In brief
In a recent analysis, Lyse Doucet argues that Donald Trump is reshaping the world order through aggressive maneuvers such as eyeing Greenland, breaking political norms, and challenging longstanding alliances. Critics voice concerns about the implications for global stability, noting a potential shift towards unregulated international relations.
On day one, he put the world on notice.
Nothing will stand in our way, President Donald Trump declared, to thunderous applause, as he ended his inauguration speech in a cold Washington winter on this day last year, at the start of his second term.
Did the world fail to take enough notice?
Tucked into his speech was a mention of the 19th Century doctrine of manifest destiny – the idea that the US was divinely ordained to expand its territory across the continent, spreading American ideals.
At that moment, the Panama Canal was in his sights. We're taking it back, Trump announced.
Now that same declaration, expressed with absolute resolve, is directed at Greenland.
We have to have it, is the new mantra. It's a rude awakening in a moment fraught with grave risk.
US history is littered with consequential and controversial American invasions, occupations, and covert operations to topple rulers and regimes. But, in the past century, no American president has threatened to seize the land of a longtime ally and rule it against their people's will.
No US leader has so brutally broken political norms and threatened long-standing alliances which have underpinned the world order since the end of World War Two.
There's little doubt that old rules are being broken, with impunity.
Trump is now being described as possibly the US's most transformative president - cheered by supporters at home and abroad, alarm among others in capitals the world over, and a watchful silence in Moscow and Beijing.
It's a shift toward a world without rules, where international law is trampled underfoot, and where the only law which seems to matter is the strongest with imperial ambitions resurfacing, was French President Emmanuel Macron's stark warning on the stage at the Davos Economic Forum, without directly mentioning Trump by name.
There is mounting concern over a possible painful trade war, even worry in some circles that the 76-year-old Nato military alliance could now be at risk if, in the worst case scenario, the US commander-in-chief tries to take Greenland by force.
Trump's defenders are doubling down in support of his America First agenda, against the post-war multilateral order.
The gloves are off for Trump as he posts the private messages he's receiving from leaders using the old tools of statecraft to try to keep him on side.
It's a good day to have a Nordic temperament, Norway's Foreign Minister diplomatically remarked on the delicate situation surrounding Trump's comments on Greenland and their implications for international relations.
