President Obama urged his successor on Friday to learn more about foreign affairs before he starts meeting with world leaders.
In his year end press conference, Obama said that he had told President-elect Trump that he should make sure he conducts foreign policy in a “systematic, deliberate, intentional way.”
“My advice to him has been that before he starts having a lot of interactions with foreign governments other than the usual courtesy calls, that he should want to have his full team in place, that he should want his team to be fully briefed on what’s gone on in the past and where the potential pitfalls may be, where the opportunities are, what we’ve learned from eight years of experience so that as he’s then maybe taking foreign policy in a new direction, he’s got all the information to make good decisions,” Obama said.
Trump recently came under fire for taking a call from the president of Taiwan, appearing to buck America’s “One China” policy. Some experts speculated that an incident this week where China stole a U.S. Navy drone operating in the South China Sea was spurred by the incident.
Still, Obama said it’s Trump’s “obligation” to take a fresh look at the U.S. policy toward China since “there is probably no bilateral relationship that carries more significance.”
“I think all of our foreign policy should be subject to fresh eyes,” he said. “If you’re here for eight years in the bubble, you start seeing things a certain way and you benefit, the democracy benefits, American benefits from some new perspectives.”
