Trump doing 'exactly the opposite' of 'peace through strength': ex-deputy Pentagon press secretary

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U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media on board Air Force One en route to the U.S., October 30, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

During the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan's allies often described his hawkish foreign policy as "peace through strength." And the peace-through-strength argument was subsequently used under GOP Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush.

Greatly influenced by paleoconservative Patrick Buchanan, President Donald Trump's America First ideology is — from a foreign policy standpoint — a departure from previous Republican presidents in many respects. Trump and his MAGA allies, however, often use the peace-through-strength argument while praising him as the "peace president."

But during a Thursday morning, October 30 appearance on CNN, global affairs specialist Sabrina Singh argued that Trump's policies are "exactly the opposite" of "peace through strength."

Singh has a long resumé in government, serving as deputy Pentagon press secretary under former President Joe Biden. In that role, she worked extensively with then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. And before that, Singh was deputy press secretary for then-Vice President Kamala Harris. In 2016, Singh served as communications director for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.

When host Kate Bolduan quoted her CNN colleague as saying that Trump's U.S. Defense Department directives are not "peace through strength," Singh responded, "This is exactly the opposite of the president's policy of his so-called peace through strength. You know, every year, the laboratories of the nuclear weapons labs in the United Sates send a letter to the Department of Defense Energy and the Nuclear Weapons Council certifying that our nuclear weapons are safe and secure and a deterrent — that they do not need to be tested. Think of it as this: As these labs test every single part of our nuclear arsenal, similar to how you would test a car, except they never turn on the engine of the car."

Singh continued, "So, if we turn on the engine of the car, you are essentially giving carte blanche to other nations around the world, like Russia and China, to start testing their nuclear weapons — which, in theory, could lead to a nuclear arms race and or an arms race."

The CNN global affairs specialist noted that the Russian government, under President Vladimir Putin, sees Trump' "words as something to be taken seriously."

Singh told Bolduan, "The president (is) outlining that the United States could begin nuclear testing — something that we haven't done since 1992. And, by the way, the U.S., while it didn't ratify in Congress, is a signer to a treaty ban on nuclear testing that has ensured strength and security and peace throughout the world against nuclear testing. And so, I think what Russia is saying here is that if the United States is going to start doing this, we're going to start doing it too."

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