Where President Kasich would send U.S. troops

WASHINGTON — When Ohio Gov. John Kasich called on an 11-year-old boy at a Pennsylvania town hall last week, Kasich probably did not expect to be grilled on foreign policy.

“In terms of your strategy for defeating ISIS, to what extent would American personnel be involved?” the boy, Jack Shapiro, asked the GOP presidential candidate. The middle-schooler's question about the Islamic State terrorist group caught Kasich and his audience off-guard.

But then Kasich delivered a sweeping answer, comparing the Islamic State to the Nazis and saying that America has a special responsibility to defeat that kind of evil in the world. He was expected to reiterate that hawkish worldview again on Monday, as he and his two remaining Republican rivals pivoted to global threats and America’s role in the world in remarks before a powerful pro-Israel lobbying group, AIPAC.

Kasich’s hawkish foreign policy positions have attracted scant attention in a GOP contest dominated more by domestic issues and personality politics. But with the spotlight at least temporarily focused on foreign policy, here’s a look at how Kasich would deal with hot spots around the world if he wins the White House:

Israel

Kasich used the AIPAC policy conference on Monday to portray himself as the most experienced GOP contender in the field and the most stalwart friend of Israel — pointing to his 18 years on the House Armed Services Committee.

"As the candidate in this race with the deepest and most far-reaching foreign policy and national security experience, I won’t need on-the-job training," Kasich told the crowd. In a Kasich administration, Israel would be America's "bedrock partner for our mutual security in the Middle East," he said.

He took a jab at Trump's promise to be "neutral" in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, saying Israel does not need "fair-weather friends" and he would not support peace talks until the Palestinians stop promoting what he called a culture of "hatred and death."

Kasich also called Jerusalem Israel's "eternal capital," possibly another dig at Trump who has wavered on whether he would recognize Jerusalem as the "undivided" capital of Israel.

Syria and the Islamic State

Kasich is the only Republican candidate still in the race who has called for sending U.S. ground forces into Syria to fight ISIS.

“We’re going to have to be on the ground,” Kasich told Shapiro at the Pennsylvania town hall last Wednesday. “Americans are going to have to be there … ‘cause nobody else is going to do this.”

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and New York businessman Donald Trump have both said they would expand U.S. airstrikes in Syria and work with a coalition of Arab and Western allies to destroy ISIS. But Kasich has said airstrikes will not be enough to defeat the group.

Kasich has not said how long U.S. forces would be on the ground in Syria, or how many troops he would deploy. But he has argued that the mission would not require a long-term engagement — a position that some foreign policy experts have greeted with skepticism.

“Kasich has not explained why ISIS or a successor group wouldn’t rebound quickly once U.S. troops departed or didn’t succeed at leaving an effective government behind,” James Lindsay, a senior vice president at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in an analysis of Kasich’s views. CFR is a nonpartisan Washington think tank.

Iran and the nuclear agreement

Cruz, Trump, and Kasich have all blasted the multilateral agreement with Iran, which is aimed at preventing that country from producing enough material for an atomic weapon for at least 10 years. The agreement imposes inspections of Iranian facilities, including military sites. In exchange, the United States and its partners — England, Germany, France, China, and Russia — agreed to lift tough global sanctions that have crippled Iran's economy.

Kasich has called it a “very bad agreement” that will not stop Iran from securing a nuclear weapon, but that will give that country a cash infusion to fund terrorist groups that threaten Israel. In his speech on Monday, Kasich called for a temporary suspension of the agreement, arguing that Iran had violated the deal with its recent ballistic missile tests.

But while Cruz has said he will tear up the nuclear deal if he is elected president, Kasich says he would not jettison the agreement. He said he reimpose harsh sanctions if Iran cheats, but suggested his his rivals’ promises to nix the agreement are not realistic.

“That’s just playing to a crowd,” he suggested in July.

Kasich has not explained how reimposing sanctions on Iran would work if other countries, such as the Russians and Chinese, refuse to do the same.

Russian aggression against its neighbors   

“Frankly it’s time that we punched the Russians in the nose,” Kasich said at a Republican presidential debate in December. “They’ve gotten away with too much in this world.”

Kasich has called for a more aggressive response to Russia’s intervention in Syria, where President Vladimir Putin has intervened to bolster the brutal dictatorship of Bashar Assad. And he has promised stronger American action to counter Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula in eastern Ukraine.

Kasich says he would provide training and weapons to Ukraine so that Eastern European country could better fight Russian-backed rebels in its territory. And he has called for putting U.S. forces in Europe to counter Russia's incursion into Crimea and to bolster Poland and other allies in Eastern Europe.

Cruz has articulated a similar position, according to a Council on Foreign Relations comparison of the candidates.

Trump, meanwhile, has praised Putin, saying he admires his strong-arm style of leadership. “I will tell you in terms of leadership he is getting an 'A,'” Trump said last fall. Trump has also suggested Russia’s involvement in Syria would be a “positive thing” because they might get “bogged down” in the Middle East.

China

Kasich has called for "significantly” increasing America's military might in Asia, vowing to begin submarine patrols and Marine exercises to counter China's claims to the South China Sea. “We ought to send some forces in there to make it clear that they don’t own it,” Kasich said last summer.

Trump has also endorsed such a proposal, and he has made China-bashing a centerpiece of his campaign, threatening to open a trade war with the Asian giant, among other things.

Cruz has said he would be more outspoken against China’s human rights record and guarding against Chinese cyber attacks, according to the Council on Foreign Relations analysis.

Cuba

President Obama moved to restore U.S. diplomatic ties with Cuba last year and he made history when he arrived in that communist nation on Sunday, the first American president to visit in nearly 90 years.

Cruz, the son of a Cuban immigration, has sharply criticized Obama’s move, saying it legitimizes the repressive Castro government. Trump said Obama should have won more concessions from Cuba in exchange for normalizing relations, but he supports the move and he also endorsed lifting the trade embargo on Cuba—a break from GOP orthodoxy and a reversal from Trump’s own previous stance.

Kasich said Obama made a “big mistake” by restoring diplomatic ties with Cuba but would not say whether he would break those ties if he wins the presidency.

“Well let’s see where we are when I come [into office] and what the administration has done,” Kasich told a Florida TV reporter in February. “I think [the Obama Administration] made a big mistake because I think Cuba needed to do something [before diplomatic relations was restored last year]. Why are we always reaching out? Why are we always moving? My sense is they haven’t made any compromises; they keep demanding things so I don’t understand what the administration is doing.”

When he was in Congress, Kasich voted against measures to ease the U.S. trade and travel embargoes on Cuba.

Trade

Both Cruz and Trump oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a sweeping free trade agreement negotiated between the U.S. and 11 other countries. It is the largest trade agreement since NAFTA - which Kasich voted for - and supporters argue it will knock down barriers for U.S. exports, create American jobs, and make the U.S. more competitive in the global marketplace.

But Trump and other critics say such free trade deals hurt American workers and encourage U.S. companies to move operations overseas in search of cheaper labor. Trump has said he would crack down on China’s unfair trade practices and renegotiate or rip up past trade agreements.

"We need smart negotiators who will serve the interests of American workers – not Wall Street insiders that want to move U.S. manufacturing and investment offshore," Trump says on his campaign website.

Kasich has said he is for “free trade” but it has to be “fair trade,” saying it’s important for American workers to operate on a level playing field. But he has not offered specifics on what he means by fair trade and he has signaled support for the TPP.