Sina Raymand – International Affairs Analyst

The End of a Dominant Narrative: Why Strategic Liberalism Is No Longer Responsive

Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. security policy has primarily been based on a combination of military superiority, institutional multilateralism, and the promotion of liberal values. National security documents from past decades, even when discussing great power competition, continued to assume that the existing international order, centered on the United States, was maintainable and manageable. However, the new U.S. National Security Strategy indicates that this fundamental assumption has become unstable.

In this document, the world is described not as an arena for the expansion of the liberal order, but as a space filled with competition, institutional erosion, and the return of the logic of power. The experience of prolonged wars, financial crises, erosion of the industrial base, and failure to manage the consequences of globalization has led U.S. policymakers to conclude that strategic liberalism has become more a factor of power attrition than a tool for preserving power. From this perspective, moving beyond this model is not considered an ideological choice but a pragmatic response to the limitations of U.S. power.

Empowered Deal-Making: The New Logic of U.S. Security Policy

The new U.S. National Security Strategy is built upon an unwritten but central concept: security is not the product of moral or institutional commitments, but the result of a balance of interests and bargaining power. Within this framework, alliances are meaningful only when they generate tangible security, economic, or technological returns for Washington. It is this logic that leads the new document, instead of emphasizing “shared values,” to focus on “fair burden-sharing,” “defense spending,” and “allied responsibility.”

This deal-oriented perspective manifests in the United States’ differentiated approach across regions of the world. Europe is described not as an equal partner, but as an actor whose position in U.S. security equations will weaken if it fails to enhance its economic and defense capacities. By contrast, toward certain rivals—especially China—greater caution is observed; as if Washington has concluded that managing competition, at times through limited and regulated agreements, is less costly than comprehensive confrontation.

Empowered deal-making does not mean complete isolationism, but rather a form of strict selectivity; choosing arenas, allies, and even adversaries based on direct profit and loss, rather than historical commitments.

Implications for Europe and NATO: Conditional Alliance and Uncertain Security

One of the most significant consequences of this transformation is the change in the nature of the U.S. relationship with Europe and NATO. The new strategy explicitly shows that Washington is no longer willing to serve as an unconditional guarantor of European continental security. Collective security, in this view, is valid only if Europe also pays the necessary costs and distances itself from structural dependence on the United States.

This approach places Europe in a dual situation. On the one hand, U.S. pressure can catalyze strengthening Europe’s strategic autonomy; on the other hand, the lack of intra-European consensus, political divisions, and economic constraints make the continent more vulnerable to security threats. NATO, under such conditions, is transformed from an alliance based on firm guarantees into a conditional and fluid framework whose credibility depends on Washington’s situational decisions.

From a realpolitik perspective, this situation does not necessarily lead to NATO’s collapse, but it transforms it from a stable hegemonic institution into an alliance based on continuous bargaining.

Rivals and a Multipolar World: Opportunities and Risks of the New Order

The new U.S. National Security Strategy also carries dual messages for global rivals. On the one hand, the relative retreat of the United States from extensive global commitments creates space for other powers to expand their influence. On the other hand, Washington’s emphasis on hard interests and economic power indicates that the United States does not intend to withdraw from competition, but rather to change its form.

In the emerging multipolar world, U.S. deal-making may increase instability, as shared rules give way to temporary, case-specific agreements. This situation is particularly dangerous for peripheral regions and countries of the Global South—countries that neither possess the bargaining power of great powers nor benefit from a strong institutional umbrella.

The transformation in U.S. security policy can be regarded as a clear return to realism, one that prioritizes power, the economy, and deal-making over values and norms. While this transformation is understandable from the perspective of U.S. national interests, at the international system level, it weakens the legitimacy of the existing order and increases uncertainty. Empowered deal-making policy, although it may reduce U.S. costs in the short term, can, in the long run, erode allied trust and intensify unregulated competition. The world after this transformation will be neither necessarily safer nor necessarily fairer; rather, it will more closely resemble an arena in which power and bargaining capacity determine actors’ fates.

Ultimately, the new U.S. National Security Strategy is less a blueprint for global leadership than a reflection of a great power’s doubt about its ability to preserve an order that it once designed.