As President Trump is scheduled to leave office in January, critics of his administration are offering appraisals of his policies in order to urge Joe Biden to change course by returning to the guiding ideas of the Obama era. Among the most significant of these areas is foreign policy. Unfortunately, many of these analyses misrepresent the coherence and efficacy of the Trump administration’s approach to foreign policy. Readopting the Obama approach to foreign and defense policies would be a mistake.

Take this recent article for Foreign Affairs, “Why U.S. Security Depends on Alliances — Now More Than Ever,” wherein former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis and three co-authors criticized Trump’s “America first” approach. They wrote: