America’s trading partners around the globe reacted with a mixture of relief and bewilderment to President Donald Trump’s eleventh-hour decision to pause some of his most aggressive tariffs.

As government officials worldwide try to divine what would convince Trump to grant them permanent waivers, his newly demonstrated willingness to abruptly reverse course — or in China’s case, to apply additional pressure by hiking tariffs to 145% — inserts another layer of uncertainty. That’s left a sense of trepidation at what might come next, and the risk that it spills out from the economic sphere into other arenas.

One Asian official said they were now in a guessing game to figure out what Trump wants. To many Europeans, the week’s U.S.-written drama underlines their determination to tough it out, show unity, and deploy the trade heft that comes with membership of the 450 million-strong European Union. It was the U.S. that blinked, not Europe, was one refrain.

“There is maximum uncertainty in America,” said Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz, voicing the hope that the EU and U.S. in negotiations could agree on the abolishment of all tariffs on both sides.

“As far as I understand, Trump is now receiving a lot of criticism from within his own ranks and from the business community,” Merz, a former Blackrock Inc. Germany chief, told public broadcaster ZDF late Wednesday. “Therefore, we must be all the more reliable, clearer, and better on the European side. And Germany must play a leading role.”

A mess. Appalling. Evidence of panic. Those were among the responses to Trump’s 90-day partial reprieve given by officials who asked not to be named discussing sensitive matters of trade and diplomacy. The move shows that the president is playing a game of chicken, one said. Another asked how they could be expected to work under these conditions, and faced with such methods.

This U-turn will further damage the credibility and reliability of the U.S., a fact that’s all the more dangerous because it can also be transferred to NATO, according to a further official from a large EU member state. After all, how credible is the U.S. military deterrent now that the U.S. president has gone to the brink of financial meltdown only to retreat and pass it off as investors “getting yippy.”

There were also more than a few references in both Europe and Asia to Trump’s vulgar language used to describe how desperate governments were for deals. One cited his remarks as an indication that EU leaders needed to be firm with Trump, adding that all options remain on the table.

The reality for the world is that while the higher reaches of the so-called reciprocal tariffs have been put on hold, the baseline rate of 10% remains, as do other U.S. tariffs on cars, auto parts, steel and aluminum.

For European Central Bank policymaker Francois Villeroy de Galhau, Trump’s partial reversal marked the start of a return to economic reason. That was the “less bad” news, he told France Inter radio on Thursday, deploying a French cuisine analogy.

“But there are still two bad ingredients in the American salad,” Villeroy said. “The first bad ingredient is unpredictability, which is always an enemy of confidence and growth, firstly for the U.S.”

The second, he said, is protectionism. “It’s against U.S. interests to increase barriers to entry to the American market – it raises prices and it’s American consumers who will pay the bill,” he said. “U.S. growth will still be negatively affected, much more than anywhere else.”

In Asia, government officials are similarly puzzled by the president’s approach, and are still scratching their heads about how to deal with it. South Korea is unsure what he even wants, according to one government official.

The acting prime minister of South Korea, one of four Asian nations and traditional U.S. allies that have moved quickly to launch talks with the U.S. to try and strike trade agreements, held a call with Trump on Tuesday. Seoul was surprised when the president then said just a few hours later that countries were “kissing my *ss” in the search for deals.

Japanese officials say they are trying not to get too focused on Trump’s day-to-day changes of strategy and work instead with people around him to get a permanent trade deal over the line. A key person is Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who was at the Japanese ambassador’s residence in Washington on Tuesday evening for a cherry blossom viewing party.

Tokyo hopes Bessent will help win over Trump to an agreement on reducing Japan’s trade surplus with the U.S., according to one senior Japanese official, although he said it’s still not clear what demands the U.S. will make. Japan has sent two senior officials to Washington to lay the groundwork for negotiations.

Bessent has said he’d be speaking to officials from Vietnam, Japan, South Korea and India soon, with a view to coordinating economic pressure on China.

India won’t wait till the last minute for any deal and will use the 90-day window to set the contours of a trade pact, a government official said. Indian officials see the U.S. as a more reliable partner than China and are keeping a watch for any potential dumping of goods from its Asian neighbor.

Countries are now trying to gather information on how others are doing, according to another South Korean government official, who said the problem is nobody seems to have cracked the code on how to appease Trump.

Ninety days looks like the minimum the U.S. needs to negotiate with multiple countries over trade deals, said Kim Gunn, a member of the South Korean parliament’s foreign affairs committee.

“I’m not sure if that’d be enough though,” he said. “You don’t want to be the last one in line and miss the chance to begin talks.”

European sentiment is clearly more skeptical, with governments less willing to bend before Trump.

Just months ago no one would have believed that a country always considered Europe’s most important ally would act “like an immature child,” said Slovenian Finance Minister Klemen Bostjancic.

“The last few days felt like we’re living in a reality show,” he told public broadcaster RTVSLO. “Unfortunately this show is very serious.”

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(With assistance from Ilya Arkhipov, Ruchi Bhatia, Soo-Hyang Choi, Jan Bratanic, Ania Nussbaum, Ben Otto, Yoshiaki Nohara, Erica Yokoyama, Kamil Kowalcze, William Horobin and Arne Delfs.)

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