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FRTrump campaigning for Rubio. (Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
“No more wars, I’m going to stop wars” vowed Donald Trump in his first post-election speech to voters. And his campaign was marked by his critique of neocon-led military engagements in the Middle East, though with little detail as to how this foreign policy would manifest itself.
His slogan, “America First”, was interpreted by many as a call to focus on domestic issues rather than overseas conflicts and regime change. And it was seemingly backed up by his running mate, J.D. Vance, who suggested that the Democrats failed because they “built a foreign policy of hectoring, moralising and lecturing countries that don’t want anything to do with it” — as opposed to the Chinese, who “have a foreign policy of building roads and bridges and feeding poor people”.
Two weeks after Trump’s historic victory, however, hopes that the next president might pursue a more isolationist — or at least less interventionist — foreign policy are already fading into the distance.
Since the election, a fierce battle has been raging within the MAGA movement between restrainers and sabre-rattlers. When political commentator and comedian Dave Smith wrote on X “that we need maximum pressure to keep all neocons and war hawks out of the Trump administration”, he was retweeted by Donald Trump Jr, who said: “I’m on it”. The anti-neocon faction rejoiced when news emerged that Nikki Hailey and Mike Pompeo, known for their ultra-hawkish positions, would not be joining the administration. But as Trump started unveiling his cabinet selections, the excitement quickly turned to despair — and anger.
Many of the names chosen by Trump to fill key foreign policy and national security roles are, in fact, well-known neocons and war hawks who advocate a muscular foreign policy against countries such as Iran and China (much like Hailey and Pompeo themselves). Such appointments don’t suggest a pivot away from Biden’s reckless interventionism and imperial overreach, but rather a return to policies that Trump once criticised.
Take Marco Rubio, Trump’s choice for Secretary of State. Rubio, a prominent senator from Florida, is a longtime hawk who has spent most of his political career promoting neoconservative foreign policy positions, particularly on Iran and the Middle East, and advocating US military action abroad. In the eyes of many MAGA supporters, he is the quintessential representative of the establishment wing of the Republican Party that Trump has long railed against. Back in 2016, when Rubio ran for the presidential nomination, Trump belittled him as “Little Marco”, and Rubio responded by calling the magnate “frightening”, “disturbing” and a “con artist”.
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SubscribeTrump’s policy is peace through strength. Presumably this requires some people considered war hawks, especially by America’s enemies. Here’s my beef with this kind of coverage. Actions speak louder than words. Trump will ultimately be judged by results, not if he has Mark Rubio in cabinet.
This leads to what I find the most annoying and feckless coverage of foreign affairs. Trump is usually called a Putin lover because he says nice things about the guy. Same thing with Gabbard visiting Syria. Does anyone older than 12 actually think trash talking enemies like Putin is a productive approach to foreign affairs? You need to engage with enemies, unless your ultimate goal is actual conflict.
IDK. This type of reporting seems very pointless and unserious to me – like space filler for a deadline.
Funny how many people think that.
Fazi’s anti-American stances, regardless of who is President or which party they come from, is on full display here. It’s his one major blind spot. He can and has written brilliant and thoughtful articles on just about every other topic on Unherd, but his anti-American sentiment leaves him lacking in his understanding of the country. He doesn’t understand and doesn’t want to, which quite honestly is fine. He favors a more independent policy for Europe which is his major interest and the EU’s continued military and economic dependence on the US is the biggest obstacle to that. He has a known stance and is pretty consistent about it. I couldn’t write a coherent article about globalism that wasn’t sharply critical of it.
I don’t think Fazi pays much attention to the details of American politics. If he did, he’d know that the neocons are fuming at Trump’s nominations with the possible exception of Rubio. They can’t be too loud or too obvious about it given he decisively won the election, but the likes of Mitt Romney and Liz Cheney have been sidelined in terms of power for the foreseeable future. This is not like 2016 when Trump had to come crawling to Mitch McConnell just to find people to staff his administration. Trump is recruiting his people this time with an eye for loyalty and policy alignment. Rubio has changed his tune significantly since 2015 though. At least publicly, he’s jumped fully on the Republican working class populist bandwagon. My take on him is that he’s like a Republican Biden. He doesn’t have a position beyond whatever gets him reelected and keeps getting him appearances on Fox News. Such people, while perhaps morally suspect, are at least useful in that they pay attention to and heed the popular will to some extent.
