There is a certain moral spectacle to the current moment. Capitals across Europe, along with Canada, Japan, and other self-proclaimed custodians of the “rules-based international order", express visible anguish over US President Donald Trump and the vandalism they believe he represents.

Their language reflects shock, even betrayal, as if an ancient covenant has been broken. Yet history inconveniently intrudes upon this carefully curated outrage.

It prompts us to ask an uncomfortable question: where was this principled indignation when the West itself repeatedly chose power over principle, expediency over ethics, and interest over international law?

Raising this question is not a defence of Trump. His disdain for multilateralism, transactional view of alliances, and casual contempt for norms are real and dangerous.

But moral judgement, to be credible, must be anchored in consistency. When it is not, it begins to resemble less a defence of universal values and more a lament over the loss of monopolistic power.

The rules-based order is often spoken of as if it descended from the heavens, pristine and impartial. In reality, it is a post-1945 construct shaped predominantly by western power.

The United Nations Charter articulated noble principles: sovereign equality, non-intervention, and the peaceful resolution of disputes.

But from the very beginning, these ideals coexisted with hierarchy — most conspicuously in the Security Council’s permanent membership and veto. Rules were never divorced from the interests of those who wrote........

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