No sooner had secured re-election than speculation at home and abroad turned to what kind of foreign policy he will pursue in term two. It’s not easy to predict. Mr. Trump’s foreign-policy instincts are mixed. He genuinely doesn’t want to preside over a new round of “endless” wars, small, hard-to-win conflicts in faraway places over issues that he believes are marginal to core American interests. But he also likes being a powerful world figure whose interventions on global issues are decisive. The president-elect is no neoconservative interventionist, but he is hard to restrain.
Events more than doctrines will ultimately drive and define Mr. Trump’s foreign policy. That’s how it goes. George W. Bush came to power wanting to reduce foreign policy’s place in American life—until he and the nation were mugged by 9/11. Barack Obama did not expect to be overthrowing Moammar Gadhafi and dispatching troops into Syria and Iraq when he took the oath of office. had no idea that a Russian invasion of Ukraine would overshadow his presidency.
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