Johnson and Biden thrown together out of geopolitical necessity

Joe Biden’s first trip abroad as US president this week will include a meeting with Queen Elizabeth at Windsor Castle on Sunday, a meeting with the 95-year-old monarch that will surely be the focus of media attention. Americans.

But Biden will first spend three days in a Cornish boutique hotel, in the less formal company of Boris Johnson, the British prime minister he memorably remembered in 2019 as “a physical and emotional clone” of Donald Trump.

Political circumstance and geopolitical necessity have united Biden and Johnson. Ahead of the G7 summit, which will be chaired by Johnson, their relationship is seen by both parties as rich in potential, but linked to potential danger.

Johnson’s first face-to-face meeting with the U.S. president in Cornwall will be a crucial moment for both leaders. One is trying restore American global leadership, the other tries to prove that “global Britain” is more than a slogan.

Things started well in London on Saturday at a meeting chaired by British Chancellor Rishi Sunak, with an agreement between G7 finance ministers on a plan raised by the United States to tax global companies.

In the run-up to the G7, which begins on Friday, Biden’s camp has been talking about the “special relationship”, a term coined by Winston Churchill 75 years ago that today evokes a collective reduction among many British diplomats.

“The term special relationship does both harm and good,” said Christopher Meyer, a former UK ambassador to Washington. “Increases expectations.”

But Meyer notes that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, on a visit to London last month, did his best to stress that Churchill’s idea of ​​the relationship still applied and that the United States did not have it. ” no closer ally or closer partner “than Britain.

Both sides want to bury the idea that Biden, who sees Brexit as a mistake for Britain, remains wary of Johnson. Analysts and officials say both leaders have made great efforts to put tensions aside: one of Biden’s first calls after his investiture he went to Johnson.

Heather Conley, senior vice president of Europe at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said: “Biden is a retail politician and understands that we need to go beyond ideological differences and be busy on the agenda.”

It is fortunate that Johnson, in the year that took full effect, had the UK preside over both the G7 and the UN. COP26 climate summit, which will give him the opportunity to assert that Britain has a convening power as an “independent” country.

Kim Darroch, another former British ambassador to Washington, said: “Because these are important meetings for Biden, the president wants a good relationship with the UK and the prime minister.”

In many areas, Biden and Johnson’s interests are aligned. The US President wants to assert global leadership in areas such as climate change, global vaccines, which contains Russia and Iran and reform a global corporate taxation. Johnson has similar ambitions and wants both summits to produce results.

But there are areas of tension, which even a long weekend in the white sands of Cornwall Badia Carbis it is unlikely to be deleted. Most important is the UK’s approach to implementing the Northern Ireland protocol, which is part of Johnson’s agreement on Brexit.

The president’s statement last year that “I am Irish” recalled his determination to secure Brexit does not destabilize the 1998 Good Friday agreement that brought peace to the region after three decades of violence. Talks between London and Brussels on the issue next week immediately precede the G7 and Amanda Sloat, senior director of the National Security Council, confirmed on Friday that Biden would raise the issue with Johnson.

He said Biden had made it clear he wanted to confirm the deal and “continue economic and political stability” in Northern Ireland. She had “no doubt this is a message that will strengthen the UK”.

Max Bergmann, a former Barack Obama State Department official and member of the Center for American Progress, said he hoped there would be a “direct confrontation” on the issue, but if it happened it would be off-camera.

Darroch said: “I think the next twelve months will be fine unless we do something about the Northern Ireland protocol that really bothers the Irish government and get in direct contact with their friends in Congress. It could be very problematic. “.

As for China, Johnson takes a more falconry stance than most other G7 countries, but some believe it could receive pressure from Biden in the coming months to toughen Britain’s stance toward Beijing.

Johnson is recent “Integrated review” Britain’s hawks criticized foreign and defense policy, with a commitment to pursuing “a positive economic relationship, including deeper trade ties and more Chinese investment in the UK”.

“I think Boris wants it in both directions: to make enough of China to keep the Americans and the anti-Chinese lobby of his party out of the back, avoiding, if possible, a deep rift with the Chinese leadership. Darroch said.

“It will end up closer to Biden in Chinese politics than some Europeans. But it will be difficult if Biden’s petition to the UK on China increases significantly. There was a time when we could hide behind a common position of the EU. No more “.

British officials say that while Western leaders have welcomed the return of the United States to the international system, they may be less comfortable when Biden begins to demand that they accumulate more cash for issues such as global vaccines, fight climate change or defense spending.

“We will all soon realize what it means to have a committed US back on the scene,” said a senior European diplomat, who noted that some countries could begin to explode against a new assertive Biden approach.

“There is a feeling in some European capitals that we are the ones who have kept the show going for the last four years when it comes to things like the weather or vaccines,” the diplomat said.