Donald Trump announced his foreign policy is “America First.”
In an interview with MSNBC following Trump’s much-anticipated speech, IPS foreign policy expert Phyllis Bennis said she had to dig really deep to find any statement of policy, but when she did, she found that what’s on the agenda is to strengthen and promote Western civilization.
What the rest of the world might have to say about that does not seem to be on Trump’s radar.
“We’re not talking with someone that acknowledges that there are such things as international law, the United Nations, human rights – those are off the agenda,” Bennis said.
Bennis said that this is where Trump’s so-called foreign policy links with his immigrant xenophobia, anti-Muslim rhetoric, anti-Mexico rhetoric, building the wall. His agenda is that America will be a strong and reliable ally, but he’s not going to tell you how he’s going to make it possible.
“It was very reminiscent of Nixon’s call when he was running for president and said ‘ I have a secret plan to end the war,’ ” Bennis said. “The secret plan, of course, turned out to be escalation.”
She said although Trump has not made a commitment to regime change as the default position of U.S. policy like other presidential candidates have, he has the absolute inability to articulate anything remotely resembling what diplomacy, or a non-military approach might look like.
Bennis said that, in the very dangerous case that Trump does come into a position of power, “What we would see, I think, is an immediate move towards the military. That would be his instinct, because he doesn’t have anything else.”
Watch the full interview on MSNBC’S website.