Trump’s Foreign Policy Philosophy Hard to Pin Down
Masood Farivar, Voice of America
Is President-elect Donald Trump a foreign policy realist or idealist? Is he bringing Richard Nixon’s hard-edged realpolitik to his foreign policy or following in the footsteps of the more idealistic Ronald Reagan?
The question has become a parlor game among Washington's policy pundits.
Trump’s frequent invocation of Reagan’s “peace through strength” mantra and campaign pledge to rebuild America’s “depleted” military has invited comparisons to the Republican icon credited with winning the Cold War.
His advocacy of a foreign policy based on America’s national interests has led some to liken it to Nixonian realism, while his aversion to foreign interventions has won him the label of a non-interventionist and even isolationist.
Don’t Fence Trump In
Trump has professed no great power doctrine and his advisers discourage applying labels to his vision of the world.
“I’m not going to be put into the little academic, graduate school box because I think it doesn’t suit, and it doesn’t apply in a rapidly changing world,” said K.T. McFarland, Trump’s incoming deputy national security adviser, when asked to describe the Trump doctrine.
While Trump’s call for “peace through strength” reflects Reagan’s view of deterrence, “there are parts of Nixon and (Henry) Kissinger that Donald Trump has also advocated,” McFarland said at the U.S. Institute of Peace, alluding to Trump’s interest-based approach to world affairs.
Trump’s Speeches
A foreign policy neophyte, Trump has shied away from declaring any grand foreign strategy during the campaign, though he did give two major speeches devoted to foreign policy and national security.
In the first speech, delivered at the realist-leaning Center for the National Interest in Washington in April, Trump outlined what he called a “coherent foreign policy based on American interests” and called for “getting out of nation building,” creating stability and quashing “radical Islam.”
“Containing the spread of radical Islam must be a major foreign policy goal of the United States and indeed the world,” Trump said. “Events may require the use of military force, but it’s also a philosophical struggle, like our long struggle in the Cold War.”
In the second speech, at Youngstown University in Ohio in August, Trump ratcheted up his rhetoric about terror, warning countries around the world that they’d be judged based on their commitment to the U.S. goal of fighting terrorism.
“All actions should be oriented around this goal, and any country which shares this goal will be our ally,” Trump told a rally of supporters.
‘Strategic Surprise’
It was a theme that Trump would repeat, in one iteration or another, throughout the campaign, but his advisers say Trump’s pre- and post-election pronouncements on foreign policy, often delivered off the cuff, should not be read as policy prescriptions.
“Actually, he didn’t say a lot about foreign policy and national security on the campaign trail, and what he did say really doesn’t add up to a policy,” said James Carafano, director of foreign policy at the conservative Heritage Foundation who advises the Trump transition team on foreign affairs. “That’s very frustrating because the people want to know what’s this guy going to do.”
With the new administration yet to take office, McFarland, too, cautioned that Trump’s foreign policy is in an early stage of development.
“That’s what a new administration does: It takes time to rethink things and to come up with policies,” she said.
If history is any guide, Trump could quickly find himself facing a set of foreign policy crises different from the issues he campaigned on. Political scientists have a term for an unexpected world event that drives a new president into uncharted territory: “strategic surprise.”
For former President George W. Bush, who campaigned on pursuing a “humble foreign policy,” the strategic surprise came September 11, 2001.
For President Barack Obama, who vowed to end the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the “Arab Spring” protests in North Africa and the Middle East marked a strategic surprise, leaving his administration more deeply mired in the region than he’d hoped.
What international crisis might alter the trajectory of the Trump administration’s foreign policy agenda has become a guessing game, with the number of scenarios exceeded only by the variety of foreign policy labels attributed to Trump.
A game-changing terrorist attack on American interests is one possible candidate. Another contender: an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) launch by North Korea.
“I think the world is not necessarily going to allow President Trump to do everything he’s planned on,” said Blaise Misztal, director of the national security program at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington. “I think you’re going to see a triangulation between what he’s said, what he’s advised to do, and what is actually feasible on the world stage.”
Flip Flopping on Issues
While Trump has flip flopped on some issues, NATO and torturing terrorists, for example, he’s held steady on others. Among them: terrorism, trade, China and Russia.
