Ambassador Robert Blackwill

But it will be a tough sell.

Just again, to use a historical analogy, we will never know whether FDR and the American Congress would have declared war on Germany once Pearl Harbor had occurred if Hitler hadn't declared war on us first.

because the body of opinion was, let's concentrate on Japan.

They're the ones who attacked us.

Germany hasn't attacked us.

And that decision by Hitler to declare war four days later after Pearl Harbor, that's what Mayor LaGuardia called a doozy.

That's a historic doozy.

Well, I myself am an optimist in several respects with respect to your question.

First of all, I think President Trump is a unique singular figure in American history and that he will take much of Trumpism with him as he goes out the door.

In particular, in particular, the erratic behavior that he prefers, the contempt for America's alliances, the statement that American values have no place in American foreign policy and so forth.

Those are so un-American, those views, that I think he takes them out the door with him.

Yes.

Well, I'm speculating, but let me say what I think he won't throw away, which is American nationalism, which has dominated American grand strategy since the founding.

Well, it became weaker, as I tried to say earlier, but the

And I can't be sure, obviously, who the Republican nominee would be and what he would say.

But I think the challenge, the debate after Trump will be between American nationalism, which, as I say, for more than 150 years was American grand strategy.

And I hope a much stronger liberal internationalism with a much stronger

greater capacity in the military, more defense of international institutions and so forth.

And I think that'll be the debate.

It'll be the Western hemisphere versus the globe.