WASHINGTON (AP) – President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to dismiss President Donald Trump’s view of “America first” in favor of “diplomacy first” will depend on whether he can regain the allies’ confidence and convince them of that Trumpism is just a speck in the annals of US foreign policy.
It can be difficult to sell. From Europe to the Middle East and Asia, Trump’s type of transactional diplomacy has alienated friends and enemies, leaving Biden with a particularly controversial set of national security issues.
Biden, who said last month that “America is back, ready to lead the world, not back away from it,” can strive to be Trump’s antithesis on the world stage and reverse some, if not many, of his predecessor’s actions . But Trump’s mark in America’s place in the world – seen as good or bad – will not be easily erased.
U.S. allies are not blind to the large American electorate that continues 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 need to gain the trust of foreign allies, but also convince domestic voters that international diplomacy works better than a tough one-sided conversation.
Trump insisted that he is not against multilateralism, just global institutions that are ineffective. He withdrew from more than half a dozen international agreements, withdrew from various UN groups, and allies and partners spoke ill.
Biden, on the other hand, says that global alliances need to be rebuilt to combat climate change, tackle the COVID-19 pandemic and prepare for future epidemics and face the growing threat posed by China. The national security and foreign policy team he has named so far is a champion of multilateralism.
His choices for secretary of state, Antony Blinken, deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman, national security adviser Jake Sullivan and head of foreign aid Samantha Power – all veterans of the Obama administration – underscore his intention to return to a foreign policy space that they believe it was abandoned by Trump.
“At the moment, there is a huge vacuum,” said Biden. “We will have to regain the confidence of a world that has started to find ways to work around us or without us.”
Biden plans to re-join the Paris climate agreement and cooperate again with the World Health Organization. He plans to soften relations with Europeans and other friends and refrain from attacking other NATO members, and may return the United States to the nuclear agreement with the Iran. Still, many Americans will continue to embrace Trump’s “America first” agenda, especially with the U.S. economy struggling to recover from the coronavirus pandemic, civil strife on American streets for racism and the absence of civil political discourse. .
“Whether people like it or not, Trump was elected by the Americans in 2016,” said Fiona Hill, who served on Trump’s National Security Council at the White House and is now at the liberal-trend Brookings Institution.
Trump’s election in 2016 and the tens of millions of votes he won in 2020 reflect a very divided nation, she says.
“We have to accept that the election result in 2016 was no accident,” said Hill.
Steven Blockmans, research director at the Center for European Policy Studies in Belgium, said that Europeans should not be fooled into thinking that transatlantic relations will return to how they were before Trump.
“In everything but the name, the rallying cry of ‘America first’ is here to stay,” he said. “Biden has promised to prioritize investment in US green energy, daycare, education and infrastructure over any new trade deals. He also called for an extension of ‘Buy American’ provisions in federal purchases, which has long been irritating in trade relations with the European Union.
Each part of the world has a different challenge for Biden.
CHINA
Fear of China’s quest for world domination began to rise before Trump took office. At first, Trump approached China’s authoritarian president, Xi Jinping. But after efforts to get more than a first-stage trade deal failed, the president increased the pressure on China and repeatedly blamed Beijing for the coronavirus pandemic.
He sanctioned the Chinese and, speech after speech, senior Trump officials warned of China stealing American technology, conducting cyber attacks, taking aggressive action in the South China Sea, cracking down on democracy in Hong Kong and abusing Muslim Uighurs in western China. .
Increasingly, Republicans and Democrats are concerned about a growing economic and geopolitical threat from China, and that concern will not end when Trump leaves office.
NORTH KOREA
Restarting US relations with Asia’s allies is critical to tackling not only China, but North Korea as well.
Trump broke new ground in the nuclear standoff with North Korea with his three face-to-face meetings with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. But Trump’s efforts have yielded no deal to persuade Kim to give up his nuclear weapons in exchange for sanctions and security guarantees. In fact, North Korea has continued to develop its nuclear capabilities.
Biden may be forced to negotiate with North Korea sooner or later, as experts say Pyongyang has a history of conducting tests and firing 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, leading the battlefield, continue to record large numbers of casualties. Taliban attacks are taking place outside cities, and the Islamic State group orchestrated bombings in the capital, Kabul, including one in November at Kabul University that killed more than 20 people, mostly students.
The U.S. and the Taliban sat at the negotiating table in 2018. These talks, led by Trump’s envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, ended up leading to the US-Taliban agreement that was signed in February 2020, providing for the withdrawal of US troops and Afghanistan.
Determined to deliver on his campaign promise to pull American troops out of “endless wars”, Trump reduced his troops from 8,600 to 4,500 and ordered the number of soldiers to drop to 2,500 by the day of his inauguration. The United States has promised to withdraw all American troops from Afghanistan by May 1, just months after Biden took office, but it is unclear whether he will.
MIDDLE EAST
Trump chose to think outside the box when it came to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and relations with Arab nations.
Palestinians rejected the Trump administration’s Middle East peace plan, but Trump persuaded two Arab nations – the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain – to recognize Israel. This was historic because Arab nations have said for decades that they would not recognize Israel until the Palestinians’ struggle for an independent state is resolved.
Warmed ties between Israel and Arab countries that share opposition to Iran helped seal the deal. Morocco and Sudan also later recognized Israel.
WILL
In 2018, Trump withdrew the United States from the nuclear deal with Iran, in which world powers agreed to lift sanctions against Tehran if it restricted its nuclear program.
Trump said the deal was unilateral, did not prevent Iran from eventually obtaining a nuclear weapon and allowed it to receive billions of dollars in frozen assets that it was accused of using to finance terrorist proxies that destabilize the Middle East.
Biden says the deal was reckless and complains that Iran has now stockpiled more enriched uranium than allowed by the deal, which is still in force between Iran and Britain, China, Russia, France and Germany.