Illustration: Dionne Gain "The day after a Trump victory," he wrote during the US election campaign, "allies would have to plan for the withdrawal of US security guarantees, rivals would look for ways to exploit the shift in US strategy, and markets would be rocked by the prospect of a new era of protectionism." All of this may yet come to pass. But, just now, it's starting to look like Wright misjudged. How does he account for this? "There is a little harm being done in the budget, in international co-operation, in resisting mutlilateralism, but yes, the real big shocks have been limited," he tells me. "Trumps' cabinet is a lot stronger than many of us feared." He lists Defence Secretary James Mattis, National Security Adviser Lt. General H.R. McMaster, and possibly the Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, as "rational mainstreamers" who live in the real world. He puts Vice-President Mike Pence in the same camp.

A Jekyll and Hyde duality: President Donald Trump. Credit:AP "These are fairly strong appointments that have created an alternative power centre. The real story is this deep tension between two factions within the administration. There's the Oval Office group of Trump, [chief political strategist] Steve Bannon and a few others, and then there's the mainstream in the cabinet and the National Security Council." Three other important power centres constrain the president's agenda in his dealings with the wider world. First, America's courts have twice struck down his attempts at a so-called Muslim ban. Second, the Congress blocked his consummation of his "bromance" with Vladimir Putin. Third, Trump has discovered that America's allies turn out to be useful, sometimes. In facing North Korea, for instance, Trump has found that Japan and South Korea will be valuable assets. President Donald Trump meets with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the Oval Office. Credit:Evan Vucci "I think and hope it's becoming a more normal administration," says Thomas Wright. "But Trump hasn't changed. He's been beaten back, he's boxed in, but he's still the same guy," as German Chancellor Angela Merkel discovered over the past few days in her meetings with Trump.

The result is an administration with a Jekyll and Hyde duality. A German commentator saw both sides on display in Trump's performance with Merkel: "He was Mr Jekyll while reading his statement, saying nice things about economic ties, his commitment to Ukraine, common friendship; all the niceties," wrote Sylke Tempel in Internationale Politik. "Then, in the question-and-answer session, he's his old self: disparaging the media, criticising the British." It got worse a day later when Merkel had left town and Trump tweeted his complaint that Germany owes "vast sums of money to NATO and the US must be paid more for the powerful, and very expensive, defence it provides". This was not only poor politics, scolding publicly America's greatest ally in Europe. It was also raw ignorance. Germany owes nothing. Berlin's commitment to NATO to increase its defence spending from today's 1.2 per cent of GDP to 2 per cent by 2024 is a commitment to increase Germany's own defence effort. Malcolm Turnbull famously encountered Mr Hyde when he took the phone call from the Oval Office. Yet it seems that he was able to get Dr Jekyll on the line too, because the president ultimately agreed to honour the asylum seeker deal that the US entered into with Australia under the Barack Obama presidency. Wright says that the larger lesson from that well-publicised exchange has been learnt by governments around the world: "To the extent that the administration can be dealt with below the level of the president, the better."

But Wright says that this formula is not ultimately workable. He wrote in America's Politico last week: "Unfortunately, Mr Hyde is not going away. Dr Jekyll may well be the everyday persona of the Trump administration's foreign policy if the cabinet can exert its influence, but ultimately Mr Hyde will define it." How so? Because US policy will be defined by crisis. And crisis is the one time that the president is indispensable. Trump will wreak havoc, says Wright, not because of what he does but what he refuses to do. "He could refuse to uphold Article 5 of the NATO treaty in Europe," abandoning an ally in trouble, says Wright, "or he could refuse to act cooperatively with other countries in a financial crisis. No one can force him to act if he doesn't want to." A prime minister might call Washington looking for Dr Jekyll but find only Mr Hyde on the line. Loading

In other words, US allies should be able to have perfectly good working relationships with Trump's America. Right up to the day they really need its help. Peter Hartcher is international editor.