Does Trump transactionalist approach make him a realist?
Stephen Walt's 4-1,2016 comment:
https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/04/01/no-realdonaldtrump-is-not-a-realist/
"Trump may have said a few things that echo realist ideas, and his
criticisms of past blunders such as the Iraq War are in line with
realist opposition to that war, but his overall worldview and most of
his other utterances are at odds with realism’s core elements.
The case that Trump is a “closet realist” rests on two pillars, both expressed in his interview with the Times. First, he has repeatedly
accused U.S. allies of “free-riding” on American protection and
suggested he’ll drive a harder bargain with those deadbeats. It is true
that some realists (including yours truly) have made similar suggestions
in the past, but so have nonrealists going all the way back to the
1960s. ... And Trump does have a point: U.S. GDP is about 46 percent of
the NATO total, but the United States provides nearly 75 percent of
total alliance defense spending. This isn’t a “realist” argument, however; it’s just a fact (and one that no doubt resonates with the
American taxpayer).
Second, Trump also suggested in the interview that it might not be so
bad if a few U.S. allies — such as Japan or South Korea — acquired
nuclear weapons. Once again, realists such as the late Kenneth Waltz and
John Mearsheimer have proposed similar measures at various times, though neither scholar advocated rapid or wide-ranging proliferation or
suggested it would be desirable in all circumstances. Rather, the
realist case for the spread of nuclear weapons is more limited: 1) It
sees these weapons as useful for deterring direct attacks on their
possessors but not for blackmail or conquest; 2) It maintains that the
fear of retaliation would deter new nuclear states from using their
weapons; 3) It argues that the slow spread of nuclear weapons would
increase stability in some regional contexts; and 4) It points out that
all-out U.S. efforts to keep states from going nuclear were not without
costs. And to be fair to the Donald, he’s not wrong to suggest that a Japanese or South Korean nuclear deterrent would be more credible than
their relying on Washington to risk a nuclear exchange on their behalf.
I’d wager a ton of money that Trump has never read a word of the
scholarly literature on the complex topic of extended deterrence, and
there are a number of other reasons why letting these states go nuclear
might not be desirable for them or in the best interest of the United
States, but the core argument he’s making here is not a radical one. ...
In any case, those two points are pretty much the extent of Trump’s
alleged “realism. Nowhere in his Times interview do you find references
to the core logic of realist theory or the key tenets of a “realist” foreign policy. Trump talks a lot about power and strength but doesn’t
say where it comes from, and he never identifies what U.S. vital
interests are or presents a George Kennan-esque focus on key centers of industrial power. There is no indication that Trump understands the
workings of balance of power theory — arguably the core idea in the
realist canon — and there’s little sign that he grasps the essential features of a globalized world economy.”
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