Trump short on foreign policy wins
ANALYSIS
President Donald Trump waves Aug. 16 as he walks from Marine One to a vehicle at the Ellipse near the White House in Washington.
WASHINGTON — With the Iran war now at a standoff and crises from Ukraine to Gaza still unresolved, President Donald Trump's ambitious foreign policy agenda appears stuck ahead of November's midterm elections.
The setbacks are striking for a president who returned to office last year promising to be a "peacemaker" and made resolving international conflicts a centerpiece of his second-term agenda.
Trump has grown impatient with reporters and even U.S. allies. Last week, he lashed out at reporters' questioning him on foreign policy issues and renewed his threat to bomb Oman, a U.S. ally negotiating with Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Labor Day, on Sept. 7 this year, is traditionally when election campaigns kick into high gear, and Republicans face the prospect that unresolved conflicts abroad and their economic fallout at home could cost the party its hold on Congress.
Trump called off talks with Tehran after pushing for weeks for a diplomatic solution and announced Wednesday a new campaign of "economic warfare" against Iran, an apparent acknowledgment that months of military attacks have not forced the concessions the U.S. wants.
As inflation persists and the Iran war drives up gasoline prices, just 33% of Americans in a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll approved of Trump's performance, another low point.
Other efforts to broker peace also stalled.
Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner left empty-handed last week from talks to advance a Gaza peace deal. Kushner and Trump envoy Steve Witkoff have yet to visit Kyiv to revive long-stalled negotiations to end Russia's war in Ukraine.
After a string of early foreign policy achievements, including a Gaza ceasefire and the capture of Venezuela's leader, Trump's record has become increasingly defined by his stalled diplomatic efforts.
"Trump has successfully challenged and disrupted the comfortable foreign policy consensus in Washington, but has not translated that disruption into a strategy with deliverables for Americans," said Asli Aydintasbas, a fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington.
The conflict with Iran has weighed "intensely" on the president, and there is no consensus in the White House on how to resolve it, one Trump ally said on condition of anonymity.
The pressure could increase if investors conclude the war will drag on, driving up U.S. borrowing costs and further constraining Trump's domestic agenda. Trump said the economic costs are worth it to ensure Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon, despite Tehran's denials it seeks one.
A senior Trump administration official said U.S. sanctions and a naval blockade crippled Iran's economy and left it "completely broke," adding, "There are many levers the president can crank harder in the weeks ahead."
Some experts give Trump credit for a willingness to grapple with issues they believe other presidents were unable or unwilling to solve.
"The president wants a more stable world and that means attempting to resolve disputes, whether hot like Ukraine or cold like trade and overcapacity," said Nick Snyder, a senior fellow at Hudson Institute, adding Trump also worked to settle conflicts between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo and Thailand and Cambodia.
Trump upended traditional diplomatic norms of peacemaking, relying on leveraging America's economic and military might, including with U.S. allies, but that unorthodox style yielded mixed results.
He brought parties to the table with the aim of ending Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but the longest war in Europe since World War II is nowhere near ending.
In Gaza, mediators fear Israel's intensifying strikes undermine efforts to end the conflict as Israel and Hamas balk at conditions needed to advance a peace plan Trump forged in October. In Lebanon, Israeli airstrikes killed 11 people in recent days despite a U.S.-mediated peace framework between the two countries.
Analysts say the U.S. military operation in Venezuela, which captured 's President Nicolas Maduro without U.S. casualties, helped convince Trump that joining Israel in attacking Iran also would proceed smoothly, but that proved to be a miscalculation. They argue Trump relied too heavily on applying coercive pressure even though Iran's leaders have little incentive to back down and reopen the Strait of Hormuz despite the country's weakening economy.
"He is obsessed with applying coercion, and sometimes flattery, to bend others to his will, but oblivious to their strategic goals and domestic politics. As a result, he keeps flailing and failing," said Stephen Wertheim, a senior fellow at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Meanwhile, the political clock is ticking, with Trump's Republican Party facing elections that could cost it control of one or both chambers of Congress and sharply curtail his ability to advance his agenda.
Analysts say Trump's reliance on coercive pressure, which often fails to produce lasting settlements, may encourage rivals to wait him out.
"U.S. adversaries understand that his political clock is shorter than theirs," Aydintasbas said, and "while the United States can apply enormous coercive pressure, it may eventually lose patience."
