Two months into Donald Trump’s presidency, it is clear that Trump cannot control himself or his own administration. Sadly, this observation applies across the board in foreign policy. Trump first warmly greeted Taiwan, threatened a trade war with China, and then abruptly announced that he recognized the one China principle and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson essentially subscribed to China’s interpretation of the bilateral relationship while threatening war with North Korea. These episodes predictably led some to suggest that Beijing would regard him as a paper tiger or that, perhaps more accurately, Trump and his team have no idea what constitutes sound policy. When it comes to Mexico, his immigration policies, which are distinguished by a lack of policy coordination and respect for US laws, have provoked a furor in Mexico even though Trump’s own son-in law unsuccessfully tried to mediate the issue. On Israel, the White House excluded the State Department from discussions with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, then Trump blithely revoked fifty years of US policy by abandoning the two-state solution to Israel’s long-running problems with its Palestinian population. The next day Trump’s UN Ambassador Nikki Haley contradicted him, stating that the US still supports a two-state solution. On Iran, the administration has both attacked the Iran deal and supported it as the best available option of many bad alternatives. On February 20, Secretary of Defense James Mattis went to Iraq to reassure Iraqis that the United States, despite Trump’s stated desire to seize Iraqi oil, was not really serious about doing so.
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US President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel hold a joint press conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC, on March 17.
