Biden’s honeymoon is over, and 2022 looks daunting

Jan 21, 2022
Biden and Putin Reuters
Biden meets Putin: Biden, unlike Reagan and George H W Bush in the 1980s, has done nothing to lead his nation towards detente with Russia. (Image: Reuters)

The US president’s first year has disappointed progressive supporters and generated little in the way of positive developments on the world stage.

President Joe Biden’s first annual report card is not very encouraging on either the domestic or foreign fronts – as reflected by his sagging opinion polls. The prospects for 2022 look even more challenging with the midterm congressional elections at the end of the year clearly emerging as a referendum on his presidency. This will concern within the Democratic Party as it prepares for the presidential elections in 2024. All of which will have serious domestic and foreign policy implications for Australia and demand our closest attention.

As the first 12 months of his presidency ticks over, there has been a significant wave of commentary in major US media and key academic journals assessing Biden’s performance and looking into the challenges ahead. Not surprisingly, it has not made good reading for an increasingly frustrated Biden seemingly mired in a daunting series of issues – both at home and abroad. Gone is the public support he enjoyed in his early days — with several polls last week starkly registering the lowest numbers yet.

The Omicron surge and the persistent US public health failings have continued to wreak havoc across the country in tandem with the worrying signs of rampant inflation (with its all too obvious global implications!). The increasingly partisan nature of the US political scene — exacerbated by the razor-thin margins the Democrats have in the Senate and a Republican-loaded Supreme Court — have blunted most of his attempts at reform. And Trump has shown no signs of retreating from the political arena where he continues to hold a significant degree of influence within the Republican Party and gives every indication of preparing for a tilt at the presidency again in 2024.

Biden has had some legislative successes but the concessions he has been forced to make to ensure their passage have provoked growing anxieties within the ranks of leading progressive Democrats with the potential to prove divisive. Kamala Harris’s appointment as Vice-President was generally interpreted as an attempt by Biden to strengthen his support within those progressive ranks. Harris has not played a very prominent role in the administration – whether by her choice or Biden’s planning. Her role as the focus moves towards 2024 will be well worth watching. Meanwhile crystal-ball gazing strongly suggests that the Republicans will regain control of the Senate and win back a swath of House seats in this year’s midterms.

Things have not proceeded all that well either for Biden in the international arena. Biden set himself the novel commitment to a foreign policy for “middle Americans” –  based on “the democratic way” which he readily volunteered would require significant change within the US. Trump’s refusal to accept the election results and the subsequent shenanigans quickly underlined how much repair work was needed in the US on that score before it could be a global showcase. For most of 2021, Biden’s foreign policy priority was China where he sought to engage directly with President Xi with whom he had previous personal contact in both their earlier incarnations.

As National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan has described it,  Biden’s “doctrine” on China has developed into a blend of diplomacy and deterrence with its central theme being competition with rather than confrontation or containment of China. He made much of this in his assessment of two long private conversations with President Xi. Biden has also insisted on a careful choice of vocabulary in US public statements on China – personally about Xi, restrained rhetoric and limited reference to the Chinese Communist Party (unlike many of the statements out of Canberra, especially from Defence Minister Peter Dutton).

At the same time, the US has been pushing ahead with refashioning its policy of deterrence of China, which eventually emerged in the last days of the Trump administration after years of discussion among the various stakeholders. This recognised that the Obama “pivot” (in which key players in the current administration were very much involved) had left the US defence posture in the region with some serious vulnerabilities. Originally patterned on the 2014 European Deterrence Initiative (EDI), designed to increase the readiness of US and NATO forces to counter Russian objectives in Eastern Europe following its successful invasion of the Crimea and Ukraine it has now emerged as the Pacific Defence Initiative (PDI).

The catchphrase now has become “integrated deterrence” which Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin described as being able to draw on the capabilities of not just the military, but on “federal agencies, partner nations and allies, as well.” He summarised the approach as “using every military and non-military tool in lock-step with allies and partners.” It calls especially for a stronger network of regional allies and “partners” opposed to China, more forward US deployment and spread of forces, weapons and materiel (including fuel reserves) through the region, increasing interoperability of non-US forces etc.

The PDI is a an extraordinarily ambitious call about which there are growing doubts among some US commentators ranging from those who are concerned that it acknowledges that US military capability alone can no longer prevail over a rapidly arming China to others who argue such a fundamental strategic plan must be based on a far more solid theme than “competition with China”. Others see it as a “dead end” with no readily achievable outcome in sight. And there are more specific concerns with the concept :

  • The US has relatively few real “allies” in the geographical scope of the PDI – unlike in Europe with the long list of NATO allies – and even some of those are wary about joining any anti-China coalitions. As exemplified here recently by South Korean President Moon’s public remarks.
  • The list of “partners” tacked on as potential supporters by the US (and Australia) is illusory – India being the only one out of 17 “partners” willing to sign up (through the Quad).
  • The push for interoperability among allies and partners needs to be balanced against the risk of increasing US command and control over national forces.
  • The impetus for more direct US military-to-military connections will not sit well with Biden’s broader democracy crusade given the plethora of examples of military intervention which have littered the political past of so many countries in the region.

To date, there has been little sign yet that any of the above has proved to be much of a deterrent on  China – and some that it has served to add fuel to Chinese aggressive policies. And at the same time, Russia has begun to share top billing with China on Biden’s priority list.  Highlighted by two conversations between Xi and Putin last year, the two countries are clearly seeking to explore opportunities to co-operate in coping with the increased US threats of sanctions and exploit what they perceive as Biden’s political fragility. The deployment a joint Sino-Russian naval convoy through several Japanese straits (in which ironically the US persuaded Japan some years ago to narrow its territorial rights so that the US Navy could transit freely!) demonstrated some important symbolism. The more recent Russian force deployments to the Ukraine border and Putin’s demands for the US to rule out future NATO membership for the Ukraine have since confronted Biden with an extremely sensitive  policy dilemma as Putin seemingly is determined to call his bluff and  challenge the whole 2014 EDI.

Elsewhere, Biden has had no apparent success on a slate of other international issues including the messy withdrawal from Afghanistan, the renewal of the Iran nuclear deal, North Korea, and immigration from Central America.

All of which adds up to an extremely daunting agenda for Biden throughout 2022 when his preoccupation about his domestic political base can only but grow and diminish his leverage in the international arena. For Australia to continue to ignore the many self-evident implications this will present for us should be unacceptable – from the next phases of the Covid pandemic, through seemingly inevitable inflationary pressures to regional security issues and even, as Penny Wong has so rightly pointed out, any new coalitions of the willing for the Ukraine or elsewhere.

Or, as The Australian reported, Barnaby Joyce’s questioning, from his recent discussions during his Covid-extended stay in the US, of  ‘the future of America’s global mission and whether it will have the capacity to uphold liberty and defend its allies to the same extent in the 21st century’. Joyce warned that Australians must have their “eyes wide open about our future”. He raised the prospect of America’s capacity to act being compromised by its economic woes, including a “dangerous escalation in inflation and an insurmountable debt” of nearly $US30 trillion …. When Australian interests are vitally and inseparably intertwined with US interests, then it is in the US national destiny that they take action. But the US will be more inclined to stay out of problems that are just for another country to solve.”

 

 

 

Share and Enjoy !

Subscribe to John Menadue's Newsletter
Subscribe to John Menadue's Newsletter

 

Thank you for subscribing!