Good comment. Your charge of inveterate anti-American outlook on Fazi’s part rings true.
A few questions: You think (pre-cognitive-decline) Biden and Rubio are similar in something more than a superficial or sweeping sense? Was Biden ever a news cycle hound like Rubio or at Trump’s far more severe level of attention hunger? Trump compares favorably in the “morally suspect” department?
The other problem with this article, addressed in the top comment, is that it’s like predicting the Super Bowl winner in preseason. Yes, the real-world stakes are higher here, but this article is about as idle and pointless as NFL chit chat in August.. At least attempt a deeper examination of the people you label and dismiss, Fazi!
You make a good point. Biden was never quite the attention seeker Rubio is. He was more of an insider and back room guy, but he was one of the more prominent and better known Democrats at the national level from the 80s onward. Hard to say because it was a different world then. No social media. No Internet. Fewer distractions. Nobody paid as much attention to politics and politicians didn’t have to jump on the table and wave their arms around to get people to put down their phones. Almost all the politicians have to take that approach to be successful these days. I meant they are similar in that they seem to have no problem at all changing their stances to appeal to voters. There is a spectrum in American politicians between those who take the approach that they are elected representatives of the people with a duty to present the majority view of their constituency whatever it is and change with the public mood, and at the other end, independent minded people who see themselves as chosen for their vision and leadership skills and trusted to use their own judgment even if it contradicts public opinion. The representative type traces all the way back to Jeffersonian primciples of government anf used to be the rule rather than the exception. After Lincoln, the other type became far more prominent and there are few who fall anywhere close to the ideal of being an impartial representative of the people. Rubio and Biden are about as close as anyone gets these days. They do it for self serving reasons but at the end of the day, the result is they tend to change with the times and the voters so they can have very long careers even in prominent positions or battleground states. Obama and the neocons are the other end of the spectrum.
I confess to preferring representatives because they reflect the will of the people for good or ill and to me that’s what Americn government is supposed to be, a government of the people by the people and for the people. For all his narcissism and personal failings, Trump is closer to reflecting at least some portion of the popular will than any other president or candidate in my lifetime. He has no overarching ideology. He has no grand plan of his own. He just wants people to like him, so he actually listens to them and tries to do some of what they ask for in his own bombastic, loud, and not very effective way. That is why several people said they would take a bullet for the man after his assassination attempt. They’re used to politicians talking down to them and condescending and telling them we can’t do what you want because of x, y, and z, or promising to do something and then doing the opposite. He doesn’t do that. As ridiculous as the notion of building the border wall is and was, as much as its a simplistic idea that costs a lot of money and solves nothing (ladders exist), it’s what his voters wanted and he did his level best to give it to them. Nobody else has done that to the extent Trump has. His appeal is based on his willingness to give the people what they want whether it accomplishes anything or not. It’s the sort of thing that can only happen in an environment where the ruling class has failed the people on both a material level, by making things worse in absolute terms, and a spiritual level, by failing to listen to and address the people’s concerns and heed thei stated preferences.
Fazi is a self described socialist who used to hang with Chomsky and Vidal. I always ignore his articles except for the wise comments….
That is all very promising.
This has the feel of a “make-work” article. It didn’t need to be written, and it didn’t need to be read. Those who want to criticise, will criticise. They haven’t done anything yet, and already the armchair analysis begins. You can always count on a drugstore cowboy to tell you just how he would have done things … 😉
I get a kick how writers call people names, like neocon, and that is sufficient to know everything about them.
So Trump is a neo-con? Could’ve fooled me.
Like it or hate it, Trump’s picks (with the exception of Rubio) are entirely consistent with his long-standing approach to foreign policy: carry a big stick and try not to use it. Pick your battles, then try to win them without firing too many bullets.
You see this in all his picks, with the possible exception of Rubio.
Rubio feels like a strategic concession to establishment Republicans. It also removes a thorn in his side in the Senate, provided of course that De Santis does the right thing which he will given he wants to be reelected.
Thank you for more enlightenment on the subject than the author.
Well put. It should be obvious that there’s a differance between actively seeking war and demonstrating that you have strength and desire if required to engage. This article is cheap click bait that undermines this publication.
