America 250

On America's 250th Birthday, the United States Arms the World's Tyrannies

On a Fourth of July, John Quincy Adams warned against the foreign policy that his successors would later adopt.

Matthew Petti | 7.4.2026 7:30 AM

Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL Add Reason to Google

Media Contact & Reprint Requests

(Illustration: Midjourney/howtogoto/Envato)

The Founding Fathers debated from the beginning whether the United States should try to spread liberty by force. While Thomas Jefferson wanted to back the French Revolution, George Washington warned Americans "to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world" in his Farewell Address.

What neither of them could have imagined was America becoming a forceful backer of absolute monarchy. But their present successor, Donald Trump, has become obsessed with building an ironclad alliance of the kind of rulers that Washington and Jefferson fought to break free of. A month ago, Trump demanded that Saudi Arabia and Qatar join the Abraham Accords, an alliance underpinned by the United Arab Emirates. Two weeks ago, he offered to be the "guardian" of these governments for pay. All three of these states are monarchies, and—unlike Britain at the time of the American Revolution—don't even have elected parliaments.

The problem goes much deeper than Trump himself. During the first half of the Biden administration, the United States sold weapons to the majority of the world's autocracies, The Intercept found. The situation........

© Reason.com