Trump relies on fear in both politics and business — diplomat Bryza

Well, looking at what’s happening in the world right now — I honestly can’t comment. I can’t fully grasp the chaos that has unfolded. I don’t know whether this is part of a well-thought-out strategy by Donald Trump or a poorly conceived one, but what we’re seeing is an unprecedented trade war. Something similar may have happened back in the 1930s. The World Trade Organization no longer seems to have control over the situation. The United States has presented a kind of “bill” to the European Union and China — and China, in turn, has responded by raising tariffs. I’m not sure how anyone could explain all of this even in five hours, but I believe you understand both the possible consequences and the motivations behind what Trump is trying to achieve.

Well, that's a great question. And there's a big debate about whether or not he's operating according to a strategy, or just has some general concepts that don't necessarily go together, that contradict each other.

I think his overall concept — if it's a strategy; I'm not sure it's a strategy — is that it's to maximize U.S. power, regardless of whether other countries are friends or foes. And the cornerstone of his economic version of power is to use tariffs to rebalance the global trading system, as he calls it. And we can go into that in more detail.

But he decides, as you and I have discussed before, Mr. Borkovskyi, whether a country is a friend or a foe based upon whether the United States has a positive trade balance with that country, which no U.S. president really has ever done before. And then, when it comes to foreign policy in general, I think what he's trying to do is to create a “fortress America” — meaning maximize U.S. power, not get tied down necessarily with multilateral diplomacy or alliances — and then expand U.S. territory throughout the Western Hemisphere to include, as he said, Greenland, maybe Canada and Panama, to allow the U.S. to project or to protect itself in terms of naval lines of communication.

So that's the overall approach, but it's just simply creating chaos around the world, and it does not seem like a strategy.

Yes, exactly. At the time, some of my British friends remarked that we’re entering a very sad and dangerous period — something reminiscent of the old “Great Game” — where global institutions can no longer regulate key processes, and a new era of intense geopolitical competition is taking shape.

But here’s the question: why isn’t Trump seeking allies? Why has he framed the problem in such a way that even traditional partners — the Anglo-Saxon world, close friends from the European Union — no longer understand him? They feel threatened.

We could understand such a stance if this were purely about a civilizational confrontation with countries like the People’s Republic of China or Russia. That would be a different story. But right now, Trump seems to be isolating himself. He has no friends left — and frankly, I’m not even sure if Elon Musk will stick by him.

Yes, so President Trump doesn't look at the world the way any president in modern history does, or has. President Trump does not believe that the U.S. needs allies or friends. He's behaving the way he did in New York as a real estate developer, where he really had just people he tried to frighten and didn't really have friends.

So he has said publicly that the most important tool of business, and of politics, and of life in general, is fear. So he wants other countries to fear, rather than to like or admire, the United States. And this is exactly the approach of traditional Russian foreign policy. I remember several senior Russian officials telling me during my day serving at our embassy in Moscow that real power comes from fear, not from being admired. And this is the way Trump looks at the world.

He and Elon Musk remain close, it seems like, but already now there's a big battle inside the White House between Musk and then Trump's senior advisor for international trade, Peter Navarro, who is a well-educated man. He has a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard. But his ideas are known very often to be presented to Trump by Navarro before he's thought them through. And what's happening with tariffs and the trade war Trump has launched seems to be one of those cases where Navarro came up with an idea that more tariffs will always be good for the United States. That happens to accord with Trump's long-standing view about tariffs — which he likes tariffs. But Navarro did not think through, and therefore Trump did not think through, how proceeding with these tariffs in a trade war against the entire world will inevitably make the United States weaker and poorer. And the tariffs themselves, initially, are inflationary. They cause prices to rise, when, in fact, President Trump had promised to reduce prices for American consumers on the very first day of his administration.

So Trump is operating on fear rather than friendship, and that is a radical departure from any U.S. president in modern history.

