The Global Trade Order That Defined the Postwar Era is Over

by Kerry Lutz
FinancialSurvivalNetwork.com

The global trade order that defined the postwar era is over. Not dying–dead. And the man with the shovel None other than reelected President Donald J. Trump, now fully unchained in his second term.

As of last week, Trump has unleashed a sweeping new wave of tariffs on 180 countries, shaking the foundations of the World Trade Organization and throwing global markets into chaos. The new directive? Buy American–or else.

This is not the return of 1930s-style protectionism. It’s something far more calculated–and far more personal. Call it what it is: Trump’s Ungentlemanly Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (UGATT). If you thought trade was complex, diplomatic, and rule-based, think again. Trump is tweeting from Air Force One, setting policy in real time, and dragging every trading partner to the table like a repo man collecting on 75 years of open-market IOUs.

But to understand how we got here, we need to rewind to a time when trade was slower, more polite, and almost boring–the GATT years.

GATT: Gentlemen, Tariffs, and Tanqueray

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was signed in 1947 as a stopgap. The real goal had been the creation of an International Trade Organization–an institution to oversee global commerce just as the IMF and World Bank oversaw money and development. But American lawmakers balked, and GATT filled the void.

It was informal, it was slow, and it was deeply elite. GATT was less a rules-based system and more of a recurring diplomatic cocktail party. Delegates in Geneva would convene for “rounds”–the Kennedy Round, the Tokyo Round, the Uruguay Round–where they’d talk tariffs over Scotch and set policy in between banquets.

Despite the theatrics, GATT worked. From 1947 to the early 1990s, global tariffs fell dramatically. World trade expanded nearly 20-fold. The United States, then the world’s unchallenged industrial superpower, opened its markets wide. American consumers enjoyed cheap goods; U.S. allies gained access in exchange for loyalty during the Cold War.

It wasn’t fair, exactly–but it was stable. And America could afford to play the generous host.

WTO: The Machine That Overreached

By the 1990s, GATT was showing its age. It lacked enforcement power and hadn’t adapted to the rise of services, intellectual property, and complex supply chains. So in 1995, GATT morphed into the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Now it had real teeth–rules, judges, binding dispute resolution. It welcomed new members, including China in 2001, under the optimistic delusion that capitalism would turn communists into capitalists and communists into democrats.

But instead of liberalizing, China weaponized the system. It subsidized its industries, stole IP, flooded Western markets with goods, and amassed trillions in U.S. debt. Meanwhile, America lost millions of manufacturing jobs. Entire towns hollowed out. The Rust Belt began to rust in earnest.

Washington elites told Americans to retrain, get STEM degrees, and enjoy the low prices at Walmart. But no one explained what would replace a $30-an-hour factory job in Toledo. For the working class, free trade didn’t feel like opportunity. It felt like betrayal.

Enter Trump: The Tariff Avenger

Trump didn’t read GATT reports or WTO rulings. He read the room. And he saw an opening no other politician dared take: tariffs as policy, and trade as war.

His first term was a warm-up act. He torpedoed TPP, slammed NAFTA, and slapped tariffs on China, Europe, and even Canada. It was chaotic, but it worked–at least politically. Blue-collar workers cheered. Elites scoffed. And Trump stayed on message: America is getting screwed–and I’m here to fix it.

Now, in his second term, there’s no holding back.

The new UGATT policy is blunt and unapologetic:

• 10% baseline tariffs on all imports from 180 countries, with “friendlier rates” for allies who make quick deals.
• Aggressive quotas and purchase agreements for U.S. beef, corn, soybeans, dairy, autos, coal, and even BIC pens–because Trump doesn’t care what we sell, only that we sell it.
• China, once again the target of tariffs on nearly everything, is now being forced to sign agricultural purchase orders before any trade talks begin.
• Trump’s team is openly warning Germany and Japan: buy American–or pay dearly.
• And of course, he’s doing it all via Twitter/X from Air Force One, mocking EU bureaucrats, WTO judges, and former presidents in 280 characters or less.

The old rules are gone. This is deal-making by dominance, not consensus.

UGATT: Less Gentlemen, More Gunslingers

Trump’s new trade doctrine is not based on economics–it’s based on power. He doesn’t care what the WTO thinks. In fact, the U.S. has already crippled the WTO’s Appellate Body by blocking new judge appointments, effectively killing its ability to enforce decisions.

Why? Because Trump views the WTO like a bad real estate contract: full of loopholes, rigged against him, and ripe for the shredder.

He doesn’t want rules-based multilateralism. He wants bilateral leverage. If the U.S. runs a deficit with you, you owe us. If you want access to our markets, buy our stuff. If you cheat, manipulate currency, or subsidize your industries–we retaliate instantly.

This isn’t diplomacy. It’s economic shock and awe.

Will It Work?

That depends on how you define “work.”

In the short term, UGATT is already delivering results. Countries are lining up to make side deals. American farmers, long caught in the middle of trade disputes, are finally seeing surges in foreign purchases. Factory orders are ticking upward in places that hadn’t seen growth since 1995. Even the domestic pen industry–long thought extinct–is having a moment.

But there are real risks:

• Prices are rising, especially on imports from countries unwilling to play ball. That’s inflationary.
• Supply chains are buckling, with businesses scrambling to source domestically or diversify partners.
• Foreign retaliation is mounting, especially from China and the EU.
• The global trading system is fragmenting into regional blocs, with more countries aligning around China to hedge against U.S. pressure.

In essence, Trump is betting that U.S. consumption, military muscle, and financial clout are still strong enough to bend the world to America’s will. He may be right.

But there’s no going back to the GATT days of polite dinners and slowly negotiated tariff reductions. This is a bare-knuckled reset of everything the global elite spent seven decades building.

The End of the Old World Order

GATT was a well-intentioned gentleman’s club. The WTO tried to be a global referee. But both relied on an idea that no longer holds: that global cooperation is always good, and that America will always be its patron.

Trump has ended that illusion. With UGATT, he has flipped the table, grabbed the pen, and written a new deal–one that’s short on nuance and long on leverage.

Whether history views this as a restoration of fairness or the beginning of a trade war spiral will depend on outcomes. But make no mistake: we are living through the final chapter of the globalist trade era. The gentleman’s agreement is over.

Trump’s UGATT has begun.

And this time, there are no cigars, no wine lists, and no consensus.

Just one man, one market, and one message blasting from 35,000 feet:

Buy American–or get out of the way.

Regards,
Kerry Lutz

Source: https://www.financialsurvivalnetwork.com/2025/04/the-global-trade-order-that-defined-the-postwar-era-is-over/