Thankfully, those nail-biting days of uncertainty, which for many of us seemed like eternity, are over, and we know that Joe Biden has managed to displace the ever-so mighty and important Donald Trump from the throne which he assumed was his forevermore.
So let me suppress my undisguised and loud hurrah and share with you some preliminary thoughts and impressions as a columnist, offering opinion and feeling rather than analysis and attempting to balance things out by giving the grump, I mean Trump, a fair crack of the whip.
I don’t want to repeat what others are saying, so here are some additional musings. First, that Biden’s victory has global implications that go beyond what it will mean for the US itself, or for that matter, Ukraine.
For what is America for us? For my generation, those of us who were the children of victims of communism, it represented reliable leadership of the free world against Soviet tyranny and its proxies. No, I’m not blind to the blemishes in Washington’s record, but I know that without the US role, Europe and other parts of the world would not be what they are.
Without the US, there would have been no Marshall Plan to bail out and revamp a devasted Europe, or NATO to provide not only the nuclear umbrella to keep Soviet missiles and tanks at bay, but also the breathing space to allow democratic European states to recover, reunite and build.
Trump, though his haughtiness and disdain for fundamental shared core values, seemed to place all this in doubt. He called on Europe to foot more of the bill for the common EuroAtlantic system of defense – which is fair enough. But he did it in such a way, with his personal connections with Russia and Vladimir Putin raising so many questions, and which he never satisfactorily answered – that the entire traditional US-European bond was called into question.
Trump won office in 2016 promising to make America great again. He did not. In fact, he achieved the contrary. He dismayed the world creating the impression that with an unpredictable and arrogant buffoon at the helm, the US had lost its way and its authority to lead.
Biden, reaffirming core US values and readiness to reassume its international responsibilities, is signaling that America can undo the damage and restore international respect for itself as a leader and, if need be, enforcer of democratic values.
Trump seemed to have no time for anyone but himself, and to listen to no one but himself. Hardly the stuff of which such distinguished, genuinely Republican, predecessors as Ronald Reagan were made of.
Biden, on the other hand, is very much a product of the old, or rather traditional school, and his presence will allow the bipartisan US Establishment to regroup and consolidate itself. Professionalism, integrity, continuity, and commitment to the public good can be expected to take precedence once again over crudity, sycophancy, and rudimentary populism.
So, for NATO, Europe, world climate change, Ukraine, Belarus, etc., though not for Putin and Moscow, Biden’s election is wonderful news – the deliverance from the Trump nightmare that we were all so hoping for.
Which does not mean that “Joe” himself is perfect, and has the charisma and possibly even stamina, which is expected of him. The important thing is that he campaigned successfully and, whatever happens, has made a profound difference. His emphasis on healing, on bringing, to the best of his abilities, a polarized America back together again, is a balm for the ears.
If anything were to happen to the president-elect, God forbid, he has courageously lined up an exciting prospect as his successor. Kamala Harris, with her exotic Jamaican-Indian roots, is already a historic first as a brilliant woman to have got so far given her background.
We can only assume that Biden will see to it that she will bolster her skills in relation to the domestic political and legal set up with proper exposure to the challenges of external politics. But did Hillary Clinton have such experience before becoming secretary of state under President Barack Obama?
Now, briefly about Biden and Ukraine. I doubt there is any other senior US politician with as much involvement with Ukraine as he, and for that matter with east and central Europe.
My friend and former Washington colleague from my days with Radio Liberty, Mark Pomer, has just reminded me that Biden’s interest in, and commitment to, this part of the world goes back a long way. As he put it: “Biden’s team understands that Ukraine is the linchpin in Eastern Europe.”
According to Pomer: “Biden virtually singlehandedly saved Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in 1993. I was the executive director of the BIB (the bi-partisan Board for International Broadcasting overseeing the radios) then and worked closely with Biden’s staff. Most important, Biden cared. He even came to our board meeting to learn more about the radios.”
The president-elect has rich first-hand knowledge of Ukraine and the issues its faces, domestically and internally. He has been in the country and not only witnessed the situation but also given the country sound advice together with reassurances of his steadfast support.
Biden has remained a champion of Ukraine, yet he has no illusions about what it itself needs to do to sustain that international goodwill and support – combat corruption and remain convincingly on the path of reform and democratic transformation.
In 2015, when Biden addressed the Ukrainian parliament, he stressed that it was up to the Ukrainian themselves to make full use of the chance which history had given them to break with the past and integrate into Euro-Atlantic structures and civilization.
I’m glad that the dirt thrown at Biden to damage his election chances from the Kremlin through Kremlin puppets such as Andriy Derkach failed to have effect. Indeed, these shots at the presidential hopeful purportedly originating from Ukraine were not even heard in the crucial days of the election period.
So, another bonus for Ukraine in all this is that the likes of Rudy Giuliani and other dubious, self-styled “Ukraine specialists” will now be consigned to the dustbin of history and Kyiv will be able to open a clean page in the history of US-Ukrainian relations.
But Biden, quite rightfully, like the European Union or the International Monetary Fund, will doubtlessly insist on conditionality – that Ukraine does indeed move ahead on a reformist path in return for the strong external support it has received from the West.
Just as the new US president will now have to put his own house in order, he will expect that Kyiv has learned since his last visit there that in today’s world no one should expect free lunches anymore.
