By Michael Rubin
President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan all declared, “diplomacy is back” as they prepared to take office. Their implication: President Donald Trump’s antics were unprofessional, and his willingness to throw allies under the bus, whether on a personal whim or due to negligence, undermined America’s effectiveness and reputation. Frankly, they were not wrong. Trump’s willingness to counter convention and his erraticism had benefits—NATO members paid their dues and deterred Iran—but the net effect was negative. Long-time allies understood that Trump was transactional, history meant nothing, and that the United States might abandon them in their hours of need.
Was Biden Different from Trump in Diplomacy?
Read also
The problem with such criticism of Trump coming from Biden’s team today is that Biden proved no better. He entered office with personal grudges against Afghanistan’s elected leaders, Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and he proceeded to betray all three.
Withdrawal from Afghanistan was bad enough, but the gratuitous humiliation of Afghan allies who had fought and bled for America was inexcusable. Among Blinken’s first acts as secretary of State were lifting sanctions on the Houthis attacking Saudi Arabia and ending Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s “Maximum Pressure” campaign that had constrained Iran’s support for proxy groups like Hezbollah and Hamas.
Perhaps Biden’s promise that diplomacy was back referred predominantly to Europe. Germany resented Trump-era questions about its Nord Stream-2 efforts to increase European dependence on Russian gas. French leaders, too, made little secret of their disdain for Trump in favor of a party whose last two secretaries of State prided themselves on their fluent French.
Alas, while Biden’s team issues statements with the polish of the pre-Trump-era, they did not revert the substance of their diplomacy to give allies deserved respect. Despite a career built on foreign policy, Biden never recognized alliances require mindfulness of partners’ needs, and not just demands they support American interests.
Does France Now Act with More Moral Clarity than the United States?
Here, France is a case-in-point. While Americans joke about French fortitude and resentments linger about Jacques Chirac’s opposition to the Iraq war based less on principle and more on a history of his own personal financial entanglement with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the reality is that France today shows greater resolve in the face of civilizational threats than does the United States.
Senior French leaders and diplomats may approach the Islamic Republic and its faux-reformists with credulity, but the French security services provide backbone to their Western counterparts. They understand the Iranian danger because they learned the hard way.
In the first decade of the Islamic Revolution, Iranian intelligence and the Qods Force conducted more assassinations in France than in any other country. France, too, has stood firm against Iranian nuclear violations while Sullivan offers Tehran a pass in the desperate hope that his career-defining gamble on Iranian moderation will pay off.
Likewise, while Biden, Blinken and Sullivan have appeased Turkey with gifts of F-16s despite the terror-sponsoring NATO members support for Hamas and the Islamic State, its occupation of Cyprus, its refusal to return F-35 Joint Strike Fighter schematics, and its cultivation of Russia and China, the French government has stood up to Turkey.
French security recognizes Turkey under President Erdogan is no different from Iran under Supreme Leaders Khomeini and Khamenei. French security acknowledges privately that Turkish intelligence was responsible for the 2013 murder of Kurdish civil society activists in Paris. While Trump greenlit Erdogan’s 2019 invasion of Kurdish-controlled northeastern Syria, French President Emmanuel Macron criticized the Turkish aggression for what it was. He understood what Biden did not: diplomacy need not appease NATO’s most temper tantrum-prone leader.
More recently, the French government has been at the forefront of efforts to enable Armenia to defend itself against Azerbaijani threats to overrun then oldest Christian country on earth. France’s provision of weaponry comes against the backdrop of Biden administration indecision at best and malign neglect at worst. It is telling that France today offers weapons to friends, while the United States give advanced jet fighters to enemies.
Has Azerbaijan Become a State Sponsor of Terror?
Azerbaijani dictator Ilham Aliyev has reacted with fury that anyone would impede his march across the South Caucasus as he seeks to unify Turkey and Azerbaijan and erase Armenia from the map.
Two months ago, France accused Azerbaijan of fomenting rioting and unrest in New Caledonia, a French territory in the South Pacific. Many diplomats reacted with disbelief. After all, Azerbaijan is a tiny country 8,500 miles away. The accusation was also surprising because, while New Caledonia suffers periodic unrest, it is analogous to Puerto Rico in that locals regard the independence movement as fringe. Azerbaijani involvement should not surprise analysts, though. As the son of a member of Soviet Politburo-turned-Azerbaijani president, Ilham Aliyev has grown up in a culture of impunity. The deference with which Washington, London, and Moscow treat him only accentuates his sense of immunity. He cannot abide by any challenge, and believes himself the equal to Macron. Aliyev today adopted not only Erdogan’s hatred of Christianity, but also his temper tantrums.
Any doubt about Azerbaijani fingerprints to the New Caledonia violence is over. Speaking to the media last week, Aliyev promised Azerbaijani support for separatist movements not only in New Caledonia, but also in Corsica and the Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte. His implication: If France does not cease defending Armenian sovereignty, Azerbaijan will unleash terror worldwide.
If diplomacy is back and the adults really are back in charge in Washington, there can only be one response: The United States must treat Azerbaijan as a pariah and rogue regime. Aliyev’s words combined with the violence in New Caledonia should be enough to begin discussing Azerbaijan’s designation as a state sponsor of terror. The White House should also tell the United Kingdom that it will no longer accept London’s diplomatic deference to British Petroleum on all matters Azerbaijan. It is also time to recognize that, the propaganda of Azerbaijan’s official and unofficial lobbyists in Washington aside, that the country does more to advance Russia’s interests than those of the West.
On September 11, 2001, France stood with the United States. Washington need not always agree with Paris, but America should always have France’s back. If Ilham Aliyev wants to attack France because Macron stands up to his racist bullying and aggression, Aliyev should realize he risks terror designation and rogue regime treatment commensurate with Azerbaijan’s actual behavior.