Hoff: Evaluating Biden’s foreign policy record
Dr. Samuel B. Hoff is a George Washington Distinguished Professor Emeritus of history and political science at Delaware State University. He has moderated the Great Decisions Foreign Policy Series for the Dover Public Library for several years.
President Joe Biden’s term in office featured a plethora of foreign policy challenges. Of these, his administration was successful in some important areas. Overall, however, it seemed like events overtook the White House’s ability to control them.
The Biden administration did a solid job in most trade relations, even if America’s trade deficit continues. Relations with Canada and Mexico, the North American Free Trade Agreement and leading trade partners gave all three countries an advantage in selected areas. Further, the administration sought to open up markets in other areas, particularly in the Americas. Finally, the administration effectively dealt with supply chain shortages emanating from the pandemic and other causes.
In this corner, the Biden team deserves credit for strengthening the hand of the CIA. As a key part of the intelligence network, the agency was relegated to second tier after the post-9/11 reorganization. However, the CIA had several successful missions during the Biden years, including arranging return of U.S. citizens held in other nations.
Clearly, the Biden State Department worked assiduously to establish and improve military and defense alliances. For example, the U.S. linked with Australia, India and Japan in the Quad to improve maritime security; with Japan and South Korea to monitor nuclear threats; with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to provide training and development; and with Pacific Island nations on security and support. Additionally, the Biden administration recently concluded a series of security agreements with Indonesia.
Symbolically, the fact that it took 18 months for the Biden White House to release its first national security plan was telling. Rather than approaching foreign relations from a strategic perspective, the administration operated from a belief that personal diplomacy combined with Joe Biden’s decades of gravitas in the international milieu was enough.
The disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 created a crisis of confidence in President Biden’s competence, the very thing he ran on in 2020. In many ways, it can be compared to other first-year foreign policy fiascoes, such as the Bay of Pigs rout in 1961 and the Somalia debacle in 1993. But, while presidents John Kennedy and Bill Clinton, respectively, were able to withstand those incidents, the Biden White House never was able to change the narrative.
Like the president he served under as vice president, Joe Biden was intent on a “China pivot” for American foreign policy. Save for his personal rapport with Xi Jinping, that didn’t result in a net advantage to the U.S. On trade, the U.S. ended up restricting several items amid a push for an industrial policy. Meanwhile, the Biden White House was powerless as China tightened control of Hong Kong, continued threats against Taiwan and had several violent incidents with the Philippines. Whereas American authorities still appear intimidated to confront China as it bullies others in the South China Sea, China has no problem probing the Arctic for property to call its own.
At the beginning of his administration, President Biden was able to secure an agreement with Russian Federation authorities to reset the New START agreement on nuclear weapons, and there was promise for agreement in several other areas. But the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO, on top of that organization’s growth over the previous decades, gave Russia an impetus for invading in February 2022. Then, the Biden White House slow-walked permission for use of military weapons by Ukraine, mitigating much of the $170 billion in total aid provided. The current situation reveals that Russia has the upper hand and, therefore, will be able to dictate terms of a cease-fire.
The always smoldering landscape in the Middle East exploded with the Hamas terrorist action against Israel in October 2023. Besides the mass killing at the scene, the taking of more than 200 hostages from Israel precipitated a frenzy of action to secure their release. That the hostages included a number of Americans was startling. The Biden White House rotated between supporting Israel’s military mission to root out Hamas in Gaza and pushing for a peace agreement for the hostages’ release. After all this time, neither has been achieved. And the parallel to the November 1979 hostage crisis in Iran was never far away: Just as that event consumed the last year of the Jimmy Carter presidency, so the negative image of American inability to free the hostages in Gaza was blamed partly on Biden.
Every contemporary American president faces a perilous foreign policy landscape. Though our nation has a formidable array of tools and resources, the reality of global politics prevents easily matching those to a particular scenario. While its cumulative record there was mixed, the Joe Biden administration was too often perceived to be playing defense.
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