Among the many unsettling aspects of Donald Trump’s political takeover, the most corrosive is the return of an old and bankrupt worldview: that of the zero-sum game.
In Trump’s conception of global affairs, prosperity is finite, and for one nation to thrive, another must be diminished.
It is a bleak, regressive mindset that stifles cooperation, inflames conflict, and betrays the very principles that underpinned decades of international progress.
The zero-sum worldview, at its core, rejects the possibility of mutual benefit. It sees diplomacy not as dialogue, but as a marketplace of extraction.
Alliances are not relationships to be nurtured, but levers to be pulled for short-term gain. This belief has shaped Trump’s conduct on the world stage, where every negotiation is reduced to a crude calculus of winners and losers — an unyielding framework that has left America more isolated and, ironically, less secure.
Nowhere is this more evident than in Trump’s posture toward Ukraine.
As Russia’s brutal invasion continues to test the resolve of democratic nations, Trump’s focus has not been on defending sovereignty, deterring aggression, or preserving democratic ideals — but on the mineral wealth beneath Ukrainian soil.
He has spoken, quite openly, of leveraging military or financial aid to secure rights to those resources. This is not strategy; it is transnationalism masquerading as statecraft.
In Trump’s world, solidarity is conditional, and aid is a mechanism of extraction.
The message is unmistakable: support is for sale, and friends are assets to be exploited.
This same narrow philosophy direct Trump’s trade policies.
His penchant for high tariffs — particularly against close allies such as Canada, Germany and Japan — has been justified under the banner of protecting American industry. But in practice, these measures often punish U.S. consumers and provoke retaliatory actions that harm American exporters.
Rather than embracing global interdependence as a source of resilience and innovation, Trump reflexively frames every trading relationship as an existential threat. The result is a confused economic order, where trust is eroded and cooperation supplanted by suspicion.
A bizarre illustration is when Trump is speaking of purchasing or conquering Greenland from Denmark. His utterances manage to be both tone-deaf and morally vacant.
Greenland is not a commodity on the open market; it is an autonomous land with its own people, culture and aspirations. Trump’s proposal, and his subsequent anger when Denmark rejected it, revealed the disturbing degree to which he conflates real estate with statecraft, and territory with treasure.
It was not diplomacy, but acquisition — a land grab dressed up in the language of “deal-making.”
Trump has mused, with apparent seriousness, about “taking” Canada. In his rhetoric, our northern neighbor becomes less a partner than a tempting extension of the American frontier — rich in resources and insufficiently claimed.
This notion is not merely delusional; it is a repudiation of the postwar liberal order that defined the West’s most successful alliances.
To speak of “taking” democratic nations is to regress into a pre-World Wars worldview, where sovereignty is optional.
Trump’s obsession with dominance over cooperation betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of how progress occurs. The greatest achievements in modern history — economic globalization, international peace frameworks, transnational scientific collaboration — have been born not from zero-sum struggles, but from synergies.
Nations thrive not by hoarding, but by engaging. When Germany produces precision engineering, or when South Korea leads in consumer tech, the United States is not “losing” — it is participating in a dynamic, evolving global system that elevates standards, fosters innovation, and ultimately benefits consumers and workers alike.
Yet in Trumpism, there is no place for mutual flourishing. If others grow, he assumes we must be shrinking. It is an anxiety-driven view of the world, one rooted in fear, scarcity, and conquest.
It is the language of empire rather than the logic of cooperation.
Most disheartening is the emotional underpinning of this worldview: the sense that security is achieved not through alliances, but through domination; that greatness arises not from inclusion, but from exclusion; that strength means standing alone.
This isn’t just policy disagreement — it is a philosophical divide. Trump’s worldview rejects the very idea of a shared future.
But in a world defined by climate change, pandemics, cyber threats, and economic interdependence, the zero-sum approach is more than wrong — it is dangerous. It leaves no room for collective action, no space for empathy, and no path toward sustainable peace.
It confines nations to an eternal struggle for supremacy, and it renders diplomacy indistinguishable from conquest.
America cannot thrive in such a world. No nation can. The future belongs not to those who “take,” but to those who build — together.
“Going alone” means “getting left behind.”
Gary Horton’s “Full Speed to Port!” has appeared in The Signal since 2006. The opinions expressed in his column do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Signal or its editorial board.
