Trump Desperately Needs a Goodwill Ambassador

In the world of international politics, if you believe that hard power, hardheaded calculation, the absence of perfect information, and the lack of a central authority to enforce peace combine to drive much of international politics and foreign policy, that makes you a realist. That would serve as an adequate description of the harsh worldview summarized by National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster and Gary Cohn, the director of the National Economic Council, in a much-derided op-ed a couple of weeks ago. As readers here know, I happen to think this basic view of international affairs has much to commend it. States do care a lot about relative power; they typically make decisions in a cold-hearted and self-interested way; and even highly principled individuals in leadership positions will do immoral things under the pressure of circumstances. To ignore these features of international politics is to deny a lot of what makes the conduct of foreign policy difficult....