In the weeks since his election, he’s reiterated his pledge to make terrorism a focus of his foreign policy, talked tough on trade, challenged the “One China” policy, and iterated again a desire to reset relations with Russia even as he embraced intelligence findings that Moscow interfered in last year’s presidential election.
Brian Katulis of Center for American Progress, a liberal Washington think tank, said the “most radical shift” Trump will likely undertake will be “engagement and involvement” with Russia, something Obama unsuccessfully attempted during his first term in office.
But former CIA director Michael Hayden said Trump is likely to reconsider his approach to Russia once he learns from intelligence agencies and allies that Russia and Syria are not committed to fighting IS.
“I’m personally very, very skeptical of any convergence between American and Russian interests in this part of the world,” Hayden said. “In fact, I’d offer the view that American and Russian interests are actually heading in different directions.”
Another major change: downplaying a postwar American foreign policy tradition of promoting democracy and freedom around the world.
“Trump has signaled as a candidate and in the transition a proclivity to appreciate authoritarian and repressive leaders around the world,” Katulis said. “And this may be the biggest departure that is historic, that there really won’t be as much of a values-based approach that focuses on human rights democracy and freedom in other countries. And that I think puts the United States itself on shaky territory.”
But McFarland played down those concerns, saying “the three bedrocks of (postwar) American foreign policy” — American leadership, American values and international alliances — will remain under the Trump administration.
Unpredictability
There is usually some continuity between administrations on foreign policy, but “that rule actually may not apply under Trump,” Katulis said.
“We’re dealing with something here that is just fundamentally different and off the charts,” Katulis explained.
That 'something' is Trump’s well-known unpredictability. Trump has criticized President Obama for telegraphing his policy moves and has vowed to remain unpredictable. But experts say unpredictability can be dangerous in the international arena where both allies and adversaries expect a certain degree of predictability from the United States.
"Predictability is the cornerstone of deterrence," said Clarke. "You need to be predictable if you’re the United states, both in what your allies know you’ll do and in what your adversaries know you’ll do and how you’ll respond."
Comments
And the cat is out of the bag so to speak.....possible end of US weapons sales to EU/NATO if this goes through as it is the logical extension of the current European arms industries.....and since Trump is talking protectionism.....
Merkel at #MSC2017 supported the creation of a European defense union
http://liveuamap.com/en/2017/18-february-merkel-at-msc2017-supported-th…
Will be interesting to see just how Mattis...Tillerson...Pence and Trump view this as in the past the US would have done anything to sink this idea....
Merkel continues.....
Merkel wants to see propaganda issues on Nato Russia Council agenda #MSC2017 refers also on latest fake news from Lithuania about rape as well as Russian cyber attacks....
NOTICE Pence did not go down this path in any of his statements in Munich as it could be construed as critique of Putin......
Merkel: Russia is "actively engaged" in hybrid warfare, spreading fake news and cyber attacks.
The disinformation in Lithuania against the German Army was an attempt to discredit the NATO mission in the Baltics
http://www.dw.com/p/2XnbY
Current opinion voiced by Europeans at the Munich Security Conference after Pence's speeches.......
Pence: Trump stands behind Nato.
Until the next Trump tweet which will surely come?
Pence scolds #MSC2017, "don't doubt US commitment."
But we only doubt it because US president does...
SO is Pence now alluding that we should basically ignore anything Trump says...does and or bashes.....????
Trump bashes NATO as being obsolete...bashes EU for their trade with the US..bashes Merkel for the refugees and bashes BMW......
BUT then Pence does what again.....and this WH is not dysfunctional??????
Vice President Pence
✔
@VP
Just as US stood w/ Europe through end of the 20th Century, Europe stood w/ US at the outset of the 21st & America will forever be grateful.
Pence lavishes hosts at #MSC2017 with memories of visits to Germany, first to divided Berlin, then after 9/11 when he saw "wall of flowers."
NOTICE that neither Mattis....Tillerson and now Pence has not mentioned that the only time that NATO ever triggered Article 5 was when the US was attacked on 9/11.....
Guardian profiles @LouiseMensch, former British MP & sleuth extraordinaire who scooped media on Trump's #Russia ties
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/17/louise-mensch-trump-rus…
Oh great now we have TWO Dept of States.....