I agree – I think Rubio was a peace offering to the establishment, and if he doesn’t support the president’s agenda, then he’s out.
Agreed. The author makes the same fatal error that Democrats have already made with Trump for nine years: “But what if the sky falls?” scare-mongering rather than an evidence-based analytical assessment of Trump’s prior record as President and his consistency of vision.
No wonder psychologists are in high demand these days.
Trump doesn’t have a track record of outsourcing his decisions as President to unelected shadow bureaucrats, like Biden and Kamala have done for four years. Ergo, this article is projection.
I think what they are missing with these pics is, Trump is planning to run the show. And these people will carry out his mission.
Unlike last time, where they had their own agendas, and came out against him when they were fired for doing so.
Yeah, the US is not going to surrender world leadership to China and Russia. Dry tour tears, and move on Fazi. The American spirit doesn’t tolerate cut and run as a policy.
Pick your team and bring it on.
Talking of picking your team, will Starmer go for prosperity, or align with the EU? 🙂
Stormin Starmer has his hands full right now suppressing the native population in favor of the newcomers.
“Leadership”… or hegemony?
You might think US hegemony is worth risking WW3 over, but the majority of the planet might feel rather differently
Nobody wants to start WW3, but neither do we want to live under the thumb of a totalitarian, surveillance state, which is what China is, nor do we want to have to have to accommodate said state or depend upon it for critical goods and resources. We need to work to reduce that dependence over time, either gradually through economic, trade, and industrial policy, or, worst come to worst, as a whole of society and government effort much like the New Deal or WWII to break the link with China for good. I believe that can be done without violent conflict, but the situation isn’t as simple as war, yes or no. There are multiple players in this game. There’s China and the US, but also Japan, India, Vietnam, South Korea, The Philippines, Australia, and Taiwan who all have disputes with China and who will surely have something to say in the matter. The US doesn’t get to unilaterally choose whether to have a conflict or not, just the line beyond which we will no longer simply accept the other side’s interference and aggression. We can, should, and will debate where to draw that line, but surely it must be drawn somewhere, as the alternative is complete surrender. My guess is Trump will draw the line a lot closer to America and its vital interests than a Harris administration would have, but there will still be red lines.
It’s naive to believe we can put an end to war. So long as there have been people, they have divided into tribes and fought each other in one way or another, usually violently. War will always be with us. History will end when the last human dies. So long as the world is interconnected economically and politically, World Wars will remain a possibility. Nobody wants to have one, but we could end up in one anyway despite our best intentions.
Great post.
Some people on this and other forums are either Lenins usefull idiots or malign actors supporting vile dictatorships.
Trying to appease rising powers like China or even declining powers like Russia is going to end badly.
Just remember Munich.
There are some great books analysing possible scenarios and many examples listed are encouraging.
However China (with Russia etc) against USA looks to me like Rome against Carthage or Nazi Germany against the West.
No prisoners taken.
Just remember Pearl Harbour
Interesting situation in Australia at the moment. China, Xi Jinping, stroking the ego of the Prime Minister Albanese, making nice with each other after previously punishing Australia over imports when the Liberal Government chastised them over Covid. I’m not sure how Albanese will square this circle but I think America will draw a line and Albanese will have to make a choice. Though he could be booted out early next year which would make things easier.
Chairman Xi is no fool. He will try to use economic leverage (read blackmail) to try to manipulate the situation and play his growing list of enemies off one another. There are probably many politicians and ultra wealthy aristocrats in said countries who are greedy and/or stupid enough to fall for this. The people who actually vote on the other hand….
I can’t speak for Australia but in the US support for China is political poison most everywhere except parts of the west coast. Both parties have been climbing over each other to be seen as tough on China or to associate the other party’s candidates with China for several election cycles. Biden kept the Trump tariffs. Governors and state legislatures are passing laws that forbid the Chinese government or even Chinese citizens from purchasing land in their states. Pensions for government workers are being legally prohibited from buying Chinese stocks and in some cases forced to divest what they already have. A lot of these actions are happening at the state and local level. The pressure is coming from voters, not the feds. Americans know who their enemies are even when our hapless rulers don’t. Xi probably knows there’s no reconciling with the US now, so he is aiming to isolate the US. It might or might not work. I don’t have enough knowledge of Australia or other countries to say for sure.
