The Atlantic

Donald Trump Stumbles Into a Foreign-Policy Triumph

The president, however inadvertently, may be reminding the world of the reality of international relations.
Source: Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

A year and a half into Donald Trump’s presidency, Henry Kissinger set out a theory. “I think Trump may be one of those figures in history who appears from time to time to mark the end of an era and to force it to give up its old pretences,” he told the Financial Times. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that he knows this, or that he is considering any great alternative. It could just be an accident.”

A term has been coined to describe this notion: Ryan Evans of calls them “.” It is the idea that, whether by accident or design, Trump creates chances to solve long-running international problems that a conventional leader would not. His bellicose isolationist agenda, for instance, might already be forcing Europe to confront its geopolitical weakness; China,

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