The US alliance is unreliable and delivering less than promised

The position that the United States is an unreliable ally holds that Washington extracts more from its partners than it delivers, leaves them exposed and forces them to hedge. Its advocates point to pressure on treaty partners through tariffs on steel, aluminium and cars, digital taxes and trade deals, and to talk of annexation and a "51st state" in the case of Canada.

The position appears in coverage of the dispute between the United States and Canada, tensions between Europe and the US, defence burden-sharing and US security guarantees, the US-Russia relationship, sanctions relief, the alliance with South Korea, Australia's role as a middle power and the Taiwan Strait. Outlets from dozens of publishers carry it, in some of these conflicts more than seventy.

The main competing position, America First, holds that allies have freeloaded on US protection and must now pay their share or accept a rebalanced relationship. Another reads the reopened US-Russia channel as pragmatic realism rather than appeasement. The events of recent months centre on the trade dispute: Canada put retaliatory tariffs of up to 50 percent on US goods into effect, the US banned Canadian alcohol, dairy products and motorcycles, and President Trump threatened to bar Bombardier jets from the US market.