There has been hardly any focus on foreign policy during this election season. Yet, Donald Trump has convinced his supporters that he alone can keep America safe.
“I will prevent World War III,” he has repeated over and over, contrasting his track record as president with that of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
But the exact opposite is true. A Trump foreign policy presidency will make global conflict far more likely during the next four years. It will make America less safe at home and abroad.
The GOP candidate is basing his whole foreign policy on his supposed ability to bend his dictator pals to his will by personality, tariffs, or threats. Never mind that he failed utterly to do so during his time in office, setting the stage for today’s wars.
Failed embrace
Trump bragged of his “love letters” and summits with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un — but the dictator refused to halt his nuclear program, and has continued to expand his nuclear arsenal and test intercontinental missiles.
Trump failed to get Iran’s supreme leader to agree to a dialogue, so instead canceled U.S. participation in the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by President Barack Obama. That deal, known as the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), had flaws. But had Trump remained in the deal, Iran would be a year away from having several bombs’ worth of enriched uranium rather than two to three weeks away.
And even the much-touted Abraham Accords, which led to the recognition of Israel by two Gulf states, laid the ground for today’s explosive violence in Gaza and the West Bank.
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The deal was negotiated by Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who relied heavily on Benjamin Netanyahu, despite the fact that the Israeli leader was facilitating the transfer of millions of Arab dollars to the Hamas terrorist group in Gaza, because he thought he could buy them off. Had Kushner done minimum homework, he would have realized he couldn’t afford to ignore the issue of political rights for the Palestinians,
Instead, Kushner offered West Bank and Gazan Palestinians only hypothetical economic gains, even though many previous attempts at economic development had been blocked by Israeli occupation. This effort to avoid dealing with the Palestinians’ political future fed into the current war in Gaza. (Kushner, however, came away with $2 billion for his fledgling investment company from a Saudi development fund led by Trump buddy and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman. When it comes to conflict of interest, the Trump family has no shame.)
And let us not forget that it was Trump who signed the surrender deal with the Taliban that made Kabul’s fall inevitable (although that is no excuse for the Biden administration’s botched pullout). It was also Trump who abandoned the Paris climate accord and still insists, despite the massive evidence all around him, that climate science is fake.
Last but foremost is Trump’s shocking bromance with Vladimir Putin, which ignored the fact that the Russian leader had already invaded Ukraine in 2014. No doubt Putin didn’t invade further during Trump’s term because he expected his American buddy to cut off aid to Ukraine and hand it over to the Kremlin if he was reelected in 2020. When that option failed, Putin waited until the end of the pandemic to launch an invasion he thought would be over in a week.
Trump’s claim of no war during his presidency ignores the utter failure of his foreign policy and its consequences for the country. Yet, he wants to try the same policy again.
Madman discredited
A week ago, a Wall Street Journal editor asked Trump how he would persuade China’s Xi Jinping to stand down from a blockade of Taiwan. “Oh, very easy,” the former president said. “I had a very strong relationship with him. He stayed at Mar-a-Lago with me, so we got to know each other great.”
Trump continued, “I would say: If you go into Taiwan, I’m going to tax you” — meaning impose tariffs — “at 150% to 200%.” Trump further told the Journal he might shut down trade with China altogether.
Economists across the political spectrum have warned that such a tariff policy would boomerang against the United States, jacking up domestic prices, slashing U.S. exports, and costing American jobs. Yet, Trump keeps touting it as his main weapon, along with force of personality, against countries that refuse his demands.
Moreover, U.S. experts on China doubt tariff threats would move Beijing on the sensitive issue of Taiwan, which requires careful diplomacy. Even the “economic experts” Trump might appoint to his team would likely recognize such threats are absurd.
When asked by the Journal if he would use military force against a blockade on Taiwan, Trump replied, “I wouldn’t have to, because he [Xi] respects me, and he knows I’m f— crazy.” That latter claim may be true, but these days, it hurts Trump more than it helps.
The early image of Trump as a madman who had to be treated carefully by adversaries lest he explode has long since lost traction abroad.