Politico reports Kushner is a "shadow Secretary of State" running his own policy without consulting Tillerson
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/trump-ignoring-cabinet-235124
GREAT Trump complains the Democrats are to slow to fill his Cabinet positions THEN he basically just ignores them using his family members instead....
BUT FAR WORSE and it is already happening in Munich this week....
Won't take long for allies & others to stop listening to Tillerson & Mattis if clear Trump doesn't.
Bad sign.
Bannon is an avowed Leninist who stated he wants to destroy the "establishment" with a TS/SCI clearance.....and sits on the NSC...as a "Leninist".
And on top of being a "Leninist"....
Rep. Jeffries says Bannon 'is a stone cold racist'
http://politi.co/2kI2CRu
Some of his Breitbart.com articles he pushed could also classify him as an "anti sematic" as well....as could some of his own articles....
So Harward turned down NSA b/c he wanted Bannon off Principals Comm.
Confirms Bannon has veto power over an elected President Trump
AND there is no confusion in the "finely tuned machine" called the WH by Trump....
Deputy NSA KT McFarland was reportedly told she could pick her new boss to replace Flynn, she chose Bolton.
Trump leaves to golf again in Florida at the expense of the American taxpayer when he has utterly failed to nominate 662 people to key government positions all the while complaining about the slow pace caused by the Democrats....then he goes golfing....
BUT WAIT...suddenly and unannounced the Director of the FBI briefs the Senate Intelligence Committee on exactly what????
On the same day Trump flies out of town....
Senators Silent After Meeting With FBI Director Comey Friday afternoon meeting came after votes finished - http://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/senators-silent-meeting-fbi-direc…
Must've been one helluva briefing by Comey
QUOTE
Marco Rubio
Verified account
@marcorubio
I am now very confident Senate Intel Comm I serve on will conduct thorough bipartisan investigation of Putin interference and influence
In 1945, Nazi Germany lay in ruins....in 2017 Germany is defending democracy while the Trump WH appears to be intent on destroying it.....
WHAT a reversal of global roles....Germany the guarantor of liberal democracy and democratic values .......
Merkel at #MSC2017: "Freedom of press is a pillar of democracy."
Mind-boggling that this truism must still be repeated and by the Germans of all people.
2017: when a GOP WH, guided by the self avowed Leninist Bannon, cites a Soviet secret police slogan to attack the free press as "enemy of the people"
NOTE
"Enemy of the people" was the term used by Lenin, Stalin, etc to justify the murder of millions of innocent people.
IMPORTANT to inhale and fully understand as it appear many Americans do not really know anything about the Soviet Union and now Russian history....
Let's be clear: "Enemy of the people" (враг народа) is pure Bolshevism.
Trump is citing core Chekist slogans now.
AND Trump as the so called legitimate US President himself does not incite violence?.....come on...in fact he does....
Donald J. Trump
Verified account
@realDonaldTrump
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!
The last time we had a US President use the term "enemy" was Nixon...
Hard to read this twice posted tweet other than as incitement to vigilante violence
BY THE WAY....
Trump's second exact tweet as above included the word in CAPS....SICK!
Donald J. Trump
Verified account
@realDonaldTrump
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People! SICK!
BUT WAIT...that tweet was then deleted.....WHY????
BUT WAIT...after studying the Trump use of twitter HIGHLY suspect that there is a damaging report/article coming from one of them......
Trump normally tries via his tweets to spin and do damage control .......
THIS tweet is unusual in that it comes out of the blue and has no referencing hands and feet THUS Trump must have been informed something is in the article pipeline....
After Trump's own WH press conference and his latest series of tweets...HIGHLY recommend one reads the SWJ article........
Nine Lessons of Russian Propaganda
by Roman Skaskiw
http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/nine-lessons-of-russian-propaganda
It behooves all Americans to thoroughly understand the terms propaganda and disinformation as they are part and parcel of the term influence operations and right now most Americans are being played badly simply because they cannot "see and understand"....
BUT do they really care?????
Does anyone find the level of hatred by this Trump WH against the US MSM to be now at a level of say a former fascist state called Nazi Germany or Fascist Italy....
The cornerstones of the so called US democracy has always been freedom of the press and free speech....and right now with Trump's tweet below..one wonders exactly where Trump and his merry band stand on those two specific items....free speech and freedom of the press.....
