By Gil Barndollar and Natalie Armbruster
After four long years of dealing with Donald Trump, European leaders breathed an audible sigh of relief when Joe Biden was inaugurated as U.S. president in January. Like Barack Obama twelve years before, Biden was seen as a dramatic course correction, a decision by America to pull back from unilateralism and bellicosity and put a sober, responsible leader back in the White House. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen commended the result, describing Biden’s election as a “new dawn in America,” where “after four long years, Europe has a friend in the White House.” She committed to renewing ties “with an old and trusted partner.”
What a difference eight months makes. Today Biden and his administration are assailed on all sides in Europe. The withdrawal from Afghanistan, U.S. acquiescence in Germany’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline with Russia, and now the AUKUS defense and technology pact have prompted fear and even fury among longtime European NATO allies of the United States. European outrage over Trump’s tone and caprice had masked a deeper truth: the transatlantic alliance is floundering because of a deeper divergence of interests between Europe and the United States.
European leaders reacted with dismay to Biden’s April decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan. Dismay turned to outrage as the Afghan government and army collapsed and the final withdrawal was conducted with the Taliban in control of Kabul. Mirroring the outcry from U.S. domestic media, the Biden administration received significant blowback from foreign officials. Tom Tugendhat, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Britain’s House of Commons, dubbed the move “the biggest foreign policy disaster since Suez.” Germany’s Christian Democratic Union Party chief Armin Laschet declared: “It is the biggest debacle that NATO has suffered since its founding, and we’re standing before an epochal change.”
This piece was originally published in The National Interest on September 25, 2021. Read more HERE.