america first policy meaning

Consider the makeup of Trump’s administration, a riot of billionaires and multimillionaires. So let me be blunt: We’re wearing them out. While both Mills and Eisenhower warned of such developments, even they might have been startled by the America of 2017. You can help Wikiquote by expanding it . Cases of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depression, having reached an alarming 300,000 in 2008, according to Invisible Wounds of War, a RAND study, continue to escalate, constituting a mental health crisis for the Army. * Committed to economic and ideological hegemony via powerful banking and financial interests that seek to control world markets in the name of keeping them “free”? At its high water mark, the group included over 800,000 members. Candidate Trump may have complained about the US wasting trillions of dollars in its recent foreign conflicts, invasions, and occupations, but plenty of American corporations profited from those “regime changes.” After you flatten political states like Iraq, you can rearm them. To outside observers, Washington’s ambitions seem clear: global dominance, achieved and enforced by that “very, very strong” military that candidate Trump claimed he’d never have to use, but is already employing with gusto, if not abandon. Or, to put the matter another way, consider this question: Is North Korea’s Kim Jong-un the only unstable leader with unhinged nuclear ambitions currently at work on the world stage? What if it ends up strengthening Taliban recruitment efforts and prolonging the war instead of shortening it? The America First Committee (AFC), which was founded in 1940, opposed any U.S. involvement in World War II, and was harshly critical of the Roosevelt administration, which it … It’s not really about ending wars, but exerting “global reach/global power” while selling loads of weaponry. As a start, forget the ancient label of “isolationism.” With the end of Trump’s first 100 days approaching, it looks more like a military-first policy aimed at achieving global hegemony, which means it’s a … More than half a century ago, sociologist C. Wright Mills offered answers that still seem as fresh as this morning’s news. Even as nuclear buildups and brinksmanship loom, Washington continues to spread weaponry — it’s the greatest arms merchant of the twenty-first century by a wide mark — and chaos around the planet, spinning its efforts as a “war on terror” and selling them as the only way to “win.”. They’re stressed out and tired; they miss their spouses and families. In a fundamentally flawed operating environment like Afghanistan, we could be there at or above our current level of commitment for decades more.”. 76 US Generals and Diplomats Write in Favor of Peace With Iran America First Policies is a 501(c)(4) tax-exempt nonprofit organization. [The America First policy] is based upon the belief that the security of a nation lies in the strength and character of its own people. Section 501(c) of the U.S. tax code has 29 sections listing specific conditions particular organizations must meet in order to be considered tax-exempt under the section. The result: tens of millions of dead across the planet and a total defeat that finally put an end to German designs for global dominance. Who put America’s oil under all those Middle Eastern deserts? As a start, forget the ancient label of “isolationism.” With the end of Trump’s first 100 days approaching, it looks more like a military-first policy aimed at achieving global hegemony, which means it’s a … Combine this with the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which translated corporate money directly into political activism, and you have what is increasingly a 1% governing system in which a billionaire president presides over the wealthiest cabinet in history in what is now a war capital, while an ever-expanding corporate-military nexus embodies the direst of fears of Mills and Eisenhower. Ignorant of the most basic military strategy, impulsive and bombastic, its present commander-in-chief is being enabled by bellicose advisers and the men he calls “my generals,” who dream of ever bigger budgets. If you were Chinese or Russian or Shia Muslim, how might US military activities appear to you? Several of Trump’s campaign aides have even used the phraseto christen a new group, “America First Policies,” to advocate on behalf of their new populist vision. Of course, no one joins the Army to get rich, but such dramatic inequities are hardly conducive either to high morale or to retaining experienced military specialists who know they can sell their skills at top value elsewhere. White supremacists, conspiracy theorists, and far right extremists have gone unchallenged long enough. In Trump’s oft-stated opinion, the US should indeed have just taken Iraq’s oil after the 2003 invasion. To them, the United States is clearly the most destabilizing entity in the world. Figuratively speaking, it’s the king of Capitol Hill. As a foreign policy analyst, I find Trump’s “America First” vision has had three primary strands: disengaging the U.S. from global politics, disdaining allies and befriending autocratic leaders. Making it solid and reliable in a few short years is truly a bridge too far for our trainers. Indeed, that very rootedness may help explain their remarkable staying power over the last eight years. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's first serious foreign policy speech made clear that his approach will be based on the idea of putting "America First" in all his decisions. The attack on Pearl Harbor of Dec. 7, 1941, removed the possibility of isolation. Simultaneously, our troops are being tasked with training an Afghan army that, despite years of effort, exists more on paper than in the field. One can hardly overstate the mind-numbing fatigue suffered by troops fighting at high altitude. It is a policy not of isolation, but of independence; not of defeat, but of courage. With its massive oil reserves, the Middle East remains a hotbed in the world’s ongoing resource wars, as well as its religious and ethnic conflicts, exacerbated by terrorism and the destabilizing attacks of the US military. The slogan ”America First” itself is highly divisive—in its first iteration, it was a rallying cry for anti-semitic groups campaigning to stop the US fighting in World War II. Small wonder that, on becoming president, Trump acted quickly to speed the building of new pipelines delayed or nixed by President Obama while ripping up environmental protections related to fossil fuel production. America’s runaway military machine has little to do these days with deterrence and much to do with the continuation of a state of permanent war. Counterinsurgency (COIN) campaigns — the sort of wars promoted by Centcom commander General David Petraeus and Afghan War commander General Stanley McChrystal — theoretically demand restraint, tact, and flexibility exercised at the squad level by so-called strategic corporals. And if that’s an overly imposing task, no less imposing are the literal mountains of Afghanistan. (Even Trump’s promise of a $54 billion boost to Pentagon spending this coming fiscal year isn’t enough for some senior military officers. It’s not only supposed to defeat the Taliban insurgency by force of arms — something its troops are, at least, trained for — but build a nation by negotiating a complex “human terrain.” That’s Army jargon for the reality that roughly 80% of so-called nation-building operations basically add up to armed social work. Candidate Trump vowed he’d make the US military so strong that he wouldn’t have to use it, since no one would dare attack us — deterrence, in a word. The American people responded by electing Ronald Reagan anyway. And as the summer ended and it was clear that the committee had failed in its mission to change the tide, Lindbergh’s views were widely protested as un-American—and worse. Instead of a stable pyramid, then, think of an expanded yet still exhausted service taking on a more unstable, hourglass shape: heavy at the top with long-serving colonels and generals, heavy at the bottom with “green” privates and lieutenants, but corseted at its essential core due to shortages of experienced platoon sergeants and battle-hardened company and battalion commanders. Truthout is a nonprofit and depends on your financial support. As the noted conservative columnist and Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer noted , on the surface, "America First" would seem to be a hard theme to argue with, but also an empty and even dangerous … Check. It has called for a “new approach” to North Korea and its nuclear weapons program. Get reliable, independent news and commentary delivered to your inbox every day. Though the nation has a long history of vowing to stay out of the problems of other countries—George Washington’s farewell address famously warned against foreign entanglements in 1796—but it was after World War I, as the U.S. was in a position of power and wealth compared to its once-stronger allies, that the modern version of that sentiment came to the forefront. The hurt to Afghans will undoubtedly be worse, for their homes are the battlefield, but our own hurt shouldn’t be underestimated. One data point here: The US military alone guzzles more fossil fuel than the entire country of Sweden.