And naturally, we have to consider the broader story with China. We remember how, around 90 years ago, there was a dramatic rise in Japan’s economic power. The 1920s and 1930s saw Japan strengthening its global influence. In response, the U.S. government imposed severe sanctions and tariffs — and we all know how that story ended. At a certain point, Japan attacked the American base at Pearl Harbor, pulling the United States into World War II.

Today, we’re witnessing a new trade war unfolding between the U.S. and China. And we know the tension isn’t just about Taiwan or financial issues. This is about something much bigger: global influence, hegemony, and influence over the Pacific and the Atlantic basins as well.

So, the real question becomes: how intense will this confrontation with China get? And what cards are still on the table? Because this is no longer just a matter of goods and tariffs. The Trump administration is clearly trying to compel China to play by American rule. Meanwhile, Beijing seems intent on using the threat of destabilization as leverage — all to secure its own share of global control.

So there's a lot of debate in the United States about what China's objectives are. I know some real deep-thinking experts on China in the U.S. who say China doesn't seek to destabilize the world. China seeks to be included in the making of the global rules for economics and politics, rather than to be excluded by the United States and some of the United States' allies.

But China is also absolutely intent to restore its territorial integrity by reincorporating Taiwan into China. And the United States is obligated to resist that.

So I think that, going back to the 1930s, you make a good point about how tough U.S. trade policy and tariffs helped to aggravate the animosity between Japan and the United States. And yes, it eventually led Japan to attack Pearl Harbor, as Japan itself was — yeah, similarly to China today — Japan was trying to expand its influence and even annex territories in East Asia. So there are some parallels.

What's even, I think, more worrisome, though, is those trade policies or tariff policies of the United States in the 1930s severely aggravated the Great Depression. And it was, of course, the economic collapse of the global economy in the Great Depression that then stimulated the animosities, or aggravated the animosities, in Europe that led to the Second World War — along with, of course, the animosity between the U.S. and Japan that culminated in the attack on Pearl Harbor. So, yeah, we're in an extremely dangerous period where the rules of economics and politics, as we've known them since World War II, are being torn up by President Donald Trump. And what the consequences might be are impossible to predict accurately now, but we know for certain they're not good.

We don't know where Trump's trajectory will lead the United States and the world — we simply don't know, and I won't attempt to predict it. But I always wanted to believe that the Americans, as a nation that has spent billions of dollars promoting democracy around the world and teaching others how to build it properly, had a system of safeguards — a system of checks and balances in their politics. We in Ukraine wanted to believe that such a system could say: "Hey, stop, Mr. President Trump, you are acting improperly, violating the Constitution, and defying common sense."

But what we saw was that America had become almost defenseless against the arbitrary actions of its own president. I don't know how this will end for the U.S., and I don’t know how far Donald Trump is willing to go tomorrow or in a week. But we’re already seeing Americans take to the streets. And if people are in the streets, it means that laws and institutions are no longer functioning properly.

We’ve seen a courageous judge, or this or that brave senator — but the electoral process is still far away. President Trump holds authority, and a significant portion of American society supports him. That situation deeply concerns me.

So, the question is: will American law and the American state allow Trump to do whatever he wants? Is there, I don't know, a red line in America?

Yeah, we don't know where such a red line might lie. 

What is clear is that American institutions are holding up. The courts have stopped some of Trump's more extreme actions. And so far — so far — he and his administration have said, we will, of course, respect and honor the decisions of the courts. 

But his vice president said in a speech a few years ago — J.D. Vance — that President Trump should, or the U.S. president should, maximize his power and behave like U.S. President Andrew Jackson did in the early 19th century when he ignored a decision by the Supreme Court. 

And he said, okay, the court can take a decision, but let the court try to enforce it. Trump has — he has a painting of, or a bust, I forgot which one it is — of Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office. So that sort of maximal presidential power model of Andrew Jackson, that led that president to ignore a court decision, seems to be something that inspires President Trump.

