Biden’s foreign policy will break with Trump’s but will come with challenges

• President-elect Joe Biden’s foreign policy approach will be a clear break from President Donald Trump’s “America First” approach, which has isolated America globally.
• “There will be message control and discipline. You will not have daily tweets, sometimes hourly, on sensitive foreign policy issues,” a veteran diplomat told Insider.
• But Biden faces a series of challenges that lack clear solutions, including a pandemic in the United States. To that end, Biden is supplementing his national security and foreign policy teams with officials who have decades of experience and bipartisan appeal.
• The COVID-19 pandemic will take center stage, and once the Biden administration can slow the spread of the disease, experts said the United States’ relationship with China, Russia and the Middle East should be at the top of the list. list.
• Visit the Business Insider home page for more stories.

Throughout his tumultuous tenure in office, the way President Donald Trump has dealt with global crises has often been to tweet first and ask questions later. His “America First” policy has largely isolated America from the world stage and opened the door to adversaries like China and Russia.

President-elect Joe Biden’s approach to foreign policy will be a clear break from Trump’s erratic and belligerent leadership style, former U.S. diplomats and foreign affairs experts told Insider, but that doesn’t guarantee that he will succeed.

Trump’s former national security adviser, HR McMaster, told CNN on Tuesday that the US allies the president has been “insulting” are breathing a “sigh of relief” about the changes that will come under Biden. But McMaster stressed that there is still “much work to be done” to overcome a series of “serious challenges”.

In terms of “process and substance,” the difference between Trump and Biden will be “day and night, black and white,” Aaron David Miller, a veteran diplomat who is now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told Insider.

“There will be message control and discipline. There will be no daily tweets, sometimes hourly, on sensitive foreign policy issues,” Miller said, adding that Americans can expect pragmatism to trump ideology in the decision-making process. , marking a major departure from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s approach.

But Miller cautioned that “competence and experience” in Washington have not always translated into positive results for the United States outside its borders.

The ball is in the court of China

In addition to dealing with major crises at home, with COVID-19 at the top of the list, Biden will become commander-in-chief at a time when the United States and China are on the brink of a new Cold War.

After controlling the pandemic, China should be Biden’s top priority, Heather Heldman, a managing partner at advisory firm Luminae Group and a former State Department adviser, told Insider.

As part of his “America First” agenda, Trump has spent much of his time in office accusing China of engaging in unfair trade practices, launching a divisive trade war to address imbalances. He has also targeted China’s tech industry, while blaming Beijing for the spread of COVID-19.

The Chinese government, in turn, has stepped up anti-American rhetoric, and while Beijing continues to receive criticism from the international community for its human rights abuses, the country has been able to expand its global influence in important ways.

Heldman expressed hope that the Biden administration “recognizes that while the handover may have been incorrect, the substance and overall assessment of China by the Trump administration in recent years has been quite spot-on.”

Orville Schell, director of the Asian Society’s Center for US-China Relations, echoed that view.

“In Trump’s defense, our relationship with China was not the same, it was not reciprocal and it was not sustainable in technology, commerce, civil society, in the media, whatever,” Schell told Insider. He added that one of the biggest questions facing the Biden administration is what China is willing to do to reshape its dynamics with the United States.

In other words, the ball is in the court of China.

“One of the great fallacies of examining US-China relations is that everyone is looking at Biden and everyone is forgetting that there are two sides to any bilateral relationship,” Schell said.

“Without some change in China’s wolf warrior diplomacy, and its aggressive and very belligerent policies, it will be very difficult for the relationship to change significantly, although Biden will be more diplomatic and consistent,” Schell said. “Simply put, this relationship will not be restored by Biden alone.”

AP Photo / Carolyn Kaster

Biden also faces the difficult task of rebuilding trust in the US after four years of Trump withdrawing from international agreements and insulting key allies.

The president-elect has already taken steps to mitigate the damage Trump did to these relationships, by pledging to rejoin the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), to rejoin the agreement. climate of Paris and reestablish the United States ties with the World Health Organization.

But when it comes to Iran, experts warn that while going back to the nuclear deal may seem easy on paper, it will require a lot of diplomatic stunts to pull it off.

“Domestic politics in both countries, and regional considerations, will make an immediate return to the deal more difficult than it sounds,” wrote Henry Rome, a senior analyst at the Eurasia Group, in a recent op-ed for the Washington Post. “A push to quickly return to the JCPOA could come at great political cost.”

