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But
it also sparked discussion over what they would do in Trump's
position, putting a rare spotlight on how the leading White
House hopefuls see America's role in the world.
On the most recent Democratic debate stage in Ohio this month,
former Vice President Joe Biden argued for a continued presence
in Syria to defend Washington' Kurdish allies. His main
progressive rival, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, indicated she
would want combat troops out of the Middle East.
To understand better how the candidates would change foreign
policy, we take a look at the experts advising the front-runners
on these issues, and what this little-known group of advisers
might mean for a future Democratic administration.
THE VETERAN
Biden's pick for his senior foreign policy role, Tony Blinken,
reflects the claim that former President Barack Obama's No. 2 is
the only Democratic candidate with the experience to undo the
impacts of Trump's presidency.
Blinken, a national security aide in Democratic President Bill
Clinton's White House, has been alongside Biden for years. He
advised Biden's aborted 2008 presidential campaign before
joining the vice president on trips to war zones as his national
security adviser.
Blinken, who also served as deputy secretary of state during the
Obama administration, is seen in the background of the May 2011
photo of Obama's national security team, which also includes
Biden, watching the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in a
Pakistan compound.
Adding to the focus on foreign policy experience, Biden has
brought in Nicholas Burns, who served as U.S. ambassador to the
United Nations in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Trump this month withdrew U.S. forces from northern Syria,
drawing bipartisan rebuke. The president defended the move as
part of an effort to "end endless wars."
In an interview with Reuters, Blinken said that claim was a
"con," since Trump has really put more troops in the Middle East
this year. He sent about 3,000 troops to Saudi Arabia in recent
months as tensions with Iran escalated.
The Obama administration had worked to limit most U.S. combat
deployments to small numbers of troops working with local
fighters, Blinken said, but a complete withdrawal from places
like Syria could lead to a power vacuum that is "filled by
chaos."
"As much of a burden as it sometimes seems to play this
leadership role, the alternatives in terms of our interests and
the lives of Americans are much worse,” Blinken said.
Biden says his foreign policy priority would be to recommit to
U.S. allies, especially North Atlantic Treaty Organization
members. He plans to rejoin the Paris Climate Accord on day one
of his presidency.
THE WONKS
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren came to prominence as a Harvard
academic studying bankruptcy, and has brought a professorial
focus on domestic policy to the 2020 race.
But before she ran for president, Warren sought to bolster her
foreign policy knowledge in 2017 by bringing in former
Department of Defense official Sasha Baker, who served as deputy
chief of staff to Obama-era Defense Secretary Ash Carter.
Warren took a seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee in
2017 and traveled widely, including trips to Iraq, Afghanistan
and China over the subsequent two years.
Warren formed a "cohesive vision" on foreign policy during this
time, said campaign spokeswoman Alexis Krieg, which "is
reflected in many of her plans ranging from how to revitalize
the State Department to how to reorient America's trade
policies."
Warren also leans on a cadre of academics for foreign policy
advice, including Ganesh Sitaraman, a law professor at
Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, who worked on her 2012
campaign for the Senate.
Sitaraman has written about a movement toward a progressive
foreign policy that promotes diplomacy over military might, but
understands the risks of partnering with "nationalist
oligarchies" like Russia and China.
Warren distilled her foreign policy views in a November 2018
speech at American University in Washington, lashing out at
"reckless, endless wars in the Middle East" and "trade deals
rammed through with callous disregard for our working people".
Warren's positions can seem to echo Trump's "America First"
approach, but her campaign has said she would take a
multinational approach in places like Syria, a contrast with
Trump's go-it-alone style.
"Senator Warren believes that by pursuing international economic
policies that benefit American workers instead of an elite few
and using diplomacy to amplify strong yet pragmatic security
policies, we can achieve a foreign policy for all," said Krieg.
THE INSURGENT
Bernie Sanders’ key foreign policy adviser is Matt Duss, a
staffer in his Senate office since early 2017 who has a
reputation for taking on the Washington foreign policy
establishment.
Duss, a Middle East specialist with a background at liberal
think-tanks including the Center for American Progress, played a
leading role in a resolution that Sanders co-sponsored with
libertarian Republicans to end U.S. involvement in Saudi
Arabia's war in Yemen.
The resolution passed in April, a rare bipartisan effort in
Congress, but Trump declined to sign it into law.
"That shows that there is strong popular support for rethinking
our approach to military intervention," said Duss, who sees the
bipartisan bill as a model for Congress reining in presidents'
power to use military force.
"This is not to say that Americans want to withdraw from the
world. They certainly don't, but they want to have a serious
debate about how we actually engage in the world," Duss told
Reuters.
Duss and other researchers Sanders has sought out for advice are
skeptical of unconditional U.S. support for countries accused of
human rights violations, including Saudi Arabia and Israel.
Sanders, who is Jewish, said on Monday the $3.8 billion of U.S.
military aid the United States gives Israel each year should be
tied to the Israeli government's "respect for human rights and
democracy," calling the security blockade on Palestinians in
Gaza imposed by Israel and Egypt "absolutely inhumane"
"It is unacceptable. It is unsustainable," Sanders said in a
speech to a conference hosted by liberal advocacy group J Street
in Washington on Monday.
"So I would use the leverage. $3.8 billion is a lot of money,
and we cannot give it carte blanche to the Israeli government,
or for that matter to any government at all."
THE BRAIN TRUST
Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has put
foreign policy at the forefront of his campaign, speaking in
debates of his deployment in Afghanistan as a naval intelligence
officer.
Doug Wilson, a former assistant secretary of defense for public
affairs during the Obama administration, leads Buttigieg's
foreign policy team.
Wilson, who like Buttigieg is gay, worked on the 2010 repeal of
the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy for LGBT
personnel.
As well as Wilson, Buttigieg has a brain trust of more than 100
foreign policy experts that the campaign turns to for pro-bono
advice on policy in different parts of the world, according to
Politico.
His campaign has also named a group of five Obama-era U.S.
ambassadors, such as Tod Sedgwick, former ambassador to
Slovakia, who have helped fundraise by bundling contributions.
At 37, Buttigieg is the youngest candidate running for
president. In June, he delivered a foreign policy speech in his
home state of Indiana in which he set out a vision for "America
in the world in 2054", the year he would hope to retire.
Buttigieg's central argument is that the United States must "be
its best" on issues like immigration, LGBT rights and tackling
hate crimes in order to project its values around the world,
Tarek Ghani, an academic and another adviser to Buttigieg, said
in Washington in June.
"If we don't do those things at home, there's nothing for us to
champion abroad," said Ghani.
(Reporting by Simon Lewis; additional reporting by Trevor
Hunnicutt and Jarrett Renshaw, Editing by Soyoung Kim and
Jonathan Oatis)
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