What are the founding principles of U.S. foreign policy? Was the U.S. ever isolationist as mainstream diplomatic history claims? And what about Donald Trump’s foreign policy? Is he a normal foreign policy president? Is he in favor of U.S. global expansion? Is China emerging as the new global empire? Andrew Bacevich, Professor Emeritus of International Relations and History at Boston University and now president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft tackles the above questions in the interview below. […]
Does Donald Trump have a consistent foreign policy? Is there such a thing as a Trump Doctrine? No, he does not. Understand that the very notion of principles is alien to Trump’s make-up. He is, therefore, incapable acting in a consistent fashion pursuant to some larger sense of purpose. So he makes things up as he goes along. He specializes in showmanship not statecraft. Trump has said repeatedly that he is not in favor of wars, yet he is clearly a militarist and the military budget continues to receive large yearly increases (the United States spends more than twice as much on its military as China and Russia combined), although, as you have pointed out before, the US has yet to win its first war in the twentieth-first century. Can you shed some light into what’s going on here? I wouldn’t call him a militarist. Again, militarists actually believe something. They fancy that through war, a nation can fulfill its destiny and a people can purify themselves while cultivating an identifiable set of virtues. Trump believes no such things. Läs artikel