March 1, 2023 | FDD Tracker: February 1-28, 2023

Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker: March

Trend Overview

By David Adesnik and John Hardie

Welcome back to the Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker. Once a month, we ask FDD’s experts and scholars to assess the administration’s foreign policy. They provide trendlines of very positive, positive, neutral, negative, or very negative for the areas they watch.

President Joe Biden made a surprise visit to Kyiv, where he vowed to support Ukraine “for as long as it takes.” Yet Biden is still hesitating to give Ukraine the weapons it needs to prevail on the battlefield, such as the Army Tactical Missile System. Meanwhile, NATO leaders are signaling they want Kyiv to enter negotiations with Moscow, even as Russian atrocities continue.

A mix of bold rhetoric and indecision also characterized Biden’s response to the appearance of a Chinese surveillance balloon over the continental United States. The administration claimed the balloon posed “no risk” yet sent an F-22 fighter jet to shoot it down. The president insisted the incident did no damage to the U.S.-China relationship, while Secretary of State Antony Blinken called it a “violation of our sovereignty” that must “never happen again.”

U.S. policy toward Iran reflects similar confusion. The administration speaks of solidarity with protesters who have spent five months marching for human rights while the regime responds with torture and executions. Yet the White House refuses to abandon hope of reviving some version of the 2015 nuclear deal, even as United Nations inspectors report Iran has enriched uranium to 84 percent purity, just shy of weapons-grade.

Check back with us next month to see if the administration has found a way to resolve these contradictions.