Category Archives: Foreign Policy

Here’s a quick news story, “Egypt sees Ethiopian dam as risk to water supply” in the Guardian,  to illustrate the importance of access to water.   I stated in my last blog piece that access to water may prove to be one of the gravest friction points in decades to come.  In this report, Ethiopia, sensing Egyptian weakness, appears intent to move on a dam project.  This dam project will provide much needed energy for Ethiopia and development opportunity.  On the other side, this dam might spell looming crop failures and a crisis for Egypt.  Egypt, already in a precarious situation from the much-hyped Arab Spring, could collapse even more, because the Arab Spring was a big lie.   President Obama backed the Muslim Brotherhood – the group that spawned radical Islamism.  President Obama keeps trying to paint the Muslim Brotherhood as a mostly secular organization, but there again is another one of those big lies he told.  Egypt’s economy has gotten much worse since the ouster of Mubarak and the prospect of a diminished water supply or an impediment to the primary water source for Egypt portends a potential for more conflicts, both internal and external.

This little example illuminates just one factor that might ignite another war or another internal revolt inside Egypt and we see these regional friction points all over the globe. It would be lovely if some naive notion like Global Zero could resolve the world’s problems and make us all safe.  The truth is we need to maintain our military might, restore our economic equilibrium and start working to be a shining example for democratic ideals.  The United States should be upgrading our aging nuclear arsenal, not dismantling it or allowing it to decay.  We need to be able to protect ourselves and the many countries that rely on our nuclear umbrella for security. The Wall Street journal ran an interview with former Defense Secretary, James Schlesinger, in 2009 that I came across yesterday mentioned in another article (I forgot which article or I’d put a link to that too).  Mr.Schlesinger provides the most insightful, detailed, clear reasons why we need to remain a nuclear power for the foreseeable future in this piece titled,“Why We Don’t Want a Nuclear-Free World”.  (WSJ interview here).

We should take a leadership role with other world powers to strike a path toward resolving the third world hot spots by forging consensus, instead of playing out our high stakes strategic gambits on the backs of these much poorer countries.  Constantly upping the ante and fueling these conflicts with more and more weapons just prolongs the carnage.  Recovering from war takes decades, sometimes longer.  The American South remained trapped in poverty for almost a century after the US Civil War and even today remnants of the effect of that war can easily be found.  Some of these third world countries remain trapped in almost endless strife, where the people face a daily struggle for just the vestiges of survival.

To confidently support arming some lunatic rebel bands in Syria, where a video hit the airwaves and online, with one such “commander” slicing up his fallen foe and yanking out his heart and liver – and eating it, well, obviously it’s reprehensible to arm these types of barbarians in our name.  Assad is a monster too, so I’m not supporting him either.  The solution would be to try to limit the arms flowing in, instead of trying to find ways to fan the flames.  I watched Vladimir Putin talk about this video and I agree with him, but I think his trying to prop up Assad won’t work either.   If Russia, China and the US decided to end this Syrian tragedy, they could do it.  All it would take is deciding the carnage has dragged on long enough, end the senseless slaughter and work toward some sort of political arrangement.  President Obama and Hillary Clinton’s arrogant presumptions about redrawing the map of the Mid-East  to fit their political agenda has led to the deaths of thousands upon thousands of civilians and will end up costing even more.  To use US might, directly or through arming others, imposes responsibility for the end result.  Supporting the Arab Spring has destabilized the entire region and their cavalier bravado looks likely to end in the region spiraling out of control and likely will lead to a larger regional war.

The last century’s collapse of colonialism, world wars and cold war era need to become historical stepping stones on a path to more constructive cooperation among the world’s leaders.  Assuredly there will be many twists and turns along the path and maybe even a few obstacles that seem insurmountable.  We might even come upon some obstacles that seem like a Sisyphean boulder that will keep rolling downhill to crush our hopes for peace. If we believe it is possible, the only thing standing in our way is the will to chip away at that boulder until it becomes just gravel to pave our path.  Being the daughter of a man who built roads for a living, I watched Pop blast away entire mountains, so I know it can be done;-)

This one article in The American Thinker titled “Global Zero: Naive, Dangerous, and Provocative” caught my attention, so after reading this piece by Sierra Rayne, I clicked on the website for “Global Zero” (here) to see exactly what they’re proposing.  This group, Global Zero, sets its goal as an elimination of all nuclear weapons by 2030 and the webpage boasts a video with President Obama speechifying on a “world without nuclear weapons” followed by a bunch of Hollywood celebrities spouting off about this issue and offering their “expertise” on nuclear weapons and nuclear proliferation  – “the greatest threat” according to these yahoos.  Rayne offers a spirited defense of a nuclear weapons deterrent impact in some detail and backs it with historical examples to make the case.

