Donald Trump's foreign policy is performance art. With Kori Schake
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Stop the world!

Welcome to Stop the World, the ASPE podcast. I'm Olivia Nelson. And I'm David Rowe. And we're coming to you, as you can see, in video as well as audio this week. Yes, many of our listeners told us they want to see us as well as hear us. I'm not sure why, Dave, but we're giving the people what they want. That's right, Liv, on Casual Friday, no less. And to kick us off with these new episodes, we've got a couple that we recorded on the sidelines of our Defence Conference held in Canberra this week, Preparedness and Resilience. It's a great show.

It was a great day. We had some news-making contributions from significant defence figures, both from Australia and the region.

And today on the podcast, we have one of our all-time favourite defence and security scholars, Corrie Sharkey. Corrie is a senior fellow and director of foreign and defence policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. She's held roles in the State Department, Pentagon, the National Security Council, served as an advisor to legendary Senator John McCain, and she's written five books with another on the way. I've been a fan of hers for years, going right back to the early days of the Deep State Radio podcast.

You can follow her work in The Atlantic and other major US publications. I personally find that there's a real healthy idealism to her view of the role that the United States should play in the world. Right now it feels like an antidote to a lot of the more negative thinking that we see around the world. Corrie gives her views on whether there's a strategy to Trump's foreign policy and the extent to which US relations with the rest of the world will be restructured.

She talks about the export of MAGA ideology, Pete Hegg says speech at Shangri-La Dialogue, US-China relations and the US-Australia alliance. It was a pleasure to host Corey in Canberra this week. We thank her for making the trip. Let's hear from her now.

Welcome to Stop the World. I'm David Rowe. And I'm here with Corey Sharkey. Corey, thanks for coming on the program. It is a great pleasure, my friend. So good to have you here. So first question, big picture. Now, I mean, it feels a little bit naive because I've just sat through your session here in Canberra at the ASPE Defence Conference. So I mean, I know your views. Plus, of course, you know, I'm a big fan of yours and I've been following them for a long time. But

I mean, one of the, I guess, the lingering questions for those of us who are observing the sort of revolution in US foreign policy is, is there any kind of strategy behind it? Is there any kind of plan? I mean, it feels like Trump's intuitions being implemented in a sort of chaotic and impatient manner, but...

I'm prepared to entertain the idea that maybe there is beneath that some sort of structural change to US relations that he's trying to implement, US relations with the world, I should say, that might actually engender some long-term change. Is that the case? So I wouldn't glamorize it by calling it strategy, but I do think it's true that the president has some fundamental beliefs that

And there are three. The first is that allies are a burden to the United States. The second is that trade exports American jobs. And the third is that immigrants take American jobs. He has held those views despite an enormous raft of data to the contrary, right? Showing that none of those three things are true.

in the way that he believes them, he's held those views for 50 years. And so those are the fundamental things driving Trump administration policy. I wouldn't call it strategy because strategy requires anticipating adversary behavior and planning how to reduce your vulnerabilities and strengthen them

And I don't know, a global tariff war strikes me as something you think the first move and not, they didn't anticipate anybody else having a play on this. And so I don't think it's fair to grace...

their behavior by calling it strategy. It's actually, you already gave the right description, presidential impulses impatiently carried out. - And in an unfiltered and unmediated fashion a lot of the time it seems to be, or almost perhaps his moods. I mean, some of it does seem to be an emotional reaction to a particular thing that's annoyed him that day.

That's exactly right. The lack of discipline and the lack of seriousness about the consequences of things he says and things he does, and the fact that he has chosen a cabinet and my fellow Republicans in the Senate consented to the confirmation of a cabinet that aren't

adults in the room, they aren't policy experts, they aren't even responsible staffers, they are amplifiers of the president's message. So they make anything he comes up with 20% worse by not knowing what he actually wants, being unwilling to try and figure that out, and not caring about the policy consequences.

So the obvious next question is how much of it, if any, will endure beyond Trump? He's a populist in the true sense, I mean, in the worst sense, in that perhaps, you know, at some level, elements of those three categories of instinct that he has that you mentioned on immigration alliances and trade, you know, they're easy emotive issues to tap into an angry electorate with, but

What we saw in the first term is that the ideas are popular with Americans. Americans are genuinely concerned about control of our borders. They're genuinely concerned about why allies don't spend more for their own defense. They're genuinely concerned about the way we allowed China into the global trading architecture without requiring to play by the rules that all the rest of us play by.