But for now, the U.S. political system and legal system is strong enough, I think, to resist any such ambitions by Trump. As you say, though, some American voters, including in the Republican Party, are turning against Trump because of what I said a few minutes ago — that Trump promised that inflation or prices for consumer goods would reduce immediately when he became president. And that's not happening. In fact, prices are going up because of the tariffs. And now some members of the Republican Party in the U.S. Senate are proposing legislation that would take away the power that was delegated from the Congress to the U.S. president years ago to set tariffs and take that power back into the Congress. Because a tariff is just a tax by a different name. And the authority to pass legislation — taxes — or to create taxes lies entirely with the U.S. Congress.

So we're starting to hear even some Republican senators saying, hmm, we should limit Trump's power and bring that power back to the U.S. Congress. 

But we're still a long way away from those small number of senators being able actually to restrict Trump's power. I think we're going to see Trump back off the craziness of his tariff policies and his global trade war once it becomes clear that the U.S. economy is really suffering tremendous damage, which we're starting to see in terms of the fall in the U.S. stock markets. And I think we will soon see, as more and more U.S. companies say, we're going to postpone our investment decisions and our growth decisions — which is then going to lead to the slowdown of the U.S. economy. It'll lead to stagflation — so high inflation and low growth — as the U.S. experienced in the 1970s. And as you said, Japan experienced in the 1990s. The U.S. economy seems to be on that path. And once we get locked, I think, unfortunately, into that economically disastrous situation, I think Trump will have no choice but to back off on his trade war. But that'll be at the cost of tremendous economic damage, as well as potential attempts to undermine the U.S. legal system.

And my last point is: Trump has already begun to pressure major U.S. law firms who have — basically — who have opposed him. And that's very dangerous. The law has to be sacrosanct in the United States, as in any country. And everyone in the U.S., even the president, must abide by U.S. law. But he's going to try to challenge that.

Dear Ambassador Bryza, I agree with you that the situation is critically dangerous. The key issue, however, is to what extent all the risks are being considered. Or perhaps some of these questions are simply being typed into GPT chat or artificial intelligence systems. Something like “what should we do about tariffs with Canada or the European Union?”

What worries us most in Ukraine, however, is that we don’t see a clear, assertive, and powerful response from President Trump to the fact that Vladimir Putin regularly violates various agreements. Just a few days ago, a massive tragedy occurred for Ukraine, a war crime committed by Russia: a ballistic missile strike on Kryvyi Rih. Children and civilians were killed. And all of this is happening while negotiations are ongoing between the United States and Russia.

We would like to see a more forceful response from President Trump — one that might, for example, be directed at Kirill Dmitriev, who was recently in the United States. We’d want to hear him say, “Listen, Dmitriev, if you strike a peaceful Ukrainian city with ballistic missiles again, we’ll provide Ukraine with Tomahawks.” We don’t hear anything like this. Perhaps something like it is being discussed behind the scenes, but at the same time, we see an escalation in Russian offensive activity in the Kharkiv and Sumy regions.

First of all, I wanted to express my horrified and deepest condolences to the families of those children and adults who were killed in that brutal attack on Kryvyi Rih and the playground there. It was utterly heartbreaking, and unfortunately, it's the norm for Russian behavior these days — and throughout much of history.

For the first part of your question, I'll say, no, the Trump administration is definitely not just simply randomly deciding by typing into ChatGPT what tariff rates to apply to various countries. There's a concept, as I said, which is they're trying to compel other countries to lower their tariffs, but also trying to raise revenue for the United States. And their belief is that there needs to be equal treatment of tariffs for any country that applies tariffs to the United States.

But the way they have been calculating tariffs, though, yeah, is maybe not so rigorous and sometimes inaccurate in terms of calculating the values of the tariffs.

But what you're really asking is about Ukraine and Putin and Trump’s approach to Putin.

Of course, I share your belief and Ukrainians' belief that the U.S. should be much firmer with Putin, who has broken, as you said, all of the agreements and who is conducting this criminal war against Ukraine and against civilians. The only positive news is Trump has said publicly that that sort of behavior by Russia is angering him.