Donald J. Trump
Verified account
@realDonaldTrump
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!
BUT WAIT...if we thoroughly understand the Russian propaganda tactics of the SIX Ds...which one's of those SIX Ds fits here?
Distort....Dismiss....Deflect...Dismay......ALL designed to create Doubt and Distrust...
SO which one or actually more than one is Trump using in this singular tweet?????
WHAT is really bad and not caught by the media is the last sentence of Spicer's in the AF1 briefing.....
"QUOTE"
It is no a White House Paper"...
UNQUOTE
BUT WAIT....DHS led by a former General would not rush out on their own without WH verbal and or written policy guidance.
BUT WAIT...at least DHS confirmed the document is in fact valid....
So was Spicer in fact lying again and the WH calls the media fake and dishonest...
WHAT is really bad and not caught by the media is the last sentence of Spicer's in the AF1 briefing.....
"QUOTE"
It is no a White House Paper"...
UNQUOTE
BUT WAIT....DHS led by a former General would not rush out on their own without WH verbal and or written policy guidance.
BUT WAIT...at least DHS confirmed the document is in fact valid....
So was Spicer in fact lying again and the WH calls the media fake and dishonest...
Reference the National Guard illegal immigrant roundup pre decisional paper from DHS.....leaked by AP.....
Now @PressSec denies AP report on National Guard/deportations, via pooler @ZekeJMiller
Spicer complained that the article was false and fake news BUT then equally complained that the reporters should have come to the WH for comments.....
ANOTHER bold faced lie by Spicer.....
AP confirmed via their records their reporters attempted to contact the WH Press Room MULTIPLE times BUT no response from Spicer......
WHAT is really bad is that the so call pre decisional positon paper made it to 11 total pages....that is a tad more than necessary for a pre decisional position paper...Trump WH was in fact going down this path and got caught out....by the Federal Courts ruling against the WH....
Strange is it not that Spicer first complains but then is in fact disproved by the media over and over and over....
BUT WAT...keep this video that is in the public domain in your head....
Letterman: Have you had any dealings with the Russians?
Trump: I've done a lot of business with the Russians. I know the Russians very well
AND then remember what Trump stated yesterday...THEN he actually lied and that is not "fake news"...but rather the "truth"....
So strange. I remember when Gorka was a Hungarian Atlanticist, lobbying for expansion of Nato. What happened?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/17/us/politics/dr-sebastian-gorka.html?…
AP asked both DHS and WH for their comments but they said nothing until after the AP report hit the streets...
No plan to use National Guard for immigration enforcement: White House
http://reut.rs/2kH8H0k
WHY did they refuse to comment????
MSM needs to approach Trump WH like a Russian intel op. Assume all info is fake until proven true.
It's 1 big operational game.
Coincidence?
Chekism 101
HERE we go again with the WH now claims is "fake news" and the "dishonest press"....
The Associated Press
"11-page doc calls for unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement as far north as Portland, Oregon, as far east as New Orleans"
REUTERS FLASH: WHITE HOUSE SPOKESMAN SAYS AP REPORT ON POTENTIAL USE OF NATIONAL GUARD TO ROUND UP UNAUTHORIZED IMMIGRANTS IS FALSE.
BUT WAIT.....
By the current @WhiteHouse standards, that proves the report is true
SO did the WH release their own leak to see where it went?????
Merkel tells the US not to damage the cohesion of EU....US means here Trump and his merry band...
MUNICH — German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen urged the United States on Friday to keep a united front against Russia, avoid “going over the heads” of allies, refrain from torture and not turn the war against terrorism into a battle against Islam.
“The world needs a globally committed, responsible America,” von der Leyen said at the start of the three-day Munich Security Conference.
When the German defence minister has to lecture a Republican US president about Russia, and the importance of Western values
Appears the European messaging mission that Mattis was sent on did not function very well..great words....BUT Trump's 77 minute rant yesterday damaged those efforts....
Vali Nasr
@vali_nasr
Mattis message to #MSC2017 in a nutshell don't panic despite what you hear Trump says
I've yet to speak to a single European diplomat who is buying this ESPECIALLY after the Trump rants and lies yesterday in his press conference that he Trump wanted to do himself....
Remember during Trump's 77 minute rant against the media accusing them of "fake news and being dishonest" he publicly stated for the world that he had no ties with Russia...has no Russian loans and certainly has not businesses in or with Russia......
