Biden’s Critics Miss the Good Old Days of Madman Trump

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These are particularly specious claims, especially given that Trump’s recklessness (or toughness, depending on your perspective) was never really applied to Russia or Putin, to whom Trump tended to be folding and obliging. (On Tuesday, true to form, Trump complimented Russia’s leader for his “genius” and “savvy,” going so far as to suggest that the United States should emulate Putin’s moves on our own “southern border.”) Trump’s interest in Ukraine seemed limited to the country’s ability to help him dig up dirt about Joe Biden’s son—Trump was impeached for holding up a $400 million arms package in exchange for this quid pro quo, something that hardly suggests someone committed to the country’s sovereignty, let alone to deterring Putin’s aims.

But in practice, the often incoherent approach of the former president wasn’t so much a deliberate attempt to give our would-be adversaries pause about what destructive feats he might conjure up as much as it was a product of the incoherent approach he took in every pursuit. Trump, moreover, hardly ever threw himself into a “madman” act—his decision to order drone strikes against Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani was a lone example of what seemed like an unexpected demonstration of belligerence (the strikes were actually several months in the making). More often, Trump got cozy with the globe’s preeminent strongmen and made it abundantly clear that he had little interest in the traditional alliances that were erected to constrain them.

His indifference to diplomacy came from the fact that he was indifferent to it conceptually. Alliances were foolhardy in great power politics, in his estimation; brute strength was the only thing that mattered. For the US, what mattered most was to use that brute strength in ways that directly materially benefited the US—let other countries deal with their own problems themselves. Or, more likely, become pawns of other, stronger powers. In this way, Trump was at least consistent: His aversion to offering concessions, even when positive-sum outcomes were possible, was his stock-in-trade as a businessman who’d rather lose than sacrifice anything in a deal.

In his 2020 book, The Room Where It Happened, John Bolton—who is, in fairness, an unreliable narrator—suggested that Trump firmly believed that Ukraine should be led by people favorably disposed to Russia. As for NATO, Trump seemed bent on stoking hostilities with its member nations, undermining the alliance at every turn. It’s hard to imagine that Trump might have fashioned some better result in the Russia-Ukraine conflict—nor is it a given that his command would do more to protect either the people of Ukraine or the post–Cold War order. Indeed, Trump’s policy was to better enable the region’s kleptocrats, which did substantial damage to that order, greatly contributing to the problem the Biden administration now faces.

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