Category Archives: Foreign Policy

Update IV: Let’s Fret About Our Own Tyrants (Little Satan Strikes Daily…)

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Homeland Security, Iran, Middle East, Terrorism, The State

The excerpt is from my new column, now on Taki’s Magazine:

“Americans are still in the grips of a Bush foreign-policy hangover. Obama refocused a drunk-on-democracy country, by reminding it that ‘the difference between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi in terms of their actual policies may not be as great as has been advertised. Either way, we were going to be dealing with an Iranian regime that has historically been hostile to the United States; that has caused some problems in the neighborhood and is pursuing nuclear weapons.'”

In other words, thumping majorities in the Middle East do not necessarily coincide with American national interests. …

Iran’s leading reformist, the mullahs-approved Mousavi, backs Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and has said he would not suspend uranium enrichment. Most Iranians concur. Like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mousavi doesn’t recognize Israel. Since the Holocaust appears to have become a centerpiece—and a precondition for diplomacy—in neoconservative talking points, they might be interested in this tidbit: on Holocaust denial, Mousavi and Ahmadinejad are on the same pseudo-scientific page.”

Read the complete column, previously on WND, and now on Taki’s titled “Fighting Tyranny Should Start at Home.”

Miss the weekly column on WND.COM? Catch it on Taki’s Magazine every Saturday.

(For the purpose of this column, Majnun is madman in Arabic.)

Update I (June 19): Bob’s comments hereunder about the Iranian Supreme Leader and his powers remind me of another Big Man in another country. What’s that place’s name again? Aha! The US! Have you counted the number of newly created, Messiah-appointed and supervised fiefdoms lately? Czars, anybody? We were supposed to have a government run almost directly by the people and their representatives. I bet we have a larger Managerial State than Iran has. We’re just so good at dubbing all that it does “freedom.” Oh, and we don’t wear towels. Please! We need to look in our own political plates.

How many people would die in the streets if Americans had the gall to protest in such numbers and at such a volume as the Iranians? We lose quite a few naughty citizens to Tazers—and other “necessary”—“discipline” almost daily, except these incidents are filed as “keeping the peace,” and “guarding our liberties” against those who would destroy them (such as Anne Gotbaum, the 100 pounder She Devil).

Update II: LITTLE SATAN STRIKES. So you think we can lord our freedoms over Iran. Again: look in your own backyard. Today, on behalf of Ron Paul’s Campaign For Liberty, The American Civil Liberties Union launched a suit against a lawful criminal gang: the Transportation Security Administration. What said bandits did to staffer Steve Bierfeldt the TSA thugs do daily, even hourly. The population complies. This time they got caught out “for the ‘illegal’ detention of the Campaign for Liberty’s treasurer in April at a St. Louis airport.”

“The ACLU damned what it called a ‘troubling pattern’ of aggressive invasions of privacy by the TSA.” Don’t we know it. Bierfeldt “recorded his confrontation with the airport security agents on his phone. The audio caused waves of indignation across the Internet, as he was seemingly harassed merely for carrying cash and Ron Paul campaign material.”

Harassed? The man was cussed, sworn at, and threatened.

On March 29, 2009, Steven Bierfeldt was detained in a small room at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport and interrogated by TSA officials for nearly half an hour after he passed a metal box containing cash through a security checkpoint X-ray machine. Bierfeldt was carrying the cash in connection with his duties as the Director of Development for the Campaign for Liberty, a political organization that grew out of Congressman Ron Paul’s presidential campaign.

Bierfeldt was detained and questioned as he returned home from a Campaign for Liberty event transporting proceeds from the sale of tickets, t-shirts, stickers and campaign material. Bierfeldt repeatedly asked the agents to explain the scope of their authority to detain and interrogate him and received no explanation. Instead, the agents escalated the threatening tone of their questions and ultimately told Bierfeldt that he was being placed under arrest. Bierfeldt recorded the audio of the entire incident with his iPhone.

