for economic and even security partners—as Modi and Carney are doing already.
The hope is that Trump will change his tune. There were small hints of that last week; a State Department assurance that India remains a key U.S. partner, and an effort to soothe South Korean anger in the wake of the ICE raids.
But while it’s hard to imagine these countries abandoning Washington completely, it’s equally difficult to imagine their leaders rushing to support the U.S. in the future. As Gen. Mattis and so many others would remind us, the damage and the dangers are real. And it’s hard to make America great when you’re upsetting America’s greatest friends.