Outgoing President Joe Biden gave a farewell boast to the State Department this week about how his tenure has improved America’s standing abroad. Biden seemed to feel the need to lie or mislead about nearly every “accomplishment” he had, in a bizarre combination of now-familiar whispers and thunderous cries.
But insofar as something improved overseas under his watch, such as weakening Iran and nearly annihilating Hamas and Hezbollah, it was not Biden’s fault but to be expected nonetheless.
Biden bowed to election-year political pressure and did everything in his power to curb and prevent Israeli retaliation for the October 7 massacre. Only after being proven wrong over and over again does he now shamelessly take credit for what Israel has achieved, ironically by ignoring his own threats directed at Israel. I started thinking that.
The only thing Biden is right about is that Iran is “weaker than it has been in decades.” But Iran will lift sanctions, allow Iran billions of dollars in oil revenue, pay the theocracy billions of dollars in hostage ransom, and rejoin the Iran deal, which is bad for the mullahs. Biden’s constant efforts to plead with him helped rather than hurt him. . Everything Biden has done will make it much harder for Israel to survive.
So Iran is currently weakened only because Israel ignored Biden’s constant ankle-biting and finger-wagging not to retaliate against Iranian aggression. Instead, Netanyahu’s government systematically destroyed Iran’s air defenses after killing most of Iran’s foreign terrorist operatives.
Mr. Biden referred to the end of the Assad regime in Syria, but the Assad regime in Syria did not fall because of Mr. Biden’s efforts. Rather, it was overwhelmed only after Israel’s destruction of Hezbollah and Iran’s humiliation, combined with Donald Trump’s election victory, encouraged Assad’s enemies to attack the isolated and weakened Assad regime.
Biden also took credit for rumors that Hamas may release hostages held in an underground labyrinth since Oct. 7.
But with less than a week left in Biden’s term, even his own Secretary of State Antony Blinken has criticized the administration for spending 16 months pressuring Israel, only further emboldening Hamas’s obstruction. So why did Mr. Biden believe that Hamas might begin releasing hostages?
Rather, Trump’s election and his threat of dire retaliation against Hamas (and by implication Iran) likely prompted a delay in negotiations for the release of the terrorists. (Related: Victor Davis Hanson: America and Europe Can Be Together or Separate)
About the horrific scramble from Afghanistan — the worst humiliation for the U.S. military in half a century that claimed the lives of 13 Marines — Biden boasted: ”
WASHINGTON DC – SEPTEMBER 9: Thirteen people killed in terrorist attack at Monastery Gate outside Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul during a press conference at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on September 9, 2024 You can see signs displaying photos and names of military personnel. D.C. Republicans and Democrats have released conflicting reports on the 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, with Republicans accusing President Biden of prioritizing optics over security, while Democrats say Republicans are manipulating the facts. accused of being (Photo provided by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
Consider his twisted logic. Biden will not flee in humiliation and leave the war to his successor just because he lost.
Biden also took credit for saving Ukraine from Russia. However, it conveniently omitted why Russia invaded in the first place.
If Biden had not fled Kabul, leaving behind billions of dollars in abandoned US military equipment and destroying the US deterrent, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s anticipated invasion If he hadn’t claimed that his own reaction to it would depend on whether it was “offensive or not.” “It was a minor invasion,” then the Russians might not have invaded at all.
President Putin took control of Crimea and Donbass in 2014 during the Obama-Biden administration. It then attacked Kiev in 2022 under Biden’s watch and tried to engulf the entire country.
But Putin has only remained within the country’s borders during one of the past four administrations, the Trump administration.
Biden touted that all these misfortunes were accomplished without the use of force, saying, “We did not go to war to make these things happen.”
But Biden has done more to weaken the U.S. military than any recent president. During his term, the Pentagon suffered substantial budget cuts. And it never fully recovered from the Afghanistan debacle.
Blame Biden’s strict vaccination requirements, a newly woke mission, and military leaders’ constant false accusations of “white anger” and “white privilege” (a defamation that triggered an internal Pentagon investigation). The military is currently facing a shortage of 40,000 new recruits each year. There is no such racism.
China has never been more belligerent than during the Biden presidency. It has repeatedly threatened Taiwan, used cyber warfare to bully the United States, brazenly expropriated American military technology, and innocently sent spy balloons across the United States.
Biden’s open border has resulted in more than 10 million illegal immigrants, including thousands of Chinese nationals. Meanwhile, Chinese investors are now systematically free to purchase thousands of acres of U.S. farmland adjacent to sensitive U.S. military bases and facilities.
All things considered, Biden would have been better off in silence, humiliation, and leaving his failed presidency.
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About the lighter
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(Victor Davis Hanson is a Distinguished Fellow at the Center for American Greatness. He is a classicist and historian at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and author of “World War II: How the First Global Conflict He is the author of “Fought and Won.” You can contact him by email at Basic Books.
