The former president’s decision to frame rising consumer prices as a positive indicator marks a dangerous departure from conventional economic signalling. In the current threat environment, inflation is more than a domestic hardship: it is a vulnerability that hostile actors can exploit. When American families lose purchasing power, social cohesion erodes, and the nation’s strategic resilience weakens.
Military readiness depends on a stable industrial base, and sustained inflation raises procurement costs, delays modernisation, and strains logistics. Every pound spent on higher food and fuel prices is a pound not invested in defence. Trump’s rhetoric may be intended to deflect blame or shape a post-election narrative, but it distorts the real threat landscape.
The Kremlin and Beijing watch these signals closely, calculating when to apply pressure. Inflation is not a tool of strength; it is a vector for adversary influence operations. We must not normalise economic decline as a talking point.
The cost of living crisis is a national security issue, and framing it as a success only hands our rivals a strategic advantage.