But we call this a minor issue in the greater cause of safekeeping “liberty.” Reality check: American airports and airlines are the scariest most oppressive in the world. Want a safe, civilized flight? Fly Emirates Airlines. Who are we kidding!

Update III (June 20): Pat Buchanan and I are on the same page (no surprise there). The following are excellent strategic policy points:

“This is another reason President Obama is right not to declare that the United States is on the side of the demonstrators in Tehran or the other cities – and against the regime.

Should this end in bloodshed, Obama would be blamed for having instigated it, and then abandoned the demonstrators …If Obama cannot assist the demonstrators, why declare we are with them? That would call into question the nationalist credentials of the protesters by tying them to a power not universally loved in Iran. It would play into the hand of the regime by confirming charges that the crowds are “rent-a-mobs” like the ones Kermit Roosevelt and the CIA used to dump over the regime of Muhammad Mossadegh in 1953.”

[SNIP]

On the other hand, here’s Chuck Krauthammer, pushing for some action.

Updated: Barack Gets Brownie Point On Iran

Barack Obama, Democracy, Foreign Policy, Iran, Neoconservatism

Barack Obama’s message is infuriating the left and right neoconnery, and that’s good for America. “The basic message is: We support the Iranian people and their democracy. Any change in how Iran is governed is their decision, not America’s. … What we’re seeing in Tehran is a reminder that millions of Muslims hunger for change — but they want to make it themselves.”

Now, let us hope the president sticks to this tack.

Update: “Foreign Policy as Social Work: The Obama foreign policy must now come down to Earth,” Mona Charin screeched. It’s satisfying to witness the neocons wander in the political wilderness. However, I worry that Obama’s own people are natural-born meddlers. I fear he’s on his own in leaving Iran to its own devices.

Mark Steyn writes equally predictably: “This election was stolen for reasons of internal survival and long-term regional strategy by a regime confident enough to snub not just a U.S. government promoting impotence as moral virtue but those allies in Europe who regularly jet in to offer cooing paeans to the vibracy [sic] of Iranian democracy.”

Don’t they sound ridiculous? The Megaphones of a crumbling empire…

McMussolini chimed in: “‘[Obama] should speak out that this is a corrupt, flawed sham of an election,’ Mr. McCain said in an interview Tuesday on NBC’s ‘Today’ show. ‘The Iranian people have been deprived of their rights.'” I have news for the senator from Arizona (whom another Arizonian, Barry Goldwater, disdained): Look in your own political plate! The rights of Americans are also imperiled.

Good for Senator Richard G. Lugar of Indiana. “[T]he ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee said he agreed with the approach that Mr. Obama and his advisers had taken since the Iranian elections on Friday, which Iranian leaders have said Mr. Ahmadinejad won in a landslide against three challengers, including his nearest rival, Mir Hussein Moussavi.”

“For us to become heavily involved in the election at this point is to give the clergy an opportunity to have an enemy and to use us, really, to retain their power,” Mr. Lugar said in an interview Tuesday on the CBS News program ‘The Early Show.'”

In case you missed it, here’s PRESIDENT OBAMA statement in full: “Obviously all of us have been watching the news from Iran. And I want to start off by being very clear that it is up to Iranians to make decisions about who Iran’s leaders will be; that we respect Iranian sovereignty and want to avoid the United States being the issue inside of Iran, which sometimes the United States can be a handy political football — or discussions with the United States.

Having said all that, I am deeply troubled by the violence that I’ve been seeing on television. I think that the democratic process — free speech, the ability of people to peacefully dissent — all those are universal values and need to be respected. And whenever I see violence perpetrated on people who are peacefully dissenting, and whenever the American people see that, I think they’re, rightfully, troubled.

My understanding is, is that the Iranian government says that they are going to look into irregularities that have taken place. We weren’t on the ground, we did not have observers there, we did not have international observers on hand, so I can’t state definitively one way or another what happened with respect to the election. But what I can say is that there appears to be a sense on the part of people who were so hopeful and so engaged and so committed to democracy who now feel betrayed. And I think it’s important that, moving forward, whatever investigations take place are done in a way that is not resulting in bloodshed and is not resulting in people being stifled in expressing their views.

