John Jefferson
As President-elect Donald Trump announces his selections for cabinet posts, there is a definite pattern of choosing figures from outside the political stream. That is perhaps understandable for a candidate that had many cabinet-level appointments turn abruptly against him in his first term. Some of the selections even seem to constitute brazen challenges to the nation’s governing elite and their institutions. To be sure, these unconventional choices also reflect Trump’s new power deriving from his significant electoral victory—taking all seven battleground states, the popular vote, and both chambers of Congress.
In the national security realm, Trump has promised the American people “peace through strength” and found widespread support for this formula, which may hark back to the golden era of Ronald Reagan. And that’s one consistent theme among all of his foreign policy choices, who come from a variety of backgrounds.
Several of the picks could be considered classic conservative “hawks” in that they have continuously advocated for military escalation against rivals. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), nominated to the key positions of secretary of state and national security advisor respectively, certainly fit in this category. Nonetheless, we can already see examples of Trump’s unique approach influencing his top advisors. Thus, Waltz actually decried President Joe Biden’s recent decision to allow Ukraine to fire U.S.-made missiles directly into Russian territory: “This is another step up the escalation ladder, and no one knows where this is going.”
Two other picks in the national security do, Peter Hegseth for secretary of defense and Tulsi Gabbard for the director of national intelligence, correspond more closely with Trump’s vision for American foreign policy. Notably, they are both from a National Guard background, which may partially explain their shared strong inclination against U.S. military interventions abroad. Hegseth, for instance, endorsed a law in New Hampshire that would prohibit sending National Guard troops into conflicts overseas without the constitutionally mandated declaration of war from Congress. Hegseth, a veteran-turned–Fox News defense analyst, was one of the most unusual of Trump’s selections; now his nomination unfortunately seems to be in significant trouble due to allegations of malfeasance.
Like Hegseth, Gabbard also served with distinction in America’s wars in the Middle East and came away disturbed by what she saw there. During her service in Iraq, Gabbard witnessed first-hand the devastation and enormous costs of that war, including to her fellow American soldiers. As an Iraq War veteran, Gabbard may well be particularly suited to serve as director of national intelligence, coordinating America’s myriad, sprawling intelligence agencies. She is well aware that intelligence has too often skewed assessments—including with respect to nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction—with devastating results. The paradigmatic case for the misuse of intelligence is the Iraq War, but intelligence failure has also haunted the U.S. government more recently—for example, when overly optimistic estimates of “progress” in Afghanistan kept the U.S. stuck in that quagmire far longer than was necessary for U.S. national security.
The sad reality is that nuclear weapons are once again emerging as a salient issue for American defense policy, and the next director of national intelligence will need to bring focus on this crucial do of national security. Gabbard chose to make the nuclear threat a centerpiece of her presidential campaign back in 2020. Today, her stark warnings seem all too prescient, especially as the Ukraine–Russia War seems to be expanding in scope, with Ukraine losing ground to the country which hosts the world’s largest arsenal of nuclear weapons. Biden himself admitted in October 2022 that major U.S.–Russia tensions mean that “we have a direct threat of the use of the nuclear weapon if in fact things continue down the path they are going… We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since … the Cuban missile crisis.” Gabbard’s long focus on nuclear strategy, crisis stability, and arms control will be an asset in a world where Russia has lowered the threshold for nuclear use, China and North Korea are rapidly expanding their nuclear arsenals, and Iran could suddenly test a nuclear weapon.
While it may not be clear at first glance what unites all of President-elect Trump’s national security picks, his national security team is well-positioned to implement, rather than thwart, his agenda—and this “team of rivals” approach will ensure that a spectrum of views will be represented before the commander-in-chief makes the ultimate decisions about the most consequential issues. Instead of a unanimous “blob” adhering to the status quo or a coterie of “yes men,” Trump will surround himself with competing and alternative views. This is essential, since foreign policy is where the president’s authority and power are greatest.
There are reasons for hawks and realists and so-called “Asia firsters” to be encouraged by the emerging Trump team—people from different experiences and with varying perspectives. Having dissenting opinions within the president’s official circle is vital for effective national leadership. Having objective intelligence assessments, free from institutional biases or erroneous threat inflation and informed by multifarious perspectives, will be key to helping Trump make the right decisions on the crucial matters of war and peace.
Whether Trump is able to replicate his first term, during which he avoided starting a new war, only time will tell. But there is a case to be made that disrupting the status quo could form a necessary, but not sufficient, first step toward mending our broken foreign policy and putting the American people and American interests first.
Read the full article here