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American leader visits overseas have traditionally been an opportunity to demonstrate the influence of the American nation on the global scene. Donald Trump's multi-day trip through East Asia, by contrast, has been a display of the power of Trump – but also, at moments, of that influence's constraints.

Trump's stops in Malaysia, Japan and South Korea over the duration of the initial days were an exercise in pleasing a sometimes volatile US leader. It was an admission that Trump, with the flick of a document, could impose taxes and additional actions that have the ability to damage the markets of export-dependent countries.

His sit-down with Beijing's head Xi Jinping on the final day, nevertheless, was a completely different scenario.

It was a encounter of peers on the international scene, where the consequences for both nations – for their economies, for their global standing, for the prosperity of their people – were significant.

With the Chinese, Trump may flick his power, but those steps come with repercussions. They carry a price.

• The US president hails 'remarkable' meeting with Xi but no pact agreed
• Xi and the US leader establish brief pause as China pursues extended strategy

For the first four days, Trump's most recent entry into world politics was smooth sailing.

Each visit was marked by a combination of standard commercial discussions – deals made under the pressure of the president's "reciprocal" taxes – and personal accommodations that at points verged on the deferential.

In the Malaysian stop, Trump secured entry to key materials and made headway toward finalizing economic agreements with south-east Asian nations. He also presided over a agreement that should alleviate border tensions between Thailand and Cambodia – the sort of "peace agreement" the American president prefers to tout.

In Japan, Trump's official aircraft flew past a landmark tower lit US flag colors – with a summit in gilded.

Recently chosen Head Takaichi outlined $550 billion in Tokyo's funding in the United States and presented the US leader a offering of two hundred fifty sakura trees for America's semiquincentennial, and a golf club and case that came from former Prime Minister Abe, the killed ex-leader who bonded with the president in his previous administration.

She also became the newest overseas counterpart to nominate Trump for his highly-coveted Nobel Peace Prize.

Matching the effort, Korea received Trump with guns performing a 21-gun salute and a military band that performed Hail to the Chief and the Village People song – the band anthem that has turned into a Trump rally anthem.

President Lee held an "recognition ritual" for Trump during which he presented the US president his country's premier award and a replica of an traditional ruler's coronet.

Midday meal with the Korean leader featured a "Conciliatory Treat" of gold-covered baked goods. Later that day, the Koreans offered the president fine beverage at an intimate dinner in the president's honor with half-dozen world leaders attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference conference.

In the United States, Trump may be the subject of "No Kings" demonstrations by the public who oppose his authority-expanding increases of leader's control, but during his regional swing he was handled as nobility.

And like the rulers of old, Trump visited the Korean nation demanding contribution – in the form of $200bn in cash payments, $twenty billion a year, from South Korea to the US, to be used at the discretion of the president's leadership. Approval on the details of those contributions helped ensure that the tax percentage on host nation goods to the United States would decrease from 25% to under twenty percent.

The main event of the president's Asia trip occurred in its final hours, however, as he encountered the Chinese leader.

In that setting, the influence relationship between heads of the planet's biggest economic powers was decidedly divergent than the exchanges Trump had with his foreign counterparts in earlier stops.

Absent were all the pageantry and the display. No armed forces orchestras, absent ceremonial troops, without carefully crafted dining selections marking bilateral friendship. By contrast, the pair of counterparts and their top aides positioned themselves across a large pale negotiating table in a unremarkable military building just off the runway of the southern port's international airport.

It was likely a demonstration of the high stakes that when Trump shook hands with the Chinese leader in the Korean city, he seemed