Leaded in his country, prophet abroad? On tour in Europe, far from his cascading political disappointments in the United States, Joe Biden seeks to present himself as the great strategist of Western unity.
• Read also: Russia not ‘intimidated’ by US military build-up in Europe
• Read also: Biden announces reinforcements of the American military presence throughout Europe
• Read also: Trump tried to drive to Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, explosive testimony reveals
On Tuesday, as the US president dined in style with the King of Spain and leaders attending a NATO summit in Madrid, the White House hastily called a press briefing.
Objective: to praise the role of the 79-year-old democrat in the agreement just signed between Turkey on the one hand, Sweden and Finland on the other, on an enlargement of NATO to these two Nordic countries, historically not aligned.
A senior US official has extensively commented on Joe Biden’s behind-the-scenes efforts to get Ankara’s veto lifted, between a last-minute phone call with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and the green light from the US president before the formal announcement of the agreement.
The same source recalled how Mr. Biden had encouraged Sweden and Finland, by organizing a conference call in the Oval Office and then a reception in the Rose Garden of the White House for the leaders of the two countries.
Some experts also believe that the prospect of a bilateral meeting with Joe Biden, scheduled for late Wednesday afternoon, did a lot to convince Recep Tayyip Erdogan to lift his veto on the accession of Finland and Sweden.
“Low profile”
“We worked conscientiously (…) while trying, in public, to keep a low profile,” said the official.
Before leaving for the G7 summit in Germany and then the NATO summit in Madrid, we saw the American president, last Friday, struck by a Supreme Court decision abolishing the constitutional right to abortion, and to which he didn’t really have an answer.
It is a much more smiling Biden who has been mingling with his peers since Saturday, posing in shirt sleeves in the Bavarian Alps and announcing in Madrid American military reinforcements in Europe.
We know that the American president is fond of these diplomatic meetings, he who has orchestrated the unity of Westerners against Russia since the invasion of Ukraine – a danger that the Americans were the first to recognize.
Joe Biden, however, frustrates the journalists who follow him and who had hoped for more sensational statements since his arrival in Germany.
“With everything that is happening in the United States at the moment (…), the White House has no real interest in creating additional distraction”, explains Brett Bruen, a former adviser to Barack Obama.
With the debate on abortion, killings by firearms, galloping inflation, the American president indeed already has a lot to do.
“Biden doesn’t have much new to announce at these summits. It seems enough for him to have a few photos showing his authority on the international scene before returning and concentrating on the campaign” for the legislative elections in the fall, he continues.
Pollsters are predicting a crushing defeat for the Democratic camp.
“Very good week”
‘Low profile’ or not, ‘it’s a really good week for Biden and for America,’ enthuses James Jeffrey, an expert at the Wilson Center and former US ambassador to Turkey, listing NATO’s recognition of the challenges caused by China, and the “extraordinary” increase in member countries’ defense budgets.
“None of this would have happened without massive pressure from the United States and from Biden personally,” he said.
James Carafano, of the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation, unsurprisingly draws a more critical assessment of Joe Biden, who does not seem to him “not very dynamic” since the start of his European tour.
“Even abroad, we look at what is happening in the United States and we have a worse opinion of Biden. It’s hard to imagine that this trip will change perceptions, ”he asserts.
For Marc Pierini, expert with the think tank Carnegie Europe, Europeans are worried about a political weakening of the Democratic president.
The prospect of seeing “Donald Trump or one of his Republican clones winning the 2024 presidential election” is a major concern, “he said.