Nice summation, Steve. Thanks for posting!
That is the problem with Fazi.
He is commie, Russian tool and hates USA.
He has no problem with Russia invading Ukraine and being involved in Syria.
Nor with China claiming islands thousands of miles from its mainland.
He is against Trump cancelling nuclear treaty with Iran and imposing sanctions because it stops Iran from funding terrorism against Israel and USA.
Anyone with half a brain in the West knows that USA is the only country which can stop world dominated by vile dictatorships like China, Russia and Iran.
You have to be moron to believe that world would be better for the future of your family.
I am 65 and childless, so it is not personally relevant to me.
The Trump cultists are out defending their hero! He can do no wrong!
Of course Trump’s team is full of clowns and religious nuts like Hegseth – what else did you expect?
what else did you expect?
Not sure what you mean, Unless he’s carried out some sort of action already that’s failed. Which of course he hasn’t. It’s almost like you want some sort of global disaster just so you can say “Told you so.”
“Not sure what you mean”
What part don’t you understand, kiddo?
Your intolerance.
Why bother? You can’t have a grown up conversation with CS because he’s a child. No-one should engage with him. Then he’ll get bored and go away as children do.
You’re right. It’s a bit like looking for a stink in the room knowing what you’ll find.
Work on your ground game, Champagne. It’s going to be a long four years.
In the good old days, jesters and freaks entertained the feasting people. It seems he has taken on that duty today.
That’s an insult to the good old days jesters and freaks community! CS would have to be entertaining for your assessment to be true.
I don’t know why Fazi’s so upset, he’s just going to fire them all anyway.
Only when they do what he doesn’t want done or leak to the left. Fazi reminds me of a flat rock you skip across a lake, the splashes showing each new subject where his facility with the language lends the impression of deep authority.
Other than Rubio, everything in this article is a distortion. The left is trying to have it both ways: Trump‘s pics are wildly irresponsible and outside the mainstream, or they are the same Neo cons that have ruled our country for the last 40 years. Which is it?
Or, shock horror, neither.
Where has Fazi complained that “Trump‘s pics are wildly irresponsible and outside the mainstream”?
If you’re asking Fazi you’re asking the wrong man. He writes far too much on far too many subjects to always know what he is talking about. This is one of the reasons journalism is in such bad odor.
The level of incomprehension in this article is quite surprising.
Trump’s geopolitical strategies are pretty straightforward: the best way to achieve peace in the Middle East is unconditional support for Israel because this forces her neighbours towards an accomodation; the best way to put Russia back in its box is an aggressive cheap energy policy; the best way to deal with China is a zero tolerance trade policy. It all makes pretty good sense. More sense than giving Zelensky carte blanche to start WW3, anyway.
It’s hard to imagine how one US Administration after another could have been more supportive of Israel, and yet we do not see peace in the Middle East.
As long as The Greater Israel project continues, she will be at war with her neighbours.
Name me a war started by Israel in the 21st century
Do you understand Israel’s enemies, a collection of desert death cults and Iran, want it not to exist any longer?
As long as the Wipe Israel Off the Map project continues, she will be at war with her neighbours.
The point you’re missing is that under the last Trump administration the policy was working. It was only when Biden rescinded it and shipped planeloads of cash to the Iranians that the trouble started again.
Well said, Hugh.
We humans have trouble dealing with complexity, so we make it simple. Instead of considering nuance and subtle shades we create a few pigeonholes and sort things into them. That sorting makes things much easier to deal with. Simplifying helps us understand a complex world.
Thomas Fazi has done that here. Everybody is either an interventionist or an isolationist, or in other terms, a neocon or an America Firster. Then he sorts the people Donald Trump has appointed into one of the two pigeonholes and compares the counts. More in the neocon hole, he decides. That’s bad.
Trouble is, you can’t make complexity simple. Simplifying distorts the real world in a way that leads more to error than understanding. The Manichaeans pigeonholed everything into “good” or “evil” and turned that into a religion. It didn’t work well, as that approach didn’t reflect the complexity of real life, where as Alexander Solzhenitsyn said, the line between good and evil cuts through every human heart.
