Trump Bets on Diplomacy Without Diplomats

“Over the past year, the Trump administration has engaged in unconventional diplomacy, gunboat diplomacy and, in the most sensitive crises, diplomacy without diplomats,” the New York Times reports.

“On Tuesday, the administration tried all three tactics at once. In Geneva, President Trump’s most trusted envoys — his real estate friend Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner — engaged the Iranians in the morning, then the Russians and the Ukrainians in the afternoon.”

“It was a stark example of Mr. Trump’s conviction that the State Department and the National Security Council, the two institutions that have coordinated negotiations over global crises for nearly 80 years, are best left on the sidelines.”