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On January 29, 2002, in his State of the Union address, George W. Bush, the president who fumbled and lurched us into a disastrous war in Iraq, did something that made sense:

He introduced the term the axis of evil.

As we all know, this club was originally comprised of Iran, North Korea, and Iraq. (Since then, nations such as Russia, China, Syria, Venezuela, and Cuba have been assigned to this camp of oppressive military dictatorships, and more recent additions may include Turkey and the Philippines.)

What do these so-called axis-of-evil governments have in common? A penchant for weapons of mass destruction, for one. But more importantly, they all stand in firm opposition to the United States.

Despite this qualification, theres good reason to believe that, more than anything, the US president Donald Trump aches to be a part of the axis of evil cohort. The fact that recent hearings just resulted in a 230 to 197 vote in favor of impeaching Trump offers some support to this argument.

But theres an abundance of other proof that Trump wants to be part of the axis of evil.

Theres a tendency for authoritarian regimes to be run by dictators for life. Russias Vladimir Putin, Chinas Xi Jinping, North Koreas Kim Jong Un, Irans Ayatollah Khamenei, Syrias Bashar al-Assad, Venezuelas Nicols Maduro, Cubas Raul Castroand those two axis hopefuls, Turkeys Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte all show signs they are settling into life-long appointments.

Trump has joked about breakinghis two-term limit.And his current campaign manager, Brad Parscale, has bragged openly that The Trumps will be a dynasty that lasts for decades.

In March of 2018, Trump hinted to a private group of Republican donors at Mar-a-Lago that hed like to be a dictator for life, likeChinas Xi, reportedly saying, I think its great. Maybe well want to give it a shot someday.

Theres nothing wrong with wanting to belong. In fact, it might be one of Trumps most human traits.

One call from Erdogan was enough to persuade the US president to pull out of Syria virtually overnight, abandoning the Kurdish allies who have been instrumental in evicting ISIS from their territories. Shortly after the Turkish government launched an offensive on those same Kurds, driving more than 160,000 out of their homes, Trump entertained Erdogan in the White House.

Meanwhile, Trump has more or less handed Putin what he wants the mostthe dissolution of the Western alliance. Leading up to recent NATO talks,Trump trashed NATO and did everything in his power to telegraph his feeling that NATO is obsoletebut somehow still cheating the US out of money.Trump delivered an even more ominous message to NATOin October when he pulled out of Syria pretty much overnight, handed the Middle East to Putin, and left our Kurdish allies to be ravaged by Turkish forces.

Not convinced that Trump wants to join the axis of evil? Lets look way back in time.In 1987, the Russian government flew Trumpmerely a fraudulent real estate magnate at the timeand his then-wife Ivana to Moscow for an all-expenses-paid trip to discuss developing a Trump tower in Moscow.

Trump reportedly came back from the trip and immediately began to spout a Kremlin-implanted, Western-alliance-breaking memethat Americas allies were ripping us off.

Or, as his spokesperson at the time put it, Hes sick and tired of seeing other countries take advantage of America.

Trump felt so passionately that this Russian propaganda was true that he took out full-page ads in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Boston Globe to promote the Moscow-crafted meme.

Its becoming more difficult to deny that ideas go directly from the mouth of Putin to Trumps tongueor more often, his Twitter feed.

During a February 2017 Budapest press conference with another eager axis of evil candidate, Hungarys Viktor Orban, Putin said, As we all know, during the presidential campaign in the United States, the Ukrainian government adopted a unilateral position in favor of one candidate.

He continued, More than that, certain oligarchs, certainly with the approval of the political leadership, funded this candidate, or female candidate, to be more precise.

According to Putin, the real meddlers in Americas 2016 presidential campaign were a crew of Ukrainian rich guys who bankrolled Hillary Clinton.

Trump has picked up this story and run with it,right down to reportedly proclaiming that Ukraine is a terrible place, theyre all corrupt, theyre terrible people, they tried to take me down.