These days, Trump is still regarded as erratic and reckless with rhetoric. But allies and adversaries alike question his mental stability and coherence — and the dictators he admires have long since gotten his number. They know they can manipulate him with flattery. And they know he wants to bring U.S. troops home, not send or keep them abroad to protect allies. Or even to protect the United States.
Autocrat alliance
Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran — the first three led by Trump’s supposed pals — are now linked together in an autocrats’ alliance of convenience. Its common purpose is to weaken and undermine the United States and its democratic allies.
The writings of Xi and Putin have laid bare their disdain for the West, and especially the United States. Xi wants China to become the world’s leading power and is trying to build global alliances with countries that resent the United States, while Putin wants to rebuild the historic Russian empire. Any Trump illusions that Russia can be pried away from China are delusionary.
Both Putin and Xi believe the West is in sharp decline and want to accelerate its internal divisions. They also see that Trump has no clue about the global challenges America now faces.
Nothing reveals those challenges so starkly as Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Beijing, North Korea, and Iran are now allied with Putin’s effort to crush Ukraine. In return for weapons, Russia is now aiding Iran and North Korea with nuclear weapons technology, and Pyongyang is sending troops to fight against Ukraine. Russia is also helping the Houthis (Iranian proxies in Yemen) to target Western shipping in the Arab Gulf.
Yet, Trump still praises his pal Putin, who is clearly playing him for a fool. The former president, as well as his billionaire ally Elon Musk have been holding secret conversations with the Russian leader since 2022.
If the autocrats’ alliance succeeds, it will have destroyed the most crucial post-World War II principle of global warfare, enshrined in the United Nations charter: that no U.N. member can invade another to annex its territory or destroy its sovereignty. With some exceptions in the developing world, those rules have mostly held until now.
Moreover, at a time when warfare is dramatically changing — in a technological age of cyberwar, massive information wars, anti-satellite and drone warfare, and the full-bore arrival of artificial intelligence — all rules are already off when it comes to undermining one’s adversaries.
Moscow and Beijing are massively involved in disseminating election disinformation in Europe, the U.S., and elsewhere, while the Kremlin carries out assassinations and sabotage in Western Europe. Both are trying to take control of international waterways, including the Arctic.
Sniping at allies
In this new age of global conflict, the most important tool for the West and its Asian allies is to tighten old alliances such as NATO and create new ones, as Biden has done with Japan, South Korea, Australia, and Southeast Asia. That multiplies the pushback against the autocrats’ efforts.
Yet, at the moment when Western/Asian alliances are key, Trump wants to undermine them. He threatens to pull out of NATO. He talks of removing U.S. troops from Korea. He also stokes violent division within the United States that plays right into our adversaries’ hands.
Like a character out of a Saturday Night Live sketch, Trump not only refuses to recognize Putin’s propaganda attacks on the U.S. election, but he now accuses the United Kingdom — our closest Western ally — of election interference. All because the British Labour Party, now in power and anathema to Trump, sent over some of its staff to observe the run-up to the U.S. vote.
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So, here you have it: A GOP candidate who prefers the autocrats he envies to our allies. A candidate who fails to recognize that he has become a tool of America’s adversaries. A candidate who has no foreign policy strategy beyond his false belief that he alone can fix it and apply tariffs if his opponents won’t bow.
It’s no wonder so many of Trump’s former national security appointees fear he would blindly accelerate America’s slide into violence and war.
To cite just three of the many top officials who quit or were fired as if they were on the former president’s TV show, The Apprentice:
Trump’s former chief of staff, retired Gen. John Kelly, rightly says Trump prefers the “dictator approach” and fits the definition of “fascist.”
His second secretary of defense, Mark Esper says: “I think he’s unfit for office. His actions are all about him and not about the country.”
His third national security adviser, John Bolton, says foreign leaders “think he is a laughing fool.”
The list of damning evaluations by dozens of former top Trump security appointees all points in one direction: Trump is a narcissistic dictator wannabe whose determined ignorance of global realities will enmesh this country in violence at home and abroad. Contrary to his bragging, he will deeply endanger the safety of this country.
Voter beware.