As the Joe Biden administration enjoys the twilight of its term, the legacy of what is left behind looms unsettlingly. Perhaps attempting to burnish his reputation, the commander-in-chief has launched attacks on Syria, where a rebel group has ousted President Basar al-Assad. But as presidential candidate Carly Fiorina famously quipped, taking a dig at then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: “... I, too, have traveled hundreds of thousands of miles around the globe. But unlike Hillary Clinton, I know that flying is an activity, not an accomplishment.” Biden is engaged in a flurry of activities but are there any achievements for the incoming Trump administration to build upon?
Where Are Biden Successes?
Upon recollection, the Biden legacy seems to be a litany of failures, missteps, and gaffes. By any measure, the world is in worse shape now than when Biden took the oath of office on Jan. 20, 2021. The Biden-Harris national security team based its foreign policy objectives on a diversity, equity, and inclusion agenda that it pushed worldwide. For one example, in Africa, US embassies flew LGBTQ+ flags, insulting many in the region. Such displays of insensitivity to other cultures also are an unmistakable signal that the United States deals with a global environment the way it wishes it were and not how it is - making it appear weak and unreliable.
Actions such as these seem to indicate that the current White House national security team is scrambling for some semblance of achievement on which to hang its hat..Real Clear Defense posted the article, “DOD Announces Nearly $1B in Long-Term Aid to Ukraine,” explaining that “the U.S. Department of Defense announced another $1 billion in long-term aid to Ukraine on Saturday [Dec. 7], as a Pentagon fund designed to support the war effort is running dry.” While building on the feckless as-long-as-it-takes non-strategy in Ukraine, The DOD announcement did not explain what it plans to do to replenish the US inventory of precision-guided weapons provided to Ukraine and other partners and allies facing threats that have grown during Biden’s stewardship of national security.
The Biden Defense Department is leaving the incoming Trump administration a rapidly dwindling munitions inventory exacerbated by the flow of US munitions stores to other countries, principally Ukraine. Furthermore, as the Commission on National Defense Strategy reported, “The Ukraine war and the Israel-Hamas war, however, vividly demonstrate that modern wars are likely to be protracted and consume a lot of munitions, from the relatively basic 155-mm artillery rounds, to Army Tactical Missile System missiles, to air defense interceptors, and the United States simply does not have enough of such munitions on hand.”
The National Security Journal observed recently “The Commission finds that the U.S. defense industrial base (DIB) is unable to meet the equipment, technology, and munitions needs of the United States and its allies and partners.” Though the US military has been struggling to keep pace with adversaries for a while, the situation over the last four years has proven dire:
“The key difference now being that the US military has lost a decade of valuable time to rebuild military capacity and bolster conventional and nuclear deterrents. The US Army active-duty force is the smallest it has been since the end of World War II; the Navy has stagnated short of 300 battle force ships, half the size of the Cold War fleet; and the Air Force combat aircraft inventory continues to shrink as retirements outpace new purchases every single year.”
While the military capability the Trump administration will inherit is not what it should be, the threats America faces are growing. Writing for The Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove pointed out, “Mr. Trump should assert the timeless truth Reagan articulated in 1980, that ‘war comes not when the forces of freedom are strong, but when they are weak. It is then that tyrants are tempted.’”
US Attacks the Enemy in Syria
Though Iran’s proxies have been attacking US installations in the Middle East region throughout Biden’s term, the current administration finally has decided to act. It apparently wants to leave a good impression, if not a satisfactory Middle East situation. With the fall of the Bashar al-Assad government in Syria, Biden took the opportunity to authorize precision airstrikes on 75 identified ISIS terrorist camps and known operatives. “Referencing the airstrikes from the White House, President Joe Biden remarked, ‘We’re clear-eyed about the fact that ISIS will try to take advantage of any vacuum, to reestablish its capabilities, to create a safe haven. We will not let that happen,’” the Daily Caller reported.
While the president-elect has cautioned to not get involved with the civil conflict in Syria, the Biden administration is stirring the pot with strikes it should have launched two years ago. Biden cannot seem to leave well enough alone. In televised remarks, the president announced his intervention in the yet-to-be-resolved hostilities in Syria with US taxpayers’ foreign assistance dollars. Will the new Syria be better than the old Syria? Whatever legacy Biden leaves, it looks like a mess.
The views expressed are those of the author and not of any other affiliate.
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