There are two gargantuan foreign policy misconceptions in the mainstream media today. The first is that former President Donald Trump was an isolationist, a throw-back to the pre-President Dwight Eisenhower days of Sen. Robert Taft when Republicans believed they could establish a fortress America and blithely let the world go to hell. The second is that President Joe Biden represents a return to the status quo of American foreign policy, with the commander-in-chief making responsible decisions about global matters that reassure our allies and resonate with our adversaries.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Trump was not an isolationist.
His voice and his actions were in remarkable synchronization as he pursued a policy that was neither isolationist nor committed to solving every global dispute. It’s America first with the recognition that sometimes America needed to exercise its military might beyond its own borders.
He was well aware that China was both a military and economic threat to the United States and he took bold action to curb Chinese power with tariffs and by telling the Chinese president that he had better not even think of invading Taiwan because the U.S. was prepared to defend the island. You did not see Chinese fighters doing flypasts over Taiwan during Trump’s presidency. Trump engaged with North Korea and tamed a corpulent communist madman.
What characterized Trump’s foreign policy was precision that avoided massive troop deployments yet still succeeded in advancing U.S. interests. Iran continued to be a threat to the U.S. and Israel so Trump ordered the killing of that country’s top terrorist general, Qasem Soleimani. It remains an enigma why there was any debate over that decision since it proved a resounding success – until Joe Biden entered the White House.
Joe Biden is pursuing a nonsensical foreign policy that might be defined as peace through weakness. Although he loves to embrace NATO, he is not lauding the NATO that was created in 1949 to deter and contain Soviet aggression in Europe by his predecessor President Harry Truman who believed in something called peace through strength. The people who created NATO could all remember that it was the policy of appeasement that empowered Hitler to bloodlessly carve up Europe until the Western democracies finally said enough.
Ironically, even though Biden likes to talk about NATO unity, it is hardly speaking with one voice. Germany is not interested in punishing Russia with any economic sanctions because it is heavily reliant upon the country for much of its oil and natural gas. Biden cannot promise to replace those resources because he has made them scarce in the U.S. by shutting down pipelines and curbing oil exploration.
Biden has pursued a policy of appeasement since becoming president. Afghanistan was a classic appeasement. Biden was either blissfully unaware or lying blissfully about the efficacy of the Taliban as he assured Americans that the terrorists were no where near Kabul and had no chance of getting there anytime soon. He surrendered an airport to them, he let them have billions of dollars in sophisticated armaments and finally he just handed over the country. Then he ordered those Americans he could find to leave the country while the getting was good.
Despite so many in the Biden administration insisting that they are being “clear” about their policy on Ukraine, none of them have come close to being clear. After Biden lost his talking points during his presser last week and admitted he really didn’t give a damn if the Russians just bit off a piece of Ukraine, his handlers rushed to the mics to explain exactly what he meant.
Unfortunately, they didn’t do much better.
Vice President Kamala Harris couldn’t clarify things even though she said it twice.
"I will repeat myself, and I’m vice president of the United States, and the president and I work closely together, and I know his position because he’s been consistent in that regard. If Vladimir Putin and Russia takes aggressive action, it will be met with a cost that will be severe," Harris told NBC’s “Today.”
How can you take Biden seriously about maintaining the sanctity of Ukraine’s borders when he talks about a “minor incursion” on one day while for the past year he has been turning a blind eye to mass illegal immigration at the southern border where there is an open border that he refuses to either seal or even acknowledge? Clearly, borders are not Biden’s strong point so why should Ukrainians rest easy or why should Russia feel threatened?
During President Trump’s senseless impeachment, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) worked tirelessly for a daytime Emmy award by suggesting Ukraine represented the freedom of the world.
Joe Biden cares so much about Ukraine that he hasn’t even appointed an ambassador to the country and there hasn’t been a public complaint from Schiff about this oversight.
The worst foreign policy to have is no foreign policy. And that is precisely what Joe Biden has. After spending his entire life in government and occupying the some of the highest offices in the land and being a part of seminal domestic and foreign foreign decisions, Biden is seemingly incapable of articulating a coherent paragraph about what he envisions in this latest global crisis – anymore than he was in Afghanistan.
Chaos grows in the earth of indecision. Chaos is a catalyst for crisis and catastrophe.
Biden is the farmer and chemist producing both.