Global Views of a Biden Presidency

On Saturday afternoon, the sigh of relief was palpable across Europe. Having appealed for calm and praised the democratic resilience of the U.S. electoral process, most political leaders issued heartfelt congratulations, church bells tolled, and fireworks exploded across the continent.

A Toll of Unprecedented Instability

There is no precedent to the instability that U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has caused to European politics. The U.S.-led intervention in Iraq of 2003 divided European governments but did not threaten the European Union. Following those events, the EU issued its first ever security strategy and in 2004 added ten new members—two accomplishments that promoted the EU’s evolution as a foreign policy player. During the past four years, Trump repeatedly accused European governments of freeriding on U.S. security guarantees, threatened trade wars, supported the UK’s departure from the EU, undermined the principle of multilateralism that is the very DNA of the EU, and stoked disunity among EU members. Even if a majority of Europeans disliked Trump, he has become increasingly popular among supporters of the far right, which has weakened Europe’s ability to be united.

A couple of years into Trump’s administration, most European governments gave up their early hopes that the transatlantic relationship would remain stable. Yet, their response to the United States has been uneven. While the EU has been able to fend off U.S. trade threats, it has not risen to the challenges that have continued to erupt on its borders: conflicts have degenerated, tensions risen, and peaceful demands for democratic change have been insufficiently supported.

This has just underscored how important U.S. engagement in Europe continues to be. Nearly all political leaders hope for a quick restart of collaboration across the Atlantic, and those who had invested in the Trump administration will soon adapt. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose Brexit agenda was paired with Trump’s promise of a quick U.S.-UK trade deal, is already under pressure to finalize an agreement with the EU that will not damage the peace agreement in Northern Ireland (and thus the economy of the entire continent, by avoiding the “no deal” scenario he has been threatening Brussels with).

The Risk of Wishful Thinking

The risk in Europe is that the sigh of relief quickly turns into wishful thinking of a return to an earlier status quo, which will not happen. The traditional transatlanticism of European states has hampered its own growth as a foreign policy player. This time, renewed cooperation across the Atlantic Ocean will require a stronger commitment from Europe to take on a greater share of its global responsibilities.

With the new administration, the United States and Europe will find themselves side by side in the need to push for ambitious change. Joe Biden’s victory speech emphasized unity and healing. Three years ago, French President Emmanuel Macron’s victory speech, after a bitterly polarized run-off with far-right contender Marine Le Pen, also recognized the need to listen to and unite all French citizens. The United States and Europe head into challenging times: their advanced democracies need reform to prevent their erosion, their economies need recovery from pandemic times, and the world needs forces for stability. Together they can fireproof their societies and the multilateral order from disorder.

Divergent reactions in the Middle East to U.S. President-elect Joe Biden’s victory reflected deep divisions in the region, where the policies of President Donald Trump were as polarizing as they have been elsewhere. Most leaders made the expected congratulatory statements—some more promptly and enthusiastically than others—but media commentary in several of the Trump-friendly states betrayed worry about relations with Biden. More interesting than what Middle Eastern leaders said, however, was what several of them did: offer gestures to a president-elect they believe will revive the traditional U.S. interest in human rights.

Statements Vary in Promptness and Warmth

Middle East leaders all sent their congratulations to Biden, but it was clear which leaders were most enthusiastic: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordan’s King Abdullah II, for example, who had strongly opposed Trump’s support for Israeli annexation of the West Bank. The alliance among Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, which had bet heavily on Trump, found itself in an awkward position and scattered accordingly. Emirati and Egyptian leaders moved out swiftly with congratulations for Biden, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud held back for a day or so and then were somewhat awkward in their messages. When Netanyahu did send his tweet, for example, Israeli media pointed out that it failed to note the reason for his congratulations to Biden and Vice President–elect Kamala Harris—no mention of the presidency, vice presidency, or elections.

