Trump’s foreign policy has no rules

Donald Trump’s national security strategy, which was given the moniker the “Donroe Doctrine,” was supposed to be the new blueprint for America’s role in the world. Actions such as Trump renaming the Gulf of Mexico, trying to take over or buy Greenland, threatening Canada and Panama, as well as his military incursion into Venezuela all fall into his updated version of the Monroe Doctrine, which his administration views as stating America’s divine right to rule the Western hemisphere. When considering his outright hostility toward our traditional allies in Europe and Asia, which he is apparently happy to leave to Russia and China, Trump’s vaunted America First movement becomes more sharply defined as a focus on the United States’ own neighborhood and a retreat from larger global concerns.

But as is so often true with the president’s policies, that awful vision has proved too incoherent to be an actual blueprint. Trump is just as invested in the Middle East as any president before him, a fact he proved by launching air strikes on Iran on Saturday for reasons that change from day to day. The Islamic Republic is far from the Western hemisphere, so whatever the Donroe Doctrine is in practice goes beyond a mere desire to withdraw the United States from global commitments outside of its own region. Something else is at play. 

Trump has now used the U.S. military twice since the first of the year — a mere 59 days — to topple heads of state. In early January, he staged a successful military incursion into Venezuela and abducted the country’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and first lady to bring them back to the U.S. to stand trial. Most observers assumed that America had deposed Maduro as a means of toppling Venezuela’s corrupt government and paving the way for elections and a restoration of democracy. There was even a shadow government waiting in the wings that had been legitimately elected two years before. Led by opposition figure Maria Corina Machado, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for her activism, it was ready to take the helm.

But no: Trump had apparently made a deal with what remained of the Maduro regime. He would leave them in power to do as they wished in exchange for opening up Venezuela’s oil fields to American companies. Since America’s incursion, Trump has shown no interest in the democratization of the country or accountability for anyone but the former president. What will happen to Venezuela is anyone’s guess. But it appears that as long as they agree to hand over billions in oil revenue to the U.S. under threat of military action, they will have a free hand. 

Then there is Iran. This past weekend, the United States, in partnership with Israel, bombed the Islamic Republic for the second time in less than a year. In June 2025, the U.S. military deployed its most powerful non-nuclear weapon to destroy underground bunkers used by the Iranian government to house their nuclear program. At the time Trump said the facilities had been completely obliterated, but no proof was ever offered of that claim. Now he and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are bombing the country again, ostensibly because they still need to destroy Iran’s nuclear program. Or is it that they want to help the protesters? Or do they want regime change? The answer keeps changing. 

The administration didn’t bother with the usual constitutional and statutory niceties, and as Salon’s Sophia Tesfaye explained, Trump has felt little need to explain his actions to the American people. He believes he has an unfettered right to use American power, whether economic or military, at his total discretion without any consultation or approval from Congress. The administration had been having talks with the Iranian government which, by all accounts, had agreed to nearly all their demands, but Trump decided to bomb anyway, proving that he had always intended to do it and the talks were just a delaying tactic. (On Sunday, the president told The Atlantic in a short interview that he had agreed to keep talking, even as the air strikes continue.)

As with Venezuela, the initial round of attacks on Iran successfully decapitated the government, killing Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, and many of his top lieutenants. But the Islamic Republic is a very different country than Venezuela, a full-blown authoritarian theocracy with a large and powerful military and plenty of high-tech armaments. With a population of 90 million, it is roughly three times larger than Iraq, and although the country is in bad economic straits, it is divided politically. There is a large anti-government resistance, but it is reportedly mostly unorganized, and the heavily-armed Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which has tentacles extending deep into the country’s economic and industrial sectors, has shown no signs of splintering.

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Nonetheless, Trump seems to think — likely at the behest of Netanyahu and people like Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., an Iran hawk — that the country is so weak that the Revolutionary Guard will lay down their arms under his threats and agree to make one of his hallowed deals. Trump told the New York Times on Sunday night that despite his paeans to the Iranian protesters, he really has no problem with the regime staying in place. He said, “What we did in Venezuela, I think, is the perfect, the perfect scenario.” I’ll bet that comes as a surprise to Netanyahu. 

Meanwhile, Vivian Salama at the Atlantic reported that the administration is so excited about their military “victories” that Cuba is next on the list. One official told Salama, “the president is feeling like, ‘I’m on a roll’; like, ‘This is working.’” One important goal of the Venezuelan operation was to halt oil shipments to Cuba, which has had the effect of leading the island’s economy closer to collapse. The Cuban people are suffering greatly, which seems to be part of the plan. 

Trump is very excited at the prospect of a “friendly takeover” and has talked about the fact that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been in talks to “make a deal.” There’s no word on what that deal might be, whether he’s thinking of making them a colony with Rubio as its viceroy, or simply turning it over to Florida Republicans to do with as they please. 

Salama reported that the president “sees himself as the first modern American leader with the guts to complete what others only flirted with: map-changing transformations across the world.” But if you look at the countries he’s chosen to target with military action so far, what you really see is that these are all countries that have defied U.S. power in one respect or another — and he’s decided to teach them a lesson. 

What is happening is basically a gang war. Trump is taking over other gangsters’ turf and taking out their leaders. There’s no need to completely change their crews. After all, they’re in the same business. It just means that they now need to report to him — while showing loyalty and ensuring protection. 

If you think that’s far-fetched, consider what Trump told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl when the reporter asked him about Khamenei’s death. “I got him before he got me,” he said. “They tried twice. Well I got him first.”

There’s no “Donroe Doctrine” or some great global imperial strategy. Donald Trump is simply a mob boss who thinks he’s settling all the family business.

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