But what we saw in the first term was once those ideas get translated into policy, support for them collapses.

And that has not happened, at least so far, on immigration. But I think you can already see Americans getting really uncomfortable about, I mean, trade has never been more popular with the American public than it is right now. American, 77% of Americans say trade is good for my family's budget.

That's not what the president's trade policy is going to produce. And so I think the president will really struggle to sustain political support for those policies. And Americans actually like our allies. We actually, when the world feels scary, it's nice to have the comfort of friends you can stand shoulder to shoulder with.

And I think the president's policies in that regard are already quite unpopular as well. You know, people were ashamed to watch the president and vice president berate Vladimir Zelensky in the Oval Office, a democratically elected leader whose country has been under siege for three years. It was shameful.

And that's a widespread reaction among Americans. And that bedrock is why I think President Trump's policies won't endure beyond his presidency or even likely through the end of it.

Right. But you think there might be a way to, I suppose, recalibrate the US relationship with the world in a way that satisfies those legitimate concerns that Americans might have had about allied burden sharing and, I suppose, some version of renewed globalization or

or globalism in which the US continues to be an open, free economy and to trade freely with the world, but in a way that, well, obviously, China's, I suppose, vandalism of free trade, having joined the WTO is a good example of that, where that could be fixed and people's anger could be satisfied in that way, but the world could actually proceed in a more rational way.

Absolutely. There are sensible policy solutions to these problems. The Trump administration just isn't choosing them. And the challenge for institutions like mine, the American Enterprise Institute, is to provide good solutions that address people's legitimate concerns without doing damage to America and the world. So just to take the Ukraine example, right? I mean...

The United States has provided an enormous amount of military assistance to Ukraine. I happen to think that's good American policy and that for 5% of the American defense budget, the Ukrainians have fought the Russian military to a standstill and imposed 780,000 casualties on the Russian military. That makes Europe and the United States safer. But

You know, there are alternatives. There are foreign military financing, right? We loaned Britain the money to fight World War I, and they repaid it in, what, the 1970s? Ukraine is going to, once they are free of Russian occupation, that economy and society are going to blossom so vibrantly that...

loan them the money for the weapons that they need and let them pay it back across 100 years when they become America's allies and the engine of innovation of all of the rest of our militaries. - So what you're saying about value for money is certainly true.

if you regard Russia as a strategic threat to the United States, which you and I both as reasonable people do, but Trump is portraying it more as an economic opportunity, if anything. How much...

How much luck does he have of actually selling that to the American public? I mean, you've indicated that he probably doesn't have much luck, but I'm just curious about how constrained is he by domestic political opinion on those sorts of issues? Well, you know, the often overlooked secret of American governance is that the system is designed for Congress to be dominant.

And Congress, especially Republicans in control of the House and the Senate, have been quite deferential to President Trump early on in the administration. And that's not improper. He won the popular vote. He won the seven swing states. Republicans believe he has a mandate that they should try and facilitate.

But that runs aground pretty quickly. The president can't seem to get his budget passed by Congress in the first year of an administration.

And when Secretary Rubio went up to Capitol Hill to defend Trump foreign policy, he got excoriated on the, why are you forcing Ukraine to make compromises when Russia isn't? And Secretary Rubio was forced to give a full-throated defense of anti-Russian policy.

which is not where he really wants to be in the Trump administration. It's not where the president is. But Congress has the ability to control these things. Sanctions on Russia are a congressional action, not an executive action.

providing weapons to Ukraine is a congressional action, not an executive action. You'll remember, of course, David, that what set off President Trump's first impeachment in his first term was him impounding money that Congress had provided for aid to Ukraine. And the Pentagon comptroller refused to violate the law despite the White House wanting them to do so. Yeah. I sometimes wonder if you showed evidence

Marco Rubio in 2022, a video of that appearance before Congress in 2025, whether he would believe, and you told him it's either true or it's a deep fake, you've got to pick which. I wonder what he'd answer. He would unquestionably answer it's a deep fake. It's a deep fake, yeah. This is an administration that tries to lie its way out of trouble, as we saw with the intelligence compromises by basically the entire cabinet. Yep, yep. So, I mean, you...

