Donald Trump met with The Washington Post’s editorial board to discuss foreign policy, but it showed that Trump has little idea what he’s talking about.
The bright spot in Trump’s announcement of his foreign policy team was his turn away from neo-conservatism and foreign interventionism.
“I do think it’s a different world today, and I don’t think we should be nation-building anymore,” Trump said. “I think it’s proven not to work, and we have a different country than we did then.”
Those are echoes of a foreign policy closer to Ron Paul than George W. Bush, and it’s a reflection of the American weariness of perpetual war since 2001.
The advisers he named, however, don’t align with such a libertarian non-interventionist view.
“They would seem to be a good fit for a candidate interested in having an ‘aggressive U.S. posture in the world,’” Daniel Larison noted in The American Conservative.
Trump’s direct quotes from the Post’s transcript doesn’t inspire hope for his comprehension of complex foreign policy questions when speaking with the Post’s CEO Fred Ryan, either.
TRUMP: I don’t want to use, I don’t want to start the process of nuclear. Remember the one thing that everybody has said, I’m a counterpuncher. Rubio hit me. Bush hit me. When I said low energy, he’s a low-energy individual, he hit me first. I spent, by the way he spent 18 million dollars’ worth of negative ads on me. That’s putting [MUFFLED]…
RYAN: This is about ISIS. You would not use a tactical nuclear weapon against ISIS?
[CROSSTALK]
TRUMP: I’ll tell you one thing, this is a very good looking group of people here. Could I just go around so I know who the hell I’m talking to?
Trump never answered the question; he continued to deflect, obscure, and change the subject.
Trump also contradicted himself on his vaunted “non-interventionist” policy.
“We do not win any more. This country doesn’t win,” he said. “We don’t win with … We can’t even beat ISIS. And by the way, just to answer the rest of that question, I would knock the hell out of ISIS in some form. I would rather not do it with our troops, you understand that. Very important.”
Like other issues, Trump has promised to win or fix problems, but hasn’t explained how he would do it. As the November election approaches, he’s running short on time to move from promises and assurances to solutions that can be debated and evaluated on merit.
