During last night’s debate, Vice President Kamala Harris did not change the perception that the Biden-Harris foreign policy has been remarkably weak. Neither was she reassuring that she would be a strong leader if elected. That’s a big problem. When our presidents are weak, dictators big and small try their luck at challenging American interests, which increases the risk that we get entangled in foreign wars.

In contrast, President Trump pursued a peace-through-strength policy. He destroyed the murderous ISIS caliphate and ordered the killing of its leader, Al Baghdadi. Unlike the Obama-Biden administration, President Trump ordered a missile strike against Syria after its regime used nerve gas against its people.

He was strong on Iran. He imposed maximum-pressure sanctions on Iran that reduced its oil exports from 2.5 million barrels in 2018 to 70,000 barrels in 2020. Trump’s sanctions cost the Tehran regime $200 billion in revenues. This forced them to cut their military spending by almost a third and reduce their money flow to terrorist proxies. Trump also authorized a military strike against Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, who had American blood on his hands and was plotting more terrorist attacks.

Unlike the Obama-Biden administration, Trump gave lethal aid to Ukraine to stand up to Russia. And when Putin ordered an assassination in the UK, Trump joined other democracies in imposing severe economic sanctions on Russia. He also closed a Russian consulate and expelled sixty Russian diplomats.

In a significant departure from Obama-Biden foreign policy, President Trump’s 2017 National Security Strategy correctly identified China as a “revisionist power...actively competing against the United States.” He imposed harsh economic sanctions on China in response to its unfair trade practices and ordered export restrictions to safeguard U.S. national security interests.

The Biden-Harris administration has had a different policy regarding our adversaries. Its shambolic military withdrawal from Afghanistan caused the death of thirteen U.S. military personnel and left stranded thousands of U.S. civilians and Afghan allies. Most significantly, the manner in which the Afghan withdrawal was conducted “marked the end of credible American deterrence during the Biden Presidency.”

The Biden-Harris administration has been overeager to revive Obama’s Iran nuclear deal. To curry favor, it gave Iran access to $6 billion in cash. It also suspended Trump’s sanctions, thus handing $100 billion in oil exports to Iran. Iran directed a large share of this cash bonanza to its Middle East terrorist proxies. Hamas and Hezbollah have started a war against U.S. ally Israel. The Houthis threaten international trade through the Red Sea. The United States was forced to move substantial military assets to the region and engage them in combat.

U.S. weakness in the Middle East emboldened Putin to start a war in Europe, a region in which the United States has important strategic interests. As Putin was making invasion preparations, the Biden-Harris administration added to Putin’s perception of weakness through a statement that a “minor incursion” into Ukraine would not trigger a U.S. response. After the invasion, the administration signaled timidity by sending Ukraine aid painfully slowly and imposing excessive restrictions on its use. Worse yet, it has no plan to end the war. The longer it lasts, the greater the risk that the United States is drawn into the conflict.

On Biden and Harris’ watch, China has become more provocative. Together with Iran and North Korea, it is actively helping Russia in Ukraine. Importantly, it has become more aggressive regarding Taiwan, a friend of America, and has caused increasingly dangerous naval incidents against the Philippines, a U.S. treaty ally.

The national security report card of the Biden-Harris administration is this: hot wars in Europe and the Middle East. And a cold war in Asia. These are all areas in which the United States has strategic interests and a military presence, which brings us just one wrong move away from U.S. military involvement.

Vice President Kamala Harris is perceived as even weaker than Biden in foreign affairs. It is an area in which she has very limited experience. She had only worked on California issues until she was elected to the Senate when she was fifty-two years old. Her Senate work on foreign matters was limited.

There are precious few references to Vice President Harris’ participation in White House decision-making. Her only foreign affairs responsibility was as the “border czar,” and with over 10 million illegal entrants through our southern border, that was not a success. She talked proudly about being “the last person in the room” when Biden decided to withdraw from Afghanistan—that did not work out either. Other than that, she made informational and ceremonial foreign visits with no responsibility to solve or negotiate anything.

We do not know what Vice President Harris’ foreign policy plans are. She is hiding from reporters on the stump. Since being selected as the Democratic presidential candidate in August, she has given just one interview (with Dana Bash, a friendly reporter at a friendly network). Even then, she insisted on bringing her vice presidential nominee, Tim Walz, into the interview. If Kamala is scared of facing Dana Bash alone, how will she handle Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, and Ayatollah Khamenei?

When our president is weak, there is a greater risk that the American people will be dragged into a foreign war. We need a leader who believes in peace through strength, is respected by friends, and is feared by enemies.

Dan Negrea served in the U.S. Department of State as a Senior Advisor in the Secretary’s Policy Planning Office and as the Special Representative for Commercial and Business Affairs. He is the co-author of We Win. They Lose. Republican Foreign Policy and the New Vold War.

Image: Lev Radin / Shutterstock.com.