Clearly, you still identify yourself as a traditional US conservative. You're a proud Republican. I'm not just a conservative. I'm a Republican. You're a Republican. Absolutely. And in the greatest sense. You wrote a terrific essay recently on why conservatives should back a foreign policy that advances freedom in the world. Instead, what we're really seeing is they're exporting MAGA at the moment more than they're exporting freedom, I would submit, especially to Europe, particularly

I mean, it's quite extraordinary to see some of the, you know, the open, the partisan. The Homeland Secretary went to Poland to campaign for a presidential candidate. Secretary or Vice President Vance overtly tried to interfere in the German elections.

It is behavior that if other countries' leading politicians did in the United States, we would be lighting roofs on fire. So what do you make of that? How damaging is it to American opinion in the world?

Oh, I think the Trump administration is doing more damage in a short period of time to American power than any dominant state has done in history. I mean, I think you have to go... I'm running a sweepstakes. Anybody who has a bet you'd like to place on this, name the last time a dominant power inflicted this much damage on themselves. I struggle to think of an example.

Athens and the Peloponnesian Wars. Okay, you're a historian, I'm not, so I'm going to lose this one. I mean, I suppose apart from starting wars that were unwise, I mean, are you going to... The wellsprings of American power are that, you know, what we learned from two catastrophic wars in the 20th century was that

you need a stabilizing force in the international order. We didn't want it to be us, right? We wanted it first to be the United Nations, and then we wanted global economic cooperation to produce it. And only sequentially did we learn it is going to have to be the United States providing security guarantees

that allow the recovery of war-torn societies, the return to vibrancy among them, American participation to encourage cooperation,

And what that system produced is an international order that is incredibly cost effective for the United States because no dominant power in history has had this much voluntary assistance from everybody else. Small and medium sized states understand that the order that the U.S. and its allies created after World War II maximizes power

the influence of small and medium-sized powers. What that gives the United States is voluntary cooperation, which means we don't have to enforce the rules, hardly ever. And so the exasperation I have with the Trump administration is their refusal to acknowledge how much this system benefits us

while it also benefits others. They're a much more Manichean frame of reference about power that either we have it or others have it. And it's the same way they think about the economy, right? That immigrants take jobs and trade exports jobs. Immigrants create new companies. Trade creates new opportunities and new markets.

You grow the common benefit. That's what the American order since 1945 has produced. And that's what the Trump administration is destroying. Right, right. Look, this is a good segue then to actually to Australian defence spending. I've got a couple of other things I want to cover, but we might as well cover this now.

From Australia's point of view, I suppose, I mean, we're very conscious, those of us who follow defence closely, if we didn't have the US alliance, you know, we're debating now about whether to spend 2% or 3% or 3.5% of our GDP on defence.

if we didn't have the US alliance, we'd be spending six, eight, whatever it is percent. I mean, we have very cheap security here in Australia as a consequence of the US. So in a sense, it feels like us as if we're getting more out of the relationship than the US. On the flip side, you know, we have contributed to

you know, every conflict with the United States for however many years over a century, I believe. So our security is cheaper because of our cooperation. So it really is a win-win. I mean, it sounds a bit CCP-ish to say win-win, but bugger it, I'm going to reclaim win-win as a phrase for the good guys. But it is a win-win in that sense. Unquestionably, we would not have the

intelligence network we have without the partnership with Australia and the other Five Eyes. We wouldn't have countries willing to commit forces fighting alongside us when we have wars to fight. We wouldn't have the basing opportunities. We wouldn't have the technological cooperation of great Australian companies. We wouldn't have votes at the United Nations.

from our partners. We wouldn't have cooperation for economic sanctions. I mean, again, the exasperation with the Trump administration is the extent to which they believe that bilateral negotiations that maximize the concessions we can force out of our friends

are somehow more in our interest than the voluntary cooperation of those countries. You can't put technology constraints on China without the voluntary assistance of Australia, the Netherlands, Japan,

Right? Because these are leading technology producers. And so it's not just a win for Australia that the United States assists in Australia's security. It's a win for the United States that Australia contributes to ours. So what should we do in this situation, Australia, in terms of our defense investment? And feel free to tell another country what they should do. I mean, I'm asking you the question. So...

I think Australia should do what I think the United States should do, which is all of us need to be spending more on our defense because the world is becoming objectively more dangerous to our interests. China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea are now essentially cooperating allies working to destroy an international order that has made our countries and their countries safe and relatively prosperous. Mm-hmm.

