Never
before has any presidential administration been as all over the place
in terms of national security and foreign policy as is that of Donald J.
Trump. Indeed, one might well argue that there is no overriding policy
at all in terms of a rational doctrine arrived at through risk versus
gain analysis of developing international situations. Instead, there has
been a pattern of emotional reactions fueled by media disinformation
supplemented by “gut feelings” about a series of ultimately bilateral
relationships that frequently have little or nothing to do with American
national interests.
This
is not to suggest that the “gut feelings” are always wrong. Established
wisdom in Washington has long reflected the view that the United States
must exercise leadership in establishing and maintaining the neoliberal
consensus that gained currency after the devastation of the Second
World War. Elections, free trade and a free media were to be the
benchmarks of the new world order but they also came packaged with U.S.
hegemony to confront those who resisted the development. And it turned
out that those “benefits” were frequently difficult to achieve as
elections sometimes produced bad results while trade agreements and an
uncontrolled media often worked against broader U.S. objectives. All too
often the United States found itself going to war against nations that
it disapproves of for reasons unrelated to any actual interests,
routinely claiming inaccurately that dissident regimes were both
“threatening” and disruptive of the universal values that Washington
claimed to be promoting.
To
consider how the neoliberal order works in practice one only has to
consider the Clintons, who justified brutal military interventions in
the Balkans and in Libya based on what they claimed to be humanitarian
principles. Or Obama, who demanded regime change in Damascus and was
prepared to launch a large-scale attack on Syria before he realized that
there was no public support for such a move and backed down............http://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/trump-foreign-policy-for-2019/
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