Kasich faults “wrecking ball strategy” in frayed relations with U.S. allies

The Trump administration's foreign policy is eroding the NATO alliance that has kept peace in Europe since World War II, Gov. John Kasich, R-Ohio, told a National Press Club audience Thursday.

European members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) have questioned whether they can still depend on the United States, Kasich said at the Club Newsmaker Headliners event.

"The alliance that has kept the peace for 70 years is being frayed," Kasich said."There is growing disunity…a growing sense of a lack of trust.”

The former 2016 presidential candidate said the U.S. is "pursuing an ‘America alone’ policy, not an ‘America first’ policy.”

Kasich said he is worried about what will take NATO's place if the alliance collapses.

“Wrecking ball strategies rarely end up successfully over the long haul," he said. “This is not a happy day for me. I wish I wasn’t here, to tell you the truth.”

Club President Andrea Edney, who introduced Kasich as possible primary challenger to President Trump in 2020, noted he had “penned at least five columns in the last six weeks. ”

Kasich said he was not “here for political reasons” but to express his growing concern with the direction of American foreign policy and trade.

“This is not personal," he said. "It’s a policy disagreement [with the president].” Trump “was elected to do things differently. I respect that,” he said, “I guess we’ll see how that works.”

Kasich credited the president “for standing up to China" for its violations of intellectual property rules, while noting that the United States needs its allies to help hold China accountable. “Are tariffs the way to go? Probably not," he said.

He suggested instead limiting student visas, restricting foreign investments and targeting Chinese banks.

When Trump meets with Russian President Putin on Monday, Kasich said arms control should be the focus. If Putin asks Trump to call off troop rotations in the Baltics, he hopes Trump will say no.

Putin, he said, is “an incredible threat” who “interfered in our elections” and used technology to interfere in other nations elections.

Showing a vintage poster promoting the Marshall Plan, Kasich noted that not only did the United States help rebuild Europe after World War II, but “we chose to help people who were our enemies: Germany and Japan.”

One payoff, he noted, is that Japan today is one of the world’s strongest democracies. “We do well when we work in teams,” Kasich said.

The former congressman contrasted that era with America’s withdrawal from Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), which he said has created a vacuum of power in Asia. Kasich also noted the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris climate accord and the Iran nuclear deal, and tariffs against European allies, Canada and Mexico, as examples of the U.S. pivot toward going it alone.

Asked about Trump’s attacks on the press, he said badgering the press wasn’t constructive, but said media organizations should worry less about “hits and clicks.”

As for his own political future, he said didn’t know what lay ahead, but he wanted “a strong finish.”