What happened

President Trump stood increasingly isolated on the world stage this week, after an acrimonious trip to France to mark the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. Almost immediately upon landing, Trump tussled with French President Emmanuel Macron, tweeting that his plan for a European army was “very insulting.” He had seemingly been angered by a garbled press translation, which said Macron wanted a European army as protection against the U.S.; Macron had in fact said such a force would reduce Europe’s reliance on U.S. defense help. The next morning, Trump scrapped a planned visit to a cemetery for American war dead, with the White House blaming poor weather for grounding his helicopter. “I suggested driving,” Trump tweeted later, but the “Secret Service said NO.” White House Chief of Staff John Kelly did attend the ceremony, at the site of a battle in which 1,800 Americans died. Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel paid their respects to the war dead under gray skies at another ceremony the same day.

Later in the trip, Trump sat stonily as Macron delivered a rebuke of his “America First” politics. In a speech, Macron branded nationalism a “betrayal of patriotism” and warned against “old demons coming back to wreak chaos and death.” Trump blasted Macron with a series of incendiary tweets, mocking his low approval ratings and even the Nazi occupation of France. “How did that work out for France? They were starting to learn German in Paris before the U.S. came along,” Trump wrote.