Isolation is defined as being alone or apart from others. In foreign affairs, isolationist countries are nations that don’t meddle in politics outside their borders. Bhutan is known to be the most isolated country in the world currently, and has been for quite some time. At one point, the U.S. also went isolationist. 

This happened right before World War II, when the Great Depression was in full swing, which was a significant contributor to our late entry into the global war. During this time, the general public believed it was better to focus on our internal problems rather than get involved in coalitions against Germany and Japan. But is becoming isolationist the answer to our problems today? 

Recently, President Trump has taken the world of politics by storm. His policies have clearly been isolationist, maybe a little too much. Last term, Donald Trump repeatedly threatened to leave NATO, a security alliance formed between 30+ countries. While he hasn’t brought that up this year (yet), he has said that the U.S. will be pulling out of the World Health Organization. 

This might not seem like a big deal on its own, at least not enough to be considered isolationist, but combined with alienating our allies with tariffs, the whole situation changes. A note on the tariffs, however, is that the situation is constantly changing, but even retracting or lessening them wouldn’t heal the damage caused to our foreign relations.

Another thing to add is that President Trump has mentioned several times that he wants America to be a self-sustaining country, which is a tad bit unrealistic considering we are the largest importer of goods in the world. If we could reach this standard without damaging our foreign relations, that would be great, but trading with other countries is a major part of international diplomacy. 

So, all things considered, going isolationist is a hard pass for the United States. As a global superpower, the US has to maintain relations with other countries; it has to be a part of our politics. While we might be leaning toward isolationism in one sector, such as economics, we are not when it comes to our involvement in foreign conflict, proven by our role in the Russian-Ukrainian war, so this is a futile worry for now.