Media Commentary Betrays Worry

Amid traditional statements by leaders, media commentary in Trump-friendly countries was a bit chaotic. The U.S. election dominated talks shows in Egypt, for example, where pro-regime host Ahmed Moussa spent his November 7 show airing Trump claims about electoral irregularities. But on November 8, Moussa switched to acknowledging Biden’s victory and reassuring viewers that Biden would not put any pressure on Egypt—claiming that during his vice presidency, Biden had intervened with former U.S. president Barack Obama on behalf of deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and would in any case be preoccupied with domestic problems. Meanwhile, former Egyptian foreign minister Amr Moussa told Egyptian television host Amr Adeeb—replying to a question about whether Biden would bring back the “nightmare” of Obama policies—that Cairo would have to “lobby, lobby, lobby!” to reinforce Egypt’s strategic value. Similarly, Saudi commentator Tariq al-Homayed took a whistling-past-the-graveyard approach, saying he doubted that Biden would make the sort of policy changes being promoted by “leftists or those associated with political Islam.”

Actions Speak Louder Than Words

In the hours before Biden’s electoral victory was called by U.S. news networks, Egypt, Iran, and the UAE all took steps that appeared to be gestures toward the new president-elect. Iran released human rights lawyer Nasrin Soutoudeh, who had been held for two years accused of espionage; Egypt released the five cousins of Egyptian-American rights activist Mohammed Soltan, who was detained in June after launching a lawsuit against a former Egyptian prime minister; and the UAE announced several social reforms, including decriminalizing alcohol use and toughening penalties for so-called honor killings. The UAE reforms appeared to be the latest in a series of moves—most notably, normalizing relations with Israel—in which the country has tried to show itself more amenable than its ally Saudi Arabia to steps long advocated by the United States.

Superficially, many in Asia welcomed President Donald Trump’s tough talk about China, praising his administration’s emphasis on “strategic competition” with Beijing. But his policies—particularly on trade and investment—are widely viewed as having undercut that goal. President-elect Joe Biden now has an opportunity to set the stage for more systematic, institutionalized, and effective competition with Beijing.

Trump’s Approach: Long on Attitude, Short on Strategy

Despite Trump’s fighting words about competing with China, many Asian governments, broadly speaking, have viewed his administration’s policies as inconsistent with this goal. Some leaders, notably in Southeast Asia, abhor Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s stark “us or them” framing, preferring to view their region in balance-of-power rather than ideological terms. And America’s closest allies, especially Japan and Australia, loathe Trump’s trade policies, not least his decision to withdraw the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal.

In the wake of American withdrawal, eleven countries completed the TPP without the United States—in effect, setting the region’s trade and investment standards without its largest economy and traditional standard setter. In a region whose business is business, that gap between American rhetoric and action has been a source of consternation to governments that view full-spectrum U.S. engagement as an essential balance to the rise of Chinese power.

Just take Southeast Asia, which the Trump administration viewed as ground zero of strategic competition with Beijing. In the last four weeks alone, Washington has picked trade fights with two strategically pivotal countries—Vietnam, which it is investigating for alleged currency manipulation, and Thailand, whose duty-free trade privileges the Trump administration has just revoked.

A Wanted Recalibration

Biden takes office against this backdrop.

Many in Asia hope his administration will maintain Trump’s tough line on China. But they also hope Washington will recalibrate, not least by returning to the TPP, now called the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). And that, quite frankly, is incredibly unlikely: both major U.S. political parties are awash in trade skepticism, and it is plausible that the United States will never again do a major multilateral trade agreement.

This, in turn, will leave Washington outside the two agreements—the CPTPP and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership—that will set trade and investment standards in Asia for a generation. And that absence will intensify persistent questions about whether the United States is fading as an economic rule setter even as it strengthens its role as a security player.

The Biden team faces three immediate challenges.

First, there is bipartisan consensus for strengthened security partnerships. But Trump muddied the waters by breaking with traditional Republicans through his implicit threats to curtail the U.S. presence and intensification of politically fraught burden-sharing pressures. Asian allies hope for quick consensus between the Biden administration and establishment Republicans on the future of America’s security posture.

Second, some fret that Biden will soften Trump’s toughened China policies, yet this seems unlikely amid bipartisan consensus for a harder edge toward Beijing. China has united against it a bipartisan cast of surprising political bedfellows in Washington—pushing together coalitions of politicians whose views diverge on nearly every other public policy issue. These have included Republican Senator Ted Cruz and Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joining hands on one congressional China initiative and Republican Senator Tom Cotton and Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren on another. The sweet spot for Biden is to pursue competition without confrontation, as one campaign adviser puts it. But Asian capitals will be alert to whether less confrontation amounts to an overcorrection. And there could be rancor around the margins as Biden weighs selectively rolling back Trump’s tariffs and reengages with Beijing on climate change. The latter effort may yield confrontation with some Republicans, who argue that former president Barack Obama’s administration softened on security goals in exchange for climate concessions from China.

