Even after President Donald Trump's recent foreign policy speech to the United Nations General Assembly, nations continue to struggle to understand the United States in the time of Trump.
In late September each year, national leaders from around the world gather in New York City for the opening of the UN General Assembly. Typically, the American president gives a speech to the gathering of senior leaders as part of the event. To most Americans, especially in the chaos of U.S. domestic politics, the UN speech is just another public presentation by the president. But to most of the world, the speech is a chance to hear a major policy statement on the U.S. approach to international relations.
In his latest UN speech, Trump was the stereotype of an American bully on a major international stage. Trump's presentation was rambling, threatening and disjointed. It was a hodge-podge of self-aggrandizing exaggerations about his accomplishments, hostility toward existing international agreements and organizations, and a commitment to American unilateralism with little regard to the interests of other nations.
It did nothing to assure traditional American allies or to give concern to our enemies.
The national leaders present in the hall laughed at Trump's declaration that his administration in two years had accomplished more than most other U.S. administrations. Perhaps many listeners recall Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan or other U.S. presidents from their national experiences.
President Trump at the UN declared that "America is governed by Americans." It may surprise many that an American president might think that someone else governs the United States.
Who governs America fits well with Trump's disdain for "globalism." He said that he chooses independence over global governance, control and domination. What global governance? Where is the loss of independence? The U.S. has veto power in the UN Security Council and at NATO over any substantive decision made in institutions we were responsible for creating.
Trump favors some vague form of unilateral decision-making with no room for compromise. He constantly expresses contempt for international organizations--institutions that were established at the urging of the U.S. to help bring some structure and a minimum amount of agreed order as an alternative to the natural anarchy of international relations. These institutions and the agreements that created them have been the foundation of American national security for decades.
The United States always has the option of taking unilateral action. But unilateralism has never been an effective policy for the United States, and it is not a path to greater strength and security today.
In his UN speech, Trump gave an image, not of a confident and strong United States, but of an angry and insecure America. He characterized the U.S. as a victim, taken advantage of by the rest of the world. While blaming everyone else, Trump failed to mention American corporate greed that promoted economic globalization at the expense of U.S. jobs.
The president declared that he favored the doctrine of patriotism, and a policy of sovereignty and national interest. Who doesn't favor national sovereignty and decisions based on national interest? Who opposes patriotism? I suspect that Trump is talking about patriotism as he personally defines it. Many Americans might not be so comfortable with Trump's definition of patriotism, including me.
While belittling multilateral agreements, Trump referred to Kim Jong Un, the most brutal dictator in the world today, as a "courageous" leader. He praised Kim without any evidence that Kim has begun nuclear disarmament. In his speech, Trump failed to mention Russia or its attacks on American and European democracy. Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin must have been delighted with the speech.
President Donald Trump's recent statement of U.S. foreign policy at the UN was erratic and an amateurish promotion of raw nationalism. In ripping up international agreements and demeaning international organizations, Trump is abandoning the international leadership position of the United States in an international structure of America's making.
International affairs, like nature, abhor a vacuum. In the days after Trump left New York for Washington, traditional U.S. allies continued to distance themselves from Trump. Meanwhile, Russian and Chinese speakers denied any attacks on American democracy and committed themselves to multilateral cooperation and to international institutions as the best means to solve common international problems.
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James Pardew is a former U.S. ambassador in the Clinton and Bush administrations, a former career Army officer, and a native of Jonesboro.
Editorial on 10/05/2018