Here’s the bottom line: failing to do your homework, ignoring the experts’ proven research, and relying almost solely on your gut will almost always lead to poor negotiation results. And failure is almost inevitable when sophisticated counterparts do the opposite.  

Of course, we don’t know that Trump failed to do any due diligence here. But it’s highly likely he walked in woefully ill-prepared. After all, he did not consult with his aides, foreign policy experts or allies before deciding in the call to withdraw our forces. Everyone was blindsided, even our military.

This lack of preparation is also consistent with Trump’s negotiations for years. While he prepared extensively and negotiated great deals on his first few big real estate developments (the Commodore Hotel/Grand Hyatt and Trump Tower), his celebrity status starting in the mid-1980s was accompanied by a belief that he could effectively negotiate anything without doing his homework or having a long-term strategy. 

It didn’t work then, leading to multiple business bankruptcies and failed deals (like the Trump Shuttle and the Plaza Hotel). And it’s not working now.

In fact, in 1984 Trump dismissed the value of preparation for international diplomacy when he said, relating to nuclear disarmament negotiations with the then Soviet Union, “i[t] would take an hour and a half to learn everything there is to learn about missiles. . . . I think I know most of it anyway.”

Second, Turkey’s President Erdoğan almost certainly did his strategic homework and concluded he could bluff Trump into believing Turkey would invade Syria regardless of the U.S. response. (continues below…)

In essence, North Korea told Trump it would take a bunch of actions but then did none of them. A classic bluff. Critically, Trump did virtually nothing in response other than praise Kim Jong-Un’s “beautiful” letters.

Trump & Russian Relationship

Russian President Putin has also consistently played Trump like the proverbial fiddle. Remember Trump’s embarrassing obsequiousness after the Trump-Putin summit where Trump said that Russia had not interfered in the 2016 U.S. election? It was only after huge bipartisan blowback that he reversed himself. 

What negotiation lessons did President Erdoğan learn from Kim and Putin? Trump can be manipulated and you can often do what you want with virtually no consequences. 

Erdoğan was right. He just got everything he wanted in Syria. And Trump, despite threatening to destroy Turkey’s economy, caved on almost everything.  

Finally, Trump’s excuse that Turkey would have invaded regardless of the U.S. response reflects a fatal misjudgment of our negotiation leverage at the time. Crucially, the U.S. kept Special Forces in that Syrian region partially to deter Turkey from invading and going after our Kurdish allies. And this had been working well for a long time!

Plus, the notion that Turkey would risk a military confrontation with the U.S. and possibly kill U.S. service members is just not credible. But Erdoğan threatened it. Why? If Trump believes his bluff and withdraws U.S. forces, Erdoğan can go in and take what he wants.

But if Trump doesn’t believe his bluff and pushes back, Erdoğan can back down and get credit from Trump for restraining himself.

It’s a win-win strategy for Erdoğan.

Unfortunately, it’s been a lose-lose one for Trump, the U.S. and our allies the Kurds. In the first days of Turkey’s incursions into the Kurdish territory of northern Syria, shelling and air strikes killed hundreds and drove 200,000 civilians from their homes.

This betrayal of a U.S. ally could have far reaching consequences. As Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.) said in a statement, “This betrayal of the Kurds will also severely harm our credibility as an ally the world over.”

It may even go down as one of the worst presidential foreign policy negotiations in our history.