The U.S. has "entered a period of maximum vulnerability" between now and the inauguration of the country's next president, former deputy national security adviser KT McFarland warned on Newsmax.
"The bad guys – the Russians, the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Iranians – they're looking at the United States and saying 'That's a weak country. It's a country in decline. Look at its leader, Joe Biden. He's clearly a leader in decline and this is our moment of taking advantage of it,'" McFarland told Wednesday's "Wake Up America."
"They all think Donald Trump is going to be elected president in November," she continued. "And they all know, when that happens, then there's a tough guy in the White House, a guy who will use tariffs against China to get what we want, who will have a military buildup, who will have a technology buildup.
"And most importantly, as Donald Trump says: on day one, drill, baby, drill. What that means is we're going to start turning on the American energy industry, and we're going to bankrupt Russia. We're going to bankrupt Iran."
Russian President Vladimir Putin's trip to North Korea this week was intended to show the West that "this is the new Cold War," McFarland continued.
"This is Cold War 2.0 and this is the axis of evil," she said. "Not only did Putin go, but he brought his entire senior leadership with him. So, it isn't just a meeting; it's a summit meeting. And, as a result of their summit meeting, North Korea and Russia have pledged a mutual defense treaty like the kind we have with our NATO allies.
"I think what this is, more of a signal, is Putin saying to [Secretary of State] Antony Blinken, among others, he's saying, 'Look, if you do anything in Ukraine, if you escalate this in any way, then Russia can call on North Korea, Russia can call on Iran, Russia can call on its brand-new allies to go after you.'"
Commenting on the deployment of a fleet of Russian war ships to the Port of Havana in Cuba, McFarland said a speech by Obama Secretary of State John Kerry comes to mind.
"He basically said the era of the Monroe Doctrine is dead," she said. "The Monroe Doctrine was a founding principle of the American republic, saying that we will not tolerate powerful forces in the Western Hemisphere. At the time, they meant the European ones, but now it's pretty applicable to Russia. That's what John F. Kennedy did. That's what Ronald Reagan did when I worked for him, when he told the Russians to get out of Grenada.
"So, we're now seeing the Russians are back, and they're doing it because they can do it."
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Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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