Trump finally unveils foreign policy team
GOP front-runner announces advisers include former Lebanese militant Walid Phares, retired US Army lieutenant Keith Kellogg
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White House hopeful Donald Trump, not known for his foreign policy expertise, on Monday unveiled a team of advisers drawn from the energy industry and the fringes of Washington’s international affairs establishment.
Trump, who is closing in on the Republican presidential nomination, has been under pressure in the media to name a foreign policy team, amid reports that mainstream conservative and neo-conservative experts are loath to endorse him.
In a wide-ranging interview with The Washington Post editorial board, the property baron-turned-Republican front-runner rattled off a half-dozen names of experts prepared to lend their reputation to his campaign.
On counterterrorism policy Trump plumped for Walid Phares, an academic whom Mother Jones magazine reported in 2011 was formerly tied to civil war-era Lebanese Christian warlords and groups backed by Israel in the 1980s.
For defense, Trump turned to Keith Kellogg, a retired US Army lieutenant general-turned-consultant who was chief operating officer to the US occupation of Iraq during its disastrous early months in 2003 and 2004.
Another pick, Joe Schmitz, also served during George W. Bush’s administration — as inspector general to the Pentagon — and later, according to the Post, in a senior role with US mercenary outfit Blackwater.
He is a coauthor of a report for a little-known conservative think tank, the Center for Security Policy, entitled: “Sharia — The Threat to America.”
The list is rounded out by energy experts Carter Page and George Papadopoulos, who previously advised Trump’s defeated rival for the Republican flag-bearer role, renowned brain surgeon Ben Carson.
According to the Post, Trump outlined “an unabashedly non-interventionist approach to world affairs” in his interview, which was published shortly before he was due to address the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC.
When asked whom he had consulted with for the speech, Trump named his son-in-law Jared Kushner who, he said, had spoken to friends in Israel.
Times of Israel Staff contributed to this report
The Times of Israel Community.