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How the Trump Administration’s Strategy Can Restore American Strength, Economic Vitality, and Global Leadership

In geopolitics, “peace through strength” remains a time-tested strategy for maintaining global order. Under the UN-aligned foreign policy of first the Obama administration and now the Biden administration, America’s hegemony has been successfully and substantially undermined, allowing regional powers like China and Russia to exploit the resulting vacuum and, at the same time, emboldening otherwise unformidable adversaries like Iran and North Korea. The remedy most favorable not only to Americans but also to the maximum number of people worldwide is re-establishing America as the global economic and military superpower to safeguard its interests and ensure that malignant actors do not set the world’s agenda.

The Obama-Biden Legacy of Weakness

The Obama-Biden administrations set precedents that showed weakness and subtly strengthened America’s adversaries, laying the groundwork for prolonged conflicts still occurring today, costing hundreds of thousands of lives combined.

As documented in Oliver Stone’s film “Ukraine on Fire,” the Obama administration actively plotted regime change, removing democratically elected Victor Yanukovich and installing a pro-western administration. The region enjoyed a brief period of peace through strength under President Trump’s first administration, during which Russia did not annex more territory. However, once Biden came into office, by first displaying extreme weakness in the Afghanistan withdrawal and later in Eastern Europe, they provided opportunities for Russia to flex its military might unchecked, with disastrous consequences. Biden ceded NATO leadership to Boris Johnson as he urged Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to break off peace talks with Russia in April of 2022. Since then, the meat grinder has continued to churn as the Biden administration refuses any negotiation with Putin while sending billions of dollars worth of bombs and munitions to continue the war.

In the Middle East, Obama’s Iran deal strengthened Iran, enabling its proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas, to thrive. Billions of dollars flowed into Iran’s coffers via unfreezing assets, cash transfers, and nuclear agreements, fungible funds that they use to fuel terrorism. The result has been an enduring cycle of conflict, instability, and humanitarian crises. It was likely these funds that allowed Hamas to plot and carry out the 10/7 attack with the confidence of Iranian backing to continue the fight. Similarly, Hezbollah-linked groups like the Houthis in Yemen have been emboldened, firing rockets at IDF forces and Western merchant ships.

These conflicts draw billions of dollars worth of military equipment, bombs, and security services from US Military Contractors. Thus, America’s deep state and the five largest military contractors (Boeing, General Dynamics, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman) are satisfied with letting the tensions continue and escalate, with any talks of abatement or ceasefire being crushed or sidelined by renewed forms of escalation. Still, knowing any serious escalation would lead to nuclear Armageddon, strategic advances that would swiftly bring an end to the wars are also argued off the table.

Economic Illusions and the Cost of War

Wars often present an illusion of economic vitality, a concept captured by the Broken Window Fallacy. The destruction caused by conflict demands reconstruction, creating jobs, and generating activity, as goes the logic. However, in these conflicts, the destruction is overseas, and the draw on the bottomless pit of US taxpayer funding is enough incentive alone. However, this is not true growth; it is an expensive diversion of resources that could have been deployed to create enduring prosperity at home and abroad. It is also impossible to quantify the loss in terms of death and human suffering.

President Trump understands this better than any world leader on the current stage. His next administration should continue where the last one left off by re-establishing negotiations among world leaders, the fruit of which will be cease-fires, peace deals, and, later on, freer trade. This will also work to re-establish American military and economic dominance. These talks will demonstrate the Trump administration’s use of all levers, including economic sanctions, tariffs, and military response, for anyone refusing to negotiate. As is rumored to already be underway at Mar-a-Lago, Trump can thread the needle between supporting our allies Israel and Western Europe and seeking compromises with our fr-enemies with long-term international trade one of many bargaining chips. This does not require a blank check for endless Pentagon and intelligence agency expenditures with no clear strategy for closing the wars.

The military-industrial complex, left unchecked, risks perpetuating inefficiency. In the same spirit that Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) advocates for smaller government through cutting waste, fraud, and abuse in the sprawling federal bureaucracy, there is an urgent need to streamline military expenditures, one of the largest line items in the budget. There are countless examples from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars where contractors had every incentive to keep the wars going strong to pad their pockets. Examples include $100 per load of laundry for US troops paid to Halliburton/KBR or a $1B contract to James Biden’s employer to build housing in Iraq that eventually fell through.