Now, I admit to having an idealistic plan to get us on the road to peace, but it sure doesn’t begin with the US and Russia cutting their nuclear arsenals dramatically first, which is how the Global Zero experts propose we go about eliminating nuclear weapons.  Of course, “multilateral” negotiations will follow that and “proportionate” cuts will be negotiated. (one can only wonder what these folks have been smoking).  I think the very last countries to reduce their nuclear arsenals should be the US, Russia and China, or even India and a few other democracies, because these are world powers and military strength keeps a balance of power in the world.

I believe that if a handful of the world powers acted in unison to defang the rogue regimes of nuclear weapons, it wouldn’t take more than an example or two of taking out their nuclear capabilities before other similar countries opted to hand over their nuclear weapons without a fight. This might be a start at reining in nuclear weapons.  Even my scenario is fraught with complications and risks, but not anywhere as dangerous as to start disarming and hope others follow your example.

Peace can only come through strength, because nothing so encourages bullies (tyrants, despots and others seeking power) than weakness.  I tried not to laugh at our champion of “leading from behind” being at the front of this rose-colored, strategic nothing-burger plan.

Here’s another one of those home truths that I am so fond of using to make my point.  Let’s state what should be obvious, but apparently needs to be driven home once more – any weapon, be it a slingshot or a nuclear weapon, is an inanimate object.  Inanimate objects aren’t the problem.  Yep, it’s always the people that pose the problem and let’s be more precise here, it’s what’s in the hearts of man that can turn that slingshot or nuclear weapon into a “threat”.   We’ve always got to contend with people first and the rest of the inanimate objects truly rank as a secondary issue.

No matter which way the world goes regarding nuclear weapons, you can’t un-invent something.  You can eventually make something obsolete, but that doesn’t follow some neat little plan devised by left-wing political activists with a victory date already set.  Boy, President Obama sure fit the bill for this poster boy, because he naively announced the withdrawal date from Afghanistan before he even got the troops in place for his ballyhooed surge.  Of course, we all know the Taliban will be right back in power, because they smelled President Obama’s weakness all the way from the Pakistani tribal areas.

Let’s talk about people, since the solution to all human problems falls on our shoulders.  People always form groups –  it’s how we live.  Groups always compete and also many groups don’t get along (let’s face it Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, the long-running American TV show to teach kids to be “good neighbors” seems to be the global exception, not the rule).  So, let’s look at life in the “Neighborhood of Make Believe”, the imaginary setting in Mr. Rogers Neighborhood for his puppet show segment in each episode.

I watched Mr. Rogers Neighborhood for years when my kids were young and unlike many children’s shows, Fred Rogers’ show, highlighted important lessons on the people problems, that carry us further toward finding peaceful solutions than most of the touted geopolitical experts in the world. In the Neighborhood of Make Believe reigned a bullying, irrational, impulsive monarch, King Friday XIII – the worst type of leader to deal with and as his name implies – bad news.  Each episode highlighted a different “people problem” and solutions to work out this problem.  King Friday never wanted to admit he was wrong, but his calm, more rational wife, Queen Sara Saturday, usually intervened to help resolve the crisis and to calm down King Friday and try to reason with him.

Sadly, the Neighborhood of Make Believe mirrors our real world rather closely, except in the real world we don’t have enough level-headed, steady leaders, like Queen Sara Saturday, running things (yes, she made running a group, “Food for the World”, a primary duty).

King Friday often made impulsive, poorly thought out decisions and it’s leaders like him that pose the challenge on dealing with the nuclear proliferation issue.  While King Friday loved to give long-winded speeches (he didn’t own a teleprompter thankfully), he still could be reasoned with, but in the real world we must contend with the threat of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of batshit crazy leaders, who don’t have a Queen Sara Saturday nearby to calm things down. Some idiotic celebrity-driven group like this, Global Zero, is just one more misguided attempt at trying to fix a complex, multifaceted problem with a leftover 60s “kumbaya” solution.

We need an international security framework, not some celebrities with a dopey plan.  Really, let’s put it this way, since ‘bullying” is now such a new crisis requiring national action: Is the way to deal with bullies to let them keep their sticks to beat up others and to force everyone else not to defend themselves (this is that zero tolerance that these leftists always embrace – hint: Global Zero)?  Yes, this is how these idiots solve the problems – no fighting, leaving the bullies to run wild and teaching other kids to be passive victims.  I dealt with some bullies on my school bus as a kid and got into more than one fist fight.  Zero tolerance for violence doesn’t deal with bullies on a school bus any more than an idiotic zero nuclear weapons policy will deal with the bullies in the world.

Every effort should be made to reduce ethnic and regional friction points, but in the big picture world, we all need a geopolitical structure that offers some stability.  That comes from global leadership and strength, not from the major world powers feverishly eliminating their nuclear arsenals and hoping others follow suit.    A phrase like “greatest threat” presumes a whole heck of a lot and basically it’s sheer arrogance to believe one problem poses the greatest threat.  Sure nuclear proliferation ranks as a serious threat, but personally I think something more basic could be a greater threat – access to water.

