WASHINGTON (AP) – President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to undo President Donald Trump’s view on “America First” in favor of “diplomacy first” will depend on whether he is able to regain the confidence of allies and convince them that Trumpism is just a mistake in the annals of U.S. foreign policy.
It could be a hard sell. From Europe to the Middle East and Asia, Trump’s transactional diplomacy brand has alienated friends and enemies alike, leaving Biden a particularly controversial set of national security issues.
Biden, who said last month that “America is back, ready to lead the world, not to withdraw from it,” could try to be Trump’s antithesis to the world stage and reverse some, if not many. , of the actions of his predecessor. But Trump’s mark on the United States’ place in the world – whether considered good or bad – will not be easily erased.
U.S. allies are not blind to the large U.S. constituency that continues to support Trump’s nationalist tendencies and his belief that the United States should stay out of global conflicts. If Biden’s goal is to restore America’s place in the world, it will not only have to earn the trust of foreign allies, but also convince home voters that international diplomacy works better than hard unilateral conversation.
Trump has insisted he is not against multilateralism, only global institutions that are ineffective. It has drawn more than half a dozen international agreements, withdrawn from various UN groups and allies and partners spoken to in the trash.
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 address the growing threat posed by China. The foreign security and foreign policy personnel he has appointed so far are advocates of multilateralism.
His options as Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Chief of State Aid Samantha Power, all veterans of the Obama administration, underline the his intention to return to a foreign policy space that they believe was abandoned by Trump.
“Right now, there’s a huge gap,” Biden said. “We need to regain the confidence of a world that has begun to find ways to work around us or without us.”
Biden intends to rejoin 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 exploiting fellow NATO members and may return the United States to Iran’s nuclear deal. Still, many Americans will continue to defend Trump’s “America First” agenda, especially with the U.S. economy struggling to recover from the coronavirus pandemic, civil strife on American streets by racism and the absence of civilian political discourses.
“Whether they liked it or not, Trump was elected by the Americans in 2016,” said Fiona Hill, who worked on Trump’s White House National Security Council and is now on the trending Brookings Institution. liberal.
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 election result in 2016 was not a coincidence,” Hill said.
Steven Blockmans, research director at the Center for European Policy Studies in Belgium, said Europeans should not be understood to believe that transatlantic relations would return to the way they were before Trump.
“In everything but the name, the cry of‘ America First ’is here to stay,” he said. “Biden has pledged to prioritize investment in U.S. green energy, child care, education and infrastructure over any new trade deal. He has also called for expanding the ‘US Purchase’ provisions in federal procurement, which has been for a long time of irritating time in trade relations with the European Union “.
Every part of the world has a different challenge for Biden.
CHINA
Fear of seeking world domination from China began to mount before Trump took office. At first, Trump defended China’s authoritarian president, Xi Jinping. But after efforts to reach more than one trade agreement in the first phase failed, the president provoked the heat in China and repeatedly blamed Beijing for the coronavirus pandemic.
He sanctioned the Chinese, and in speech after speech, top Trump officials warned that China was stealing American technology, carrying out cyber attacks, taking aggressive action in the South China Sea, repressing democracy in Hong Kong, and abusing the Muslim Uighurs in western China.
Increasingly, Republicans and Democrats are concerned about China’s growing economic and geopolitical threat, and that concern will not end when Trump leaves office.
NORTH KOREA
Restoring U.S. relations with Asian allies is critical to confronting not only China but North Korea as well.
Trump opened new ground in the nuclear confrontation with North Korea with his three face-to-face meetings with North Korean Kim Jong Un. But Trump’s efforts failed to produce any agreement to convince Kim to give up his nuclear weapons in exchange for relief from sanctions and security guarantees. 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 track record in conducting tests and launching missiles to capture Washington’s attention on the North Korean presidential election. Americans.
AFGHANISTAN
Nearly 20 years after a U.S.-led international coalition overthrew the al-Qaeda-backed Taliban government, Afghan civilians continue to be killed by thousands. Afghan security forces, at the head of the battlefield, continue to add high casualties. There are Taliban attacks outside the cities and the Islamic State group has orchestrated bombings in the capital, Kabul, including one in November at Kabul University that killed more than 20 people, mostly students.
The US and the Taliban sat at the negotiating table in 2018. Those talks, led by Trump envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, ended up leading to the agreement between the US and the Taliban that was signed in February. of 2020, which provided for the withdrawal of US and NATO troops from Afghanistan. .
Fulfilling his campaign promise to withdraw U.S. troops from “endless wars,” Trump reduced troops from 8,600 to 4,500 and then ordered troop levels to drop to 2,500 on the day of the inauguration. The United States has pledged to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan on May 1, a few months after Biden took possession, but it is unclear whether it will do so.
MIDDLE EAST
Trump chose to think outside the box about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and relations with Arab nations.
The Palestinians rejected the Trump administration’s peace plan, but Trump convinced two Arab nations – the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain – to recognize Israel. This was historic because the Arab nations had said for decades that they would not recognize Israel until the Palestinian struggle for an independent state was resolved.
The warm ties between Israel and the Arab states that share opposition to Iran helped seal the deal. Later, Morocco and Sudan also recognized Israel.
IRAN
In 2018, Trump withdrew the United States from Iran’s nuclear deal, in which world powers agreed to lift sanctions on Tehran if it halted its nuclear program.
Trump said the deal was unilateral, which did not stop Iran from finally acquiring a nuclear weapon and allowing it to receive billions of dollars in frozen assets that it has been accused of using to finance terrorist intermediaries that destabilize the state. Middle East.
Biden says leaving the deal was reckless and complains that Iran has now stored more uranium enriched than allowed in the deal, which is still in force between Iran and Britain, China. , Russia, France and Germany.