Over the past four years, international conditions have changed radically and returning to the multilateralism of the Bush-Obama years won’t offer Joe Biden the leverage needed to deal with China and Russia.
The freedom for swift action that authoritarian regimes enjoy permitted China to quickly suppress COVID-19 and
register economic growth in 2020, while Europe and North America suffered greatly from the pandemic and a recession.
China Advancing Everywhere
However, Beijing has broken numerous commitments on trade and investment in the past, is violating its promise to maintain a two-system one-nation policy in Hong Kong, and appears reticent about commitments on climate change.
Europe Recognizes Threat, but Does Little
Trade and foreign investment are the cudgels
Beijing uses to weaken Western resistance and punish critics. It is investing heavily in Western European companies to access cutting-edge technology and in Eastern and Central Europe infrastructure, and that could undermine loyalty to NATO.
Digital technologies are rapidly dividing the world into two spheres.
One led by China, which preaches the benefits of autocratic government and would be happy to provide acolytes with the tools for the surveillance state and repression. The other is led by America and its advanced allies, who offers technology freely to partners to build wealth, prosperity and mutually respected security.
Great Mischief
Russia cannot challenge the United States or NATO in conventional weapons, but the potential for a conventional conflict to ignite a nuclear war permits Russia to pursue great mischief without fear of military retaliation, for example, in the Middle East by supporting U.S. rivals and to engaging in cyberwarfare.
Biden’s commitment to multilateralism and shoring up relations with allies is a process, not a policy. It must be accompanied by a clear message about the challenges that China and Russia pose, and that acknowledges a credible response will be costly to Americans and that articulates with firmness and clarity what we expect from our allies to enjoy our protection.
We cannot trade with China on our current scale without peril and must bear the cost of disengagement. The Germans, for example
cannot be dependent on trade with China and buy natural gas from Russia without helping finance their military and cyberwarfare infrastructure.
Biden’s
most comprehensive statements on foreign policy have mostly waxed about the importance of multilateralism, but the recent trade and investment treaty China has accomplished with the EU indicates multilateralism and reliance on allies will prove a hollow policy.
Peter Morici is an economist and business professor at the University of Maryland, and a national columnist. He tweets @pmorici1
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