Core Brief: Threats Win Early—But Lose Big: Trump’s School Yard Bullying Will Fail

Short‑term concessions, long‑term retaliation.

Aug 22, 2025

Threats work until they don’t. Intimidation is effective only for a short time. Those doing the threatening and intimidating always lose, and their fate is far worse than the short-term gain they realized.

The Lunch Money Bully eventually has to pay back the money, is punished, and ostracized.

The Mob Boss loses his fortune and assets, spends decades in jail, and no longer has power.

The Bilgerant Dictator is forced from power, imprisoned, exiled, or executed and remembered as a pariah.

The News

July 28, 2025: Trump “secures” a deal of 15 % tariff on most EU goods, while the EU pledges roughly $600 billion in US investments, andTrump retains the right to raise tariffs if Brussels “fails to deliver.” Reuters
Brookings (Dec 2024) finds tariff threats erode trust and push partners to build alternative alliances, yielding scant strategic gain. Brookings
NBER research shows unilateral US tariff “gains” (~0.25 % welfare) vanish once partners retaliate. NBER
Steel‑and‑aluminium tariffs backfired: EU retaliation drove Harley‑Davidson to move production, costing $90‑100 million annually. Reuters

What’s Happening

Trump intimidated the EU with threats of 30% tariffs. The EU negotiated a surrender to 15% tariffs

Threats and intimidation work in the short term because they exploit fear, uncertainty, and imbalance in negotiating power. But over time, they generate backlash, weaken trust, and trigger counter-strategies. In the case of Trump’s tariff threats against the EU, the pattern follows a classic trajectory of coercive diplomacy:

Fear of Immediate Harm
The EU faced the risk of a damaging trade war. Trump’s threats, like imposing 30% tariffs on key sectors, created urgency to avoid economic disruption, especially for export-dependent industries like German autos or French agriculture.
Asymmetry of Risk
The US economy is more diversified and less dependent on exports to Europe than vice versa. This gave Trump the upper hand, allowing him to demand concessions with fewer immediate costs to American consumers.
Unpredictability
Trump’s erratic behavior made it hard to know if he would follow through or escalate further. This uncertainty amplified the pressure, pushing the EU to compromise to avoid greater instability
Trust and Reputation Erode
Once a leader uses coercion, partners stop viewing them as reliable. The EU may cooperate in the short term, but will immediately begin looking for ways to reduce dependence on the US, as seen in Europe's efforts to deepen internal trade and hedge toward Asia.
Resistance Builds
Coercion never builds lasting alliances. The EU may comply today, but it will resist tomorrow. Trump’s 2018 tariffs led to long-term EU plans to build resilience, diversifying supply chains, investing in strategic autonomy, and coordinating alternative trade pacts.
Retaliation and Coalition-Building
Bullied nations eventually find allies. In response to US tariffs, the EU, China, and Canada all began closer cooperation. Even traditional US allies started negotiating in ways that limit US involvement, like forming the EU-Mercosur deal and increasing coordination with ASEAN.
US Influence Weakens
Every time Trump uses threats, it devalues the norms of fair trade and mutual respect that once gave it moral leadership. That weakens America's structural power in international institutions, turning partners into skeptics and adversaries.

THE CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

In Trump’s cultural perspective, power is imposed. You win by forcing the other side to submit. It is a high-power distance mindset where leaders give orders and everyone obeys. But that perspective collapses when it meets a different system, like Europe’s.

European institutions operate on consensus and legalism, low power distance, and universalism. Trump doesn’t understand this; he sees delay as weakness, compromise as surrender. So he defaults to threats, 30% tariffs, take-it-or-leave-it terms, expecting the same obedience he receives in the US.

Trump is a power-seeker archetype, driven by will, control, and unilateral direction. He is assertive, inflexible, and focused on imposing outcomes. Negotiation is a contest of strength, not a way to work together. That puts him at odds with the EU’s rule-imposer archetype, which believes in legal structure, predictability, and shared governance.

Trump doesn’t just ignore this difference. He can’t grasp that it exists.

The EU sees the broader picture, trading a short-term loss for long-term strategic advantage.

WHY IT MATTERS

Threats and intimidation deliver small, quick wins and large, long-lasting losses.

Trump’s 15% tariffs on the EU look like a victory, but a “victory’ built on coercion is coercion, not victory. Brookings and the National Bureau of Economic Research show, threats end trust, deliver almost no lasting gain, provoke retaliation, and end in greater loss for the beligerent party.

When Trump threatens, allies respond by reducing trade, bypassing American leadership, and forming new coalitions without it. After Trump’s 2018 tariffs, the EU strengthened ties with Asia, launched independent defense initiatives, and negotiated trade deals that excluded the US. Trump’s 15% tariff agreement will trigger the same pattern. The more America uses intimidation, the faster it loses strategic influence, economic access, and partners. Threats deliver headlines, then backlash, isolation, and decline.

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