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US presidential trips abroad have traditionally been an chance to showcase the power of the US on the global scene. Donald Trump's five-day tour through East Asia, conversely, has been a show of the authority of the leader – but also, at points, of that influence's boundaries.

The president's stops in Malaysia, Japan and Korea over the span of the first four days were an demonstration in pleasing a occasionally unpredictable president. It was an admission that the leader, with the stroke of a document, could enact duties and further steps that have the capacity to harm the markets of trade-reliant nations.

His discussion with China's president Xi Jinping on the final day, nevertheless, was a completely different scenario.

It was a session of equals on the world platform, where the stakes for each country – for their financial health, for their international prestige, for the well-being of their people – were significant.

With the Chinese, the president may wave his pen, but those steps involve ramifications. They carry a toll.

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For the opening segment, Trump's recent foray into global diplomacy was successful.

Each stop was marked by a blend of traditional economic talks – arrangements made under the threat of the president's "mutual" tariffs – and individual concessions that at times bordered on the obsequious.

In Malaysia, the president gained access to key materials and made advances toward concluding economic agreements with south-east Asian nations. He also led a treaty that should reduce frontier issues between Thailand and Cambodia – the sort of "truce" the president enjoys to highlight.

In the Japanese leg, the president's helicopter passed by a famous structure lit red, white and blue – with a peak in gilded.

Freshly appointed Leader Sanai Takaichi detailed $half-trillion in Japan's financial commitments in the United States and gave the American president a gift of a quarter-thousand cherry trees for the United States' semiquincentennial, and a golf equipment and bag that was owned by former Prime Minister Abe, the killed past head who bonded with the president in his initial presidency.

She also became the newest foreign leader to propose Trump for his much-desired peace award.

Matching the effort, the Korean government received Trump with artillery firing a traditional greeting and a service ensemble that performed Hail to the Chief and the classic tune – the Village People anthem that has turned into a presidential event theme.

Leader Lee held an "recognition ritual" for the US leader during which he gave the American leader his country's highest medal and a copy of an traditional ruler's coronet.

Lunch with the Korean leader included a "Diplomat's Sweet" of gilded brownies. Later that day, the Koreans offered Trump vineyard wine at an private meal in the president's honour with half-dozen international heads participating in the APEC meeting.

In the US, Trump may be the focus of "Anti-Monarchy" protests by Americans who disapprove of his authority-expanding expansions of leader's control, but during his Asian tour he was handled as royalty.

And like the monarchs of history, the president visited Korea demanding tribute – in the shape of $200bn in financial transfers, $20 billion a year, from South Korea to the United States, to be used at the discretion of the president's leadership. Agreement on the details of those contributions helped ensure that the tariff rate on South Korean products to the US would drop from 25% to fifteen percent.

The central moment of the president's regional visit took place in its last moments, though, as he sat down with Xi.

In that setting, the influence relationship between heads of the planet's biggest economic powers was noticeably different than the interactions Trump had with his foreign counterparts in previous days.

Missing were typical ceremony and the spectacle. Lacking service ensembles, absent ceremonial troops, without carefully crafted menus honoring shared goodwill. Rather, the pair of counterparts and their senior advisors positioned themselves across a large pale discussion surface in a nondescript armed forces facility just near the airstrip of Busan's global terminal.

It was possibly a demonstration of the high stakes that when Trump made contact with the Chinese leader in the southern port, he seemed