“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty told Alice scornfully, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less. The question is which is to be master—that's all.”
America First is whatever Donald Trump says it is, at the time that he says it. His declaration that he is the master of the term, and defines it according to what he sees as America's interest on a moveable basis, is in no way inconsistent with the foreign policy of his first term or his second: he makes decisions, sometimes snap decisions, based on what he sees as choices standing to benefit the country.
The criticism of Trump's foreign policies as Lindberghian isolationism were always a joke — they've never been that, and the truth is the same people who raise those smears do so of just about anyone on the right whose policies they find insufficiently hawkish. But it is also true that many who publicly represent themselves as Trump-whisperers on questions of foreign policy were nothing of the kind. They were just people who occasionally came into the president's orbit who had opinions about what he should do — just as everyone else who walks into the Oval Office does on a daily basis.
Trump's rejection of these outside voices as the arbiters and definers of America First's meaning was unequivocal, and in a knife-twisting fashion, given of all places to the blob-entity "suckers and losers" writers at The Atlantic:
“Well, considering that I’m the one that developed ‘America First,’ and considering that the term wasn’t used until I came along, I think I’m the one that decides that,” Trump said. “For those people who say they want peace—you can’t have peace if Iran has a nuclear weapon. So for all of those wonderful people who don’t want to do anything about Iran having a nuclear weapon—that’s not peace.”
The president's decision to publicly take ownership of this doctrine, reframed as something whose scope is defined entirely by him, has the benefit of clarity. All the thumb-sucking over Trump's foreign policy doctrine over the past near-decade was just a waste of time. America First isn't a brand to be farmed out to junior members for dilution and re-envisioning according to their personal priorities. It is what Donald Trump says it is, end of story. If you want to complain about it, go on Twitch.
Carlson and his allies are in a tough spot. They have predicted an Israeli strike on Iran would result in World War III. Inside the Trump administration, skeptics of Israel’s intervention predicted that Iran would strike U.S. bases in Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. “So far the Iranians have not trained their guns on us,” one administration official said. “That bolsters Israel’s credibility,” because the Israelis assured the Trump administration that Iran would not escalate against U.S. positions.
That said, the restrainers are not out of the game. Trump has signaled that he wants a swift end to a war. On Saturday, Trump posted on Truth Social about a one-hour phone call with Russian president Vladimir Putin: “He feels, as do I, this war in Israel-Iran should end.” Trump also followed up with another post on Truth Social the next day imploring Iran and Israel to make a deal and end the war. Also Sunday, Reuters reported that the White House vetoed an Israeli plan to assassinate Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (Israel has denied the story).
At issue now is whether or not America will provide Israel with the B-2 bombers and bombs called Massive Ordnance Penetrators, or bunker busters, that are capable of tunneling deep underground. Some want the U.S. to go further and send in the Air Force to strike Iran’s underground facility in Fordow. It is widely believed that Israel’s air force lacks the capability to destroy Fordow, which is buried under a mountain near the holy city of Qom. On Sunday evening, Iran International reported explosions near the site, suggesting Israel may have other means to destroy this crucial node in Iran’s nuclear supply chain.
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