Donald Trump’s speech on foreign policy last week failed to offer anything new from the contradictory nonsense that he has been pushing all through his campaign, trying to unite his confused ideas under his “America First” theme. Rather than coming up with some over-arching ideas or principles, he has offered the same brash mix of American xenophobia and isolationism, combined with vicious attacks on what he called Barack Obama’s “weakness, confusion and disarray” in foreign policy.

The core of his ideas seems to be that the United States will no longer carry the burden of defending its allies without much greater participation from them in the action. To achieve this, he has suggested that Japan and Korea may start their own nuclear weapons programmes, which horrified both the Asian governments. He also said that European Nato members will need to contribute more to their defence programme. On China and Russia, he said he could work with them, although he totally failed to offer any hint of what that might mean.

What made Trump’s speech very different from any recent American contender was the clear hint that he would take America out of its alliances and withdraw US troops from these arenas if its allies did not knuckle under his pressure. He is far more isolationist than any recent president as he openly despises the multi-national institutions that have created the world’s foreign policy architecture. He is also deeply suspicious of multi-lateral trade deals as he looks at the world through a short-term prism of immediate American interests.

Trump has offered a dangerous muddle on his ideas on the Middle East. He has promised to contain the spread of radical Islam, but has offered no idea on how this vague promise will be implemented. He had previously offered to send US troops into Syria, but later retracted that idea to insist that US troops would only be used if they were fighting alongside forces from other allies. He has also promised a depressing re-alignment to working closely with Israel, saying that “Israel, our great friend, ... has been snubbed and criticised by an [Obama] administration that lacks moral clarity”. He has also reiterated his opposition to the Iranian nuclear deal, which he had previously promised to dismantle.

He insists that Iran should not be allowed to get a nuclear weapon, although he refuses to acknowledge that that is exactly what Obama has also said.