But we oughtn’t to leave it there. For while Washington’s national power does give us more latitude to make material policy adjustments than most states, within Washington the exercise of power is not so unconstrained as populists assume.
Presidents don’t make foreign policy alone, for example. They rely on the military and on the career diplomatic corps — as well as on policy advisors from the world of think tanks, academia, and the like. All of these people have career advancement to consider, which inevitably shapes their analyses of any given foreign policy problem. It takes considerable sophistication to override those considerations, and in the absence of a clear alternative policy direction, even that sophistication will likely prove inadequate.
Presidents also don’t make foreign policy in a global vacuum; other actors on the international stage are fully capable of making their own moves on the chess board in response to — or in anticipation of — our own. Rivals like China and Russia, as well as allies and clients like Japan and Saudi Arabia, will naturally try to manipulate us into situations where they are at an advantage — and they frequently start with an information advantage at a minimum to begin with.
And all of the above have access to the administration’s political opposition and the increasingly partisan press to further their particular agendas.
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