Now, with respect to the United States and our interactions with Iran, I’ve always believed that as odious as I consider some of President Ahmadinejad’s statements, as deep as the differences that exist between the United States and Iran on a range of core issues, that the use of tough, hard-headed diplomacy — diplomacy with no illusions about Iran and the nature of the differences between our two countries — is critical when it comes to pursuing a core set of our national security interests, specifically, making sure that we are not seeing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East triggered by Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon; making sure that Iran is not exporting terrorist activity. Those are core interests not just to the United States but I think to a peaceful world in general.”

We will continue to pursue a tough, direct dialogue between our two countries, and we’ll see where it takes us. But even as we do so, I think it would be wrong for me to be silent about what we’ve seen on the television over the last few days. And what I would say to those people who put so much hope and energy and optimism into the political process, I would say to them that the world is watching and inspired by their participation, regardless of what the ultimate outcome of the election was. And they should know that the world is watching.

And particularly to the youth of Iran, I want them to know that we in the United States do not want to make any decisions for the Iranians, but we do believe that the Iranian people and their voices should be heard and respected.”

The Heritage Foundation’s laments are THE ULTIMATE endorsement for the Obama stance: “President Obama has shown little interest in continuing President George Bush’s push for democracy in the Middle East.”

Yippee! Let’s hope Obama’s “disinterest” in democratic evangelism persists.

Bibi Can Bitch Slap Barack, Easily

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, History, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Middle East

I repeat myself but, “Patriots for a sane American foreign policy ought to encourage all America’s friends, Israel included, to push back and do what is in their national interest, not ours. Those of us who want the U.S. to stay solvent—and out of the affairs of others—recognize that sovereign nation-states that resist, not enable, our imperial impulses, are the best hindrance to hegemonic overreach.”

Retired Israeli Ambassador, and BAB A-Lister, Yoram Ettinger reminds us, with reference to history, that Israel fared best when it resisted American pressure. He does it with the a dash of that unique Israeli humor. Enjoy!

Obama Pressures? No Need to Panic!
Yoram Ettinger, Ynet, June 5, 2009

President Obama’s speech in Cairo intensified psychological pressure on the Jewish State. Obama erodes Israel’s special standing in the US. He has adopted evenhandedness and moral equivalence toward Israel (a staunch democratic ally, a role model of counter-terrorism) and toward the Palestinian Authority (an ally of US’ enemies, a role model of terrorism and hate-education). He ignores Israel’s ancient history, suggesting that the justification for its existence is rooted in the Holocaust. And, he has transformed “Settlements” into the crux of the Arab-Israel conflict, although Palestinian terrorism and Arab wars against Israel preceded the 1948 establishment of the Jewish State and the 1968 establishment of the first “Settlement.”

Obama hopes that Prime Minister Netanyahu will succumb to psychological pressure. But, he cannot break Israel’s back or sever US-Israel special relationship.

Notwithstanding the Cairo Speech, the resolution of the Palestinian issue is not Obama’s top priority. The national security of the US and the political future of Obama do not depend on the fate of the “Settlements.” Obama was elected, primarily, in order to stop the monthly increase of unemployment by over 500,000 persons, the loss of homes by millions of Americans, the collapse of credit and consumption, the disintegration of American banks and the destruction of large and small American businesses. In addition, President Obama is challenged by the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the potential volcano which could erupt following the evacuation of Iraq, the nuclear threat posed by North Korea and Iran, a potential takeover of nuclear Pakistan by the Taliban, a possible Pakistan-India eruption, imperialist Russia and China, etc. If Obama were practically – and not just rhetorically – preoccupied with the Palestinian issue, then he would resemble a person preoccupied with tumbleweeds, while being smothered by a West Texas sandstorm.

