Per source: https://whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2025-National-Security-Strategy.pdf

Overview

The 2025 National Security Strategy, issued in November 2025 under President Trump's second administration, adopts a resolute "America First" approach. It seeks to restore American preeminence by aligning ends and means, achieving peace through strength, and reversing prior foreign policy mistakes that eroded U.S. power, wealth, and sovereignty.

Key Threats and Challenges

The document highlights threats from hostile foreign influences, including espionage, predatory trade, drug and human trafficking, propaganda, and cultural subversion. Primary adversaries are:

• China — for economic imbalances, supply chain dominance, and technology theft.
• Russia — as a potential Eurasian hegemon.
• Iran — for destabilizing the Middle East.

Additional challenges include mass migration, terrorism (e.g., narco-terrorism and Islamist groups), adversarial control of chokepoints (e.g., Strait of Hormuz, South China Sea), unfair trade, IP theft, and the fentanyl crisis.

Strategic Priorities

The strategy rests on core pillars:

1. Protecting the homeland — via secure borders, resilient infrastructure, and controlled immigration.
2. Building a dominant military — with advanced nuclear deterrence, missile defenses (including a proposed "Golden Dome"), and capabilities for rapid victory.
3. Promoting prosperity — through the strongest economy, industrial base revitalization, energy innovation, and IP protection.
4. Preserving peace through strength — by deterring adversaries and negotiating peace deals (citing eight in eight months, e.g., Kosovo-Serbia, Israel-Iran, Gaza ceasefire).
5. Advancing American values — by restoring cultural and spiritual health, competent governance, and pro-American policies.

Regional Focus

• Western Hemisphere → Asserts a "Trump Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine for U.S. preeminence, counters migration and cartels, and reduces non-hemispheric influence.
• Indo-Pacific → Rebalances trade with China, secures supply chains, deters aggression (especially regarding Taiwan), and strengthens alliances (Quad, Japan, South Korea).
• Europe → Encourages greater self-reliance, NATO burden-sharing (targeting 5% GDP on defense), and strategic stability with Russia (including ending Ukraine hostilities).
• Middle East → Expands Abraham Accords, partners rather than dominates, degrades Iran, and avoids endless wars.
• Africa → Prioritizes trade/investment over aid, partners on minerals and energy, and counters terrorism selectively.

Specific Policies

Key initiatives include:

• Military modernization in AI, biotech, quantum, space, and nuclear domains.
• Defense industrial base revitalization.
• Economic tools like tariffs, reshoring, and reciprocal trade deals.
• Energy dominance (fossil fuels, nuclear) while rejecting "Net Zero."
• Strengthened alliances (NATO reforms, AUKUS, Quad) with fairer burden-sharing.
• Leadership in emerging technologies and cyber/space deterrence.

Conclusion and Tone

The strategy conveys a realist, pragmatic, and confident tone, portraying America as poised for a new golden age through focused strength, diplomatic successes, and domestic renewal. It emphasizes prioritizing core U.S. interests, deterring threats, and fostering a world of sovereign nations where America leads by example.