How is Trump weakening American power? Let me count the ways

August 25, 2026 — 5:00am

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The US remains immensely powerful. Yet, week by week, Donald Trump is exposing the limits of its power.

Of course, he’s not doing it deliberately. He does it unwittingly through blunder, bluster and bad strategy. On his current trajectory, he will leave America weaker than he found it in three ways, with urgent questions now arising about a fourth.

Most glaring is Trump’s failure at arms. He is being “humiliated” by a much smaller rival, as German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has remarked.

His supposed “two to four weeks” war against Iran is approaching six months. By refusing to countenance the expert advice of his generals, he handed control of the Strait of Hormuz to his enemy.

The US failure in Iran has nothing to do with Pete Hegseth’s fetish over falling levels of troop testosterone. It has everything to do with strategy.

The Islamic Republic is still in place, its stature much enhanced, and the price of oil remains around 30 per cent higher than when Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu launched their war.

Persistent inflation is one result. The average American household has paid at least $US1200 ($1675) in higher costs as a result, according to economist Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics.

The taxpayer is on track to spend more than $US100 billion for the war, 18 US service members are dead, more than 600 wounded, America’s Gulf allies have lost confidence in their ally, and US stature is much reduced.

Worse, by moving assets from other theatres to fight a losing war in the Middle East, US global readiness is weakened. The spoils of war, indeed.........

© The Sydney Morning Herald