On Thursday, US President Joe Biden delivered his first speech on foreign policy at the State Department. The President had already outlined some foreign policy objectives during his inauguration speech and on the campaign trail, but his appearance on Thursday revealed some further details.

1.    The US will take a multilateral approach to foreign policy

The return of multilateralism and diplomacy as a key tenet of American foreign policy has been stressed continuously by members of the new administration and is a sharp turn away from the unilateral ‘America First’ approach of the previous administration. Biden reiterated this point, saying: ‘America is back. Diplomacy is back.’

Biden’s decision to visit the State Department barely a few weeks into his presidency was a statement in itself. Trump took longer than a year to visit the State Department, which saw its workforce and capabilities dimmish significantly during his time as president. Biden emphasised that the new administration will fully support foreign-affairs officers and that they will be trusted with greater responsibilities to promote US interests abroad. Biden did not lay out any specifics, but Secretary of State Anthony Blinken will likely be leading efforts to reinvigorate the State Department’s workforce.

Diplomacy will be at the heart of Washington’s approach to a broad array of international issues. Biden underlined the importance of ‘rebuilding the muscle of democratic alliances’ to confront Washington’s adversaries, but he also acknowledged the need to work more widely with the international community to tackle issues like COVID-19 and climate change. Biden reaffirmed earlier pledges to ‘re-engage with the World Health Organisation’ and other international bodies as part of the new administration’s multilateral push.

2.    Biden wants to restore American leadership and strengthen the American-led order

The new administration’s multilateral approach to foreign policy should not be mistaken for acceptance of a multipolar world order. Biden commented on a need to ‘earn back [the US’s] leadership position’. The Biden administration may be strong advocates for cooperating closely with other states and participating in international organisations, but the expectation is still that Washington will be the leading authority.

Essentially, the Biden administration is hoping that they can run the clock back to an era of unquestionable American hegemony and have chosen diplomacy as the means to achieve this. Strengthening the US’s alliances and reaffirming the norms and values which underpin the American-led order are intelligent choices but reversing the decline of American power may prove a difficult task. The US remains at the head of the global pecking order, as it did during Biden’s time as vice president under Obama, but new and greater challenges have emerged, especially from a rising China. In its diplomatic dealings, Biden may find that Washington holds fewer trump cards than it did since the last time Democrats were in power.

3.    Great power competition with China will remain

Biden was clear that Beijing will remain Washington’s primary strategic concern when he said: ‘we’ll also take on directly the challenges posed to our prosperity, security and democratic values by our most serious competitor, China’. 

He added: ‘we’ll confront China’s economic abuses, counter its aggressive coercive actions and push back on China’s attack on human rights, intellectual property and global governance’.

Evidently, the new administration is not set to de-escalate the growing economic and strategic competition between the US and China. Bipartisan support, which has become rare in American politics, remains in favour of a tough stance on China. The trade war will endure in some form, as Washington has no immediate plans to lift tariffs on Chinese goods initially brought about by the Trump administration. Sanctions imposed on Chinese officials to punish Beijing for its crackdown on pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong will also likely remain.

The President and other members of the new administration have signalled that they will rely more on cooperation with allies to confront China than the previous administration. Biden called American allies the US’s ‘greatest asset’. 

However, Biden indicated that the new administration is willing to engage with China and noted that: ‘we’re ready to work with Beijing when it’s in America’s interests to do so’. Washington will likely try to reinforce regional partnerships to counter Beijing whilst also leaving the door open for more positive Sino-American engagement.

4.    The US will take a tough stance on Russia

The present state of US-Russia relations has not been this frosty since the Cold War and Biden’s speech made it clear that they will not be thawing any time soon. He said: ‘the days of the United States rolling over in the face of Russia’s aggressive actions, interfering with our elections, cyber-attacks, poisoning its citizens, are over’.

In terms of actual policy, not much is likely to change between the Trump and Biden administrations. However, a more consistent approach towards the Kremlin is expected from the new administration. Trump was personally hesitant to criticise the Kremlin whereas the policymakers in his administration were keen to support Ukraine against Russian-backed separatists and impose tariffs to discourage the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline which would transport natural gas between Russia and Germany. Unlike Trump, it is unlikely that Biden will break rank with other arms of the US government when dealing with Russia.

As with many issues, Biden reiterated the importance of working with allies to confront challenges posed by Russia. To that end, the Biden administration will work with NATO partners in a fashion more in keeping with the history of the US-NATO relationship than the Trump administration’s unconventional approach.

The President also commented on domestic upheaval in Russia. Biden and Secretary of State Blinken both criticised the imprisonment and alleged poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny by the Kremlin when speaking at the State Department. Biden urged for his immediate release. 

