In his first State of the Union address, United States (US) President Joe Biden made the depth of his country’s opposition to the Russian invasion in Ukraine clear. Mr Biden declared that Vladimir Putin had “badly miscalculated” by underestimating the Ukrainians as well as the unity of the West and would pay a price in the long term; he framed it as a battle between democracies and autocracies. Mr Biden’s most critical comments on Mr Putin drew the most applause
In his first State of the Union address, United States (US) President Joe Biden made the depth of his country’s opposition to the Russian invasion in Ukraine clear. Mr Biden declared that Vladimir Putin had “badly miscalculated” by underestimating the Ukrainians as well as the unity of the West and would pay a price in the long term; he framed it as a battle between democracies and autocracies. Mr Biden’s most critical comments on Mr Putin drew the most applause from both sides of the aisle. His remarks indicate that countering and weakening Russia will remain the Biden era’s top foreign policy objective. Delhi should take note.
Mr Biden was acutely conscious that voters will eventually judge him on domestic issues. To be fair, on the economy and Covid-19, there is a mismatch in his actual performance — he has done a reasonably good job — and perceived performance — his popularity ratings are at an all-time low. His first year was marked by growth and job creation, but inflation has threatened to mar his record and damage the Democrats in the midterms scheduled for November this year. The US President focused on how battling inflation, by lowering costs, will be his key priority — and in a sign of how economic nationalism has outlasted Donald Trump, harped on a Made in America approach. On Covid-19, the US President, recognising how fatigued citizens are and how divided the country is now, declared that a new moment had arrived — but sensibly mentioned the need to be on guard against new variants, and push vaccination, including in the rest of the world.
There were two major gaps in the speech. Mr Biden made just a couple of references to China — and framed the relationship with Beijing as one of economic competition. For a country that has been billed by his own administration as the US’s most serious competitor on the political, strategic and economic planes, the absence of a vision on China as well as Asia, the Indo-Pacific, and Quad is disappointing — and should show Delhi how quickly Beijing is slipping down the policy priority radar in DC. The second, more unforgivable, absence, was Afghanistan. It was just six months ago that Mr Biden’s decision to leave Afghanistan enabled the return of the Taliban to Kabul; there is also a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan today. To not mention it, to not acknowledge the mistakes made, to not lay out red lines for the Taliban, and to not even offer a word of empathy for the Afghan people marked an abdication of responsibility.
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