He has threatened to respond against such Russian action. What exactly he would do is not clear. I mean, as we all know, there's a negotiation going on right now whereby the Trump administration is negotiating on the one hand with Ukraine and on the other hand with Russia, with the goal seemingly being simply to stop the fighting, but not really to end the war. Putin's goals are unacceptable for ending the war, as we all know. And Trump and J.D. Vance have put horrible pressure on President Zelenskyy simply to end the war regardless of Ukraine's own objectives to survive. 

But what I'm trying to say is Trump is growing impatient with Putin. He said it publicly. 

Whether Trump's impatience leads to a resumption of U.S. arms deliveries to Ukraine, including potentially Tomahawk cruise missiles, remains to be seen. I think Trump's response is still being formulated. But I am absolutely certain, as we discussed the last time I had the honor to be on your show, that there's no chance that Vladimir Putin is going to, at least now, to obey any ceasefire. He wants to keep fighting. And the only way to stop him is to defeat him on the battlefield. And I hope President Trump will come to understand this brutal reality.

When we observe the destruction of certain global institutions and relationships, we realize that Putin is sitting in the Kremlin, laughing. He sees how much international institutions are weakening. The full-scale Russian invasion, for example, exposed the weakness of the United Nations. There is no collective will to fully restrain Russian aggression.

Another concerning point is the specter — or the threat — of a new “Yalta.” We understand that when the post-Yalta structures and world order begin to crumble, sooner or later, a new “assembly point” will emerge. Putin, from the start — before the full-scale invasion — was proposing to “redistribute” spheres of influence globally. And his primary demand remains clear: control over Ukraine.

The second deeply troubling issue for me is the U.S. government's proposal regarding the minerals deal and the recognition of Ukraine's debt for free aid. The $150 billion provided to us on a grant basis is now being presented by Trump as something we should recognize as a debt. Ukraine cannot accept this. If we did, it would be like shooting ourselves in the foot — inflicting significant harm on ouwselves. While we welcome American investors in Ukraine, we cannot accept such terms.

I sometimes fear, or suspect, that this agreement was crafted in such a way that it would be impossible for us to sign it. Then, President Trump could turn to the American public and say: "Look, the Ukrainians didn’t sign this. That shows we don’t have the kind of friendship or chemistry in our relationship with Ukraine." After that, he could distance himself from the Russian-Ukrainian war and focus on other issues, like the Middle East, the potential war with Iran, or the threats from China. It's a troubling combination.

Yeah, no, I think that is what's happening. Look, you need to keep in mind that President Trump, as I said, does not think about the world and does not think about Europe the way any other of his predecessors did. He probably doesn't know anything about Yalta, and he doesn't care. I don't think he cares whether or not Russia controls Ukraine. I don't think he cares whether or not Russian influence and domination of Europe occurs. Trump views Ukraine as the problem of Europe. And he dislikes Europe. He has said that the European Union was created only to weaken the United States — that's its only objective.

As you saw from the horrendous leak of the Signal chat involving his secretary of defense, his national security advisor, his vice president, secretary of state, Vice President Vance said that basically he's sick and tired of the U.S. helping out the Europeans. 

And the secretary of defense said he loathes, or he hates, Europe. That's Trump's approach toward Europe. A second Yalta would be perfectly fine with them. 

I think they're horribly misguided, and they're operating according to a principle of the arrogance of ignorance.

They don't understand the world, and they're arrogant, and they just say, well, you have to do what the U.S. says, as is the case, as you mentioned, on the critical raw materials demands, essentially, of the United States. I think there are some people in the top levels of the Trump administration who believe that, on the positive side, it's time for a fresh approach to diplomacy and that it's possible to conduct diplomacy more like business ventures. So, if the United States invests large amounts of money in Ukraine to develop those critical raw materials, that presence of U.S. investors will serve as a security guarantee. So it's a way to get security guarantees for Ukraine without committing any U.S. or NATO military forces, or even without committing any money other than investment on which U.S. companies can earn a return.

