Build a wall, make nice with Moscow, tear up free trade deals and force Washington’s allies to pay more for their own security. OK, and then what? Beyond a few broad isolationist and protectionist strokes, President-elect Donald Trump has not painted a detailed picture of his foreign policy, reports AFP from Washington. Now, with just ten weeks until he takes command of the world’s sole superpower, Washington’s friends and foes are seeking clues to his agenda. And if it seems vague, perhaps that’s intentional. In speech after campaign speech, Trump insisted on the virtue of “the element of surprise.”
In January, Trump was asked whether as president he would bomb Iran’s nuclear sites instead of relying on a negotiated deal to keep them mothballed. “I want to be unpredictable,” Trump protesting, insisting that US voters’ would support—as they eventually did—his shoot-from-the-hip style.
In the closing stages of his presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly mocked the ongoing US-backed Iraqi campaign to liberate the city of Mosul. Why had President Barack Obama’s generals flagged up the siege four months in advance, giving the Islamic State group warning on the assault?
“What a group of losers we have,” he said on Saturday, as Iraqi and Kurdish forces backed by US advisers and air power closed in on the city. Generals might argue that building a coalition while preparing supply lines and refugee reception areas could not have been carried out in the dark. But Trump is adamant—citing his experience negotiating property deals and luxury branding—that being unpredictable can be a plus.
“He doesn’t have a foreign policy track-record to explore,” wrote former CIA and NSA director Michael Hayden wrote for online journal The Cipher Brief. This time last year, his prescription for the Islamic States was simple: “I would bomb the shit out of them. I’d just bomb those suckers.” But he is not a neoconservative, with grand plans to remake the world in America’s image through military adventurism and coercive diplomacy.
Despite evidence that he supported it at the time, Trump insists that former president George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq was a terrible mistake. He has touted a form of great power politics, “making deals” with US rivals to unite against threats like “radical Islamic extremism.”
“Wouldn’t it be nice if we actually got along with Russia and China and all these countries?” Trump said in January. “Wouldn’t it be nice?” Allies like Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia and European NATO members will have to pay their way, however, Trump has no time for free riders. Trump’s presidency will apparently be much more skeptical of free trade, believing export powers like China are stealing American jobs and capital.