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Presidential journeys overseas have typically been an occasion to demonstrate the power of the US on the world stage. Trump's multi-day trip through East Asia, by contrast, has been a demonstration of the power of Trump – but also, at points, of that authority's limitations.

Trump's stops in Malaysia, Japan and South Korea over the course of the opening phase were an exercise in pleasing a sometimes unpredictable US leader. It was an admission that the leader, with the flick of a pen, could impose tariffs and additional actions that have the ability to devastate the financial systems of trade-reliant states.

His meeting with Chinese leader Xi on the last day, however, was something entirely different.

It was a meeting of peers on the international scene, where the consequences for each country – for their financial health, for their global standing, for the welfare of their populations – were significant.

With the Chinese, the president may use his power, but such actions come with ramifications. They involve a cost.

• Trump describes 'remarkable' meeting with Xi but no agreement agreed
• The Chinese president and Trump reach short-term ceasefire as China adopts strategic patience

For the initial phase, Trump's most recent foray into global diplomacy was smooth sailing.

Each stop was punctuated by a combination of conventional economic talks – deals made under the shadow of the president's "equivalent" tariffs – and special treatment that at points bordered on the subservient.

In Malaysia, the president obtained entry to essential resources and made advances toward concluding economic agreements with ASEAN countries. He also oversaw a agreement that should ease border tensions between Thailand and Cambodia – the sort of "peace deal" the American president loves to promote.

In Japan, Trump's official aircraft flew past a famous structure displayed American colors – with a peak in golden.

Recently chosen Leader the Japanese leader described $550 billion in Japanese investments in the United States and offered the president a gift of a quarter-thousand cherry trees for the United States' 250th anniversary, and a golf club and case that was owned by former Prime Minister Abe, the assassinated past head who connected with the president in his first term.

She also became the latest foreign leader to suggest the president for his highly-coveted peace award.

Not to be outdone, South Korea received the president with cannons discharging a 21-gun salute and a military band that performed the leader's song and YMCA – the musical group song that has become a political gathering standard.

Leader Lee Jae Myung held an "recognition ritual" for the US leader during which he gave the American leader his nation's highest medal and a model of an ancient Korean dynastic crown.

Noon repast with the Korean leader contained a "Peacemaker's Dessert" of gilded chocolate squares. Later that day, the hosts offered the president fine beverage at an private meal in Trump's honour with half-dozen global figures present at the regional summit meeting.

In the US, the president may be the target of "Anti-Monarchy" rallies by Americans who oppose his boundary-testing increases of leader's control, but during his Asian swing he was treated like nobility.

And like the rulers of ancient times, the president visited Korea demanding payment – in the shape of $200bn in monetary contributions, $twenty billion a annually, from South Korea to the America, to be used at the direction of Trump's leadership. Agreement on the conditions of those transfers assisted in that the duty level on Korean products to the United States would fall from 25% to fifteen percent.

The central moment of Trump's Asia trip occurred in its concluding phase, nevertheless, as he sat down with Xi.

In that setting, the influence relationship between leaders of the global top two markets was markedly different than the interactions Trump had with his international peers in earlier stops.

Absent were the usual pomp and the pageantry. No military bands, without protocol units, missing carefully crafted menus marking shared goodwill. Rather, the both heads and their top aides positioned themselves across a extended light-colored discussion surface in a nondescript service structure just off the runway of Busan's air transport hub.

It was possibly a demonstration of the significant risks that when the president exchanged greetings with the Chinese leader in Busan, he seemed