Biden vs Trump On National Security: Here’s The New Administration’s First Month Report Card

On a number of national security issues, the Biden administration is showing troubling signs of a backslide with regard to the historic progress Trump made.

Whatever your views of Donald Trump’s presidency, it is hard to dispute that he produced a stronger record of achievement across the board when it comes to protecting the American people from a range of foreign threats than any other president in at least a generation. His national security accomplishments in four short years included taking on China, forging the historic Abraham Accords in the Middle East, defeating the ISIS caliphate, countering Iran, and standing up the Space Force. So now, one month into his tenure, how is President Joe Biden doing in preserving and building on Trump’s remarkable record?

One month ago, all presidential appointees in the White House wrote standard, end-of-office resignation letters to Trump. In my letter departing as deputy assistant to the president and spokesman for the National Security Council, I singled out 10 key accomplishments he achieved for the American people (most of which were accomplished in the last 18 months of his term, with new NSC leaders Robert O’Brien and Matt Pottinger executing efficiently on his priorities across the government). The 10 accomplishments offer a good framework for scoring President Biden’s effect on our national security in his first 30 days in office.

The bottom line: The jury is still out on where the Biden administration stands on most of these issues so early into the administration, but on a number of the items, there are worrying signs of a backslide on the historic progress Trump made. Following are each of Trump’s key accomplishments and a couple of points from Biden’s initial actions on each of them:

1. Building a new international consensus on China by standing up to its aggression in all its forms:

Further, Biden held a two-hour call with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Feb. 10, and while he echoed Trump’s priorities on maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific and pressing Xi on Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Uighur human rights, at a CNN town hall he later appeared to excuse the treatment of the Uighurs, saying, “Culturally, there are different norms that each country and their leaders are expected to follow.”

Biden also failed to confront Xi for his party’s unleashing the China virus on the rest of the world and for continuing to cover it up.

2. Strengthening critical partnerships with allies such as India, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, the Philippines, and Thailand on issues from counterterrorism to maritime security:

Here there is actually good news. In a Feb. 18 call with the “Quad” countries — United States, India, Japan, and Australia — Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his counterparts agreed “to strengthen cooperation on advancing a free and open Indo-Pacific region, including support for freedom of navigation and territorial integrity.” Good work so far. Let’s hope that stands.

Trump pledged to withdraw the 2,500 remaining U.S. troops from Afghanistan by May 2021, in accordance with that agreement with the Taliban last year. There is a real question about whether Biden will either delay that pullout or cancel it entirely, leaving some U.S. troops in Afghanistan indefinitely.

As a reminder, President Barack Obama and then-Vice President Biden had more than 100,000 troops in Afghanistan in 2011, and it will be important to see whether Biden follows through on Trump’s promise finally to end our presence in that country after two decades.

4. Bringing Iran’s economy to its knees and choking off funds to its terrorist allies:

Here there are real questions. No one was tougher on Iran than Trump, who in 2018 pulled us out of the “disastrous” Obama-Biden Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal, that included $1.7 billion in funding for Iran, $400 million of which was airlifted into the country on pallets of cash. Now Biden wants to rejoin that widely criticized deal, although for the time being he is insisting on Iran halting the enrichment of uranium before lifting the Trump-imposed sanctions.

A positive move was Biden’s decision to launch airstrikes on Iran-backed militia targets in eastern Syria this week in response to several recent rocket attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq, including one that killed a contractor. This response was welcome, if not somewhat surprising, given his strong criticism of Trump’s decisive action against malign Iranian actors for similar misconduct a year ago.

Once again, this was a real victory for Trump, where under Obama and Biden, the force reached a peak of tens of thousands of fighters in 2014. Trump effectively eliminated the ISIS caliphate in December 2017, after less than a year in office.

Most notably, Trump made the bold decision in October 2019 to send U.S. troops into northern Syria to capture or kill ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, resulting in the terrorist’s death by suicide vest when he was cornered in a tunnel. Biden pointedly gave Trump no credit for launching the successful operation at the time, very much of a piece with Biden’s opposition to the raid on Osama bin Laden eight years earlier. Needless to say, whether Biden exhibits the same decisiveness to keep ISIS from resurging early in his term remains an open question.

6. Forging a historic peace agreement between the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Israel, the most significant step toward peace in the Middle East in over 25 years:

In September of last year, Biden “welcomed” Trump’s forging of the first of the Abraham Accords and noted that “a Biden-Harris administration will build on these steps, challenge other nations to keep pace, and work to leverage these growing ties into progress toward a two-state solution and a more stable, peaceful region.” Since that statement, Trump expanded the Accords to include Sudan and Morocco.

Needless to say, this pledge by Biden on the Accords is great news — but whether he will, in fact, honor it remains unclear, both in his initial steps on rejoining the Iran deal and in his move in January “temporarily pausing” the landmark Trump sale last November of 50 F-35 stealth fighter jets to the United Arab Emirates that followed that country’s signing of the Accords.

7. Rebuilding our military and establishing the Space Force, the first new branch of the Armed Forces in 70 years:

Finally some good news here, but not without a push. After initially mocking a reporter’s question about whether Biden would keep Trump’s signature new service branch formed last year, White House press secretary Jen Psaki stated the next day, in response to criticism from Republicans, “We are not revisiting the decision to establish the Space Force.” Can’t anything be easy from this White House?

Whether Biden will continue Trump’s rebuilding of our nation’s military is far from settled, as initial planning suggests he will recommend a flat Defense Department budget for 2022, at $696 billion, rather than Trump’s planned $722 billion that included big increases for shipbuilding. Watch this space, as Biden’s budget is scheduled for release on May 3.