Instead of trying to make the complex simple, a better approach is to embrace complexity. Don’t try to understand things and figure them out in advance. Instead of pigeonholing papers on your desk leave them in piles and deal with any paper that becomes important as the need comes up.
That’s the agile method, and in fast-changing environments it works much better than more deliberative methods. Some say that when a new complex problem comes up a 5/15/80 rule applies. You know 5% of what you will need to know about the problem. Another 15% you don’t yet know it, but you know you need to learn it. The remaining 80% is what you don’t yet even know you will need to know.
So how do you learn what you need to know? You “move fast and break things”, learning by experimentation and trial and error. You don’t let yourself be pigeonholed or burdened by what has been. You are unpredictable, creative, innovative, and impulsive.
That’s how Donald Trump operates, and as far as I can tell, that’s the kind of people he’s picking for his cabinet. He doesn’t pick them to be an interventionist or isolationist, but to loyally follow his lead and stay out of any pigeonhole where Thomas Fazi puts them.
So how do you learn what you need to know? You “move fast and break things”, learning by experimentation and trial and error. You don’t let yourself be pigeonholed or burdened by what has been. You are unpredictable, creative, innovative, and impulsive.
I mean this in the spirit of cheap shots, but do you mean like Kennedy?
C’mon reds, it’s a bit of fun. Remember that?
Breaking rockets by being impulsive may be fine. But breaking 80% of people who will never know what you have learned at the end of their breaking? Might that be reckless?
Strange critique. Fazi shouldn’t call an interventionist like Rubio a “neocon” – despite Little Marco meeting all the criteria for that label – because Rubio is going to “move fast and break things”?
Isn’t moving fast and breaking things a pretty good description of what Neocons have been doing, all over MENA, since 911? At what point do we decide we’re done “learning by experimentation and trial and error” and come to the conclusion that the US’ elites’ desire for world hegemony is ruinously expensive, and generally unpopular with the average citizen who’s obliged to meet the costs for all this overseas meddling?
It’s far easier to protect and conserve (admittedly both good and bad) places and institutions that have been built over centuries than to restore them as well or better once broken.
Move Fast and Break Things is reductive and simplistic in the extreme. It a bumper-sticker or t-shirt slogan turned into a two-byte philosophy by certain brainy simpletons. However intellectually bright, people like Musk, Zuckerberg, Bezos, and Trump mustn’t be entrusted with too much of our present and future.
Author continuing to essentially contend if we just back off Xi, Putin & Khamenai all will be well because it’s been the US and allies causing all the problems. He’s never grasped Totalitarianism creates the problems and Autocrats have to perpetually undermine, destabilise and control those adjacent. And that adjacency doesn’t have a limit unless checked and deterred.
The Republicans and Trump himself moved more to seeing these autocratic regimes as working in partnership to undermine the West last couple of years. Much more unanimity on Capitol Hill and Johnson didn’t block the last aid package. Like all 2nd term Presidents Trump will gravitate more towards foreign policy and his historical legacy. Being seen to be an appeaser of Autocrats not a great look for the Narcissist in Chief.
Autocrats like Bibi?
Trump – and everyone else in leadership positions in the West – appear only too happy to not only appease them, but supply them with all the materiel they need to carry out ethnic cleansing.
You’re not very clear on what ethnic cleansing is.
Oh, what a surprise! The despot was never truly for the people! More seriously – I think this nonsense is why I don’t have it in me to rail against the chaos that is clearly going to happen, like I did when it was more of an abstract the first time he was president. I feel like the people who voted for him, this time, deserve exactly the chaos they are going to get, now. They chose it, clear eyed, knowing full well what he is and what he will never truly deliver. Do I think Kamala, or the Democrats in general, were a great choice? No! But the idea that the cabinet of kooks would be better is so absurd that I think those that voted for it deserve exactly what they are going to get. Disruption can absolutely be positive – but this is not what people like this are capable of delivering. Their version of disruption is destructive, not creative. Not at all forward thinking. It drags us all down to a Soviet apparatchik level. See RFK Jr subserviently scarfing McDonalds in Trump’s company, to see exactly where this supposed vanguard is going.
Fazi’s point is that, despite promises of a less interventionist stance, Trump’s foreign policy appears to be more of the same.