MAYBE he spoke way to fast for his own good....
Financial Times
✔
@FT
The FT investigated Donald Trump's ties to Russia and found a mix of bling, business and bluster spanning 30 years
http://on.ft.com/2kwlXtT
By The Way...there was a verified accurate and true Russian document indicating that Trump had lent either his name to and or had done a name branding deal with over 245 Russian company and then denies in public that he has no business in or with Russians was a blatant lie....
Advertising/name branding for money is still business....
AP says they requested comment from both WH and DHS on their story, why did they wait to deny after it drops?
https://apnews.com/5508111d59554a33be8001bdac4ef830?utm_campaign=Social…
Date of memo - Jan 25 - indicates it's from that first hyper-radical week, before the EO blow-back
BUT WAIT.......
A DHS official says memo was "a very early, pre decisional draft... and was never seriously considered by the Department?
THEN why the sudden DHS reachout to the various States.....??
DHS confirms that the memo reported by AP did exist; but they said it was "never seriously considered"
And down YET another Trump WH rabbit hole we go.
Asking anyone that has any experience of how the impacts of WH decisions are viewed in the true outside of the US world.....
If this is in fact implemented by the Trump WH....the image damage to the view that the US is the motherland of true democracy and rule of law AND good governance....will harken back to the days that the US military rounded up all Japanese Americans and then interned them which history did not allow the US to ever forget except the Trump WH...
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-weighs-mobilizing-nat-guar…
Trump weighs mobilizing Nat Guard for immigration roundups
The Trump administration is considering a proposal to mobilize as many as 100,000 National Guard troops to round up unauthorized immigrants, including millions living nowhere near the Mexico border, according to a draft memo obtained by The Associated Press.
The 11-page document calls for the unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement as far north as Portland, Oregon, and as far east as New Orleans, Louisiana.
Four states that border on Mexico are included in the proposal — California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas — but it also encompasses seven states contiguous to those four — Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.
Governors in the 11 states would have a choice whether to have their guard troops participate, according to the memo, written by U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general.
While National Guard personnel have been used to assist with immigration-related missions on the U.S.-Mexico border before, they have never been used as broadly or as far north.
The memo is addressed to the then-acting heads of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It would serve as guidance to implement the wide-ranging executive order on immigration and border security that President Donald Trump signed Jan. 25. Such memos are routinely issued to supplement executive orders.
Also dated Jan. 25, the draft memo says participating troops would be authorized "to perform the functions of an immigration officer in relation to the investigation, apprehension and detention of aliens in the United States." It describes how the troops would be activated under a revived state-federal partnership program, and states that personnel would be authorized to conduct searches and identify and arrest any unauthorized immigrants.
Requests to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment and a status report on the proposal were not answered.
The draft document has circulated among DHS staff over the last two weeks. As recently as Friday, staffers in several different offices reported discussions were underway.
If implemented, the impact could be significant. Nearly one-half of the 11.1 million people residing in the U.S. without authorization live in the 11 states, according to Pew Research Center estimates based on 2014 Census data.
Use of National Guard troops would greatly increase the number of immigrants targeted in one of Trump's executive orders last month, which expanded the definition of who could be considered a criminal and therefore a potential target for deportation. That order also allows immigration agents to prioritize removing anyone who has "committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense."
Under current rules, even if the proposal is implemented, there would not be immediate mass deportations. Those with existing deportation orders could be sent back to their countries of origin without additional court proceedings. But deportation orders generally would be needed for most other unauthorized immigrants.
The troops would not be nationalized, remaining under state control.
Spokespeople for the governors of Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Oregon and New Mexico said they were unaware of the proposal, and either declined to comment or said it was premature to discuss whether they would participate. The other three states did not immediately respond to the AP.
The proposal would extend the federal-local partnership program that President Barack Obama's administration began scaling back in 2012 to address complaints that it promoted racial profiling.
The 287(g) program, which Trump included in his immigration executive order, gives local police, sheriff's deputies and state troopers the authority to assist in the detection of immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally as a regular part of their law enforcement duties on the streets and in jails.
The draft memo also mentions other items included in Trump's executive order, including the hiring of an additional 5,000 border agents, which needs financing from Congress, and his campaign promise to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico.
