Trump Isn't Pulling Back the American Empire: New at Reason

Given how much America’s military footprint has grown under previous presidents, it would certainly be nice if a president tried to pull back. But is President Donald Trump is doing that, as his isolationist cheerleaders claim?

Reason Foundation Senior Analyst Shikha Dalmia does not think so.

Trump’s much-hyped pullouts from Afghanistan and Iraq aren’t in fact full withdrawals. The government indicated this week that America will leave 1,000 troops in Syria. And the Pentagon’s plan right now is to withdraw only half of the 14,000 U.S. troops from Afghanistan, America’s longest war. This has prompted Sen. Rand Paul to introduce legislation demanding a full withdrawal.

Meanwhile, Trump is boosting military spending and tearing up existing treaties without signing new ones. And he is increasingly wielding America’s economy as a weapon to achieve foreign policy objectives, hardly the behavior of a non-meddlesome power.

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