Despite the mostly confrontational rhetoric directed at the Kremlin, Biden did announce that the US and Russia have agreed to extend New START (Strategic arms reduction treaty) for five years which limits both countries from expanding their nuclear arsenals.

5.    Global warming and the climate crisis will be at the heart of US foreign policy

Biden highlighted climate change as a top priority during his presidential campaign and was keen to spotlight the issue again during his speech at the State Department. The President stressed that Washington would be ‘integrating climate objectives across all of [its] diplomacy’.

On his first day in office Biden affirmed pledges made by his party to take a multilateral approach to climate change by re-entering the Paris Agreement which the previous administration had abandoned. During the speech, Biden also announced his intentions to host an international climate summit on Earth Day.

In keeping with the themes of multilateralism and American leadership, the President said that Washington must ‘challenge other nations’ to take climate change seriously and that ‘America must lead… on this existential threat.’

Biden did not mention his recent decision to terminate the Keystone XL pipeline which was planned to boost the transportation of oil between Canada and the US. The decision was well received by environmental activists and progressive Democrats but has drawn criticism from the Canadian government and has lead to job losses for workers in the oil industry.

6.    The US will end support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen

One of the more seismic changes to US foreign policy is the new administration’s withdrawal of support for the Saudi Arabian-led war in Yemen. A reset of relations with Washington’s Gulf allies did not come out of the blue. Biden had announced that he would halt weapons sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates pending a review, not long into taking office. However, it was not until his speech on Thursday that Washington’s withdrawal of support for the war became public knowledge.

Biden said: ‘we’re ending all American support for offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales’. The President called the war a ‘strategic and humanitarian disaster’ and stated that the US would instead back the UN-led initiative to impose a ceasefire in Yemen. The new administration also plans to bolster aid sent to the war-ravaged country.

Biden did throw out some conciliatory remarks towards the US’s Gulf allies. He acknowledged that Iranian-backed groups threaten Saudi security with UAV and missile strikes and that the US would continue to support Gulf allies by providing defensive munitions. 

7.    The US will take in more refugees and promote humanitarian efforts abroad

The new administration appears eager to promote the US as a humanitarian leader on the world stage. Biden highlighted the challenges posed by more than 80 million displaced people globally and the importance of American leadership on the issue.

The President said that he had signed an executive order to bolster the United States Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) and raise refugee admissions back up to 125,000 in the first fiscal year of his presidency. 

8.    Biden has condemned the military coup in Myanmar (Burma)

Biden has decried the military’s seizure of power following elections in Myanmar. The military alleges that Aung San Suu Kyi’s landslide victory was the result of extensive voter fraud which prompted military leaders to stage a coup on 1 February.

Biden has said that: ‘the Burmese military should relinquish power they have seized, release the advocates, activists and officials they have detained, lift the restrictions on telecommunications and refrain from violence’. The President also stated that the US will work with allies to ‘address the military coup in Burma’. 

The coup poses an early foreign policy challenge for the new administration to tackle. However, it is not likely that Washington will do more than issue symbolic sanctions and deliver pro-democracy rhetoric to influence events in Myanmar.

9.    The US will upgrade its approach to cybersecurity

Biden said on Thursday that the status of cybersecurity has been ‘elevated’ by his government. The increased focus on cybersecurity was likely prompted by the recent SolarWinds hack which exposed vulnerabilities in US government and military software last December. Russian hackers are believed to have been behind the cyberattack.

The President stated that: ‘we are launching an urgent initiative to improve our capability, readiness and resilience in cyberspace’. Cyberspace has become an increasingly important domain of warfare as technology continues to improve, so it is likely that the new administration will elaborate further on plans to bolster the US’s cyber capabilities in the near future. For now, Biden has proposed that $10 billion be spent on cybersecurity and information technology as part of a wider COVID-19 relief proposal.

10. If not ‘America First’, ‘Americans First’

In many ways the new administration’s foreign policy approaches harken back to a not-too-distant period when the US was fully engaged on the world stage and actively promoted liberal institutionalism, democracy, and American leadership in a globalised world. Biden perhaps recognises that many Americans have grown cynical of this approach, instead believing it to have contributed to fruitless wars in the Middle East and the outsourcing of American jobs abroad. This of course, was a grievance shared by many Americans who voted for Trump.

The new administration has made it clear that Trump’s ‘America First’ era is over, at least for as long as they are in power. Nevertheless, Biden was at pains to state that ‘foreign policy is about promoting the interests of the people of the United States’. 

The widening chasm at the heart of American socio-political stability is more inherently domestic than foreign, but the pressures of globalisation have exposed painful vulnerabilities in the American middle and working classes. The new administration should tread carefully to ensure that its foreign policy is not perceived to further exacerbate these vulnerabilities.