Here's my first draft of a national-security agenda for Democrats seeking the White House in 2028.
We've just witnessed the most profound flip-flop in recent presidential history. When Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination in 2016, he said: "We must abandon the failed policy of nation building and regime change that Hillary Clinton pushed in Iraq, Libya, Egypt and Syria." During his first term, he largely kept his word -- but since retaking office he has adopted a trigger-happy approach. He has ordered strikes on eight countries in 14 months, roughly as many as in his entire first four years. The change is so head-spinning that some on the MAGA right have steam coming out of their ears.
The most recent foray undoubtedly required Congress to weigh in. This isn't a strategic strike at Iran's military infrastructure -- it is a war aimed, in Mr. Trump's own words, at regime change. Lawmakers could have debated and voted during the USS Gerald R. Ford's long journey across the Atlantic, but they were a day late and a dollar short.
Democrats, however, shouldn't view this as some pop quiz about whether the Trump administration is heeding the Constitution. They need to realize that foreign policy demands results, not merely rules. Defending the sanctity of the system is different from projecting strength as a virtue. The most important question is whether Mr. Trump's approach advances America's global security and economic interests.
You need not have lived through the Iraq or Libya debacles to realize that decapitating the Islamic Republic doesn't guarantee that freedom and democracy will emerge in Tehran. Never has the U.S. managed to foment regime change from the air alone. Washington could have defined success as taking out Iran's nuclear facilities, military bases, antiaircraft batteries, terrorist proxies and missile-production facilities. What the American people need to hear from Democrats isn't arguments about the process but a clear articulation of the strategy we would pursue.
For our party, this is a threshold issue. Much as Mr. Trump never misses an opportunity to divide Americans, our nation is stronger on the world stage when we are united, as George H.W. Bush understood when liberating Kuwait. Democrats need to explain how we would use all our foreign-policy tools -- economic statecraft, military power, political persuasion and cultural influence -- to advance our interests and security. That means taking a clear-eyed view of the challenges we face on the global stage.
Iran isn't America's only adversary. North Korea also threatens the U.S., and America's two most potent antagonists are Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping. They share the conviction that the fall of the Berlin Wall marked a pivotal moment in geopolitical history. Mr. Putin has sought to restore Russia's sphere of influence and status as a global superpower, while Mr. Xi has vowed never to let any similar humiliation befall China and is determined to replace the American-led system. Together, these four countries compose an autocratic alliance intent on undermining the America-centered strategic architecture.
The question for American leaders and those who would succeed them is how they intend to respond. Mr. Trump's answer, on the whole, has been to placate Russia and China on the theory that he gets along personally with Messrs. Putin and Xi. But his personal relationships are immaterial to our national interests. Democrats counter with a promise to observe international law, but we need an agenda beyond following the rules.
- Europe: modernization and reform. Washington should marshal the Continent to align its nations in a singular mission of credible deterrence against further Russian aggression. Too many assets remain clustered around Brussels or more generally west of the Rhine. In the wake of Mr. Putin's attack on Ukraine, some of the alliance's resources should be moved east as a reinforced defensive line.
- The U.S. and Europe should enhance economic ties to protect themselves mutually against supply-chain vulnerabilities and should double down on our collective technological edge. We should develop protocols to ensure Mr. Putin understands that gray-zone proxy attacks will trigger a collective and costly response from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
- Indo-Pacific: isolate the isolator. For years, Washington maintained a hub-and-spoke approach to allies surrounding China, nurturing singular relationships with Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia and others. The Biden administration forged multilateral alliances that made Beijing an outlier in its own front yard, culminating in the August 2023 Camp David agreement between the U.S., Japan and South Korea.
- The Trump administration has since abandoned our strategy of "isolating the isolator," as evidenced by Washington's weeks-late reaction to China's bullying after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's November comments on Taiwan. Mr. Xi's attempt to coerce our most important regional treaty ally might once have prompted America to rally a regional response in Tokyo’s support. Thanks to this White House’s go-it-alone approach, Beijing got off scot-free.
- Democrats should re-energize the Quad and burnish our relationships with India and the Philippines and Tokyo’s ties with Seoul. To match our political network, we need a cohesive economic program developed around semiconductors and other key industries. Nothing would do as much to send the message that the U.S. is a permanent Pacific power than a successful effort to establish an integrated regional air-defense system.
- Middle East: a bifurcated network. After the Abraham Accords, Washington integrated Jerusalem into the Pentagon’s Central Command while simultaneously developing deep ties with Gulf Arab states. While the Israelis and the Arabs are yet to be entirely aligned, those bifurcated investments created a comprehensive stability that worked well during June’s 12-day war.
- That same arrangement should be extended to the political and economic realms. To build a bridge between Israel’s technological prowess and the Gulf countries’ role at the center of the global economy, no individual figure or nation can be given license to undermine regional stability and U.S. security interests, as exemplified by Benjamin Netanyahu’s willingness to allow settlers to terrorize West Bank residents.
- Africa: early and often. In a region that U.S. foreign-policy makers too often overlook, Washington’s approach will need to take an entirely different form. China is acting more aggressively to coax, bribe and debt-trap countries into following its direction. To combat that threat, Washington needs to engage African governments early and often, employing a four-corners strategy -- a focus on Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa -- to ensure that our economic and security interests in the continent’s rising prosperity point toward freedom rather than autocracy. We can’t treat Africa as an afterthought any longer.
- Western Hemisphere: the beating heart of the region. Recent years have seen several Latin American countries move closer to the U.S. even as other allies, including Canada, have recoiled at Mr. Trump’s bullying. Democrats need to develop a strategy that, having pushed Russia out of the region, replaces Mr. Trump’s efforts to control the region through military adventurism and political coercion with a new campaign to box China out through economic statecraft and political persuasion.
- Argentina’s recent decision to pause a joint Chinese effort to construct a large radio telescope is a hopeful sign. But the reaction in Ottawa reflects the skepticism the next president will inherit given Mr. Trump’s military activity and economic coercion. The U.S. should launch a hemispheric initiative to put the American economy at the center of an economic bloc that can compete with China.
As Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney argued recently, the Trump administration has permanently ruptured the international system that was born from faith in America’s word and the architecture we created. The next president is sure to discover that there’s no reset button beneath the Resolute Desk. Washington will need to pick up the pieces and create something new.
Foreign policy is rarely the most important issue in any campaign -- but it can be a disqualifier, as it was for President Gerald Ford in 1976. Americans don’t choose presidents to be desk clerks or pencil pushers in the name of international norms. They want leaders they can be confident will secure America’s interests. As we prepare to repair the long-term damage Mr. Trump has done, we need to reassure the American people that we have not only the discipline to follow the rules but a vision and agenda to further our country’s interests around the world.
Mr. Emanuel, a Democrat, served as a U.S. representative from Illinois (2003-09), White House chief of staff (2009-10), mayor of Chicago (2011-19) and ambassador to Japan (2022-25).