Story highlights It is far easier for a President to have major influence over American foreign policy than over domestic policy

Trump's moves represent the real possibility that America's engagement with its European allies may be fundamentally changing

Washington (CNN) On Sunday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel uttered a single sentence that speaks to how fundamentally President Donald Trump has reshaped -- and will continue to reshape -- the world, and America's place in it.

While Merkel made no mention of Trump specifically, she made clear that her realization had come "in the last few days" -- a time period which overlapped with a G7 meeting in which Trump blasted America's traditional European allies over NATO obligations and made clear that he was more than willing to go it alone on climate change and trade.

What Trump's words -- and Merkel's reaction -- reveal is something that sharp foreign policy minds have known since the start of Trump's campaign: His true potential for drastic change exists in the foreign policy sphere.

Trump's ubiquitous "Make America Great Again" slogan was interpreted by many of his followers as the idea that we would make America great again by slaying political correctness, by bringing back jobs, by keeping undocumented workers from entering our country, from showing the mainstream media who's boss. It was re-making our daily life right here in the good, old U-S-of-A that people were focused on.

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