[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 100 (Thursday, June 13, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4095-S4096]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          BIDEN ADMINISTRATION

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I come to the floor to discuss the 
differences between Democrat foreign policy and Republican foreign 
policy.
  There seems to be a pattern where if a Republican President is 
elected, partisan pundits warn that it will be very bad for our 
international relations. Now, by contrast, when a Democrat President 
takes over from a Republican, the same partisan pundits often promise 
smooth overall international relations. These same left-leaning pundits 
then breathe a sigh of relief that our alliances will be shored up and 
everything will be miraculously harmonious, but if you look at the 
record, it often doesn't work out that way.
  President Carter presided over a string of foreign policy disasters, 
leaving the United States looking weak and humiliated.
  Ronald Reagan was portrayed as a dangerous cowboy who might start a 
nuclear war. On the contrary, Reagan's calculated efforts to push back 
against Soviet communism resulted in fewer nuclear arms and freed 
millions of people from repressive regimes.
  In 2009, the new Vice President, Joe Biden, went to Munich to deliver 
the Obama administration's first major foreign policy address. That 
address was hailed by some in the media as announcing a more 
cooperative approach with European countries.
  Biden's promise to defer more to other countries rather than setting 
the agenda was a foreshadowing of President Obama's infamous ``leading 
from behind'' policy, which turned out to be a disastrous policy.
  Biden also said:

       It's time to press the reset button and to revisit the many 
     areas where we can and should be working together with 
     Russia.

  Then look at what Russia did after that comment. This comment was 6 
months after Russia had invaded and occupied territory of the Republic 
of Georgia, which, if you remember, had sent significant forces to 
fight alongside the American military in Afghanistan and Iraq.
  Now, can you believe that in a unilateral effort to show good--
meaning good will--towards Russia, the Obama-Biden reset included 
abruptly scrapping planned missile defense cooperation with the Czech 
and Polish allies of America.
  To add insult to injury, the Obama administration made the 
announcement about abandoning our missile defense cooperation with the 
Czech Republic and Poland on the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of 
Poland--not an ideal time to make that announcement--and, of course, 
that announcement turned out to be a grave error. Not only did it 
offend some of our most pro-American allies, but it also sent the very 
exact wrong message to dictator Vladimir Putin.
  Putin's Russia, like the old Soviet Union before, only understands 
strength. They respect even enemies that have strength. They are not 
going to take advantage of somebody that shows strength. Unilateral 
concessions are perceived by Putin as weakness and actually encourage 
further aggression, just like we saw against Ukraine in 2014.
  The Obama response to the 2014 invasion of Ukraine was, again, 
dangerously weak. Sending such a signal to Putin is the wrong thing to 
do. This signal amounted to wagging its proverbial finger at Russia 
while denying Ukraine the defensive weapons needed to repel the Russian 
invasion.
  So what did Obama do? His policy was to send helmets and blankets and 
then push for negotiations--another show of weakness--doing all this 
while leaving Ukraine helpless, with a gun to its head.
  Obviously, negotiations under such circumstances effectively meant 
Russia keeping what it gained by force and freezing the conflict until 
Russia could take more land.
  Is there any wonder, then, that Putin felt he could get away with 
taking the rest of Ukraine in February of 2022? Do you know what he was 
getting away with at the same time? Killing women, children, 
grandmothers, grandads, really kidnapping maybe 20,000 children, taking 
them to Russia.

  President Obama's pursuit of a nuclear deal with Iran at all costs 
alienated our closest ally in the Middle East. That close ally we all 
know is Israel. But the Iran agreement also alarmed Saudi Arabia, which 
has been a longtime strategic partner of the United States.
  Then you will remember the drawing of the infamous redline in Syria 
at the time Syria was going to gas people to death and this infamous 
redline, before immediately abandoning it, as Obama did, sending a very 
dangerous signal about America's weakness to the axis of Iran, Russia, 
and China, now very much cooperating as an axis like Germany, Italy, 
and Japan did before World War II and during World War II.
  Now, all of this about the redline no doubt played into Vladimir 
Putin's calculations when he chose to invade Ukraine for the first time 
a few months later.
  So far, I have just talked about Democrat administrations. I want to 
talk about Republican.
  When Trump was elected, he scrapped the nuclear deal. This repaired 
the trust with our gulf partners, and not only repairing trust but 
leading and setting the stage for the Abraham Accords, which accords 
were cooperation that nobody thought could ever happen between Israel 
and Arab Nations because previous administrations said: We can't expect 
any sort of close working relationships between Israel and Arab 
countries if we don't have a Palestinian State. But President Trump 
didn't wait for a Palestinian State. Yet he had success bringing Israel 
into economic relationships with a lot of Gulf partners.

