Shockingly enough, what people say during campaigns is meant to increase the odds they get elected.
Richard N. HaassThe reason I called the president Donald Trump a disrupter is that he came into office 70 years after World War II, 25-plus years after the end of the Cold War. Like any president, he didn't come into office with a blank slate - he entered with an enormous inheritance of relationships with institutions, policies and the like. And in my view he is much too quick to pull the U.S. out of various institutions and various agreements, and he's been much too quick to question the value of allies and alliances.
Richard N. HaassChina likes the idea of sovereign rights when it comes to organizing their politics as they see fit, and their economics. But they may grudgingly come to understand certain things differently in the area of climate or disease. China is a country fairly integrated into the world. Yet China is uncomfortable with this idea because they worry it will constrain their freedom, politically and economically, to do what they believe they need to do to maintain political stability and cohesion.
Richard N. HaassIf there's any country that has the capacity not to control North Korea, but to influence North Korea, it's still China. The Chinese always say they have very little influence. They have more than they say they do. We should put pressure on them to do it and there's finally, we're seeing the first signs of a little bit of Chinese disaffection. At some point they're getting tired of the antics of this country. This is a dangerous ally for China to have. And the more Chinese can pressure them and put the economic screws on them, the better it will be for everybody.
Richard N. HaassIf the president Donald Trump had connected the Jerusalem question to some other positions, linking it to Israeli and Palestinian behavior or putting the Jerusalem statement in a larger context of U.S. policy, it could have potentially advanced the peace process. But I don't see how singling it out might help.
Richard N. Haass