Third, Asians see a United States beset by partisanship, bogged down by domestic debates on which there is little consensus. Woody Allen famously argued that “80 percent of success is showing up,” and this is precisely the lens through which many in Asia tend to judge American commitment. Asian governments will want administration officials to show up early and often, so visits and headline announcements in the first nine months will set a tone for Asia policy that could endure for the duration of Biden’s term.

Latin America has never been a top-tier threat to the United States. President-elect Joe Biden and his team are bound to overlook the region as they confront the daunting list of urgent priorities awaiting them: China’s expansionism, the Kremlin’s adventurism, Iran’s terrorism, North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, a fragile U.S. economy, and, of course, the coronavirus pandemic will all conspire to keep Latin America a second-ranked concern.

This is not new. Except for sporadic spikes in the White House’s attention to the region sparked by immigration crises, financial crashes, drug trafficking, trade agreements, or Cuba, Latin America has rarely received sustained, high-level attention from any U.S. presidential administration.

Trump’s Legacy in Latin America

President Donald Trump and his administration were no different. The administration occasionally focused on the regional issues that mattered to the president, but those were isolated, often improvised, efforts bereft of a strategic vision. In fairness, that’s long been the norm for Latin America policy, regardless of who occupies the Oval Office.

Consider the policy changes that did happen. Trump notoriously sought to build a wall along the border with Mexico; adopted an aggressive—indeed cruel—immigration stance; launched large, militarized narcotics interdiction efforts; stepped up the pressure on Nicolás Maduro’s nightmarish regime in Venezuela; and negotiated mostly cosmetic changes to the free trade agreement with Mexico and Canada, which amounted to a rebranding exercise for NAFTA. These policies weren’t nothing, but they didn’t amount to much.

Biden’s Vision for Latin America Policy

The Democratic Party’s platform has called Trump’s wall along the southern border “unnecessary, wasteful and ineffective” and plans to stop it. Biden’s approach to the region centers on climate change, clean energy, human rights, labor rights, and the fight against corruption—not exactly Trumpian concerns. He has promised a four-year, $4-billion regional strategy to Central America to reduce the poverty and violence that has prompted entire families to start walking toward the United States. One significant risk is that hundreds of thousands of displaced Central Americans may see Biden’s election as a signal that access to the United States is now safer, setting off an immigration crisis.

Biden has also said that the sanctions-centered approach to Venezuela and the illusory warmongering favored by Trump will shift. He plans to concentrate U.S. efforts on ensuring free and fair presidential elections in the country and supporting the Latin American nations now hosting the bulk of the 5.1 million Venezuelans who have fled.

The main relationships that the new White House will need to manage are with Brazil and Mexico. These two giants account for more than half of Latin America’s population and GDP, as of 2019. Both have populist presidents with agendas that collide with Biden’s: the deforestation of the Amazonia in the case of Brazil and migration, drugs, and trade in the case of Mexico.

The president-elect knows the region fairly well. In eight years as vice president, he visited sixteen times, “more than any other [U.S.] president or vice president,” as Atlantic editor Christian Paz has pointed out. Hopefully, this familiarity will count for something. Yet the region he will encounter will be very different from the one he visited so often: a global coronavirus hotspot undergoing the deepest economic contraction of the past 120 years. Nonetheless, Biden does know the region, so the hope remains that he will break the long tradition of U.S. leaders glancing south only when circumstances force their hand.

Shortly after major U.S. news organizations called Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, eighty-one-year-old Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been ruling the country since 1989, issued a characteristically harsh statement:

“The situation in the US and what they themselves say about their elections is a spectacle! This is an example of the ugly face of liberal democracy in the US. Regardless of the outcome, one thing is absolutely clear, the definite political, civil, and moral decline of the US regime.”

