Biden to announce end of US support to Saudi war in Yemen, freeze on troop withdrawals from Germany

US President Joe Biden will announce Thursday afternoon an end to US support for the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen’s civil war and a freeze of troop redeployments from Germany, Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, said at the White House.

After two weeks of emphasis on domestic issues, Biden is visiting the State Department to turn his focus to foreign policy. In remarks to diplomats at the Harry S. Trump Building in Washington before his formal address, Biden said he intended to “send a clear message to the world: America is back.”

“We’re going to rebuild our alliances. We’re going to reengage the world,” Biden said, citing as his top priorities battles against the pandemic and climate change and “standing up for democracy and human rights around the world.”

After Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris thanked State Department employees, they met privately with Secretary of State Antony Blinken before what will be Biden’s first foreign policy speech of the administration.

Briefing reporters at the White House beforehand, Sullivan also said that Biden would announce a presidential memorandum on protecting the rights of LGBTQ people worldwide.

In ending US support for Saudi operations in Yemen’s civil war — which has caused massive humanitarian suffering — Biden will be delivering on a campaign promise. His administration has already announced a review of major US arms sales to Saudi Arabia that were approved by the Trump administration. Both moves have strong support from Congressional Democrats.

Biden will also freeze former President Donald Trump’s order to withdraw roughly 12,000 US troops stationed in Germany. Many national security experts from both parties had called Trump’s order shortsighted.

Sullivan said the president’s visit will be the first of several to national security departments and agencies, including the Pentagon and the intelligence community. But even though many State Department officials were aghast at the policies of Trump, who derided their work as the “Deep State Department,” Biden will face a diplomatic corps that remains skeptical of the new White House.

Some employees have noted with concern that political appointees, not career diplomats, are beginning to fill the top ranks at the department. While that is not particularly unusual — and is within any president’s prerogative — it singes a staff that felt burned by Trump’s efforts to install loyalists with little experience in diplomacy.

At least nine new deputy assistant secretaries of state are political appointees, some of whom had previously worked at the department, among dozens of slots that are also open to career diplomats. Biden has also named at least four appointees as senior advisers. The department has not yet released a list of staff members that are being placed in top jobs.

“Foggy Bottom is weakened and wary of new slogans and superficial statements of support,” said Brett Bruen, a former State Department consular officer and member of the Obama administration’s National Security Council.

He said career State Department employees were “deeply disappointed” by the number of political appointees being installed. “The question being asked around the building is, ‘When will it be our time, and will this be any better than before?’” Bruen said.