WASHINGTON — A fist bumping and meeting with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. Rates and export controls on China. Jerusalem as the capital city from Israel. US troops from Afghanistan.
More than a year and a half into President Biden’s term, his administration’s approach to strategic priorities has been surprisingly consistent with Trump administration’s policies, former officials and analysts say.
Mr Biden vowed on the campaign trail to break with the paths taken by the previous administration, and in some respects on foreign policy he has done just that. He has restored alliances, especially in Western Europe, which Donald J. Trump had weakened with his “America First” proclamations and criticism of other countries. In recent months, Biden’s efforts have positioned Washington to lead a coalition impose sanctions against Russia during the war in Ukraine.
And Mr Biden has denounced autocracies, promoted the importance of democracy and called for global cooperation on issues such as climate change and the coronavirus pandemic.
But in critical areas, the Biden administration has failed to make substantial rifts, demonstrating how difficult it is in Washington to chart new foreign policy directions.
That was underlined this month when Mr Biden traveled to Israel and Saudi Arabiaa journey aimed in part at strengthening the closer ties between the states that Trump officials had promoted under the so-called Abraham chords.
In Saudi Arabia, Mr. Biden met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, despite his previous vow to make the nation a “pariah” for human rights violations, especially the murder of a Washington Post writer in 2018. US intelligence concluded that the prince had ordered the brutal murder. Behind the scenes, the United States still offers important support for the Saudi army in the war in Yemen despite mr. Biden’s previous promise to end that aid because of Saudi airstrikes that killed civilians.
“Policy is converging,” said Stephen E. Biegun, Assistant Secretary of State in the Trump administration and National Security Council official under President George W. Bush. “Continuity is the norm, even between presidents as different as Trump and Biden.”
Some former officials and analysts praised the consistency, arguing that despite the commander in chief’s deep failings, the Trump administration has properly diagnosed and sought to address key challenges to US interests.
Others are less optimistic. They say Mr Biden’s choices have exacerbated US foreign policy problems and, at times, deviated from the principles set by the president. Senior Democratic Legislators have criticized his meeting with Prince Mohammed and aid to the Saudi armyfor example, even though officials have promoted United Nations-brokered ceasefire in Yemen.
The Biden Presidency
With the midterm elections approaching, this is where President Biden stands.
“As time has gone by, Biden has failed to deliver on many of his campaign promises, and he has stuck to the status quo in the Middle East and Asia,” said Emma Ashford, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council.
Both the Trump and Biden administrations have faced the question of how to maintain America’s global dominance at a time when it appears to be waning. China has risen as a counterweight and Russia has become bolder.
The Trump Administration national security strategy formally refocused foreign policy towards “great power competition” with China and Russia and away from prioritizing terrorist groups and other non-state actors. The Biden administration has continued that drive, in part because of events such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Biden’s White House has postponed the release of its own national security strategy, expected early this year. Officials are rewriting it because of the war in Ukraine. The final document is still expected to highlight competition between powerful nations.
Mr Biden said that China is the United States’ biggest competitor – a claim Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken reiterated in a recent speech – while Russia poses the greatest threat to US security and alliances.
Some scholars say the tradition of inter-government continuity is a product of the conventional ideas and groupthink that stem from Washington’s bipartisan foreign policy, which Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser to President Barack Obama, mockingly referred to as “the Blob.”
But others argue that external circumstances — including the behavior of foreign governments, the sentiments of American voters and corporate influence — leave American leaders with a limited number of choices.
“There is a lot of attraction that brings the police to the same place,” said Mr. biegun. “It’s still the same problems. It’s still the same world. We still have much of the same tools that we can influence others to get to the same results, and it’s still the same America.”
By committing to withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump responded to the will of most Americans, who tired of two decades of war. For Mr Biden, the move was also an opportunity to tackle unfinished business. As vice president, he had advocated bringing troops home, in line with Obama’s desire to end “eternal wars,” but was opposed by US generals who insisted on a presence in Afghanistan.
