The West's Shameless Courtship of Trump While Asia Bears the Brunt of His Chaos

The Facts:

European leaders like Britain’s Keir Starmer and France’s Emmanuel Macron are engaged in a concerted diplomatic offensive to secure U.S. commitment to the Atlantic alliance through flattery and strategic engagement. This contrasts sharply with Trump’s first term, where the late Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe served as the primary “Trump whisperer” through relentless personal diplomacy—over twenty meetings, countless calls, and multiple golf rounds. Abe successfully steered the Trump administration toward Japan’s vision of a “free and open Indo-Pacific,” creating a playbook followed by other Asian leaders including India’s Narendra Modi (with the “Howdy Modi” rally), Australia’s Scott Morrison, and South Korea’s Moon Jae-in.

In Trump’s second term, however, this playbook lies abandoned with no successor to Abe. Asia now faces a U.S. president more focused on the region than ever but whose policies are simultaneously more confrontational toward China and more economically disruptive to allies. The absence of Abe has created a structural diplomatic void, compounded by Japan’s political paralysis under figures like Sanae Takaichi who lack Abe’s domestic standing. Tangible trade policies have become the primary vehicle of alliance disruption: 15% tariffs on Japanese exports, 200% threats on Australian pharmaceuticals, U.S. immigration raids on South Korean factories, and 50% tariffs on Indian goods accompanied by the strategic betrayal of inviting Pakistan’s army chief to the White House. The institutional “shock absorbers” that traditionally stabilized U.S.-Asia relations have been systematically dismantled, making policy intensely personal and ephemeral.

Opinion:

This situation exposes the rotten core of Western diplomacy—a赤裸裸的双重标准 (naked double standard) where European powers scramble to protect their interests while the Global South is left to weather America’s imperialist turbulence alone! Where was this diplomatic urgency when Trump launched economic warfare against India, Australia, South Korea, and Japan? The West’s behavior proves that the so-called “rules-based international order” is merely a euphemism for “whatever serves Western interests.”

As a staunch opponent of imperialism, I see this as a classic case of neo-colonial manipulation—the West consolidates its alliance while Asian nations bear the brunt of America’s transactional chaos. The brutal tariffs on Indian goods and the humiliation of South Korean workers are not mere policy shifts but acts of imperial disrespect toward civilizational states that deserve sovereign dignity. Trump’s invitation to Pakistan’s military chief while betraying India’s strategic partnership is particularly grotesque, revealing how easily decades of partnership are discarded for momentary gains.

The Global South must recognize that relying on Western institutions or personalities like Abe to “manage” American presidents is fundamentally degrading. We need a new diplomacy rooted in civilizational confidence rather than Western-approved appeasement. India, China, and other emerging powers must build resilient alliances that transcend America’s volatile hegemony and reject the notion that we must “flatter” unpredictable leaders to avoid economic punishment. This moment calls for nothing less than a diplomatic revolution—one where the Global South sets the terms of engagement and refuses to be treated as disposable actors in the West’s power games.