The Idiotic, Incoherent, Incompetent Foreign Policy of Donald J. Trump

The man playing at being president has no idea what he is doing.

For fifty days, Donald Trump insisted that Putin had to agree to a ceasefire in his war on Ukraine. He said that he would be very unhappy if Putin refused. He warned of “severe consequences,” including tough new sanctions on Russia.

He then announced a “summit” with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin in Alaska with one week’s notice. He literally rolled out the red carpet for an accused war criminal, applauded him, couldn’t keep his hands off of him, had a private meeting with him in the presidential limo, talked with him for a couple of hours, then canceled all the other events of this summit, held a 12-minute session with the press where Putin spoke first and spoke longer, then completely dropped any talk of ceasefires, sanctions, criticism and seemed to say that ending the war was now up to Ukrainian President Volodymyer Zelensky.

“Even in the annals of Mr. Trump’s erratic presidency,” wrote Peter Baker on the front page of the Sunday New York Times, “the Anchorage meeting with Mr. Putin now stands out as a reversal of historic proportions.”

An AI generated image of Donald Trump in Moscow.

Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, often called the Trump of London, was even more blunt, calling it “just about the most vomit-inducing episode in all the tawdry history of international diplomacy.”

There is lots to say about the debacle, this propaganda victory for Putin, and many people have already said it. I had a long interview with journalist Bill Press on his podcast last week. I told him that “this has got to be the most jarring failure of any American president in U.S. history when dealing with a foreign leader.” And that was just the beginning. You can hear “The Tale of Two Summits” in its entirety here.

Even beyond the fawning treatment of a brutal dictator, the near-betrayal of U.S. allies and the lasting damage done to U.S. standing in the world, it is what this summit and the emergency meeting with Europe’s top leaders in Washington three days later revealed: Trump has absolutely no idea what he is doing.

He has purged or sidelined most of the seasoned national security experts in the government. He relies on a very small circle of loyalists who are singularly lacking in foreign policy experience, including Vice President JD Vance, Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller and right-wing lunatic Laura Loomer. He sets up major meetings on a whim, with zero preparation, agency coordination or clear goals. He seems to believe his own hype that he is a master negotiator who alone can get deals done.

It is time that we all recognized that this is complete nonsense. We have to let go of the idea that he might have some grand strategy in mind. Or a master plan. Trump’s attempt to show some results from the two meetings — that he would set up a meeting between Putin and Zelensky to hammer out a peace deal — was a complete scam. Russia announced this weekend that no such meeting is planned.

It is the same lies that Trump peddles and far too many people take seriously. CNN, for example, documented 53 times that Trump said he would end the war on Ukraine “in 24 hours.” He now claims it was said in jest. As CNN accurately notes, “this ‘in jest’ claim is a lie.”

“On the campaign trail in 2023 and 2024, Trump said on dozens of occasions, in an entirely serious tone, manner and context, that he would end the war in Ukraine either within 24 hours of his return to the White House or even sooner than that. He said over and over again, including at both presidential debates of 2024, that he would have the war “settled” when he was president-elect, before his inauguration.”

Our journalists must stop pretending that he has some kind of policy agenda, some geopolitical strategy. We have to call out newspapers when they run headlines like the one The Washington Post ran this week on the news that there will be no Putin-Zelensky meeting: “Frustrated, Trump signals pause in his Ukraine peace effort.” No. A more accurate headline, one that didn’t pretend that Trump knows what he’s doing, would be: “Trump fails in Ukraine peace efforts.” Even that is too generous.

The Wall Street Journal more accurately described this “pause.” Their headline was, “Trump Gives Familiar Two-Week Deadline for Next Steps to End War in Ukraine,” noting that this was his frequent dodge and accurately reporting that “after initial high-profile meetings there’s been little visible progress, and Russian officials have rebuffed a series of proposals.”

It would be more accurate to describe Trump’s meeting with Putin as something that wasn’t serious from the very beginning. It was a distraction that spiraled out of control. This was likely intended as a change of subject from the Epstein files scandal. To Trump, it didn’t matter what came out of the meeting as long as it dominated the news for a few days, which it did. It is very possible that sending troops to Washington, D.C. was done for the same reason, then acquired its own momentum.

Most importantly, we must understand that world leaders have learned how to play Trump. Putin, of course, was the master at this. He flattered Trump, maybe privately threatened him with whatever the Russian leader seems to have on Trump. He fed him lies that Trump was quick to parrot, like the absurd idea that Trump won the 2020 election and the no country can have fair elections with mail-in voting.

“And do you know that we’re the only country in the world — I believe, I may be wrong — but just about the only country in the world that uses (mail-in voting) because of what’s happened, massive fraud all over the place,” Trump told FOX host Sean Hannity. Nonsense, of course. Thirty-four nations have mail-in voting, including Russia.

But Putin was not alone in his manipulations. European leaders have learned the art of dealing with Trump. They shouldered their way into the Monday meeting Trump had set up with Zelensky. They refused to let Trump bully Zelensky, understanding that like all bullies, Trump backs down when confronted with strength. But the were clever enough to surround their demands that Trump defend Ukraine against Putin with waves of flattery. Zelensky spent his opening five minutes thanking Trump over and over again. He wore a jacket to the White House. He brought him a gift.

More importantly, Zelensky came with a bribe. Now that Trump has cut off military aid to Ukraine, Zelensky promised that his country would buy $100 billion of US weapons, financed by European leaders. For Trump, it is all grift, all the time. He always wants to know: what’s in it for him?

The European leaders also gave Trump the visuals he craves: powerful leaders from France, the United Kingdom, Italy, France, NATO and the EU all arrayed in front of him. He was the center of attention. He got to play world leader.

The results? They backed Trump down from abandoning Ukraine, from insisting on his “land swaps" (meaning the Ukraine would surrender 20 percent of their territory to Putin). They kept the Western Alliance and its support for Ukrainian independence and territorial integrity intact. They had to grovel, but they got what the wanted.

We may look back at the Monday, August 18 meeting as a pivotal moment. It may be when Europe’s leaders began to assert the diplomatic and military leadership over the Western Alliance that is commensurate with their economic power. Coupled with the leadership role that Europe is playing now on efforts to end Israel’s slaughter and starvation in Gaza — attracting the support of Japan, Australia, Canada and other leading countries — this may be the moment when Europe’s leaders took the keys away from an incompetent driver and began to steer the car away from the cliff.