The signed order contained no mention of the possible use of state National Guard troops.
According to the draft memo, the militarization effort would be proactive, specifically empowering Guard troops to solely carry out immigration enforcement, not as an add-on the way local law enforcement is used in the program.
Allowing Guard troops to operate inside non-border states also would go far beyond past deployments.
In addition to responding to natural or man-made disasters or for military protection of the population or critical infrastructure, state Guard forces have been used to assist with immigration-related tasks on the U.S.-Mexico border, including the construction of fences.
In the mid-2000s, President George W. Bush twice deployed Guard troops on the border to focus on non-law enforcement duties to help augment the Border Patrol as it bolstered its ranks. And in 2010, then-Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer announced a border security plan that included Guard reconnaissance, aerial patrolling and military exercises.
In July 2014, then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry ordered 1,000 National Guard troops to the border when the surge of migrant children fleeing violence in Central America overwhelmed U.S. officials responsible for their care. The Guard troops' stated role on the border at the time was to provide extra sets of eyes but not make arrests.
Bush initiated the federal 287(g) program — named for a section of a 1996 immigration law — to allow specially trained local law enforcement officials to participate in immigration enforcement on the streets and check whether people held in local jails were in the country illegally. ICE trained and certified roughly 1,600 officers to carry out those checks from 2006 to 2015.
The memo describes the program as a "highly successful force multiplier" that identified more than 402,000 "removable aliens."
But federal watchdogs were critical of how DHS ran the program, saying it was poorly supervised and provided insufficient training to officers, including on civil rights law.
Obama phased out all the arrest power agreements in 2013 to instead focus on deporting recent border crossers and immigrants in the country illegally who posed a safety or national security threat.
Trump's immigration strategy emerges as detentions at the nation's southern border are down significantly from levels seen in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Last year, the arrest tally was the fifth-lowest since 1972.
Deportations of people living in the U.S. illegally also increased under the Obama administration, though Republicans criticized Obama for setting prosecution guidelines that spared some groups from the threat of deportation, including those brought to the U.S. illegally as children.
Last week, ICE officers arrested more than 680 people around the country in what Kelly said were routine, targeted operations; advocates called the actions stepped-up enforcement under Trump.
Since the Russian military annexation of Crimea which started an open non linear war with the US which Russia truly believes is the global leader of "neoliberalism"....and this non linear war is in direct support of the Russian political war with the US...WHICH regardless of what anyone thinks it is a war without shooting.....but it is war....as one can see from constant comments being made by Putin and his inner circle...
This Russian non linear war supporting the Russian political war has three KEY geopolitical goals that have been publicly stated by the Russians since actually 2006.....
1. damage and discredit NATO
2. damage and discredit EU
3. COMPLETELY disconnect US from Europe and ME
I have been drumbeating this message since Crimea but many commenters failed to really connect the dotted line.
WHEN Trump talks about his idea of a grand bargain check out the Russian New Yalta 2.0 plan Putin has been pushing also since 2006...
The Russian vision is that there is an economic zone extending from Portugal to the Russian Far East merging into the current Russian Eurasian group...naturally under the political influence of Russia....naturally with economic advantages going to Russia....
THIS is in fact when one hears the words from Trump "grand bargain" this is what both Trump and Putin have in mind.....
THEN it appears that some on the conservative side of US politics are starting to see the same Russian geopolitical goals...that have been there to observe since 2006....
QUOTE
David Frum
✔
@davidfrum
Severing US-Germany tie has been supreme strategic goal of Soviet, then Russian, policy.
Who says Trump doesn’t deliver for his people?
JUST keep remembering this when one hears anything concerning a Trump WH FP.....
696 executive branch positions require Senate confirmation.
For 662, Trump has not yet nominated anyone
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-a…
Appears that the author of this article might have asked himself in the article can we as a nation state conduct FP out of one's "hip pocket" and from the WH instead of involving the DoS ....a very valid question.....MAYBE that is why the DoS Tillerson spent the night not in a hotel.....
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/state-dept-carries-out-layoffs-u…
State Dept carries out layoffs under Rex Tillerson
While Rex Tillerson is on his first overseas trip as Secretary of State, his aides laid off staff at the State Department on Thursday.