And so we all need to up our game. I hope that when the Trump administration starts haranguing European allies about the need to spend 5%, that they commit to spending 5% ourselves, because that would add $470 billion every year to the top line of the American defense budget.

Senator Wicker, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has done a terrific report last year, a strategy for the United States. And he has calculated the U.S. needs to spend at least 5% more on

at least 5% of our GDP for at least a decade to overcome the underspending we have been doing in the last 20 years. So, you know, the United States is good at haranguing allies, but we need to fix the problem ourselves as well. Okay. Okay. All right. One of the mega questions for countries like Australia, and we'll possibly wrap it up after this, but unless I have some follow-ups, of course, which I might.

Countries like Australia, big question, what does Trump policy on China, what shape is it starting to take? I mean, there are all sorts of things that you can read into it. There are the yo-yo tariffs going up and down. There were the negotiations on that. To what extent is China policy from the U.S.,

a sort of full spectrum planned competition to tame its hegemonic ambitions and deter it from aggression and coercion and so forth? And to what extent is there a risk that Trump simply says, screw it, I'm going to make a deal? I mean, my reading at the moment feels like the former looks a little bit

uh the former makes it looks a little bit more likely like you know sort of full spectrum uh competition i actually was quite heartened by pete hegseth's speech in a train and rely once it got past all the you know the domestic politicking at the start the stuff on the indo-pacific was actually quite strong maybe i shouldn't just you know maybe i shouldn't put too much faith in it sweet summer child sweet sweet child

I too thought that the commitment on the part of Defense Secretary Hegseth to security in Asia was heartening. The problem is Secretary Hegseth cannot deliver the President of the United States. Nobody can. So you ask about China policy, there isn't a China policy.

There's whatever the president blurts out today, whether it's he knows how to deal with Xi Jinping, whether it's we're going to put 148% tariffs on China, whether it's Taiwan should be part of China. Like he said, all of those things, which of them constitutes his policy is

I think we're just all paying an enormous chaos premium because Americans have elected somebody fundamentally irresponsible on issues of our own security and the security of our friends and allies. So I don't think, I mean, I do think we are at much higher risk of unanticipated abandonment or reversal of people's expectations.

And so my advice to America's friends is work the other levers of American power, congressional relationships, civil society relationships, working with states. Right. American governors are incredibly powerful and incredibly influential in American domestic politics. There are ways to constrain them.

the erratic behavior of the Trump administration and the shock of his very aggressive assertions of executive power, that shock is only just now beginning to wear off. And you begin to see the courts begin to constrain the administration, states beginning to insist on their autonomy, Congress beginning to insist on

that they alone can determine spending and that the president has a responsibility to faithfully execute the laws. Those are all the natural antibodies in the American political system. It's designed to be tied very tightly to public attitudes and be very responsive and to do nothing until you win the political argument.

And all of the president's policies are going to be contested increasingly. And so for America's friends and allies, that means you will have the ability to make your case

to other centers of power in American politics. And that is absolutely fair game. Right. Okay. So, I mean, to put myself in Anthony Albanese or Penny Wong's shoes right now, it is very hard for us to show a stiff spine and stand up to China on issues that we might ordinarily stand up to them on.

If we are worried that we might have the rug pulled out from underneath us by our major ally who leaves us swinging in the breeze and then Beijing comes back to us going, now, about that thing that you did that was really annoying for us. Absolutely. That is absolutely the right thing to worry about. And I believe one of the consequences of Trump foreign policy will be that American allies become increasingly hesitant to

to expose themselves to Chinese retribution or other retribution. You know, it's a fundamental fallacy of Trump administration policy. They think the U.S. can abandon allies and those allies will still make the choices that are in our interest for them to make. And my experience doing coalition management in the Balkan wars, in the wars of the Middle East, in the Afghan war,

is that when the United States steps back, everybody else steps back further. And you end up with countries making compromises that are not in their interests and they're not in American interests because they lack confidence that the United States will support them. That's what I think, what I fear we are going to see in the Trump administration and why all of us need to try and

persuade the Trump administration that there are genuine and enduring costs to the mistakes that they're making. Okay. All right, Corey, great to have your wisdom as always. That was informative and fun. So thank you. Thanks for coming back to ASPE. Thanks for being on Stop the World. It was a great pleasure, my friend. Thanks for listening or watching Stop the World. We'll be back with another episode next week. Ciao.