Trump lays out non-interventionist U.S.
military policy
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[December 07, 2016]
By Steve Holland
FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. (Reuters) -
President-elect Donald Trump laid out a U.S. military policy on Tuesday
that would avoid interventions in foreign conflicts and instead focus
heavily on defeating the Islamic State militancy.
In the latest stop on a "thank you" tour of states critical to his Nov.
8 election win, Trump introduced his choice for defense secretary,
General James Mattis, to a large crowd in this city near the Fort Bragg
military base, which has deployed soldiers to 90 countries around the
world.
"We will stop racing to topple foreign regimes that we know nothing
about, that we shouldn't be involved with," Trump said. "Instead, our
focus must be on defeating terrorism and destroying ISIS, and we will."
Trump's rhetoric was similar to what he said during the election
campaign when he railed against the war in Iraq.
In Fayetteville, he vowed a strong rebuilding of the U.S. military,
which he suggested has been stretched too thin. Instead of investing in
wars, he said, he would spend money to build up America's aging roads,
bridges and airports.
Even so, Trump said he wants to boost spending on the military. To help
pay for his buildup, Trump pledged to seek congressional approval for
lifting caps on defense spending that were part of "sequestration"
legislation that imposed cut spending across the board.
"We don't want to have a depleted military because we’re all over the
place fighting in areas that we shouldn't be fighting in. It's not going
to be depleted any longer," he said.
Trump said any nation that shares these goals will be considered a U.S.
partner.
"We don't forget. We want to strengthen old friendships and seek out new
friendships," he said. He said the policy of "intervention and chaos"
must come to an end.
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President-elect Donald Trump speaks at a USA Thank You Tour event at
Crown Coliseum in Fayetteville, North Carolina, U.S., December 6,
2016. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
While U.S. armed forces are deployed in far-flung places around the
globe, they are only involved currently in active combat in the
Middle East, specifically Iraq and Syria for the most part.
"We will build up our military not as an act of aggression, but as
an act of prevention," he said. "In short, we seek peace through
strength."
Trump described Mattis as the right person for the job and urged
Congress to approve a waiver to let him take on the civilian
position. Under U.S. law a military leader must be retired for seven
years before becoming eligible to become defense secretary.
Speaking to the crowed, Mattis said, "I look forward to being the
civilian leader as long as the Congress gives me the waiver and the
Senate votes to consent."
"We're going to get you that waiver," Trump said, returning to the
microphone. "If you don’t get that waiver there are going to be a
lot of angry people."
(Reporting by Steve Holland; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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