Khamenei’s derision was a reminder that Tehran’s opposition to the United States is trifold: applied equally to leaders of both parties, an enduring pillar of the 1979 Iranian revolution, and central to Iran’s identity as an Islamic republic. Although Iranian President Hassan Rouhani—whose limited presidential authority expires in the summer of 2021—publicly expressed hope that a Biden administration might return to the Iran nuclear deal, Khamenei made clear that a new administration in Washington would have no ability to change Tehran’s longtime policies. U.S. elections are “none of our business,” he said. “Our policy is clear and well calculated and [presidents’] coming and going will have no impact on it.”

Khamenei’s View at Home

Khamenei’s views do not reflect the sentiments of a young Iranian population—with a median age of thirty-two—that overwhelmingly welcomes better relations with the United States and the potential sanctions relief that could result from a Biden presidency. Yet Iranians’ popular cynicism about their own regime’s repression and mismanagement coupled with pessimism about Washington’s ability to effect change in Tehran—using either engagement or coercion—has contributed to a profound and pervasive national fatalism. “In the last forty-two years,” a friend wrote me from Tehran shortly after Biden’s victory, “we’ve had U.S. presidents who’ve sought to befriend our government and those who’ve sought to overthrow it. . . . Nothing has changed, and nothing will change.”

The United States and Iran

Tehran’s role in major global security challenges—including nuclear proliferation, cybersecurity, terrorism, and the deadly conflicts in Syria and Yemen—will continue to merit U.S. attention. While a full or partial restoration of the 2015 nuclear deal may be possible, meaningful change in the U.S.-Iran relationship is unlikely until there is a change of leadership in Tehran. For his part, Khamenei continues to predict that it is the United States, not the Islamic Republic of Iran, whose days are numbered. “Such an empire will not last long,” he said shortly before the U.S. election. “It’s obvious that when a regime reaches this point, it will not live for much longer and will be destroyed.”

Despite Khamenei’s hubris, a Biden presidency presents both an opportunity and a challenge for Tehran. The opportunity is a chance to improve the country’s moribund economy; the challenge is that Tehran will no longer be able to effectively use President Donald Trump as a pretext or distraction for its domestic repression, economic failures, and regional aggression.

Although President Donald Trump deeply damaged the United States at home and many of its interests abroad, U.S.-India relations surprisingly thrived during his tenure. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s personal relationship with Trump helped New Delhi secure benefits even in an “America First” presidency. While India suffered some economic pain, bilateral strategic ties prospered as Trump’s administration gave India pride of place in U.S. national security thinking, offered it previously unavailable advanced military equipment, and supported it comprehensively in its crises with Pakistan and China.

New Delhi’s First Take

Despite these gains, Modi often walked on eggshells when dealing with Trump. U.S. President-elect Joe Biden’s victory promises comfort on this score. Not surprisingly, Indian leaders across the political spectrum have welcomed Biden’s election, with Modi tweeting congratulations on Biden’s “spectacular victory” and emphasizing his past contributions to bilateral relations. A separate tweet, congratulating U.S. Vice President–elect Kamala Harris, communicated the pride that Indians feel on seeing an American of Indian ancestry rise to the second-highest office in the country. These sentiments collectively express New Delhi’s hope that the U.S.-India partnership will expand both because of strategic convergence and the Biden-Harris links to India.

This promise notwithstanding, uncertainties abound as New Delhi swiftly pivots to deal with the incoming U.S. administration. Modi’s conspicuous embrace of Trump can be explained away by saying his actions served India well in their time. But the gnawing qualms surrounding possible shifts in U.S. policy cannot be dismissed as easily.

Four Possible Shifts Ahead

Four issues remain particularly important. First, Biden’s policies toward China and Pakistan could disrupt India’s current strategy. Whatever the complications for the United States, Trump’s strident opposition toward China served Indian interests well. India could avoid frenetically balancing against China and, until the recent troubles on the border, could actually entertain cooperation with Beijing. India thus enjoyed the best of both worlds: limiting China’s opposition toward itself while having its rival constrained by American hostility.

A more nuanced U.S. competition with China—which could represent Biden’s correction of extant U.S. policy—would undermine this Indian calculus and push New Delhi toward options it would prefer to avoid. Although it is unlikely that Biden will change course radically in respect to Pakistan—or Afghanistan—even subtle changes that presage greater U.S. cooperation with Islamabad hold the potential of undermining Indian interests.

