[dmurray]

I felt more or less like this, though I don't know if I posted it on HN. Lots of things I didn't like about Trump, but I did favour the less interventionist foreign policy he promised and initially delivered.

Now I feel I was wrong and Trump is just averagely warmongering, as US presidents go.

[tokai]

Honest question; why did you believe that about Trump? He was, and is, a serial lier and famously inconsistent. In his first term he moved on the same conflicts he has started now, but was held back circumstances and a cabinet that wasn't 100% yes men. I never understood how anyone could see Trump as the anti-war candidate during the election.

[dmurray]

I believed it because he didn't start the same conflicts he started now. More fool me, perhaps, but one person's "held back by circumstances" is another person's "it was all bluster anyway".

It was also consistent with a broader policy of isolationism shown during his first term. Reducing support for NATO, backing out of trade deals - all consistent with America First and not being the world's policeman, which has been the US's justification for every war in the last 80 years.

I'm not American, so probably have a different perspective on this from Americans. But also that's a reason for me to judge a US president disproportionately more on his foreign policy than on say, healthcare or which bathroom people should use.

[tokai]

> is another person's "it was all bluster anyway But it wasn't bluster, and it was obvious that it wasn't.

[erentz]

This is where the media (or your media bubble) failed you. Trump was always this way. In his first term he significantly increased the amount of bombs dropped and number of countries bombed over previous presidents.

[Ritewut]

Trump kidnaps a sitting president of a foreign nation after months of conducting strikes in the Caribbean. This is not a war but calling him "averagely warmongering" is just wrong.

[dmurray]

Which American president did not cause the removal of a sitting leader of a foreign nation from power? Doing it bloodlessly rather than through direct military force or by arming local terrorists absolutely does make you less warmongering than average.

[drnick1]

Removing Maduro was absolutely the right thing to do in America's interest, and was relatively inexpensive. Millions of barrels of oil are now flowing out of Venezuela into America, and, as a side effect, other enemies like Cuba are strictly worse off too. In fact, Cuba will very likely either collapse too soon. Another 70 yo problem solved.

[nozzlegear]

> Which American president did not cause the removal of a sitting leader of a foreign nation from power?

Joe Biden. Unless you'd contend that withdrawing from Afghanistan was an elaborate, self-owning plot to overthrow the US-friendly government in favor of the Taliban, which I think goes against the spirit of your question.

[dmurray]

More on the "funding local terrorists with plausible deniability" end of things than the Trump playbook, but here's the Biden cabinet taking credit for ousting Assad:

https://fpif.org/u-s-officials-take-credit-for-regime-change...

[nozzlegear]

Literally the third and fourth paragraph in that link:

> Administration officials deny that they aided Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the U.S.-designated terrorist organization that led the drive to overthrow Assad, but they insist that they facilitated the opposition’s victory, citing years of U.S. efforts to empower the opposition and weaken the Syrian government.

> U.S. policy “has led to the situation we’re in today,” State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a December 9 press briefing, the day after Assad fled the country. It “was developed during the latter stages of the Obama administration” and “has largely carried through to this day.”

An Obama-era policy, kept in place through Trump's first term and then through Biden's, ultimately resulting in local forces overthrowing a dictator that nobody liked, does not count as Biden being a warmongering regime changer. Your source even goes on to say that Biden was so dovish on Syria that senators were beginning to suspect he wanted to find a deal to keep Assad in power. What evidence do you have for funding local terrorists in Syria?