The JCPOA was always unpopular with Republicans in Congress, giving Trump the political backdrop to withdraw from it in May 2018.If Biden acted to ease sanctions or provide economic relief to Iran, that has also been struck by the COVID-19 pandemic, he would likely face a swift backlash from Republican lawmakers.

Such a move could also increase tensions with Israel and Saudi Arabia, who see Iran as a threat and see the United States as a counterweight.

“From Iran to Syria, to what to do with our free-falling relationship with China, to any number of difficult issues regarding the Russians, to anticipating the next pandemic, to the Arab-Israeli issue … there are no good answers to either. problem, “Miller said.

Biden turns to his foreign policy A team

To tackle the mountain of complicated foreign policy problems he will face, Biden has hired a diverse team of veteran diplomats and officials he has worked with in the Obama administration.

He appointed Antony Blinken as secretary of state, Jake Sullivan as national security adviser, Linda Thomas-Greenfield as US ambassador to the UN, Avril Haines as director of national intelligence and John Kerry as climate envoy.

“You’re going to have a group, whatever its imperfections, that really thinks in terms of national interests, which is a revolutionary concept given the last four or five years,” Miller said, adding that unlike the advisory team at Trump, this group will not address the “needs of the vanities, politics or personal beliefs of one man.”

At 43, Sullivan will be the youngest national security adviser in decades. He played an important role in the negotiations that led to the 2015 nuclear deal and also served as Biden’s national security adviser when he was vice president. Wendy Sherman, the lead U.S. negotiator at the JCPOA, described Sullivan as “sparkly.”

Thomas-Greenfield is a veteran diplomat with decades of experience. Nicholas Burns, former US Ambassador to NATO, characterized Thomas-Greenfield as “universally admired and respected in the Foreign Service” and someone who “will help revive American diplomacy.”

Biden’s decision to appoint Kerry as climate czar, meanwhile, indicates the high level of attention his administration plans to devote to combating climate change. In addition to previously serving as secretary of state, Kerry is a strong advocate for reducing carbon emissions and implementing renewable energy to curb the effects of global warming.

“Kerry is an energizing bunny,” Miller said. “He will do it with a degree of enthusiasm and persistence that will be very impressive.”

Senator Angus King, a Maine independent who sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee, praised the selection of Biden de Haines as America’s spy chief. She would be the first woman to lead the intelligence community if confirmed, and her nomination comes amid Trump’s ongoing politicization of the traditionally non-partisan national security apparatus.

“The intelligence community is at a delicate time where they need a steady hand to guide them, get them back on course and restore morale,” King said in a statement to Insider. “The mission of the CI is fundamental, to seek the truth and tell the truth, but the outgoing president did not appreciate or respect this simple objective.”

The Maine senator described Haines as “an experienced and intelligent professional who has openly expressed her concerns about the dangers of politicizing the work of the CI.”

Haines, however, faces deep reservations from some human rights groups about his role in Obama’s controversial and secret drone program, an issue that Biden has rarely, if ever, addressed.

“My concerns about her are more my concerns about the Obama administration,” Andrea J. Prasow, Washington deputy editor of Human Rights Watch, told the New York Times. “With these cabinet picks, we go back to the previous administration instead of making bold and forward-looking selections.”

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Biden’s decision to choose Blinken to be the top US diplomat drew widespread applause from across the political spectrum and from seasoned diplomats.

“This is a good choice. Tony has the great confidence of the president-elect and the knowledge and experience for the important work of rebuilding American diplomacy,” said Matt Duss, foreign policy adviser to progressive Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. tweeted. “It will also be a great new thing to have a top diplomat who has regularly engaged with the progressive rank and file.”

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican, said he was “delighted” to learn that Biden had selected Blinken for his previous position.

Powell described Blinken as “a balanced diplomat with a superb reputation” who “will represent America with skill and professionalism.”

Blinken, a former undersecretary of state under President Barack Obama, has a long working relationship with Biden and many saw it as a no-brainer for the secretary of state. He served as a personnel director on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when Biden was president, and later as the vice president’s national security adviser.

“He comes into the job with great preparation and a lot of experience. He is highly respected within the State Department,” Heldman said of Blinken. “This was absolutely the person I was hoping Biden would pick.”