Yes, thanks to Putin, Trump believes that it wasnt the Russians who sabotaged the American presidential election of 2016. It was the Ukrainians.

Even the favors Trump tried to extort from the new Ukrainian president are based on the ideas Putin spoon-fed him, from investigating Hunter Bidens Burisma deal in Ukraine to Ukraines alleged interference in the 2016 American presidential election.

Or, as Trump put it in this White House transcript of his July 26thphone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky:

I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike I guess you have one of your wealthy people The server, they say Ukrainehas it.

For a quick glossary:

The server is Hillary Clintons alleged missing server.

CrowdStrike is the firm that ferreted out the Russian penetration of Hillary Clinton and former White House chief of staff John Podestas emails five months before the election,a company that Trump believes is owned by Ukrainians (its not, its owned by Dmitri Alperovitch, who came to the US as a child from Russia).

The wealthy people are the oligarchs Putin talked about in his Budapest press conference.

And the whole fantasy is very transparently one of Putinsbits of tantalizing misinformation.

Trump has routinely violated the Constitutional principle of the eighth amendment, created to prevent the government from using the power of office for cruel and unusual punishment.

But Trumps policies have been both cruel and unusual.

He seeks to deter immigration by inflicting maximum pain on peopleincluding unaccompanied childrenwho are seeking a better life.

He pardoned three men the military had already convicted of war crimes.

Trumps recent statement about Ukraine ambassador Marie YovanovitchShes going to go through some thingsshows the instincts of an intolerant totalitarian.

Trumps condemnation of the press as the enemy of the people shows his desire for a media that acts only as his mouthpiece (like state media in Russia, North Korea, and China, for example).

For 27 years, we have stood by the Ukrainians and their aspirations for a Western-style democracy. Ukraine has historically been a bulwark against Russia.They are on the Russian border. And they have been attacked and invaded by Russias little green menRussians on the Kremlin payroll whose uniforms dont indicate what country they come from.

Since Russia seized the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine in 2014 it has run a continuing war in the countrys Donbass region to establish separatist peoples republics in Ukraines Donetsk and Luhansk regions. So far, the war has killed 12,000 Ukrainians, and has forced 1.5 millionto flee their homes. Ukrainian forces have had to dig a World War I-style trench 250 miles long to defend themselves.

In the course of the recent impeachment hearing and rulings, one thing has become clear: Americas Congress and State Department are deeply committed to the Ukrainian cause. Donald Trump is not.

To understand Trumps deep emotional yearning to join his buddies Putin, Xi, and Kim in the axis of evil club house, put yourself in Donald Trumps position. First, you have to get into the mental and emotional mindset of a grammar-school bully. You are a coward when it comes to people your own size, but you know from experience that you can make yourself feel smart and tough by beating up on kids smaller than you. But youve heard of other bullies in other school yards who are even tougher than you are.And when you meet the top bully, the one with the biggest, baddest reputation of all, you simper, you cower, you cringe, and you become a sycophant.

If theres a club where all the bullies meet,you want in.

And who is running the hottest inner circle of bullies on planet Earth today?Vladimir Putin.And Donald Trump wants in.

Most of his presidency so far has been in service of earning the acceptance and admiration of the bullies who established political play yard dominance long before he even entered politics.

Putin has been on the cover of Forbes Magazine more than once. In emulation, Trump had fake Time Magazine covers made featuring himself and placed them prominently on his wall long before he ran for president.

Theres nothing wrong with wanting to belong. In fact, it might be one of Trumps most human traits, one we can actually identify with.

But this particular club just happens to be the axis of evil, the gang that is out to replace American political values of democracy and freedom of speech with totalitarianism.

Totalitarianism and something Donald Trump is trying hard to establish: a cult of personality. A dictatorial presidency. And, in the manner of Kim Jong Uns family, a dynasty.

Satire and ridicule aside, the radical rebalancing of alliances is one of the biggest political shifts a nation can undergo, short of war.Trump has delivered the axis of evils wet dream and has taken the Western alliance off the table. That is a tectonic shift in geopolitics.And in the long run, it will have an impact on your future and mine.

