Trump’s Foreign Policy Emerges

Writing at Politico about recent U.S. foreign actions, with particular emphasis on the recently released peace plan for Israel and the Palestinians, authors Robert Malley and Aaron David Miller conclude a Trump foreign policy is emerging.

It is easy to condemn the Trump administration for lacking a strategy. Easy, but wrong. The Trump administration’s strategy is unfolding before our eyes, the sum total of every new step it takes.

It reflects the Trump team’s conviction that power unexercised is power wasted, that power ought to be used to break up the ways of the past, and that past presidents spent far too much time fretting about how America’s rivals would react to our actions when America’s rivals ought to worry about how America will react to theirs.

One supposes it will continue to be the Trump go-to dogma until it stops working. Meantime, expect much whining from friends (and enemies) who were comfortable with the US-as-big-patsy model followed by previous presidents of both parties.