I believe that the United States and Europe, both for strategic reasons and for normative and political reasons, should remain strong partners.
China is going to be the main challenge for the United States. The largest economy in Asia, soon to be first in the world, it is becoming, if not aggressive, much more assertive in protecting its interests. Through its Belt and Road Initiative it is really reaching out to the rest of the globe as well. Does Europe need to compete or fight with China? In what way does the Atlantic alliance help contain the rise of China, if that is really the big (systemic and geopolitical) challenge?
I think dealing with China will probably be one of the most challenging tasks for the Atlantic community. And that is because I expect the United States’ relationship with China to remain troubled. The underlying conflicts of interests over trade, over security, over human rights are not going away. In fact, they could get worse because Biden cares more about human rights, about Hong Kong, Taiwan and Uighurs in Xinjiang than Trump. But I do think that the European Union, collectively and individually, will be pulled in different directions. On the one hand, it shares the American scepticism about Chinese ambitions. On the other hand, China has arrived in Europe through the Belt and Road Initiative and trade and investment are rising. The economic stakes of strong Chinese-European ties are high.
This is another area where I think that Russia looms large. We have seen in the last ten years or so what I would call a quasi-alliance between Russia and China, but one that I think is rather unnatural and perhaps fragile. So another task that I would put on the European and American agenda is to pull Russia westwards, and to try to respond to what I am sure the Kremlin is feeling quietly, which is that over the long run, the greater threat to Russian interests come not from NATO, Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus or Estonia, but from a rising China.
What ought Europe to do to help? If there is going to be a retreat from the Middle East, what does this entail, in terms of the commitment to Israel and Saudi Arabia, for instance? How will Biden handle Iran, which is an issue of importance for the Europeans and where they can be of great assistance to the President-elect?
Let me stress that when I say "pullback from the Middle East", I am talking mostly about land wars. And I expect there to be a pullback from the military front but a lean in on the diplomatic front. So, no more attempts at regime change, no more toppling of Saddam Hussein, and Muammar Ghaddafi. But there will be more engagement diplomatically, so that as the United States pulls back militarily it compensates by doing more diplomatically. And I presume that there will be some residual US forces in the region to deal with counterterrorism as well as some US forces offshore to deal with the Persian Gulf and Iran. I do not see the US disappearing: I see it avoiding land wars and regime change and focusing more on a set of core objectives, including containing Iran, protecting the flow of oil, defending Israel’s security.
And I also think that it would be wise for Europe to be ready to assume more responsibility for the broader Mediterranean basin. Whether that is in Syria, in Libya, in Nagorno Karabakh. I think Biden will be looking for concrete examples of European willingness to shoulder more burdens.
Copyright: Delil SOULEIMAN / AFP
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