Ramaswamy wary of Israeli ground invasion of Gaza, calls for ‘revival of realism’ in foreign policy

GOP presidential contender Vivek Ramaswamy said Tuesday he is worried that an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza will trigger a series of events that will pull the U.S. into a larger conflict.

Mr. Ramaswamy said he fears an invasion would increase the chances that the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah launched an attack on Israel from the north.

“Israel is then in a two-front war,” Mr. Ramaswamy said in a speech at the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington. “There is no reasonable scenario to which, if Israel’s own existence is on the line, the U.S. isn’t going to get involved militarily to protect Israel.”

Mr. Ramaswamy said he fears that would lead to U.S. targets, including the embassy in Baghdad, being attacked in the region, sparking a “long-term, prolonged, likely no-win war in the Middle East.”

“Israel has a right to exist and a right to defend itself, but I worry about two separate questions that I don’t think have been debated sufficiently: Is Israel even likely to succeed in that ground invasion and even if it does reach its stated objective of toppling Hamas, will that victory merely be pyrrhic in nature?” he said. “What succeeds Hamas 1.0 might be a worse version.”

Outlining his broader foreign policy vision, Mr. Ramaswamy called for a “revival of realism” that he said “departs from the consensus of the last 25 years” and “puts the interests of American citizens first — full stop.”

“I summarize my foreign policy in a nutshell with three simple objectives: avoid World War III, declare economic independence from China and then secure the American homeland, protecting our own borders,” he said.

Mr. Ramaswamy said he is aware his views set him apart from several of his rivals for the 2024 GOP presidential race — including when it comes to U.S. support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.

“I do not believe that this war advances American interests,” he said. “To the contrary, I am deeply concerned that we are marching our way into major conflict with a nuclear power in Russia at a moment when we have for the first time since the early 1970s” been going without a nuclear nonproliferation agreement with Russia.

“I worry that the Russia-China alliance is the single greatest threat to the future existence of the United States of America,” he said. “I worry our continued engagement militarily in Ukraine is driving Russia further into China’s hands by the day, strengthening that Russia-China military alliance.”

He said the U.S. should strike a deal to end the war that involves preventing Ukraine from joining NATO and ceding parts of Ukraine to Russia in exchange for Moscow exiting its military alliance with China.

The nation’s role on the world stage tends to take a back seat to domestic challenges in presidential campaigns. But that has not been the case in the 2024 presidential race.

The United States’ continued support for Ukraine in its war with Russia, and the growing role it could play in the Israel-Palestinian conflict following the Hamas terrorist attack, has put foreign policy back on the front burner.

The events also have exposed a deep divide between President Biden and several of his other GOP allies — most notably former President Donald Trump.

Mr. Trump and others, including Mr. Ramaswamy, have rallied around a populist vision that is anchored in focusing more on pressing issues at home, and less on European alliances and being the world’s policeman.

The latest schism has centered around Mr. Biden’s $105 billion request for military aid — mostly for Israel and Ukraine — from Congress as part of a package that he says will beef up American security.

Mr. Trump has railed against Mr. Biden’s response to the Hamas attack, taking particular aim at the Democrat for linking the conflicts playing out in Gaza and Ukraine.

“Crooked Joe Biden gave one of the most dangerous and deluded speeches ever delivered from the Oval Office,” Mr. Trump said this week in New Hampshire. “Crooked Joe went before the American people and said that if you want to support Israel you have to give a blank check for the proxy war also in Ukraine.

“The world is exploding,” Mr. Trump said.

Mr. Ramaswamy piled on at the Hudson Institute, saying the Biden “aid package represents strategic insanity.”