Second, Biden’s approach to U.S.-India trade disputes is unclear. India seeks reinstatement of its privileged access as a developing country to the U.S. market. Trump abolished this benefit and Biden may not restore it without greater U.S. access to the Indian market in return—exactly when New Delhi itself has become more protectionist. More liberal U.S. visa policies for Indian professionals could take the sting out of these trade problems, which appear poised to fester nonetheless.

Third, the Trump years represented a values holiday for the United States. Excepting its adversaries, the United States did not care much about what happened inside other countries in the areas of human rights, religious freedoms, and democratic practices. A Biden administration would likely be different, bringing domestic Indian political developments under greater U.S. scrutiny and possibly pushback.

Fourth, Biden’s commitment to dealing with transnational challenges such as climate change offers possibilities for U.S.-Indian cooperation in principle, but it could also lead to frictions depending on what is asked of India. Moreover, U.S. and Indian visions of global order have important differences and there could be as many opportunities for irritations as cooperation, including in multilateral institutions where both partners interact.

The official Indian enthusiasm about Biden’s election, therefore, should not obscure the concerns of Indian policymakers as they attempt to protect the gains they sometimes unexpectedly received from Trump. Biden’s administration will unquestionably be good for America in diverse ways. But whether it can satisfy Indian strategic interests going forward remains a big question in New Delhi.

Moscow didn’t have too much of a stake in the U.S. election: it assumed that, whether President Donald Trump or President-elect Joe Biden won, the U.S.-Russian confrontation would continue and probably grow more intense.

Despite Trump’s recurrent rhetoric about getting along with Russia, his administration has taken a hard stance toward Moscow. In the last four years, the United States has imposed no fewer than forty-six sanctions packages on Russia. Trump has canceled the INF Treaty, potentially opening the way for the United States to deploy fast-flying U.S. missile systems in Europe that would target Russia’s critical strategic assets at close range. And Trump’s White House took a hard line on extending the New START Treaty, the last major element of the arms control system. Meanwhile, U.S. troops in Europe have moved closer to the Russian border, even as U.S. warplanes and naval ships exercised closer to Russia’s frontiers and did so more often. What’s more, Trump leaned hard on Germany, urging it to cancel the almost completed gas pipeline project Nord Stream 2, the flagship of Moscow’s energy export policy.

Russia Has No Illusions About Biden

Weeks ahead of the vote, the Kremlin began to get ready for a Biden win. Russians have no illusions. The Democrats are determined to be even tougher on Russia than the outgoing administration. Sanctions are likely to continue as the prime instrument of U.S. Russia policy. Under Biden, they may get more targeted and strategic. With better communication between the United States and Europe, the West’s Russia policies will be better coordinated, ratcheting up pressure on Moscow. The Democratic administration will probably provide more military support to Ukraine and pay more attention to the standoff in Belarus. While Trump’s promotion of U.S. liquified natural gas in Europe challenges Russian energy interests in the short term, Biden’s policies, going broadly in the same green direction as those of the EU, sap at the foundation of Russia’s reliance on hydrocarbons as the backbone of its economy.

Biden and Vice President–elect Kamala Harris are expected to criticize Russia’s domestic policies and practices with gusto and offer more support to anti-Kremlin elements. Biden, of course, supports a simple extension of New START, but arms control talks with his administration will probably be as tough as any in history. The positives of Biden’s accession include more predictability and hopefully a diminishing role for Russia as a focus of U.S. domestic politics. Yet, with all these concerns in mind, the Kremlin will not miss an opportunity to reach out to the Biden administration hoping to resume dialogue.

The Uncertain Rule of the Liberal Establishment

The election itself has confirmed to the Russian public that, while the U.S. political system is in a deepening crisis, U.S. political institutions continue to function. The chaos that many prophesied and some were looking forward to hasn’t happened. While giving extensive coverage to the U.S. election, Russian television networks concluded that U.S. election practices did not meet the standards that the United States uses while assessing elections in other countries. That may explain Russian President Vladimir Putin’s delay in congratulating Biden on his victory. This is a political statement thinly disguised as waiting for the procedure to be finalized. The Kremlin does not expect Biden to be a strong leader, much less a successful reformer. In short, Russia is bracing for the uncertain rule of the liberal establishment, challenged by the pro-Trump forces that have held sway for the last four years.