Read more:
Trumps bid to join the axis of evil - Quartz

On Friday, Facebook and Twitter shut down a network of fake accounts that pushed pro-Trump messages all while masquerading as Americans with AI-generated faces as profile photos.

In a blog post, Facebook said that it connected the accounts to a US-based media company called The BL that, it claims, has ties to Epoch Media Group. In August, NBC News first reported that Epoch Media Group was pushing messages in support of President Donald Trump across social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Epoch has extensive connections to Falun Gong, an eccentric Chinese spiritual community that has faced significant persecution from the countrys central government.

While the Epoch Times denied any connection to The BL in a statement to The Verge, Facebook begs to differ: With all due respect to the publisher of the Epoch Times, he may not know executives at The BL were active admins on Epoch Media Group Pages as recently as this morning when their accounts were deactivated and the BL was removed, a Facebook spokesperson tells us.

Facebook noted that many of the fake accounts used in the latest campaign employed false profile photos that appeared to have been generated by artificial intelligence. Those accounts would post BL content in other Facebook groups while pretending to be Americans. Pro-Trump messages were often posted at very high frequencies and linked to off-platform sites belonging to the BL and The Epoch Times. The accounts and pages were managed by individuals in the US and Vietnam.

Facebook said that it removed 610 accounts, 89 Facebook pages, 156 groups, and 72 Instagram accounts that were connected to the organization. Around 55 million accounts followed one of these Facebook pages and 92,000 followed at least one of the Instagram accounts. The organization spent nearly $9.5 million in advertisements, according to Facebook.

The BL is now banned from Facebook, Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebooks head of security policy, said in a statement. We are continuing to investigate all linked networks, and will take action as appropriate if we determine they are engaged in deceptive behavior.

Update, December 20th at 3:51 PM ET: Updated to include that The Epoch Times denies any connection to The BL, and clarified that it is Facebook which is alleging that based on its own internal investigation.

Update, December 20th at 8:10 PM ET: Added additional comment from a Facebook spokesperson.

Read more:
Facebook and Twitter shutter pro-Trump network reaching 55 million accounts - The Verge

North Korea may have been the one issue on which President Donald Trump apparently listened to his predecessor, Barack Obama, when he warned about the serious challenge facing the incoming occupant of the Oval Office. Nevertheless, Trump initially drove tensions between the two countries to a fever pitch, raising fears of war in the midst of proclamations of fire and fury. Then he played statesman and turned toward diplomacy, meeting North Koreas supreme leader, Kim Jong-un, in Singapore.

Today that effort looks kaput. The North has declared denuclearization to be off the table. Actually, few people other than the president apparently believed that Kim was prepared to turn over his nuclear weapons to a government predisposed toward intervention and regime change.

Now that this Trump policy is formally dead, and there is no Plan B in sight, Pyongyang has begun deploying choice terms from its fabled thesaurus of insults. Democrats are sure to denounce the administration for incompetent naivete. And the bipartisan war party soon will be beating the drums for more sanctions, more florid rhetoric, additional military deployments, new plans for war. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) already has dismissed the risks since any conflict would be over there, on the distant Korean Peninsula. At which point Trumps heroic summitry, which offered a dramatic opportunity to break decades of deadly stalemate, will be judged a failure.

If the president had racked up several successeswars ended, peace achieved, disputes settled, relations strengthenedthen one disappointment wouldnt matter much. However, his record is an unbroken string of broken promises, opportunities squandered, principles violated, and intentions abandoned.

There is no relationship more important than that between the United States and the Peoples Republic of China. Despite Trumps supposed friendship with Chinas Xi Jinping, the trade war rages to the detriment of both countries. Americans have suffered from both the presidents tariffs and Chinas retaliation, with no end in sight. Despite hopes for a resolution, Beijing is hanging tough and obviously doubts the presidents toughness, given the rapidly approaching election.

