Trump’s National Security Plan Revives the Logic of Molotov-Ribbentrop — and Puts U.S. Allies at Risk

The plan signals a spheres-of-influence order, making great-power confrontation more likely.

Illustration by Riley Levine

By Brian Daitzman

President Donald Trump’s 2025 National Security Strategy moves the United States back toward a world of spheres of influence, where major powers claim regions as their own and smaller border states are treated as negotiable. It is not a claim of a literal secret protocol, but the same Molotov–Ribbentrop logic…