"There’s a lot of hysterical noise coming from our foreign policy and national security establishments, but they have good reason to panic:
1. Trump promises to depart from the guiding principles that have informed defense, diplomacy, and trade for the past 40 years; and most of Washington has staked everything on the status quo.
2. Foreign policy and national security experts spent years condemning populism and demonizing Trump, with some going so far as to actively subvert his agenda and break laws and bend rules to destroy him. Retribution is a real and terrifying possibility.
3. Washington has long been a permissive environment, where waste, incompetence, corruption, and conflicts of interest are allowed to flourish. Lives, careers, and fortunes now hang in the balance.
4. Most importantly, foreign policy, and to a lesser extent, national security, have always belonged to America’s elite. Trump and his movement now threaten their prestige and authority, not to mention the humiliation of having to answer to political appointees you deeply despise.