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Power Problems • March 5, 2024 

# The Hard Choice of Retrenchment 

Stephen Wertheim, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, discusses the lack of strategic focus in the Biden administration’s foreign policy and argues that genuine prioritization requires retrenchment. The U.S. should draw down from Europe and the Middle East, he argues, and step away from formal security commitments there in order to avoid getting entangled in conflicts where U.S. interests are not vital. He also discusses Biden’s maladroit approach to East Asian security, particularly Taiwan, the failure of his “democracy vs autocracy” rhetoric, and the prospects for a negotiated resolution to the war in Ukraine, among other topics.

**Show Notes**

- [Stephen Wertheim bio](https://carnegieendowment.org/experts/2062)
- Stephen Wertheim, “[Why America Can’t Have it All](https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/why-america-cant-have-it-all),” *Foreign Affairs*, February 14, 2024
- Stephen Wertheim, “[Biden’s Democracy-Defense Credo Does Not Serve U.S. Interests](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/01/joe-biden-democracy-defense-foreign-policy/677221/),” *The Atlantic*, January 23, 2024

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This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/). 

##### Featuring 

![Stephen Wertheim](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/author_picture/public/2024-11/stephen-wertheim%20Cropped.jpg?itok=4L3y0Ys6) 

##### Stephen Wertheim 

Senior Fellow, Carnegie Endowment for Peace

![John Glaser](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/author_picture/public/2021-01/John%20Glaser.jpg?itok=-uvxR8zG) 

##### John Glaser 

Host, Power Problems Podcast

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](https://twitter.com/jwcglaser)