The unique covenant between the US and the Jewish State has never evolved around the Arab-Israeli conflict. It has evolved around shared values (which precede 1948 and even 1776), joint interests and mutual threats. Between 1948 and 1992, all Israeli Prime Ministers rejected US prescriptions/ultimatum for the resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The 1957 withdrawal from Sinai was an exception. However, US-Israel strategic cooperation catapulted to unprecedented levels as a result of regional reality and Israel’s steadfastness in face of pressure. For example, two unprecedented strategic memoranda of understandings were concluded in November 1983 and April 1988, in spite of brutal US pressure on Israel during the First Intifada and the First Lebanese War. These strategic memoranda were signed due to Israel’s unique contribution to vital US national security interests: war on Islamic terrorism, ballistic missile defense, restraining the USSR and regional rogue regimes, sharing of critical intelligence and battle experience, upgrading of defense and commercial industries, etc. In fact, a critical mass among the US public, Congress and even the Administration appreciates the Jewish State – irrespective of “Settlements” – for sparing the US the need to deploy tens of thousands of US military personnel and to invest annually mega-billion dollars in the eastern flank of the Mediterranean.

This 2009 psychological pressure is dwarfed by past practical and brutal pressure, which was exerted by the US and by the international community and was fended off by Israel’s Prime Ministers. In 1948, the Department of State and the Pentagon imposed a military embargo and threatened to add economic sanctions, in order to force Ben Gurion to refrain from a declaration of independence and to accept a UN Trusteeship. The Administration demanded an end to “occupation” in the Negev, the internationalization of Jerusalem and the absorption and compensation of Palestinian refugees. In 1967, President Johnson warned Prime Minister Eshkol: “If you shall act alone (in pre-empting an Egyptian-Syrian-Jordanian strike) you shall remain alone.” In 1981, President Reagan threatened Prime Minister Begin with a military embargo and a severe rupture should Israel bomb Iraq’s nuclear reactor. The US was joined by the USSR, Europe, the UN and Israel’s own Peres, Weitzman and chiefs of Mossad and Military Intelligence, who all opposed the bombing. Israel’s Prime Ministers withstood massive US and global pressure, with relatively-limited economic, military and diplomatic resources at their disposal.

A US President is a very powerful leader, but he heads one of three branches of government, which are totally independent of each other [theoretically, at least]. The US president is substantially constrained by an elaborate system of checks and balances. He does not appoint congressional leadership or candidates for congressional seats. Congress – which possesses the “Power of the Purse” – has been a consistent bastion of support for the Jewish State. The loyalty of the legislators is first and foremost to their constituents and to the Constitution, including an effective Separation of Power. Therefore, most Democrats opposed Obama’s appointment of Charles Freeman to head the National Intelligence Council. Most Democrats opposed President Clinton’s free trade initiatives, over 30 Democratic House Members voted to impeach Clinton. A Democratic majority in both chambers did not prevent a failed 1992-1994 presidency and a Democratic collapse at the 1994 election. Moreover, the relative weight of Congress rises during economic crises and the assertiveness and independence of legislators grow as congressional campaign season (which will be launched in September 2009) approaches.

Will Prime Minister Netanyahu retreat in the face of President Obama’s psychological pressure, or will he leverage the strategic and political reality in the Middle East and in the US for the mutual benefit of both the US and the Jewish State?

**
Of course, I maintain that cutting the Gordian Knot—that is foreign aid to Israel—would be the best thing for the Jewish State.

Photos Show Rape And Sex Abuse In Iraq Jails

Crime, Foreign Policy, Iraq, Military, War

GI JOE AND GI HO ARE BACK IN THE NEWS. “Photographs of Iraqi prisoner abuse which U.S. President Barack Obama does not want released include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper reported on Thursday.

The images are among photographs included in a 2004 report into prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib prison conducted by U.S. Major General Antonio Taguba.

Taguba included allegations of rape and sexual abuse in his report, and on Wednesday he confirmed to the Daily Telegraph that images supporting those allegations were also in the file.

‘These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency,’ Taguba, who retired in January 2007, was quoted as saying in the paper.”

[SNIP]

Yes, and as I chronicled, the story of “Redacted,” dramatized by De Palma, was all true too.