President Biden's Europe trip is meant to reassure allies that the U.S. is back in the business of global leadership, but long-term credibility will be a hard sell
Biden speaking with reporters on the final day of the G7 summit on Sunday. Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images Joe Biden wrapped up the first leg of his first international excursion as president with the closing of the G7 summit in Cornwall on Sunday, and the statements and commitments that came out of the meeting suggest he is having some success getting allies onboard with his foreign policy agenda.
The overall atmosphere at the summit was one of relief and reunion, like a moderately dysfunctional family welcoming a cousin home from rehab. The G7 leaders took no pains to conceal how glad they were to be doing business with a good old-fashioned institutionalist American president, as opposed to a vainglorious egomaniac with a gratuitous aversion to international cooperation. U.K. prime minister Boris Johnson called Biden “a breath of fresh air.
Hence, Biden’s fundamental dilemma in dealing with Europe and other democratic allies is that no matter how personally competent and trustworthy he may be, they can’t trust the American government to uphold these commitments in the long term anymore. For decades, one of the few things Republicans and Democrats could broadly agree on was the importance of global American leadership and democracy promotion. Trump’s view of international partnerships as drains on U.S.
During the G7, Biden reportedly could not get countries with major trade ties to China onboard with a more explicit stance against Beijing’s human-rights abuses and labor practices. Competing with China will require a broad commitment to a strong framework of global trade rules that put a price on China’s anti-competitive authoritarianism without the blunt and dangerous instrument of trade wars.
Biden’s next stop is the NATO summit in Brussels, where he will reaffirm the U.S. commitment to the Article 5 mutual defense clause, which Trump had undermined. The summit will address the new strategic challenges the alliance is facing from China and Russia, as well as the withdrawal from Afghanistan. NATO is updating its strategic concept for the first time since 2010.
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