OpinionGuest Essay

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By Stephen Wertheim

Dr. Wertheim is a historian of U.S. foreign policy and an analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

If Kamala Harris reaches the Oval Office, she will inherit a dilemma larger than the sum of all the international conflicts and crises that will land on her desk: What is the purpose of American power now?

The administration in which Ms. Harris currently serves has not given an adequate answer. President Biden has armed open-ended wars on the grounds that the United States is still the “indispensable nation” — a grim prospect as an increasingly competitive world imposes escalating costs on a country roiled by troubles at home. The leading global power has lost control of its foreign policy, buffeted from one emergency to the next, unable to set priorities of its own.

The present cacophony is decades in the making. Coming out of the Cold War, successive American administrations chose to pursue global military dominance, even in the absence of rivals. The United States expanded its alliances and stationed troops across the globe, seeking perpetual peace through perpetual strength. The hope, too, was that the stabilizing effects of U.S. military primacy would spill over into other areas, fostering global cooperation to protect the environment, secure human rights and expand prosperity through trade.

But this theory failed — gradually, then suddenly. Instead of bringing global peace and advantage to Americans, it has embroiled them in a world of conflicts. It hasn’t stopped China from rising or Russia from lashing out, but it has exposed the United States to great risk when they did. None of this has focused Washington on the threats that touch Americans where they live and work.

For eight years, Donald Trump, of all people, has been permitted to monopolize calls for a new vision of America’s role in the world. He has drawn surprising potency from his vow to put “America first,” even as many of his specific policies lack coherence and popularity. He held the advantage on foreign policy in this year’s election before Mr. Biden stepped aside, and according to recent polls, he still does. Whatever happens in November, the Republicans can be expected to carry on Mr. Trump’s nationalist pitch.

Ms. Harris won’t break sharply with her boss, the sitting president, while on the campaign trail. If she takes his seat in January, however, she should unburden herself of orthodoxy, out-innovate her opponents and create a foreign policy fit, at long last, for the 21st century. By setting the needs of Americans front and center at every turn, she will strip Trumpism of its allure and deliver the global leadership that the country craves. Call it America first, but for real.

No president since the Cold War has taken office facing an acute risk of a major-power war. The 47th will — and must make preventing catastrophic conflict the highest priority. It won’t be easy to steer a country used to dealing with weak states and terrorists rather than rivals who could, if cornered, send nuclear missiles into U.S. cities. Democrats too often turn foreign policy into a morality tale, reducing matters of geopolitics to a “battle between democracy and autocracy,” in Mr. Biden’s words. Republicans under Mr. Trump peddle a perverse anti-moralism, as though acting ruthlessly or flattering dictators could amount to a strategy.

Ms. Harris can do better. Rather than let Mr. Trump and his ilk monopolize valid concerns about World War III, she should frankly explain to Americans that the danger is real and will be mitigated only through assertive diplomacy — because no military buildup will ever be enough to make the rest of the world cower in fear and sit still. The era of unrivaled American primacy, in the shadow of the Soviet collapse, may be over. But a new era of responsible American leadership can begin. The United States should make the world safe for diversity, blocking whoever tries to dominate without seeking dominance itself.

In that spirit, Ms. Harris should sustain support to Ukraine to preserve its independence against Russian aggression. Yet she should simultaneously work to halt the war — which risks escalating into a direct U.S.-Russia conflict every day it drags on — through the only realistic means available: negotiation. Ukraine has no plausible path to retake all its territory by fighting. Even if it eventually found some way to do so, a desperate Kremlin could well resort to nuclear weapons to avert total defeat. For some Ukrainians, that might be a risk worth taking. For Americans, it would not be, and the president’s duty is to protect them.

Ms. Harris should use carrots and sticks to bring both countries to the table, including threatening to reduce aid to Ukraine if it passes up a good deal and offering........

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