Trump is smarter than he looks but he seems to be quite ignorant. Or he's just stroking up the nationalistic views.
The US cannot completely disengage and cannot stop being an empire, its what's keeping it alive.
If we disengage why do Japan, China, the Gulf Arabs and everyone else have to buy US treasury bills to keep the USA free credit card going on perpetually?
As soon as the plug is pulled, wouldn't the US sink into a depression that makes 1929 look like a day in a picnic?
The rest of the worlds economies will collapse too, as world trade stops.
China and Russia have become very strategic together to working on alternative financial and trade structure to weather the future storm and sanctions. It's why they were pushing so hard for the Iran Deal and why Iran may become a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. But even 20 years from now the best they could do would be maybe 20% of current trade probably less.
Trump also says silly things like Japanese, South Koreans and Germans should pay more for the upkeep of the US troops stationed there.
The reality is that they do shoulder the burden, but making them pay for everything means risking exposing the imperial structure and the reality of those countries relationship with the US.
It would show the world and the citizens of these countries that they are a vassal and not truly independent, people might wake up and develop nationalistic feelings that will be anti-American and anti-empire.
This is why the Establishment has been telling Trump to let sleeping dogs lie..ignorance and apathy should be cultivated.
