Trump has effectively killed the world order by 'negging' his natural allies, says Nobel Prize winner

At an event in New York yesterday, Krugman made a claim that should shake American confidence. The United States is no longer the world's largest economy. China has already overtaken it on purchasing power parity and is approaching parity on a dollar basis. The fact itself is significant. The implication is more troubling.

Krugman argued that American power in global trade was always overstated. The US positioned itself as indispensable. That narrative was built on exaggeration. The country was influential but not irreplaceable. When Trump came to power, he stepped onto a stage already occupied by a declining superpower. His response has been to accelerate the decline.

The President has systematically alienated the countries most aligned with American values. Europe. Democracy. Open society. Liberal institutions. These are the principles the US claims to defend. They are also the countries that provoke the most hostility from Trump and JD Vance.

The contradiction deserves examination. Trump won partly by articulating legitimate concerns about American decline. The country's relative power is diminishing. That is factually defensible. The strategic question is what follows from that fact.

Krugman's argument suggests Trump has chosen the approach most likely to worsen decline. By antagonising Europe, the President is abandoning the one region with genuine shared interests and shared values. The US and Europe face common threats: Chinese economic dominance, Russian military aggression, democratic erosion globally.

Confronting those threats requires alliance. It requires the coordination Trump seems to view as weakness. It requires the very thing his administration treats as obsolete: working with other democracies on shared problems.

Krugman said he was uncertain whether Trump's disdain for Europe runs structurally deep or whether it reflects the particular people currently in power. That agnosticism is reasonable. Presidential administrations change. Priorities shift.

But the pattern is consistent. Trump and his inner circle prefer authoritarian partners to democratic ones. They view shared values as liability, not asset. They operate from the conviction that America should act alone.

Krugman's insight is that isolated power decays faster than allied power. Alliances are how declining superpowers remain relevant. They are how nations share costs and amplify capability.

Trump diagnosed American decline accurately. His remedy guarantees it