Would Isolationist Presidents Cause War?

Abstract

In American politics, it has been seen that the presidents, who came to power from an isolationist perspective, contrary to their rhetoric, find themselves in the greatest wars in American History. In this study, it was researched whether the isolationist rhetoric of some Presidents who were sitting in the presidency during the period of the great chaos experienced in the USA and the world resulted in great wars, or whether the discourses that winning the elections to these Presidents should have an isolationist approach as a result of decomposition of the world and reflection of economic problems to their countries. The assumption of this study is that the Presidents who won the elections with their isolationist rhetoric were later faced with major wars during their presidency as a result of the processes that had laid their foundations before they were President and their infrastructure had been formed in the light of developments in the world. In this context, the internal political and international conjuncture of William McKinley, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt periods will be evaluated. Accordingly, domestic and foreign policy statements and decisions of the presidents will be analyzed. As a result of the analysis carried out in the conclusion section, there will be an inference and foresight on American internal policy and foreign policy regarding the isolationist discourse in the Donald Trump period that is on the agenda.