That lines between domestic concerns and foreign policy challenges are blurring finds a reflection in the national security document.
As the 21st century great power competition undergoes seismic changes, and as the United States recalibrates its domestic and foreign policies, the Biden administration recently released what could be called the first of the many national security documents to come out of the new American leadership. Titled “Interim National Security Strategic Guidance”, it is a window into the probable direction of Biden’s national security strategy and foreign policy orientations. If there is one overriding feature of the strategic guidance paper, it is America’s growing strategic competition with China. The national security document categorically refers to China as “the only competitor potentially capable of combining its economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to mount a sustained challenge to a stable and open international system”. The Biden administration aims to confront the China challenge not only through a robust foreign policy guided by US diplomacy, but also by building an America that is confident about its priorities at home. The United States through its intent has reflected to be at the centre stage of the international system.
There is a growing need expressed by the Biden presidency to rebuild and restore America from the disruptive years of the Trump presidency. The blurred lines between what are domestic concerns in the United States and the foreign policy challenges have been reflected in the national security document, which contends that the Biden team “will reform and rethink our agencies, departments, interagency processes, and White House organization to reflect this new reality”. There is an emergent recognition that the financial and security order, which the United States built and spearheaded since the end of World War II is weakening, and global distribution of power is changing, creating new challenges for the US government.
The aggressive turn in China’s behaviour, more particularly in the Indo-Pacific, remains a primary foreign policy challenge for the Biden administration. Defending the freedom of navigation and overflight in the contested waters of the South China Sea, in the midst of China’s growing anti-access and area denial capabilities remains one of America’s primary focus areas. The growing incidents of US-China confrontations in this region will have serious politico-security implications for America’s allies and partners. Also in the US radar of concerns has been China’s economic coercion and ambiguous financing practices through its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The strategic guidance paper contends that the US “will support China’s neighbors and commercial partners in defending their rights to make independent political choices free of coercion or undue foreign influence”.
The Biden administration, in its early days, has had to deal with China’s military muscle flexing in the Taiwan Straits, and the respective power projections there will seriously test not only the capability but also the political willingness on part of the US government to cross swords with China on the issue of Taiwan. The security of Taiwan assumes critical importance and the extent to which the Biden administration can adhere to long held American alliance commitments there, will be a theatre where the future of US-China power struggle will play out. In the same breath, the US-China dynamics is a complicated one, which has a deep interdependence in the economic realm, and in meeting a number of global challenges including climate change, global health security, arms control and non-proliferation. As such, the Biden administration has built a national security and foreign policy team that aims to engage with China when it serves American national interest, but do so “from a position of confidence and strength”.
Also in focus is the new strategic embrace between China and Russia, which is perceived to be aimed at blunting America’s strategic edge. Therefore, even as the Biden administration chose to extend the New START treaty with Russia, it intends to “engage in meaningful dialogue with Russia and China on a range of emerging military technological developments that implicate strategic stability”. Also among the top list of challenges for the Biden administration will be to respond to the ramifications of the rise in new technologies like artificial intelligence and quantum computing, that could shape the future of military and economic balance in the international system. Among other things in the science and technological base, the Biden administration aims to bolster America’s cybersecurity, strengthening “capability, readiness, and resilience in cyberspace”. In this evolving and rapidly changing matrix of new threats, opportunities and challenges, how the Biden administration deals with the complex dynamics of Chinese national power from a position of strength, will have wide-ranging implications for its relationship with new strategic partners like India.
India-US strategic partnership would require to get augmented not as a counter balance to China but for a stable world. The new areas of cooperation in India-US strategic partnership such as sharing the knowledge in fundamental research should be explored for mutual benefit. Biden’s administration shall focus on understanding India better in the changing dynamics of geopolitics. India’s relevance, its stature in the international system has grown and it is being acknowledged as a responsible player, which has got all the attributes to lead world affairs together with the United States.
Dr Arvind Kumar is Professor of American Studies at School of International Studies, JNU. Dr. Monish Tourangbam specialises in American affairs at the Department of Geopolitics and International Relations, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), Manipal.