8. Pressing NATO members to increase their defense spending, resulting in pledges of an extra $400 billion through 2024:

There are good initial signs here. In advance of last week’s NATO ministerial meeting, a U.S. official noted that Biden and his team “expect all allies to live up to this commitment” on defense spending for the alliance, even as they would seek a “change in … tone and approach” from Trump, whose very tone and approach is exactly what brought the NATO allies to increase their spending massively beginning in 2018 after years of excuses.

Decorous calls for NATO allies to do more are nothing new. What was new under Trump was worrying less about the decorum but actually getting the allies to increase their defense spending.

To build on this important agreement forged by Trump in September, which provided for economic interaction between these two Balkan nations, Biden indicated earlier this month that he will press for the countries to recognize each other politically.

Mutual recognition and ultimate integration of the two countries into the European Union has been a shared goal of the United States and the European Union for the past decade, and Trump’s approach was to broker an economic agreement between the two countries as a initial step to pave the way for that goal.

Biden deserves credit for building on Trump’s progress bringing the countries together economically, but Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic’s response to Biden’s overture indicates that political recognition of Kosovo remains dead on arrival in his country. This at least demonstrates shared interests between Biden and Trump on Balkan policy.

10. Reducing undocumented migration from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico by 85 percent:

No policy was arguably as important to Trump than securing our southern border, and he delivered on it starting early in his tenure, from building over 450 miles of a border wall, to instituting a “remain in Mexico” policy that mandated asylum-seekers remain outside the United States while they await their status.

Biden reversed both of those on his first day in office. He called the border wall “a waste of money that diverts attention from genuine threats to our homeland security,” and has long called the remain in Mexico policy “inhumane.”

The result? A surge of over 100 percent in illegal border crossings over this time last year. Now Biden is proposing an eight-year pathway to citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants that many fear will itself be a magnet for more illegal immigration as migrants try to get to the United States to benefit from it. Make no mistake, there could be no clearer contrast between Trump and Biden in the area of national security than on border policy.

The record is clear: Trump produced remarkable achievements on national security in four short years, achievements that many Americans are looking for Biden to sustain and build on. This early in his presidency, it remains unclear whether Biden will do just that, but a one-month examination of his initial moves on some of Trump’s key wins raises some concerns on that important question.

We all know Biden has handlers. They shape policy and guide
him in his presentation and follow through on those policies.

They MUST be coaching him almost hourly on what to say about
these policies.

We know from actions already taken, that these are the cream
of the crop anti-American, anti-Constitution, and anti-survival
wonks on the planet.

Their goal is nothing more than the destruction of our
nation, and it’s ability to influence global dynamics.

So few grasp this, that they are gleefully protesting
against a nation that makes their anarchist actions seem
almost ho-hum due to a lack of reaction to put them down.

The U. S. S. R. lasted for about 70 years. Why did it
end then? It did because there was a nation out there
that gave a damn, and had the power to object to it.

What these illiterates are trying to install here, is another
version of the same thing, that would last three to four
generations, during which the populace becomes miserable,
their lifestyle goes black, and their freedoms no longer
exist on just about any level.

They are damning their children, grand-children, and great
grand-children to a life of despair and gloom.

What a great thing to be proud of.

In this instance though, there would be no powerful nation
out there able to confront the U. S. S. A., and get it
to change its ways.

China would be the global hegemoic entity. It would love
a Communist U. S. S. A., that would not stand up to it in
any meaningful way. By that time, it couldn’t. So we
may not be looking at a 70 year lifespan for a U. S. S. A.
entity. It could last for much much longer.

This is the whole shootin match folks. We lose this
nation and the whole planet becomes China’s sand box.

This is pretty simple. Harris will do the opposite of everything that the Trump Administration did:

1: when Jinping tells Harris to get out of the way, she will do as told.

2. when Jinping tells Harris to get out of the way, she will do as told and she will tell our allies in this that they’re on their own

3. The Dems, the Swamp and UNIPARTY are the party of war. The more conflict there is, the more money they make. Unlike President Trump, they could care less about some Private in the 82nd Airborne dying somewhere for absolutely no reason. They’re going to try and impose their will anywhere they want and embroil is in conflict everywhere

4. Sec Austin stated that they were t sure what they hit but they’re confident they hit something. That’s reassuring. Getting back into the deal with Iran will put them back in the world stage to fund their terrorism.

5. ISIS, the ones that actually survived, went into hiding Knowing that if that popped their heads out of their holes, a bomb would be dropped on thOse same heads. I’m thinking that isn’t going to happen with Harris.

6. One by one, the current admin will initiate regime change and try to instal the next crop from the Muslim Brotherhood, thus blowing the Abraham Accords to smithereens. The only thing that will stop that is if all the countries involved, liking the peace and benefits, tell Harris to pound salt up her a$$.

7. Austin has stated that he wants a stand down to root out extremists in the ranks. It’s going to be interesting when all the white, conservative males find themselves in that category a d are chapters s out of the military

8. Harris will not pressure any NATO country for the money. Nor will the current admin have a team to negotiate trade deals, like the team President Trump had. It’ll be back to liberal state state hacks, that are commies and know nothing about finances or trade deals, allowing the US to get taken to the cleaners again. Toss in the fact that they know CornPop is out of it, in more ways than one, and that the current administration is a group of Leftist amateurs, those checks will soon stop showing up.

9. CornPop couldn’t find those places on a map.

10. What’s the number? 3500 a day pouring over the border. The number of visas that the State Dept issues is going to be increasing. CornPop has said that it’s only right that foreign workers be allowed to compete for jobs here in America. And since Wall St and big tech love that foreign cheap labor, everything President Trump did for American workers will be erased. What I did funny is, all the tech workers that voted for Harris are going to be competing against Pete and Mary from Mumbai pretty soon.

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