Beyond economics, the relationship is deteriorating sharply. Disagreements and confrontations over everything from geopolitics to human rights have driven the two countries apart, with the administration lacking any effective strategy to positively influence Chinas behavior. The presidents myopic focus on trade has left him without a coherent strategy elsewhere.

Perhaps the presidents most pronounced and controversial promise of the 2016 campaign was to improve relations with Russia. However, despite another supposedly positive personal relationship, the Trump administration has applied more sanctions on Moscow, provided more anti-Russian aid to Ukraine, further increased funds and troops to NATO Europe, and sent home more Russian diplomats than the Obama administration.

Worse, Washington has made no serious effort to resolve the standoff over Ukraine. No one imagines Moscow returning Crimea to Ukraineor giving in on any other issue without meaningful concessions regarding Kiev. Instead of moderating and minimizing bilateral frictions, the administration has made Russia more likely today than before to cooperate with China against Washington and contest American objectives in the Middle East, Africa, and even Latin America.

Although Trump promised to stop Americas endless wars, as manyif not moreU.S. military personnel are abroad today as when he took office. He increased the number of troops in Afghanistan and is now seeking to negotiate an exit that would force Washington to remain to enforce the agreement. This war has been burning for more than eighteen years.

The administration has maintained Washingtons illegal deployment in Syria, shifting one contingent away from the Turkish-Kurdish battle while inserting new forces to confiscate Syrian oil fieldsa move that lacks domestic authority and violates international law. A few hundred Americans cannot achieve their many other supposed objectives, such as eliminating Russian, Iranian, and other malign influences and forcing Syrias President Bashar al-Assad to resign or inaugurate democracy. However, their presence will ensure Americas continued entanglement in a conflict of great complexity but minimal security interest.

The Saudi government remains corrupt, incompetent, repressive, reckless and dependent on the United States. Only Washingtons refusal to retaliate against Iran for its presumed attack on Saudi oil facilities caused Riyadh to turn to diplomacy toward Tehran, yet the president then increased U.S. military deployments, turning American military personnel into bodyguards for the Saudi royals. The recent terrorist attack by the pilot-in-trainingpresumably to join his colleagues in slaughtering Yemeni civiliansadded to the already high cost of the bilateral relationship.

The administrations policy of maximum pressure has proved to be a complete bust around the world. As noted earlier, North Korea proved unwilling to disarm despite the increased financial pressure caused by U.S. sanctions. North Koreans are hurting, but their government, like Washington, places security first.

Russia, too, is no more willing to yield Crimea, which was oncepart of Russia and isthe Black Sea naval base of Sebastopol. Several European governments also disagree with the United States, having pressed to lighten or eliminate current sanctions. The West will have to offer more than the status quo to roll back Moscows military advances.

Before Trump became president, Iran was well contained, despite its malign regional activities. The Islamic regime was hemmed in by Israel and the Gulf States, backed by nations as diverse as Egypt and America. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, sharply curtailed Irans nuclear activities and placed the country under an intensive oversight regime. Now Tehran has reactivated its nuclear program, expanded its regional interventions, interfered with Gulf shipping, and demonstrated its ability to devastate Saudi oil production. To Americas consternation, its Persian Gulf allies now are more willing to deal with Iran than before.

Additionally, the Trump administration has largely destroyed hope for reform in Cuba by reversing the Obama administrations progress toward normalizing relations and discouraging visits byand trade withAmericans. The entrepreneurs I spoke to when I visited Cuba two years ago made large investments in anticipation of a steadily increasing number of U.S. visitors but were devastated when Washington shut off the flow. What had been a steadily expanding private sector was knocked back and the regime, with Raoul Castro still dominant behind the scenes, again can blame America for its own failings. There is no evidence that extending the original embargo and additional sanctions, which began in 1960, will free anyone.

