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So how will impeachment affect Donald Trump’s foreign policy? With an already distracted, now impeached and angry, President, we can’t rule out some reckless and unpredictable adventure abroad, especially in response to American adversaries like North Korea and Iran eager to test Trump’s resolve. But it’s more likely the election year will have a greater affect than impeachment.
Moreover, for the distraction and dislocation of impeachment to undermine foreign policy, the Administration would first need to have a coherent set of policies that they were actually working on and that held promise of some success.
Far more consequential for Trump’s foreign policy is that impeachment is occurring in an election year — a coincidence that makes Trump’s circumstances unique and likely will set the stage for what Trump will try to do abroad. Trump’s foreign policy is already tethered tightly to serving his domestic political needs like no other President. From withdrawing from the Paris Climate accords and the Iran nuclear deal to recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and opening an embassy there, Trump has satisfied political constituencies at the expense of the national interest.
Of course, Trump is unpredictable, and it’s possible that he could get “fire and fury” mad in the wake of impeachment overreacting to, say, North Korea’s missile provocations. But it’s just as likely he’d try to set up another vanity summit with Kim to show that his negotiating gambit with North Korea is still in play.
Perhaps the greatest risk and danger to US foreign policy in the coming year is that US adversaries, aware of Trump’s desperation, will test him. They might assume that Trump’s reelection worries will prevent him from responding forcefully to their provocation, or that he can be lured into a negotiation, and needing a win, will make concessions.
Kim Jung Un is likely to test him by ramping up missile testing by year’s end or perhaps in the middle of a Senate trial in January. And there’s a pretty good chance that Iran — having watched his unwillingness to strike Iranian targets for their attacks on Saudi oil facilities last September — might do the same by violating some aspect of their commitments under the Iran nuclear deal, which they remain in, or making some aggressive move in the Persian Gulf.
This is where the intersection of election politics, Trump’s own mercurial temperament, a polarized Congress, and the absence of wise counsel around him could create a deadly mix, pushing the United States into a military conflict neither Trump nor the country wants or needs.
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