Trump razes old order, in a win for China

DAVOS, Switzerland – In a long, rambling address that was by turns bombastic, aggrieved and self-congratulatory, President Donald Trump pronounced last rites on American leadership of the liberal democratic order forged by the United States and its allies after World War II.

Mr Trump used a keynote speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Jan 21 – a pilgrimage site for adherents of globalisation – to assert that the US was done offering its markets and its military protection to European allies he derided as freeloaders. And he vowed to advance his trade war. He characterised tariffs as the price of admission to a land of 300 million consumers.