For a time, Venezuela appeared to be an administration priority. As usual, Trump applied economic sanctions, this time on a people whose economy essentially had collapsed. Washington threatened more sanctions and military invasion but to no avail. Then the president and his top aides breathed fire and fury, insisting that both China and Russia stay out, again without success. Eventually, the president appeared to simply lose interest and drop any mention of the once urgent crisis. The corrupt, repressive Maduro regime remains in power.

So far, the presidents criticisms of Americas alliances have gone for naught. Until now, his appointees, all well-disposed toward maintaining generous subsidies for Americas international fan club, have implemented his policies. More recently, the administration demanded substantial increases in host nation support, but in almost every negotiation so far the president has given way, accepting minor, symbolic gains. He is likely to end up like his predecessor, whining a lot but gaining very little from Americas security dependents.

Beyond that, there is little positive to say. Trump and Indias Narendra Modi are much alike, which is no compliment to either, but institutional relations have changed little. Turkeys incipient dictator, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, receives a free pass from the president for the formersabuses and crimes. But even so Congress is thoroughly arrayed against Ankara for sins both domestic and foreign.

The presidents aversion to genuine free trade and the curious belief that buying inexpensive, quality products from abroad is a negative has created problems with many close allies, including Canada, Mexico, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and multiple European states. Perhaps only with Israel are Washingtons relations substantially improved, and that reflects the presidents abandonment of any serious attempt to promote a fair and realistic peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

This is an extraordinarily bad record after almost three years in office. Something good still might happen between now and November 3, 2020. However, more issues are likely to get worse. Imagine North Korean missile and nuclear tests, renewed Russian attempts to influence Western elections, a bloody Chinese crackdown in Hong Kong, increased U.S.-European trade friction, more U.S. pressure on Iran matched by asymmetric responses, and more. At the moment, there is no reason to believe any of the resulting confrontations would turn out well.

Most Americans vote on the economy, and the president is currently riding a wave of job creation. If that ends before the November vote, then international issues might matter more. If so, then the president may regret that he failed to follow through on his criticism of endless war and irresponsible allies. Despite his very different persona, his results dont look all that different from those achieved by Barack Obama and other leading Democrats.

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. He is a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan and the author of several books, including Foreign Follies: Americas New Global Empire.

View post:
The Tragedy of Donald Trump: His Presidency Is Marred with Failure - The National Interest Online

Berlin has accused Washington of interfering in German internal affairs, after Donald Trump signed off on US sanctions against companies building a Russian natural gas pipeline to Germany.

"The Federal Government rejects such extraterritorial sanctions," Ulrike Demmer, a spokeswoman, said in Berlin on Saturday.

They affect German and European companies and constitute an interference in our domestic affairs."

The US is an outspoken opponent of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which will transport natural gas about 750 miles from Russia, through the Baltic Sea and into Germany.

The sanctions will hit any company working with Russias state-owned Gazprom to complete the project.

On Saturday, Switzerland-based Allseas, which operates ships laying sections of the undersea pipeline, said it was suspending work on the 8.5 billion project, which is well advanced.

Washington and Eastern European countries oppose the project because it will increase the EUs heavy dependence on Russian gas imports.

The pipeline will double Russian energy imports into Germany and, the US fears, give the Kremlin leverage over the EU and its leading economy.

See the rest here:
Berlin outraged after Donald Trump hits gas pipeline project with sanctions - The Telegraph

Troops' opinion of Trump heads down A new Military Times survey of active duty troops reveals that President Trump's favorability among service members continues to slide. Approval of the president's performance has been on the decline since the initial poll in 2016. While his numbers remain higher than President Obama's, he lost ground among many subsets in 2019.

President Donald Trump received a loud ovation when he participated in the coin toss ahead of Saturdays Army-Navy football rivalry game in Philadelphia. But troops actual feelings about the commander in chief appear much more ambivalent in the latest Military Times survey.

Half of active-duty military personnel contacted in the poll held an unfavorable view of President Trump, showing a continued decline in his approval rating since he was elected in 2016.