Much of seventh-floor staff, who work for the Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources and the Counselor offices, were told today that their services were no longer needed.
These staffers in particular are often the conduit between the secretary’s office to the country bureaus, where the regional expertise is centered. Inside the State Department, some officials fear that this is a politically-minded purge that cuts out much-needed expertise from the policy-making, rather than simply reorganizing the bureaucracy.
There are clear signals being sent that many key foreign policy portfolios will be controlled directly by the White House, rather than through the professional diplomats.
Not a single State Department official was included in the White House meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner - who has no regional expertise or diplomatic experience - had a greater role in the meeting than the Senate-confirmed secretary of State.
Rex Tillerson was absent Wednesday but did join Kushner and Netanyahu for dinner the night before. Acting Deputy Secretary of State Tom Shannon was on the official schedule to take his place but was then shut out of the White House meeting.
In an emailed statement to CBS News, a State Department official explained that the decision to modify the meeting was made at the White House to “allow for a more personal discussion.” That presumably is a reference to the long-standing friendship between Trump, Kushner, and Netanyahu.
That particular incident was disheartening to many State Department officials who hope that Mr. Tillerson - who had a long career as Exxon Mobil’s CEO - will bring his worldly experience and management to a building that has been demoralized by the Trump administration’s antipathy toward multilateralism and cavalier approach to diplomacy.
Two sources also told CBS News that Ambassador Kristie Kenney, the Counselor of the State Department and one of the last remaining senior officials, was informed that she will be let go. She is a career foreign service officer who had served as an ambassador under Presidents Obama, Bush and Clinton. Her staff was told that Secretary Tillerson does not intend to fill the counselor’s position anytime soon.
While positions are often reshuffled during transitions and those perceived as politically-oriented are moved aside, the departures leave the positions vacant at a time of global instability. In Thursday’s presser, President Trump referred to “mass instability overseas, no matter where you look.”
“The middle east is a disaster,” he complained. “North Korea - we’ll take care of it folks; we’re going to take care of it all. I just want to let you know, I inherited a mess.”
“It is irresponsible to let qualified, nonpartisan, experienced people go before you have any idea of their replacement. You can’t do foreign policy by sitting in the White House, just out of your back pocket,” explains Tom Countryman, Former Assistant Secetary for Non-Proliferation who was let go earlier this month. Countryman worries that the White House is displaying an intent not rely on the State Department for foreign policy in that no one will be in place to challenge the edicts drawn up in the Oval Office.
This may be what President Trump was referring to when he repeatedly said that “our people” are not yet in place at U.S. government agencies. He blamed the leaks of embarrassing White House transcripts of his phone calls with foreign leaders - including difficult conversations he had with Mexico and Australia - on officials who had previously worked for the Obama Administration.
R.C. Hammond, a State Department spokesman, did not respond to the specific question of what motivated the layoffs but provided the following statement: “As part of the transition from one administration to the next we continue to build out our team. The State Department is supported by a very talented group of individuals, both Republicans and Democrats. We are appreciative to any American who dedicates their talents to public service.”
Hammond previously worked for Newt Gingrich and is a new hire at the State Department.
Trump's "finely tuned machine" has struck a hard blow for Trump's FP...
Rex Tillerson has to spend Wednesday night in a sanatorium because no one booked him a proper hotel room
https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-02-16/tillerson-s-sana…
Well maybe since he has earned so much at Exxon he should actually pay his way instead of the taxpayers always paying...OR he simply forgot to apply for a government travel credit card....and ask for an upgrade through the government travel agency.
Honestly I am totally surprised that those who voted for Trump and who are taxpayers have not basically revolted and demanded that Trump and his entire family get out of their businesses as demanded by the Office of Government Ethnics by placing everything into a true blind trust thus not having to travel the world and play golf at the taxpayers expense especially those Trump cares about out in the rust Belt looking for work and better paying jobs.......
Trump and his family are costing the US taxpayers millions of hard earned tax dollars just to cover their own personal live style....
Today, we are paying for:
-Secret Service for Trump sons in Dubai to open hotel
-3rd $3m trip to Mar-a-Lago in a row
-NYC security (Melania)
NYC is paying an average of $400,000 per day for his wife to stay in NYc when there is a totally empty WH
US taxpayers had to foot a $100,000 Secret Service charge to accompanying Trump Jr to South America to sell condos...
