Republican front-runner Donald Trump says that, if elected President, he will pursue an “America First” foreign policy that will ensure that his country is no longer “ripped off” by its own allies or more notably China which, he calls, a nation that has rebuilt itself as the world’s second largest economy with “money drained out of the United States”.
In an interview with The New York Times, Trump said he was not an “isolationist”, but one who strongly believed in an “America First” approach at a time when the United States has become a “debtor nation” that owes China and Japan over $3 trillion and “disproportionately funds” NATO and the UN.
“We have been disrespected, mocked and ripped off for many many years by people that were smarter, shrewder, tougher. We were the big bully, but we were not smartly led,” he said, adding: “We will not be ripped off anymore, we’re going to be friendly with everybody, but we’re not going to be taken advantage of by anybody.”
Saying America over the years has piled up a mind-boggling $21 trillion debt, Trump said one of the major reasons was its massive spending on the military in order to be “policeman for other countries”, many of which were rich but were not taking care of the dues sufficiently. He said he would be open to withdrawing US forces from Japan and South Korea if they did not pay more towards the costs of maintaining American troops there.
The New York billionaire came down hard on China, which dominated his telephone interview. Talking of China’s ascent with American money, he said: “They’ve done it through monetary manipulation, by devaluations. And very sophisticated. I mean, they’re grand chess players at devaluation.” He commented that the US has made China rich by negotiating bad trade deals with it.