I think that novel approach is bound to fail, but at least there's some thinking about it in terms of a partnership with Ukraine and a way to provide a security guarantee in an innovative way, again, which I think will fail. 

But then there are others in the Trump administration who are treating Ukraine in terms of its critical raw materials like a colony of the United States, and as European countries did, as they treated Africa in the 19th century during the scramble for Africa in the age of imperialism. 

I think that is borderline criminal, and it plays to the worst instincts in Western diplomacy that led us to two world wars. So I'm appalled.

But at this point, I'm afraid to say that I don't see this issue of Ukraine really being a major issue yet for the American public. U.S. attention is not focused on foreign policy in general, except in terms of these tariffs and what it's going to do to the U.S. economy. And otherwise, as you said, Trump himself is focused on Iran, hopefully negotiating a new agreement with Iran on its nuclear weapons program, and with containing China.

And why doesn’t Trump offer anything in return to Ukraine? We understand that when such communication takes place, something needs to be offered. For example, Trump could say, “Alright, you give us part of your minerals, we’ll extract them, everything will be fair, and in return, I’ll tell Putin to back off from Ukraine.” I’m simplifying the idea, but Trump hasn’t made any signals in our direction. He isn’t offering us anything. Instead, he’s threatening us with the cessation of aid, threatening Zelenskyy by saying, “If you don’t agree, you’ll have big problems,” and so on. Is this really a bargaining strategy? Is he truly ready to proceed with this?

And the second point — how ready will he be to defend American allies like Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Poland? The situation with the withdrawal of American troops from the military base in Jasionka is also something that deeply concerns us.

Yes, so as I've been saying, Trump doesn't look at the world the way you and I do. He doesn't understand or believe that Putin himself believes in what he himself wrote about Ukraine and how it doesn't have a right to exist as a country. And that it's just really Russia. Trump doesn't believe that Putin would, in fact, after, if he were, God forbid, to achieve his objectives in Ukraine, would move onward and challenge NATO, NATO member states in the Baltic states. I totally believe that is Putin's plan, but Trump does not believe it.

And, as I was saying before, Trump believes that Europe should take care of Ukraine and take care of itself, take care of Eastern Europe. He believes that the United States has paid for Europe's defense for these past seven decades, and the Europeans have not invested in their own defense. And on that, I agree with him. Europe needs to do much more to invest in its own defense. 

But Trump really doesn't care what happens to Europe, I think, to speak crudely. He prefers a world of the post-1815 Congress of Vienna, where the big powers decide what happens to the smaller countries, to the smaller states. And that's why he has an affinity for Vladimir Putin; Putin sees the world in the same way. 

And maybe that's why Trump has not put any tariffs on Russia or on Belarus, when instead Trump has applied tariffs to America's closest friends and allies. So I think Trump is signaling to Putin, "Hey, let's carve out the world between us. Let's let the big powers decide what the rule is going to be." So that's you, Russia. It's us, United States. It's China. And the smaller countries are just going to have to fend for themselves, and Europe will have to take care of the European ones.

I think that is a strategic vision that will inevitably lead to disaster. And as you said, it could lead to another major war in Europe. But that is Trump's view right now, and we need to recognize it for what it is. And that means it's up to the Europeans to stand up and be strong and do exactly what they're doing — rearm themselves and offer their unwavering military, political, and economic support to Ukraine. And I'm doing everything I can in my private life, in my business life, to help our European allies to do just that.

As far as I understand, Donald Trump has not read Fyodor Dostoevsky, whose key message is that a Russian will first strike you with an axe, then cross himself and begin to weep. Let’s hope that the situation doesn’t turn out as tragically as it appears. I want to sincerely thank you, dear Ambassador Bryza, for this incredibly important and insightful conversation on our airwaves. And I would like to remind our viewers that Matthew Bryza, a former adviser to the U.S. Secretary of State and former director for European and Eurasian affairs at the U.S. National Security Council, joined us today.