However, strategic contracting using smaller private military contractors (PMCs) and proper guardrails can ensure competition, which brings accountability, efficiency, and innovation—qualities often absent in Pentagon mega-contracts largely controlled by the big five. Once established, bureaucratic institutions such as new departments within the Department of Defense require extraordinary measures and endless discussions before being disbanded. They almost never are. This extends to the military, whose top brass, as sharp as they are, mostly do not hold MBAs or come from a cost-sensitive business background.

Under the right kind of careful management, the Trump administration can bring the wars to a swift close by supplementing the armed forces with key supporting personnel and services outsourced to smaller contractors who can bring innovative solutions and strategic partnerships (with proper vetting). By implementing firings, which Trump has been known to use since the 15 seasons of The Apprentice, any failure or quality of work issues could lead to near-immediate contract termination, allowing a more effective replacement to fill the void and get the job done.  

Lessons from COVID-19: A Supply Crisis Leading to Stagflation

Domestically, the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the perils of terrible economic policy. Lockdowns, implemented mainly at the state or local level in the States, disrupted global supply chains, halting production and slashing real GDP growth. In response, the Fed massively inflated the money supply, papering over the problems and devaluing the dollar. Inflation surged, first in asset prices, followed by consumer prices, and everyday Americans continue to bear the brunt of rising prices, outpacing wage growth.

The damage is done. There’s no way to reverse the money supply inflation without crashing the economy. The Fed’s attempts to rein in inflation by raising interest rates have only led to a stagnating economy, forcing it to reverse course in the fall of 2024. Raising the Fed funds rate further would have continued to dampen the economy, reduce tax revenues, and leave America unable to pay the interest on the national debt.

The currency printed during the past decade is already circulating in the economy, so some level of asset- and consumer-price inflation is inevitable. The best solution, however, lies in rising to the challenge: boosting real GDP growth and ensuring that every American citizen contributes to the economy. Under the Biden-Harris administration, most jobs have either gone to foreign-born workers, been outsourced overseas, or have been replaced by capital investment (read: so-called AI). Longstanding economic policies have led to this situation. For example, high payroll taxes have led large employers to substitute with capital investment, especially IT. Other regulations like state and local minimum wages have just led the big companies to install kiosks rather than hire more workers, while many mom-and-pop restaurants have shuttered.

Shareholders can’t get enough of this, as service quality and job satisfaction decline while the bottom line grows. Special visa schemes (H1B, H4EAD) have allowed companies to hire foreign workers at a discount, leaving American citizens with college debt and no meaningful jobs to pay it back. The failure at the border has led to millions of low-skilled and blue-collar illegal immigrants flooding the economy, allowing companies to take advantage by quietly skirting labor laws like overtime and minimum wage. These well-intentioned laws then act only as a discriminant against anyone with US citizenship as they’re subject to Department of Labor “protections” and are seen as more of a risk of expensive lawsuits against their would-be employer.

Every able-bodied man should have the opportunity to work or start a business, support their family, and create a foundation for societal stability. This will begin to heal the economic stagnation on Main Street, though admittedly, it will also contribute to inflation due to the money velocity increasing as people get back to work and, as consumer confidence rises, back to spending. In short, resolving economic stagnation makes inflation bearable as it’s coupled with real wage growth and, at the same time, grows tax revenue organically instead of attempting to use monetary policy and endless legislation to bandage up the economy.

Addressing the Root Causes of Economic Malaise

By addressing these issues, America can restore its workforce and leverage its economic engine to power global trade. A robust American economy naturally strengthens the dollar, attracting global capital and ensuring long-term dominance in international markets.

America must lead by example, combining military strength with economic vitality. Reaffirming its role as a global superpower and tackling systemic issues at home can ensure peace and prosperity both within its borders and abroad. The path forward demands bold action, but history has shown that the world follows when America rises to the occasion.