WASHINGTON (AP) – President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to drop President Donald Trump’s vision of “America first” in favor of “diplomacy first” will depend on whether he is able to regain the trust of allies and convince them that Trumpism is just a blip in the annals of US foreign policy.
It could be a tough sale. From Europe to the Middle East and Asia, Trump’s brand of transactional diplomacy has alienated friends and enemies, leaving Biden with a highly controversial set of national security issues.
Biden, who said last month that “America is back, ready to lead the world, not withdraw from it,” could strive to be Trump’s antithesis on the world stage and reverse some, if not many, of the actions of his predecessor. But Trump’s mark on America’s place in the world – seen as good or bad – will not be easily erased.
American allies are not blind to the large constituency of American voters who continue to support Trump’s nationalist tendencies and his belief that the United States should stay out of world conflicts. If Biden’s goal is to restore America’s place in the world, he will not only have to gain the trust of foreign allies, but also convince home voters that international diplomacy works better than unilateral talks.
Trump has insisted he is not against multilateralism, but only global institutions that are ineffective. He pulled out more than half a dozen international agreements, withdrew from several UN groups and dumped allies and partners.
Biden, on the other hand, says global alliances need to be rebuilt to combat climate change, address the COVID-19 pandemic and prepare for future epidemics and meet China’s growing threat. The national security and foreign policy personnel he has named so far are champions of multilateralism.
His election for Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Head of External Assistance Samantha Power – all veterans of the Obama administration – underscore his intention to return to a foreign policy space that I think he was abandoned by Trump.
“Right now, there’s a huge vacuum,” Biden said. “We will have to regain the trust of a world that has begun to find ways to work around us or without us.”
Biden intends to join the Paris climate agreement and cooperate again with the World Health Organization. He intends to calm relations with Europeans and other friends and refrain from the explosion of fellow NATO members and may return the United States to Iran’s nuclear deal. However, many Americans will continue to support Trump’s “America First” agenda, especially with the US economy struggling to recover from the coronavirus pandemic, civil strife on American streets due to racism and the absence of civilian political discourse.
“Whether people liked it or not, Trump was elected by the Americans in 2016,” said Fiona Hill, who served on Trump’s White House National Security Council and is now a liberal-minded Brookings Institution. .
Trump’s 2016 election and the tens of millions of votes he garnered in 2020 reflect a very divided nation, she says.
“We have to accept that the 2016 election result was not a coincidence,” Hill said.
Steven Blockmans, research director at the Center for European Political Studies in Belgium, said Europeans should not be persuaded to believe that transatlantic relations will return to the way they were before Trump.
“In all but name, the cry of ‘America First’ is here to stay,” he said. “Biden has promised to prioritize US green energy investment, childcare, education and infrastructure over any new trade agreements. He also called for the extension of the “American Buyers” provisions in federal procurement, which has long been irritating in trade relations with the European Union. ”
Every part of the world has a different challenge for Biden.
CHINA
Fear of China’s search for world domination began to grow before Trump took office. At first, Trump stood up to China’s authoritarian president, Xi Jinping. But after efforts to get more than one trade agreement in the first phase failed, the president set China on fire and repeatedly blamed Beijing for the coronavirus pandemic.
He sanctioned the Chinese, and in speech after speech, senior Trump officials warned that China was stealing American technology, carrying out cyber attacks, taking aggressive action in the South China Sea, fighting democracy in Hong Kong and abusing Muslim Uighurs. from western China.
Increasingly, Republicans and Democrats are equally concerned about a growing economic and geopolitical threat from China, and that concern will not end when Trump leaves office.
NORTH KOREA
Resetting US relations with Asian allies is key to confronting not only China but also North Korea.
Trump has opened new ground for the nuclear confrontation with North Korea through three face-to-face meetings with Kim Jong Un of North Korea. But Trump’s efforts have failed to persuade Kim to give up his nuclear weapons in exchange for exemptions from sanctions and security assurances. In fact, North Korea has continued to develop its nuclear capabilities.
Biden may be forced to deal with North Korea sooner rather than later, as experts say Pyongyang has a history of testing and launching missiles to draw Washington’s attention to the US presidential election.
AFGHANISTAN
Nearly 20 years after a US-led international coalition overthrew the Taliban government that supported Al Qaeda, Afghan civilians are still being killed by the thousands. Afghan security forces, led on the battlefield, continue to claim heavy casualties. Taliban attacks took place outside the cities, and the Islamic State group orchestrated bombings in the capital Kabul, including one in November at Kabul University, which killed more than 20 people, mostly students.
The United States and the Taliban sat at the negotiating table in 2018. Those talks, led by Trump envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, eventually led to the US-Taliban agreement signed in February 2020, providing for the withdrawal of US and NATO troops. from Afghanistan. .
He began fulfilling his campaign promise to withdraw American troops from “endless wars,” Trump reduced troops from 8,600 to 4,500, then ordered troops to drop to 2,500 by the day of the inauguration. The United States has pledged to withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan by May 1, just months after Biden took office, but it is unclear whether he will do so.
MIDDLE EAST
Trump has chosen to think outside the case about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and relations with Arab nations.
The Palestinians rejected the Trump administration’s peace plan in the Middle East, but then Trump persuaded two Arab nations – the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain – to recognize Israel. This has been historic, as Arab nations have said for decades that they will not recognize Israel until the Palestinian struggle for an independent state is resolved.
The warm ties between Israel and the Arab states that share opposition to Iran have helped conclude the agreement. Later, Morocco and Sudan recognized Israel.
IRAN
In 2018, Trump pulled the United States out of the nuclear deal with Iran, in which world powers agreed to lift sanctions on Tehran if it cuts its nuclear program.
Trump said the deal was unilateral, did not stop Iran from eventually acquiring a nuclear weapon, and allowed it to receive billions of dollars in frozen assets it was accused of using to fund terrorist proxies destabilizing the East. Middle.
Biden says the withdrawal was reckless and complains that Iran has now deposited more enriched uranium than allowed under the agreement, which is still in force between Iran and Britain, China, Russia, France and Germany.