James

"From high-profile summits with Russian President Vladimir Putin and a grand plan for a ceasefire in Gaza to dressing down Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and periodic trade wars with almost every country on earth, U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump has been rather unpredictable. But according to the White House, it’s all been part of a plan. Released overnight on Thursday, the Trump administration’s new National Security Strategy (NSS)—a document released by each new president spelling out his foreign policy priorities—is perhaps the clearest articulation yet of the U.S.’s new approach to international affairs. The document reorients U.S. foreign policy around economic and military interests, explicitly abandons the promotion of democracy abroad, and harshly criticizes longtime European allies while treating countries traditionally viewed as adversaries as mere competitors. In his cover letter for the document, Trump wrote that it was 'a roadmap to ensure that America remains the greatest and most successful nation in human history.' The last Trump administration NSS, released in 2017, singled out China as a revisionist power. 'China and Russia want to shape a world antithetical to U.S. values and interests,' it declared. 'China seeks to displace the United States in the Indo-Pacific region, expand the reaches of its state-driven economic model, and reorder the region in its favor.' Eight years later, China isn’t an adversary but a competitor. There 'isn’t much in terms of China representing an ideological or ideational challenge, or China having a different view of [international] order than the United States,' David Sacks, a fellow for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, told TMD. Instead, the document simply describes the country led by Xi Jinping as simply an economic and military 'competitor.' It stresses that the U.S. must maintain military 'overmatch' against China to deter a wider regional war over Taiwan, but only supports defending Taiwan for 'instrumental' reasons, Sacks noted. Namely, for the island’s strategic position in the Indo-Pacific region and its vital semiconductor industry..." --- To read the full Morning Dispatch article—"Trump's New Foreign Policy Roadmap"—click the link below.