Who do you think of as the world policeman? The United Nations, Interpol or CSI? However, the United States is the country likely to come to mind. It had held a tight control over the global economy since the end of World War II. The country was in a coalition that fought the Nazis in World War II, then led to the establishment of the current UN, and supported South Korea with massive grant-type aid in 1950s.
Recently, the Trump administration has reached out to North Korea by meeting its leader in a first summit to reach a deal on denuclearization agreement. However, contrary to the expected behavior of a global policeman, there are now many issues and problems that pit the U.S. against other countries such as the U.S.-China and the European Union trade tariff conflicts, protectionism and isolationist tendencies. Let’s examine these issues.
The United States gained its independence from the United Kingdom in 1776. How did a 242-years-old independent country become the strongest nation on earth? Before World War II, America was a relatively small country. It is the entry of American in the war in the wake of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that projected the country as the first world power. The U.S. expanded its capital by producing munitions at military plants and exported them.
After World War II, the confrontation between the communist and capitalist sides, led by the U.S., intensified. It launched a reconstruction program, called the Marshall Plan, to stop Western European countries, devastated by the war, to fall under Soviet communism. The Marshall Plan had a significant impact on economic recovery of Europe. The United States also provided Korea with free aid in the 1950s to help Korea in many ways, including food, fuel, and economic assistance. Then, in 1961, an intergovernmental economic organization, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) was founded to stimulate economic progress and world trade under the de facto leadership of the US.
These activities have led to the perception of the United States as the international policeman. The recent summit between the U.S. and North Korea was successfully. North Korea indicated its readiness to dismantle its nuclear weapons and abandon the nuclear threat. This was seen as a mark of leadership from the United States. However, the U.S. has recently engaged in initiative not usually associated with its standing as the world policeman.
Since the Donald Trump took office as the 45th U.S. president in January 2017, the U.S. is sending confusing signals globally. Many political experts had already predicted that situation. As a candidate, Trump pledged to put America first, including the establishment of Mexican border walls and the implementation of protectionist policies, and received much support from the American people. As soon as Trump took office, he signed an executive order to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), an organization the U.S. was trying to establish at that time. The TPP was an organization for free trade, including tariff elimination, protection of overseas investment and trade relief, in cooperation with 11 countries adjacent to the Pacific. When Trump withdrew the U.S., then leading the TPP, the process stalled.
Furthermore, the U.S. pressured Mexico and Canada to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Canada and Mexico are more dependent on the US for trade than the other way around. Through NAFTA, many American and Canadian companies employed cheap labor in factories in Mexico from which products are exported. Canada has been benefitting from NAFTA, including working with many companies in the U.S. to set up research centers. So, the US protectionist trade policy had become a threat to NAFTA. In fact, Trump pledged to withdraw from the organization. Negotiations went well, and fortunately NAFTA didn’t break up. At that time, many countries, including the EU countries, Korea and Japan, key U.S. trading partners, were confused by the actions of the United States. Indeed, the U.S. is currently renegotiating the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Japan, and South Korea, threatening to reduce the financial contribution to the US military presence as leverage.
In addition to NAFTA, TPP and FTA, the U.S. broke the Paris climate change treaty, causing confusion in the world order, as the US is the leading polluter. It is an international treaty signed in Paris on December 12, 2015 to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. The agreement was a big deal involving a total of 195 countries, including the United States. The U.S. break-up of the treaty caused much confusion especially among developing countries where development is crucial.
The U.S. has caused a lot of confusion as well with its trade tariffs dispute with China. The U.S. experienced a financial crisis during the Obama administration. The previous administration needed a revival of traditional manufacturing to help revive the economy. In response, the Trump administration launched a "reshoring" policy aimed to bring factory jobs back into the U.S. to create employment there. The U.S. imposed a 25 percent tariff on 818 Chinese imports on July 6. China retaliated by imposing a 25 percent tariff on 545 U.S. imports, automobiles and fisheries products. This trade dispute is continuing. Many political and economic experts describe this as the second Cold War. This means that the U.S. and China are fighting for hegemony. The more this dispute continues, the more damaging it can be to U.S. allies such as Korea, Japan and neighboring countries. This U.S. behavior runs counter to what could be expected of a global policeman. The U.S. is disrupting the world order and threatens the economy of many countries by using protectionism and neo-isolationism.
This U.S. behavior is clearly a change from that of the past. Since Trump's taking office, the U.S. has been acting in stark contrast to its status as a world policeman, with a new isolationist policy, raising tariffs on China and EU goods and setting up a Mexican border to prevent illegal immigration. But on the other hand, the U.S. is trying to solve the North Korean nuclear problem through the North Korea-USA summit, which will hopefully lead to the North's denuclearization. Through this action, the United States tries to preserve world peace from nuclear threats. We will have to keep an eye on this U.S. move. For the sake of our future, we will have to continually watch the behavior of the United States.