David E. Sanger

I've covered five American presidents since I got back to Washington from a life as a foreign correspondent.

And my takeaway is that Trump is really not an isolationist.

He never has been.

He's actually more of a unilateralist.

Well, he wants the total freedom of action.

He knows that he is not really interested in democracy promotion.

He knows that he wants to prioritize economics and economic development over everything, even if those economics don't necessarily come with security benefits to the U.S.,

But I also think that what's really notable about this strategy is that it doesn't cast our traditional adversaries, China and Russia, but mostly China, as global strategic challengers, much less a threat to the U.S.

So one would think from these documents that Europe's troubles pose a greater threat to the U.S.

than any of the above.

The closest analogy I can make is Trump and the White House itself.

The next president can come in and scrape all the gold off of the Oval Office walls and put turf back down in the Rose Garden.

But whoever it is, is not going to be able to go rebuild the East Wing.

There's going to be a ballroom and you're going to have to learn how to live with it or like it.

And my guess is that the foreign policy of this president is going to have a similar effect.

That at this point, the world is going to assume that the United States always has the ability to turn back in on itself and that each region of the world and even our allies are going to have to learn to depend on themselves.

And I don't think that there is anything we can do over the next generation, no matter who becomes elected president, to make them believe that the U.S.

is always going to be with them.

I think the fundamental trust in the U.S.

as the defender of a certain set of concepts of the West has been shattered for some time.