Foreign Policy

The Trump Administration Promised a Pivot From the Middle East to East Asia. It's Doing the Opposite.

The U.S. military is downsizing exercises in South Korea and pulling its last aircraft carrier out of the Pacific.

Matthew Petti | 8.18.2026 2:25 PM

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The U.S. military is more naked in East Asia than it has been for a while. The USS George Washington, the last U.S. aircraft carrier in the region, is heading out to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Middle East. President Donald Trump also announced on Sunday that he would "substantially reduce" planned military exercises in South Korea.

"​​While somewhat unrelated (?), I recently asked the President of South Korea if they would like to join us in the Denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said, 'No thanks!'" he wrote in his announcement.

In other words, the U.S. presence in Asia is taking a back seat to the U.S. presence in the Middle East. (Three months ago, a Navy official also admitted to Congress that the U.S. was pausing weapons sales to Taiwan because of how much ammunition it used up in Iran.) That is a complete reversal of the strategy that the Trump administration promised when it came to office.

Trump's top military planner, Elbridge Colby, has long preached that the cold war with China is the single greatest challenge to U.S. power, and that Middle Eastern wars are sapping resources away from it. Vice President J.D. Vance expressed similar views, calling potential war with Iran a "huge distraction of resources." The National Security Strategy published by the administration in 2025 declared that "the days in which the Middle East dominated American foreign policy in both long-term planning and day-to-day execution are thankfully over."

The Middle East is now, in fact, dominating both the long-term planning and day-to-day execution of the Trump administration's foreign policy. It was largely by choice. Trump came to........

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