Trumps 42 percent approval in the latest poll, conducted from Oct. 23 to Dec. 2, sets his lowest mark in the survey since being elected president. Some 50 percent of troops said they had an unfavorable view of him. By comparison, just a few weeks after his electoral victory in November 2016, 46 percent of troops surveyed had a positive view of the businessman-turned-politician, and 37 percent had a negative opinion.

But the latest numbers still leave Trump with a higher approval rating than former President Barack Obama when he left office in January 2017.

The numbers also show that Trump remains slightly more popular in the military community than among the American public as a whole. The latest Gallup poll had the presidents disapproval rating among the public at 54 percent, and his approval at 43 percent.

The poll surveyed 1,630 active-duty Military Times subscribers in partnership with the Institute for Veterans and Military Families (IVMF) at Syracuse University. The numbers likely reflect a more career-minded subset of the military than the force as a whole, according to Peter Feaver, a former White House adviser to former President George W. Bush who is now a political science professor at Duke University.

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These are people for whom the morals and standards of the military mean a lot, he said. The president has criticized those same career workers in the State Department and other agencies. So, its possible they are more likely to be offended by the president than other parts of the military.

Still, Feaver said, the drop in Trumps popularity in the poll (conducted with the same parameters over the past four years) indicates growing dissatisfaction with Trump and his handling of several military issues.

When asked specifically about Trumps handling of military issues, nearly 48 percent of the troops surveyed said they had an unfavorable view of that part of his job, compared to 44 percent who believe he has handled that task well. That marks a significant drop from the 2018 Military Times poll, when 59 percent said they were happy with his handling of military issues, against 20 percent who had an unfavorable view.

In the time since the 2018 poll, Trump fired his popular former defense secretary, retired Marine Corps Gen. Jim Mattis. Trump also ordered a controversial and sudden withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria, and became the subject of impeachment hearings in the House over the delay of military assistance funding to Ukraine.

Also, in the days before the poll closed in December, Trump made the controversial decision to grant clemency to three warfighters accused of war crimes, a move that was opposed by many military leaders at the Pentagon.

Over time, as the president has been involved with more controversial things connected to the military whether its the border wall or the pardons or the way that Secretary Mattis left that has changed the view of him, said retired Marine Corps Col. Dave Lapan, who worked as a department spokesman during both the administrations of Trump and Obama.

And theyve seen more indications that he hasnt been a great commander in chief. So, theyre moving closer to where the rest of the public is.

Similar to past surveys, this poll showed significant gaps in views of the president among various subsets of the military.

Trump is far more popular with enlisted service members than with officers. Among the enlisted force, the recent survey showed a 43 percent favorable rating. For officers, however, only one-third responded with a positive view.

Military men appear to be more supportive of Trump compared to military women. Among men, the survey shows a 43 percent favorable view, while among women service members, 53 percent of women expressed a very unfavorable rating of Trump and 56 percent responded negatively.

The survey also shows a gap among white and non-white service members. Among whites, 46 percent of troops had a favorable view of the president, versus 45 percent with an unfavorable view. Yet among non-white service members nearly two-thirds responded with a negative view of him.

Some of the shift in military sentiments could be linked to the firing of Mattis, who a year after his dismissal still enjoys an exceptionally high 86 percent favorability rating among all service members in the poll.

Trumps replacement for Mattis, current Defense Secretary Mark Esper, does not inspire strong feelings one way or the other. Esper drew a 24 percent approval rating from troops and a 20 percent disapproval rating, with 56 percent saying they have no strong opinion of the Pentagon leader.

Troops surveyed by Military Times offered generally upbeat assessments of Trumps steps in Afghanistan (59 percent said they approve of plans to negotiate with the Taliban and reduce troop levels there) and his promises to intervene less overseas (47 percent believe he will keep U.S. forces out of another major military conflict).

Yet 58 percent of those polled said they disapprove of Trumps decision to withdraw U.S. forces from northern Syria in the face of Turkish military advances.

