The American Guarantee Is a Joke

America's word isn't worth a dime. Last week, as Ukrainian President Zelenskyy pleaded for promised military aid that never arrived, global markets tumbled on conflicting Federal Reserve signals about interest rates. In Washington, seventeen inspectors general were abruptly dismissed, gutting oversight of the very institutions meant to keep the government honest. Three separate crises, one common thread: the world's most powerful nation can no longer be trusted to keep its promises.

When Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declared Ukraine's pre-2014 borders "unrealistic" last Tuesday, he shattered decades of American security guarantees. Allies from Warsaw to Taipei observed years of American assurances evaporate in a single press conference. In diplomatic circles, the question isn't whether America will honor its commitments but which one it will break next.

The tremors of unreliability shake Wall Street just as severely as foreign capitals. The Federal Reserve sends such mixed signals that major banks have given up predicting its next move. Market volatility has spiked as traders attempt to price in economic uncertainty and the fundamental unreliability of American institutional decision-making. When the world's reserve currency becomes a source of instability rather than security, something has broken.

America's domestic institutions fare no better. The sudden shutdown of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau left banks and consumers in regulatory limbo, not because of policy disagreements but because no one can trust whether any federal agency's decisions will stand from one week to the next. When Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency ordered USAID's closure, decades of humanitarian commitments vanished overnight. America's signature now carries so little weight that even its own agencies can't trust their mandate to exist tomorrow.

This erosion of trust creates real victims. Ukrainian soldiers ration ammunition, unsure when or if the promised resupply will arrive. Asian allies quietly expand military budgets, hedging against American security guarantees that seem increasingly hollow. European leaders speak openly of a post-American NATO, not from desire but necessity. A nation's word is its currency in international relations, and America's checks are bouncing.

The financial costs compound daily. Foreign investment in U.S. markets has plummeted as international firms price in the risk of dealing with an unreliable partner. The dollar's dominance in global trade faces its first serious challenge in decades, not from any rival currency's strength but from America's weakness. Even domestic businesses delay expansion plans, unable to trust that today's regulations will resemble tomorrow's.

The civil service, meant to provide continuity and expertise across administrations, faces an unprecedented exodus of talent. Career diplomats find their carefully negotiated agreements discarded by tweet. Senior officials learn of major policy shifts from cable news. The institutional memory that once made American governance reliable evaporates with each departure.

Each broken promise makes the next one easier to break. Every institutional failure weakens resistance to further erosion. The Federal Reserve's credibility crumbles from policy shifts and the growing certainty that no American institution remains immune to instability.

America's power always rested more on trust than force. The post-war order succeeded because allies believed U.S. commitments would outlast any administration. That trust allowed America to build alliances, shape institutions, and lead global responses to common threats. As that trust crumbles, America's ability to advance its interests diminishes with each broken promise.

Russia exploits every wavering American commitment. China positions itself as the more dependable partner in regions where U.S. credibility has collapsed. Even Canada and Mexico accelerate plans for a future where their largest neighbor's word carries less weight than ever.

Building trust requires time; destroying it takes moments. American reliability took decades to establish and mere months to squander. The world needs trusted leadership now more than ever - on climate change, technological disruption, and security challenges that cross all borders.

But America's signature on any agreement comes with an unspoken asterisk. Its guarantees carry implicit doubt. Its institutions operate under constant threat of reversal. This crisis of trust threatens America's fundamental ability to advance its interests and protect its existence. In a world built on the reliability of American commitments, their collapse threatens U.S. power and global stability.

The American empire faces a paralysis more fundamental than policy or politics. As its internal machinery breaks down - courts weaponized, elections contested, truth itself fragmented - its proclaimed role as global stabilizer becomes dark comedy. The rest of the world watches this deterioration with a mix of horror and fascination. They see a superpower that cannot govern itself, drunk at the wheel, lecturing about international order. They see institutions that cannot bridge partisan divides promising to bridge global ones. They see a nation that cannot separate truth from conspiracy, claiming to be an arbiter of global facts.

By the time America reconstructs its capacity for coherent self-governance - if such reconstruction is even possible - the world will have built new systems and alliances that bypass the United States entirely. The American century may be remembered not for its successes or failures but for its final gift to history: the marriage of destructive power with institutional decay.