Trump claims he's "the president who delivers peace" but his record says otherwise

Trump might not be a Bush or a Clinton, yet his behavior while in office made it clear he won't be a departure from their foreign policy

"Take a look at the globalist warmongers backing our candidates. That's because they are candidates of war. I am the president who delivers peace and it's peace through strength. There was a reason we had no conflict, we didn't get into wars, because other countries respected us."

There exists a misconception that Trump — a man who ran on a platform of "bombing the hell out of ISIS” and killing the families of alleged terrorists — is somehow a peace candidate. Considering the above quote, and how Trump is apparently willing to play into our collective amnesia about his foreign policy, let's take a look back and see just how peaceful it actually was.

One of the first actions carried out as president by Trump was personally authorizing a US raid in Yemen targeting "computer materials" containing possible future terror plots. When all was said and done, a school, health facility, and mosque were damaged, and eight women and seven children were dead. Among these casualties was 8-year-old Nora al-Awlaki, who took a bullet to the neck and lasted a grueling two hours before bleeding out. Her 16-year-old brother and his father were also both killed in separate US drone strikes back in 2011 under the Obama administration. All three were US citizens, and only the father was ever accused - never convicted - of terrorism.

By the end of 2017, aerial strikes inside Yemen were up by 21 from the previous year, standing at 131. The following year, the Trump administration bolstered funding and weapons to the oppressive dictatorship of Saudi Arabia to allow them to expand their campaign in Yemen.

In Pakistan, drone strikes continued, even if sporadically. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism counted five US attacks inside the country as of 2017, and at least one drone strike as of mid-2018.

In Somalia, the Trump administration doubled the number of US airstrikes in 2017 compared to those seen during 2016, while also increasing the Obama-era number of US forces there, bringing the total to 500. Five attacks inside Somalia killed or injured 50 civilians in 2017, with at least two involving US aircraft. Trump withdrew most US troops from Somalia shortly before leaving office, but Biden returned them.

In Libya, Trump also maintained a US presence following Obama's bloody overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. September 2017 saw Trump's first airstrike in Libya, but certainly not his last. By March 2018, Trump had launched eight confirmed airstrikes inside Libya.

In Afghanistan, by September 2017, the US military under Trump had launched 751 airstrikes, the highest total for any month in seven years of military action in the country. Two months later, Trump followed in the footsteps of Barack Obama by ordering his own "surge" of US troops into the mineral-rich country, bringing the total number to 14,000 US soldiers.

Also in Afghanistan, Trump the Peace Candidate dropped America's largest non-nuclear bomb on the country, killing dozens.

And although Bush sent them into Iraq and Obama sent them into Syria, Trump never bothered pulling US troops out of either country during his term. In fact, shortly after taking office, Trump launched 59 Tomahawk missiles into Syria and made numerous comments about how US troops are only in the country to steal their resources.

Trump killed the Iran nuclear deal, openly assassinated an Iranian general, pushed for a US invasion of oil-rich Venezuela and participated in a failed coup attempt there, boosted defense spending, labeled Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning as traitors, pardoned US troops accused of brutal war crimes in Iraq, allowed US troops to use toxic munitions in Syria and Iraq, revoked a policy requiring US intelligence agencies to publish the number of civilians killed in drone strikes outside of war zones, gave a speech to the CIA and vowed “greater support for America's sixteen intelligence agencies” than they had received from any other President (so much for fighting the deep state), ordered the creation of a new low-yield nuclear warhead, conducted provocative military drills in the Black Sea, signed an executive order to keep the Guantánamo Bay prison camp open, and claimed that torture "absolutely" works.

Did Trump successfully "start" a war? Not quite — although he tried. Even so, he still continued the Bush-era wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Obama-era wars in those places, plus in Syria, Somalia, and Yemen. And Trump certainly didn't improve US relations with these countries, or other countries such as Iran and Venezuela.

Trump might not be a Bush or a Clinton, and yet his behavior while in office made it very clear he won't be a massive departure from their views, especially when it comes to perpetuating an aggressive imperialist foreign policy.