When asked about Trumps decision to use military construction funds to build his controversial southern border wall, 59 percent said they disapprove of his decision. More than half rated current U.S. relations with traditional allies like NATO as poor.

Lapan said he thinks those topics have had more resonance with troops than some of the controversies early in Trumps presidency, like his public spats with former prisoner of war Sen. John McCain.

His comments with McCain were upsetting to a lot of folks, but it was probably more in the senior ranks, he said. For junior troops, Mattis is much more popular. And these other decisions affect them. So they are changing their minds more.

Troops were split evenly on the ongoing impeachment proceedings in Congress. In the poll, 47 percent said they back the impeachment, 46 percent said they were opposed. Thats roughly the same breakdown as the rest of the American public.

Feaver called that an interesting and potentially problematic finding, given that Trump will still be commander in chief if he is impeached by the House but acquitted by the Senate.

Im sure senior leaders wont be happy seeing that half of them wanted him impeached, given the efforts to keep troops out of politics," Feaver said.

More than three-fourths of troops surveyed said they believe the military community has become more polarized in recent years, with about 40 percent saying they have seen significantly more division in the ranks.

Still more popular than Obama

Military and veteran voters overwhelmingly backed Trump in the 2016 election, according to exit polls. And even with the dip in his popularity shown in the recent Military Times poll, Trumps support among troops remains higher than his predecessor when he left office.

When Obama left office in January 2017, a Military Times poll showed that 52 percent of troops had a negative opinion of him, against 36 percent with a positive opinion.

As negative as some of the views are in the poll toward Trump, they have not yet reached the levels of disapproval voiced by troops in the final military survey before Obama left office.

Then, service members blasted the Obamas decision to decrease military personnel (71 percent said end strength needed to grow after years of decreases) and questioned his moves to withdraw combat troops from Iraq (59 percent say it made America less safe).

In the latest poll, respondents identifying themselves as conservative (about one-third of the total) still outnumbered the liberals (almost one-quarter) by a significant margin.

And the poll shows a subtle shift toward more service members identifying as political independents, who now make up 45 percent of respondents, an uptick of 3 percent compared to the 2018 survey.

This years survey saw an increase in the number of Democrats (about 3 percent more) and a decrease in the number of those who considered themselves members of the Republican or Libertarian parties (about 7 percent less, combined) from the 2018 survey.

Feaver said that breakdown may be more indicative of the Military Times readership than changes in the whole of the military. But he also said that the findings give an important insight into the armed forces that few other polls can reach.

Its a useful thermometer of that segment of the military that is more career-minded, he said.

We know the military tends to follow the general public but lag conservative. We know that Trump is not as popular with the general public as he has been, and that he hasnt really built upon his base. Now were seeing that reflected in the military, too.

The annual Military Times readers survey is one of the only public metrics that evaluate the personal views of service members.

Defense Department does not conduct any public opinion polls on political issues and has significant restrictions on media access to service members for their personal opinions.

Between Oct. 23 and Dec. 2, Military Times in collaboration with the Institute for Veterans and Military Families at Syracuse University conducted a voluntary, confidential online survey of U.S. service members. Poll participants are readers of Military Times publications whose military status is verified through official Defense Department email addresses.

The survey included 28 questions on service members opinions related to the current political climate, policy and national security in the United States.

The survey received 1,630 responses from active-duty troops. The IVMF used standard methodology to weight the results according to the rank, gender and service branch of the actual U.S. military. The margin of error for most questions was roughly 2 percent.

Like most studies where participation is voluntary, the polls sample is subject to self-selection bias. Researchers sought to account for that and adhered to generally accepted scientific practices analyzing the data.

The survey audience was 92 percent male and 8 percent female. The respondents identified themselves as 75 percent white, 14 percent Hispanic, 13 percent African American, 5 percent Asian and 5 percent other ethnicities. Respondents were able to select more than one race.

The Military Times and the researchers at IVMF have used identical methodologies for this survey since 2016.

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Half of active-duty service members are unhappy with Trump, new Military Times poll shows - Military Times