As for his domestic picks: unless you think the US federal government is doing a good job, then it’s clear outsiders will be needed to come in and clean them up.
A McDonald’s meal once in a while isn’t going to do you any harm… and RFK clearly looks after himself.
“A McDonald’s meal once in a while isn’t going to do you any harm”
Missing the point spectacularly!
Kennedy sitting there with an awkward grin while being forced to eat what he describes as poison to demonstrate his complete obedience to the boss is a humiliation he will have to live with – at least for a few months until they fall out and he is discarded and becomes another victim of the Trump ego.
Musk won’t be far behind.
Yes, they are all there “kissing the ring”.
And the ring is not the only thing.
The Guardian is the place for you. Seriously, your kind of people. Plonk is plenty good for them.
I’m not sure about that McDonalds photo. It’s very staged for maximum effect. They must have known what the reaction would be. The question is why? Are they playing with the media. There’s war in Ukraine and the Middle East and the media are up on their hind legs over a photo that the Trump team released themselves. This was no leak about something hidden.
I don’t see the Trump vision being as NeoCon and pro-interventionist. Simply being pro-Israel and a hardliner on Iran doesn’t imply pro-intervention. Shackle Iran with sanctions which were working in Trump 1.0; let Israel dismantle Hamas and Hezbollah; and then get back to the fuller implementation of the Abraham Accords. Push the end of the Ukraine war with territorial concessions, Ukraine in the EU but barred from Nato and that might work. Putin can save face with a victory. Trump is pushing NATO members to up their spending and he can begin to reduce the US role in Europe. Trump will reorganize and revive the military that will provide a stronger deterrence to China, coupled with a tougher line on trade, all while investing in reviving key industries at home. Trump is not going to lecture on human rights and base his foreign policy on expand Western values abroad – to me a central feature of the NeoCon mindset.
Many great points.
However, Ukraine not in NATO will never be safe from Russia.
That is exactly current scenario.
If being in NATO was not important when faced with neighbour like Russia, why did Finland and Sweden join NATO?
The same for Baltic States, Poland etc.
You can not wish away reality of genocidal imperialism like Russia.
It was tried in Munich in 1938.
Did it work with Hitler?
Britain decided to declare war on Germany, after Germany ignored their ultimatum on Poland. Britain didnt declare war on the USSR, which invaded Poland and the Baltic States at the same time, as well as invading Finland. Surely it was for the US to declare war on Germany, which they didn’t do till Hitler declared war on them in 1942.
No point in lecturing Russia on human rights, because Russians aren’t going to have any this century.
Never having had any, Russians are a bit unclear as to what they mean. The knout is no longer used, so that shows progress in human rights is possible
Well, quite.
Gearing up to recognize the real threat China poses to the west, to help defend Israel against the menace of Iran and to steer towards getting the hell out of Zelenskyy-the-grifter’s spend little war hardly makes Trump’s cabinet picks neocons. More like common sense. Mr. Stull’s commentary elsewhere is right to the point. You might want to try writing on occasion sans your socialist lenses.
Seriously. Would supporting China, Iran, Russia, etc., instead of opposing them, make Trump’s cabinet more America First? Having a strong military doesn’t? For this author, Making America First seems to mean total disengagement from every hot spot, conflict, disagreement, or alliance anywhere, regardless.
No choice between interventionism and isolationism. Glad you’re not in charge! What a silly article.
You are right, but your name is new on here.
Fazi is commie and Russia tool.
He wants West to fail.
He will support and argue for any genocidal dictatorships which are opposed to USA.
That sounds a bit severe. You are making him out to be Jeremy Corbyn.
I think Fazi is a bit hasty in his assessments.
There is an old Russian proverb: The hen is in the nest, but the egg is still in the p***y.
Where has this so-called journalist been in the last 10 years, especially during Trump’s first term? Thank God it only took me 1 minute of reading to discover what a crock nonsensical piece of pap or shill article this is. I love UnHerd but wow, they need more informed articles than this. A complete resistance 2.0.
I wish I had back the time I wasted on this blather.
lol, Trump is will be the commander in chief, his word and action is final on any actual mobilizations of troops or equipment in any interventions or wars!
He’s probably creating a marginally Hawkish cabinet to make the world tyrants shake and recoil, and then he can play whichever hand he desires…
No need for alarmism, yet.
