300 Days of Trump. How is the World Faring?
Trump and his supporters think it's all going great. For America. Really?
Today is the 300th day of Donald Trump’s second term. It’s been a roller coaster, to say the least, but with many more downs and then ups and plenty of 360-degree loops.
In my latest “From Across the Pond” column in Politico Europe, I take a look at Trump’s claims of foreign policy success and what the real record shows.
By forcing Europe and other allies to pay more for defense, to take on a bigger share of the burden of helping Ukraine, and to buy more weapons from the U.S., Trump has boosted the collective strength of America and its allies to unprecedented heights. Or so the argument goes.
This year, the U.S. increased defense spending by about 13 percent to reach $1 trillion. And its NATO allies — perennial spending laggards — have now committed to spending 5 percent of their GDP on defense. That’s a bigger share than the U.S. will spend.
Building on this growing strength, according to Robert O’Brien, Trump’s first-term national security adviser, the U.S. president has “positioned himself as the indispensable global statesman by driving efforts to bring peace to other, often far-flung and long-standing disputes.”
Trump himself frequently touts this peacemaking prowess, boasting that he has “ended 8 wars in 8 months.” And to be fair, in some of these cases he did teach a masterclass in using leverage to get what he wants.
Read the entire article at Politico.eu.