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As Joe Biden continues to fill out his cabinet, let’s take a look at who he has nominated so far with regards to foreign affairs positions.
Keep in mind that many of these require Senate approval, and the Georgia runoffs on January 5, 2021 will decide which party controls the Senate. Obviously, a Democratic-majority Senate will make it much easier for these nominees to be approved.
Secretary of State - Antony Blinken
Antony Blinken is a former deputy secretary of state under President Obama, and began his career at the State Department under President Clinton. He has been working with Joe Biden for nearly 20 years, ever since he was his top aide on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He then became Biden’s national security adviser when he was vice president. In that role, Blinken helped develop the US’ role in the uprisings that took place in Egypt, Iraq, Syria, and Libya.
It is then not too difficult to discern how Blinken will act as Secretary of State, since he has held similar responsibilities before. He has also already made his stances on some matters clear.
In November, Blinken voiced concern when the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) said that its executive director, Gasser Abdel Razek, was arrested only a few days after two other senior EIPR members were detained on charges that included joining a terrorist group.
Blinken’s emphasis on human rights puts in question the amount of aid the United States gives Egypt - which in 2019 totaled $1.5 billion. This will presumably decrease unless Egypt improves its human rights record.
This new policy will have an increased emphasis on putting pressure on Egypt over human rights.
Given Egypt’s paramount strategic importance in the Middle East, it is unlikely that Blinken’s policies will amount to anything more than a slap on the wrist if and when human rights violations go beyond his accepted threshold.
Director of National Intelligence - Avril Haines
Haines started her government career working on international treaties in the State Department. She then got to know Joe Biden when she worked at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Biden was a senator from Delaware. Haines then followed Biden to the White House when he became vice president, working on the National Security Council. In 2013, she became Deputy Director of the CIA.
At the CIA, she embarked upon some controversial initiatives, including her role in the Obama administration’s drone program which killed hundreds of civilians, and her role in the CIA’s use of torture.
While Haines is praised by all as a very intelligent and competent pick, her questionable past roles in the drone strike program and torture means that we can probably expect more drone strikes to be used by the Biden administration to take out individual terrorists. This very well may be used against individuals who are deemed to be terrorists in Egypt, most likely in collaboration with the Egyptian government.
Defense Secretary - General Lloyd Austin
Gen. Lloyd Austin began to know Joe Biden during briefings in the White House Situation Room during the Obama administration when Austin was leading U.S. Central Command, overseeing Middle East operations and putting together a plan to defeat ISIS.
Since then, he has been a member of the board of directors at Raytheon. During the Trump administration, Raytheon has been supplying Saudi Arabia with munitions for its lawless and brutal war in Yemen.
In 2019, Raytheon sold $8 billion in arms to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which was blocked by congressional Democrats on human rights grounds. However, the sale was pushed through anyways by the Trump administration.
So, what will General Austin do with regards to Egypt?
Probably continue selling weapons to Egypt’s dictator to fill the pockets of his Raytheon buddies. With President Trump increasing the military budget by 15% to a total of $705 billion in the most recent fiscal year, it is likely that a Defense Secretary Austin will use that budget to continue purchasing weapons from Raytheon, or cutting them deals to sell weapons to other countries.
In totality, we can expect Biden’s policy towards Egypt to be more or less the status quo. While the State Department will put an emphasis on human rights, the Department of Defense and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence will continue to sell Egypt weapons and protect American interests in the Middle East.
The only drastic change we should expect is foreign aid being incumbent upon respecting human rights. While the Trump administration did not even pretend to care about human rights, the transition to previous stances of publicly championing human rights and privately selling weapons and administering drone strikes will be a swift one.
Where do the Copts fit in?
One can hope that Antony Blinken will strongly vouch for the rights of Copts in Egypt. But with so many other financial and diplomatic interests at play, it might be a stretch to count on his support of Copts.