Biden's foreign policy: Is Russia or China the enemy?

SOON after assuming office, US President Joe Biden, apparently referring to his intention announced during the election campaign to reverse the foreign policies of his predecessor Donald Trump, reportedly remarked that the enemy of the United States was not China but Russia. But in recent months, Biden on China has been sounding more and more like Trump. One popular commentator has thus been moved to suggest that Biden as a newly elected president and his foreign policy advisers should do their own thinking about how to deal with China.

In other areas, Biden swiftly reversed Trump's policies. He demonstrated his support of multilateralism by rejoining the Paris accord on climate change and the World Health Organization and agreeing to the appointment of the director general of the World Trade Organization. He showed climate change to be a top and central concern by organizing early on a virtual conference of the top 20 carbon-emitting countries. He struck down Trump's immigration policies that he considered to be racist and unwarranted. Recently, he made good on his announcement that as a basic policy, he would reinforce the alliances that the US had by attending a summit of alliance members at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, where he pronounced as sacred the US commitment to Article 5 ("An attack on one is an attack on all.")