Despite the chaotic withdrawal last August when the Taliban took over the country, polls have shown: most Americans supported ending US military involvement there.
Mr Trump and Mr Biden have argued for a smaller US military presence in conflict zones. But both touched limits on that thinking. Mr Biden has sent more US troops to Europe since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and to Somalia, reversing a Trump-era withdrawal. US troops remain in Iraq and Syria.
“There is deep skepticism about the war on terrorism by senior members of the Biden administration,” said Brian Finucane, a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group who worked as a lawyer for the State Department on military issues. “Still, they are not yet ready to implement broad structural reforms to reverse the war.”
Mr Finucane said reform would include: withdrawal of the 2001 war authorization that Congress gave executive power after the September 11 attacks.
“Even if the Biden administration doesn’t take affirmative steps to further expand the scope of the 2001 AUMF, it can be used by future governments as long as it’s on the books,” he said, referring to the authorization. “And other officials can extend the war on terror.”
On the Most Urgent Issue in the Middle East—Iran and Its nuclear program – Mr. Biden has taken a different path than Mr. Trump. The government has negotiated a return to an Obama-era nuclear deal with Tehran that: mr. Trump dismantled, which led to Iran accelerating its uranium enrichment. But the conversations have got into an impasse. And Mr Biden said he would hold on to one of Mr Trump’s key actions against the Iranian military, the designation of its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization, although that poses an obstacle to a new agreement.
China’s policy stands out as the most vivid example of continuity between the two governments. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has a Trump-era genocide designation against China because of the oppression of Uyghur Muslims. Biden officials have continued to send US naval vessels through the Taiwan Strait and shaping arms sales to Taiwan to try to deter a possible invasion by China.
Most controversially, Mr. Biden has maintained Trump-era tariffs on China, despite some economists and several top US officials, including Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen, question their purpose and impact.
Mr. Biden and his political aides are well aware of the growing anti-free trade sentiment in the United States that Mr. Trump took advantage of to gather votes. That realization has led Mr. Biden to shrink from rejoining the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement between 12 Pacific Rim countries that Mr. Obama helped organize to strengthen economic competition against China, but which Mr Trump and progressive Democrats condemned.
Analysts say Washington must offer Asian countries better trade deals and market access with the United States if it is to counter China’s economic influence.
“Neither the Trump and Biden administrations have pursued the trade and economic policies advocated by the Asian friends of the US to reduce their dependence on China,” said Kori Schake, director of foreign and defense policy at the American Enterprise Institute. . “Both the Biden and Trump administrations are militarizing the China problem to some extent because they can’t figure out the economic piece.”
It is in Europe that Mr. Biden distinguishes himself from Mr. Trump. The Trump administration was at times contradictory about Europe and Russia: While Mr. Trump praised Russia’s President Vladimir V. Putin, criticized the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and military aid to Ukraine withheld for domestic political gain, some officials under him worked in the opposite direction. By contrast, Mr. Biden and his aides have united in affirming the importance of transatlantic alliances, which has helped them coordinating sanctions and arms transport against Russia in Ukraine.
“I have no doubt that words and politics matter,” said Alina Polyakova, president of the Center for European Policy Analysis. “If allies don’t trust, the US will stand” Article 5 of NATO and come in defense of an ally, no matter how much you invest.”
Ultimately, the greatest contrast between presidents, and perhaps the aspect most watched by America’s allies and adversaries, lies in their views on democracy. Mr Trump complimented autocrats and broke with democratic traditions well before the Washington uprising on Jan. 6, 2021, congressional investigators claim he organized. Mr Biden has placed the promotion of democracy at the ideological center of his foreign policy, and in December he welcomed officials from more than 100 countries to a “Summit for Democracy.”
“American democracy is the magnetic soft force of the United States,” said Ms. Schake. “We are different and better than the forces we fight against in the international order.”