[[Page S4096]]

  This major diplomatic breakthrough went way beyond the long-sought 
recognition of Israel by Arab and Muslim countries; it also opened the 
door to economic and people-to-people ties that have the potential to 
foster a new era of mutual understanding and peace in the Middle East.
  President Obama was also overly cautious in dealing with China's 
aggression in the South China Sea and too overly deferential to China's 
imperialistic sensitivities toward Taiwan.
  Now, do you remember that in 1979, the Taiwan Relations Act passed, 
and it mandated strong, if unofficial, economic and military ties, 
including military sales. This has been the basis of U.S. policy with 
Taiwan for decades.
  The more you slow-walk military sales to Taiwan out of deference to 
China's feelings, the more China feels really empowered to dictate 
aspects of our bilateral relationships with Taiwan.
  President Trump abandoned this weak and this dangerous Obama policy 
of appeasement.
  President Trump imposed sanctions against the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline, 
which Russia was clearly pursuing to give Russia geopolitical leverage 
over Europe and Ukraine because supplying energy to other countries 
brings that leverage.
  The Trump administration armed and trained the Ukrainian military and 
cooperated closely with our frontline allies like the Baltic nations 
and Poland.
  The Trump administration stopped being deferential towards China. Arm 
sales to Taiwan became a regular occurrence, and U.S. Government 
officials got the blessing to interact with their Taiwanese 
counterparts. Can you imagine China feeling it has a right to tell 
Senators and people in the administration or U.S. House of 
Representatives Members: You can't go to Taiwan.
  Now, this message that Trump sent--China got that message that it 
couldn't get away with breaking trade rules and pushing around our 
allies and partners in the region.
  Most recently, President Biden's insistence on returning to failed 
Obama-era policies has resulted in foreign policy setbacks. The cascade 
of countries joining the Abraham Accords would likely have continued, 
to include even Saudi Arabia, but the Biden administration's repeated 
efforts to resurrect the defunct Iran nuclear deal once again damaged 
the trust of our regional allies and our partners--at the same time, 
empowering Iran.
  President Biden promised to repair relations with our European 
allies. What he meant became clear when he dropped sanctions on the 
Nord Stream 2 Pipeline. This was a sign of deference towards Germany at 
the expense of our Eastern European allies. Germany is indeed a close 
ally in Europe, but Germany is not all of Europe.
  Also, while it is known that there was a personality conflict between 
President Trump and former Chancellor Merkel of Germany, our alliance 
with Germany is deep enough to survive both personality conflicts and 
differences over Nord Stream 2.
  In hindsight, everyone, even including the Germans, can see the folly 
in giving Vladimir Putin the ability to turn the heat on and the lights 
off throughout all of Europe. And he would be glad to have that power. 
This gesture of good will towards Germany was certainly not worth 
bolstering Putin and upsetting several Central and Eastern European 
allies, who saw clearly what was at stake if you gave Putin that power.

  Let's face it: Trump does ruffle feathers. But his policies--
including pushing delinquent NATO members to spend the agreed amount on 
defense that they are obligated to spend on NATO security--these 
countries were better for it, and European security was better for it 
than the Obama and Biden policies that simply sought applause from 
certain European leaders.
  There are those strongly backing Trump and then, as we know, those 
strongly opposed to Trump--both claiming, though, to know what he would 
do in a second term. I do not have much time for pontificating and 
political prognosticating based upon speculation. I prefer to look at 
the record, and I hope I have reminded people of that record.
  We should demand a foreign policy based on American strength. 
Sometimes we talk about peace through strength, or sometimes we forget 
to remind people that a strong American military is the best tool to 
bring about world peace. So we should demand a foreign policy based 
upon that strength.
  And we should also be on guard to not accept a failure of American 
leadership spun as a more collaborative approach with our allies. Our 
allies who are closest to the threats from Russia and China really want 
strong American leadership and need us to push our more reluctant 
allies to do what it takes to defend the free world.
  That is what we saw in the first Trump administration, and it is the 
kind of leadership we badly, badly need right now.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.

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