Beautiful Virgin Islands

Thursday, Sep 18, 2025

Joe Biden unveils a reassuringly familiar national-security team

Joe Biden unveils a reassuringly familiar national-security team

The mixture of brains and experience will delight allies
LESS THAN 24 hours after Donald Trump concluded that he could block the transition to Joe Biden’s incoming administration no longer, the Democratic veteran took the stage alongside his chosen national-security team. “America is back, ready to lead the world, not retreat from it,” he said. The happy gurgles of relief this elicited in Washington, DC, London, Tokyo and beyond may be imagined.

Even more than expected, Mr Biden’s choices reflected a stress on unflashy expertise, pragmatism and personal loyalty. His secretary-of-state nominee and national security adviser, respectively Antony Blinken and Jake Sullivan, are well-regarded Obama administration veterans.

Mr Blinken, mild-mannered, impeccably coiffured and Francophone, served as the former vice-president’s national security adviser and as a deputy secretary of state. Mr Sullivan, possessed of a first-rate intellect and slightly lesser coiffuring, was another well-liked Biden NSA.

Being friends, they would not be at each other’s throats as Mike Pompeo and John Bolton were. The likely result of their partnership (cue more cooing) would be a return to low-key, competent governing, and a predictable foreign policy that reflects Mr Biden’s long-standing views. Messrs Sullivan and Blinken could be expected to engage with global problems, through alliances where possible, and rebuild the institutions they were charged with.

America, suggested Mr Blinken, should have the “humility and confidence” to rely on its allies. By choosing a relatively low-profile secretary, notwithstanding Mr Blinken’s qualities, Mr Biden may additionally be signalling that he intends to do the highest-level diplomacy himself.

It was hard not to hear this as a repudiation of Mr Trump—and harder still when Mr Biden’s chosen Director of National Intelligence (DNI), Avril Haines, promised that, if confirmed by the Senate, she would “continue speaking truth to power”. Another Obama administration veteran, and former deputy chief of the CIA, she would be the first woman DNI.

Alejandro Mayorkas would be the first Latino and immigrant to lead the Department of Homeland Security. Mr Biden’s chosen UN ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield was a rare black woman at the heights of American diplomacy, before she was sacked by Mr Trump.

The diversity of Mr Biden’s nominees is also from Mr Obama’s playbook. It is intended in part to mollify the hard-left, whose champions the president-elect has otherwise ignored. His nomination of John Kerry, to be his empowered climate envoy, was another challenge to the left. Mr Kerry is a pillar of the reviled Democratic establishment; yet the left must love his newly-created post.

Mr Biden’s nominees have been duly welcomed across the party. By way of dissent, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other lefties have limited themselves to signing a petition against the possible reappointment of Mr Biden’s former chief of staff, Bruce Reed, a relatively obscure figure, on account of his past openness to welfare reform. If that constitutes the serious Democratic infighting that some news reports have described it as, Mr Biden can rest easy.

Stiffer criticism of Mr Biden’s nominees has come from Republican hawks. Senator Marco Rubio characterised them as a bunch of privileged do-gooders who would be “polite & orderly caretakers of America’s decline”.

That rather ignored the fact that most of Mr Trump’s team are Ivy Leaguers, who have not restored American hegemony-and that Ms Thomas-Greenfield grew up poor in Louisiana. Yet Mr Rubio’s spiky comments speak to a legitimate question about how Mr Biden’s national security approach will differ from Mr Obama’s.

Mr Sullivan and Mr Blinken have criticised the Obama administration’s areas of diffidence (on Syria and China especially). Mr Biden has additionally underlined that the post-Trump world is different from the one his former boss presided over. On balance, that is probably to his advantage.

Besides lashings of goodwill, his administration will have some useful leverage to work with, in the form of Mr Trump’s sanctions on Iran and tariffs on China. It will have little incentive to dispense with either in a hurry. Even if Iran can be persuaded to comply with the terms of the nuclear containment deal (negotiated by Mr Sullivan) that Mr Trump abrogated, Mr Biden would try to broaden it.

And there is no appetite in Washington for giving China something for nothing. Notwithstanding the happy rhetoric, this might augur a foreign policy that is neither a total repudiation of Mr Trump’s nor a re-embrace of Mr Obama’s, but a cross between the two.
Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
Tens of Thousands of Young Chinese Get Up Every Morning and Go to Work Where They Do Nothing
The New Life of Novak Djokovic
The German Owner of Politico Mathias Döpfner Eyes Further U.S. Media Expansion After Axel Springer Restructuring
Suspect Arrested: Utah Man in Custody for Charlie Kirk’s Fatal Shooting
In a politically motivated trial: Bolsonaro Sentenced to 27 Years for Plotting Coup After 2022 Defeat
German police raid AfD lawmaker’s offices in inquiry over Chinese payments
Turkish authorities seize leading broadcaster amid fraud and tax investigation
Volkswagen launches aggressive strategy to fend off Chinese challenge in Europe’s EV market
ChatGPT CEO signals policy to alert authorities over suicidal youth after teen’s death
The British legal mafia hit back: Banksy mural of judge beating protester is scrubbed from London court
Surpassing Musk: Larry Ellison becomes the richest man in the world
Embarrassment for Starmer: He fired the ambassador photographed on Epstein’s 'pedophile island'
Manhunt after 'skilled sniper' shot Charlie Kirk. Footage: Suspect running on rooftop during panic
Effective Protest Results: Nepal’s Prime Minister Resigns as Youth-Led Unrest Shakes the Nation
×