YET when Trump voters scream about "draining the swamp" and the Tea Party complains about waste in government...WE hear absolutely nothing from them do we?????
AND with that Trump "finely tuned machine" he claims to have he has done what again...?????? "Gotten off to the so called fastest start of any previous President"...is what he claimed again yesterday.....especially in the area of FP.....
27 days in, Obama and Congress:
✓Passed stimulus bill
✓Passed fair pay act
✓Expanded children's health care
Trump & Congress have done:
FP is what.....?
Only reason why Flynn would lie to FBI about his phone call with Russian Amb is that he feared he had done something immoral/illegal or because he feared that Trump had done something immoral/illegal, like promising to lift sanctions in exchange for election support.
This Flynn lying is something worth noting...Flynn fully understands the SF86 security clearance process and had not yet achieved the final clearance thus was working on an interim TS/SCI...until his full background check was completed and updated.
So when he was reinterviewed by the FBI who has the clearance responsibility and the FBI centered on those Russian calls....Flynn had to have fully understood where the rubber was hitting the concrete......especially since he was a former long time intel officer and use to the clearance review process......
The interviewers would have specifically told him the reasons they were there and specifically indicated what areas of the SF86 they had problems with....
In that face to face interview they were also probably asking about his foreign national contacts ie the Russian Ambassador who he probably did not mention in his previous interview....thus for the adjudicator a potential lie....BECAUSE if you check on the SF86 that you have had contacts with foreign nationals of say Russia you must provide names and locations...
When the Russian government makes some really stupid statements we have the tendency to say..."what have they been smoking...or they are hitting the vodka to hard".....BUT what does one say now concerning the Trump WH..."that finely tuned machine he talked about yesterday"??????
Flynn fired.....another selected natsec advisor was not hired because she plagiarized her books and Ph.D thesis ......THREE more Trump advisors under FBI/IC investigations for their Russian connections and now this??????
Trump’s director of scheduling fails an FBI background check along with 5 other WH staff, escorted out by security
http://www.politico.com/blogs/donald-trump-administration/2017/02/white…
BUT WAIT...it is just not Trump WH employees who are having problems remembering things lately...it is Trump himself who seems to be "forgetting small details"...
Fox News
✔
@FoxNews
.@johnrobertsFox: @POTUS was in fact fully briefed on the content of those conversations that Gen. Flynn had with the Russian ambassador.
Trump and his family are now deep into the Russian style kleptocracy....
His family is now using and abusing their assumed power of the Presidency for their own benefits....
Kleptocracy watch: Trump's son-in-law/WH advisor hazes CEO whose merger deal needs gov't approval.
Trump winery asks Trump Labor Dept. for permission to hire foreign workers
http://hill.cm/Xmdsa3O
Flynn who held a USG security clearance and as required for retired Generals did not inform DoD about his Russian paid trip to Moscow where he sat on the same table as Putin....two chairs apart....
Clearly, Flynn never requested such approval.
Pentagon finds it has no records approving Mike Flynn’s Russian-TV pay
https://www.wsj.com/articles/pentagon-finds-it-has-no-records-approving…
Ah.......now we see that yes Flynn even lied to the FBI when they were following up n his Russian contacts...they already knew what the NSA had for recordings and Flynn should have known as well.....SO when the FBI asks specific questions about a certain call..you better not lie.....
Michael Flynn reportedly told the FBI that he never discussed sanctions with Russia's ambassador
AND Trump still refuses to fully answer the direct question about Russian contacts....concerning him and his advisors....
Sums up the chaotic Trump rant and rave for 77 minutes yesterday after he stated he has a fine tuned WH.....
Situation at WH -- A senior NSC aide said to me: "I don't know anything.
Nobody knows anything.
I don't know who knows anything."
John Oliver: "Trump vs. Truth." "How did we get a pathological liar in the White House?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xecEV4dSAXE
Important to remember about this particular Trump press conference...and his massive attack on the media and free press and free speech.....
But what I will say is that Trump's decision, amid turmoil inside and outside his White House, to turn his fire on the media was a deeply predictable move.
It's also one that will almost certainly succeed in changing the subject from Russia and Mike Flynn.
Trump knows all that. It's why he did it.
Bannon's fingerprints all over this move....