Muscular FP against Iran and China is deterrence, not war. One hopes it reduces chance of war.
Though it is easy to agree Rubio may be too long too deep in the govt to change State’s ideological meddling, which is war mongering by another name.
The real FP question is will Trump put US interests first, or Israel’s?
It seems Fazi doesn’t know what “NeoCon” means. Neoconservatism is a political movement that began in the United States during the 1960s among liberal hawks who became disenchanted with the weak & incompetent Democratic Party and the growing New Left and counterculture of the 1960s.
The Trump Doctrine has always been, and will remain, the ancient Roman Axiom:
Si vis pacem, para bellum (“If you want peace, prepare for war.“)
If you want peace, prepare for war, and be prepared to go to war if required (because if you’re not, your enemies will see through you very quickly).
It’s odd because this Nuland fiefdom in the US State Department seems to be down to Biden’s sponsorship over the past decade. Yet Obama urged the ‘turn to Asia’ in terms of foreign policy.
So neoconservatism has its post-Soviet slant and then a different inflection that Trump might get behind, which is pulling down the Iranian regime. There the requirement is for Israel to somehow link up with Saudi as well as holding fast against the terror proxies.
Trump’s foreign policy approach is hardly going to work if he picks a softy for SofS. He needs to create an atmosphere of him just about managing to hold the warmongering Rubio back.
I’d have thought stopping Iran getting nuclear weapons was in everybody’s interest, including a more isolationist USA.
Fazi just sad that “America First” doesn’t mean “America run away”.
.
Fazi is without peer in regurgitating what appeared the past week in the American legacy media. In UK terms it is like speed reading the Guardian and the BBC and thinking you have grasped the essentials.
Russia of course violated the 1987 INF treaty, which Trump highlighted in the early days of his first term. If true, Trump’s claim means Russian concern over NATO/Ukraine in relation to the later US withdrawal from the treaty was confected, yet there is nothing on this important piece of context in this article.
Few can understand the use of the word ‘peace’ by Fazi. It very often seems to mean ‘letting brutal authoritarian dictatorships do what they want to your allies’.
Take Ukraine. Do we seriously think if Putin keeps the areas his army now occupies, he won’t continue to undermine the remaining 80% of Ukraine and there isn’t a serious risk he would one day invade again?
His previous administration testifies to this: while it is true that Trump started no new wars, as his supporters often claim,
So in one sentence it’s true that he’s started no wars but it’s only a claim made by supporters. This is some writing.
“So in one sentence it’s true that he’s started no wars but it’s only a claim made by supporters. This is some writing.”
It’s a claim his supporters use to provide evidence that he’s anti-war…. hence the rest of Fazi’s sentence:
“… one may argue that he helped pave the way to many of the conflicts currently unfolding around the world.”
Is comprehending Fazi’s point genuinely that hard?
One “may argue” many things, such as the notion of men getting pregnant or immigration always being a net win. Doesn’t make those things true.
Jim, Fazi is incorrect.
Democrats merely demonstrate their own leadership weakness when they don’t own their time in office and their own mistakes.
As an example, Biden and his cabal of bureaucrats were fully in charge of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, no matter how many times Biden cries out while sucking his thumb, ‘…but, but, but the Ghost of Trump MADE me do it even though I’m in full command as the President of the United States and the Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces!’
Even Biden’s own generals testified before Congress that Biden went against their recommendations and, thereby, screwed up the withdrawal.
Furthermore, “pave the way” means absolutely nothing in presidential politics.
The successor paves his or her own way … often by immediately throwing out as much of the prior Administration’s decisions as possible by Executive Order, Lawsuits, stonewalling, ignoring initiatives, and removing and leaving unfilled the bureaucratic roles that were responsible to execute the prior president’s wishes. They use every trick in the book. They are the new President after all.
In short, overall incompetency isn’t excused no matter how many times Biden or his bureaucratic friends exclaim, “but the Devil made me do it!”
Trump certainly “paved the way” for a border wall that Biden had no problem reversing. You’re right, it’s an absurd idea.
Easy to pile on here..so I will; Harris/Biden repeatedly projecting Ukraine would be welcomed into NATO. As if that wasnt throwing a match into a tinderbox..