Since I don’t pretend to be an expert, I’ll concede the point that many unforeseen threats could emerge that jump way ahead of even water.    Some pandemic could pose an existential threat to many countries in rapid succession, throwing the world into a tailspin or some natural catastrophe, which impacts several continents.  Heck, it could even be both, a natural catastrophe followed by a pandemic. This is why I hate celebrity-driven causes, they’re filled with “informed experts”, who possess not an iota of understanding about military history,  grand strategy, nuclear strategy or even general history.  This glossily-packaged  cause is about the celebrities’ vanity, not about any serious effort to impact nuclear proliferation.

Here’s a thought, perhaps, the greatest threat just might be weakness, which this loopy movement would increase dramatically.  My best advice for people – if some morons come up with a plan that has ZERO in the title, consider it null (nothing but hot air).

This morning brings the true radical agenda of Obama into clear view.  In fact, the mainstream media will need to dig much faster and deeper to bury the true extent of this administration’s  far left lunacy with today’s news that Susan Rice will become the new National Security Adviser, in the wake of Tom Donilon announcing his resignation (story here).  Since this position does not require Senate confirmation, President Obama, once again thumbed his nose at the American people.  Who cares that he sent Susan Rice out to lie to the American people about Benghazi?

And to complete the far-left turn in President Obama’s foreign policy trajectory comes Samantha Power, the relentless humanitarian interventionist, who has no respect for the US military, but wants to use them as her personal tool to wield her lofty, unbelievably naive strategy to end genocide in the world. (here)  Power advocates some principle she calls “the responsibility to protect”, to prod the US to intervene all over the world to stop “genocide’  (a term which definitely is in the eye of the beholder in most of these racial and ethnic squabbles).  She’s all for American unilateral military intervention on her terms and for the trendy causes that left-wing academics embrace. (American Thinker piece on her views here) She knows absolutely nothing about military matters, but that never has stopped any of these tough-talking, leftist ideologues from wanting to use the US military for their political  adventures.

As I stated in a previous post, only when the world’s major powers can act in unison and form a united front, should we intervene in these messy third-world situations, where we have no clear national security objectives.    Going it alone leads to mission creep and puts our troops in situations with murky, ill-defined military objectives and unnecessarily costs American lives.  For this administration the loss of American lives doesn’t count – this President with these pushy women prodding him, continues to lie about Benghazi, authorizes drone strikes killing American citizens with no outside oversight, and now has promoted two of the most ideologically left women to complete his second term foreign policy team.   So, let’s not act surprised when President Obama decides to ratchet up US support for the Syrian rebels or if he starts using the US military for more military adventurism in the Middle East.  With these two women tightening their apron strings around this indecisive waffler-in chief, don’t be surprised if Samantha borrows from her husband’s theories and turns those Sunstein “nudges” into “shoves”, as she tries to subvert American law to the will of her international legal remedies for the world’s humanitarian problems.

Andrew McCarthy penned a brutally honest assessment of the John McCain Arab democracy projects in a National Review piece, “Syria: John McCain’s Next Libya” (article here).  It’s way past time for the GOP to take away the megaphones from John McCain and Lindsey Graham.  They spend more time being simultaneously for and against issues than John Kerry and that sure takes policy acrobatics to a whole new level.  These two relish all the media attention and they hog the media spotlight to such an extent that President Obama gets a pass on these policy debacles, because Graham and McCain so generously stamp the GOP seal of approval all over these foreign policy disasters.  It seems like only a few upstarts like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul have the guts to stand up to these bloviating relics.   The GOP needs an internal rebellion or maybe it’s time for a new party, because the GOP  doesn’t seem to welcome new ideas and their “maverick” should be put out to pasture with his woefully misguided foreign policy adventure notions.

Long, long ago there was a revolution that was not our own.  Our own political leaders argued back and forth whether to stick our nose into some other country’s  internal struggles.  During that revolution (the French Revolution), George Washington stood on a policy of neutrality, amidst impassioned cries for the United States to come to the aid of the revolutionary factions trying to topple an odious monarch.  His wise decision should give us pause to keep arming rebel bands, whose willingness to commit atrocities make them no better than the autocrat they’re trying to depose.  The French Revolution did not usher in some glorious new period of enlightened democratic governance.  It opened the door for an even more odious tyrant, Napoleon Bonaparte, to grasp the reins of power and embark on a decade of military adventurism, waging war across Europe, into North Africa and all the way into Russia.   John McCain always speaks like he’s an expert on military matters, but thus far he sure seems weak on military history and if his Libya adventure is any indication, he’s clueless on his glorious Arab Spring.

Like I said before, the only way to effectively stop the slaughter in Syria is for the major world powers to form a unified front and insist on a cessation of the carnage.  This would incur a great deal of responsibility for these world leaders too, which they won’t want to incur.  Plus, the Russians and Chinese have already decided to play the same old Cold War era game, so we should resist the urge to join in that outdated policy avenue.  Far better to stay out of the Syria mess than to escalate the violence and arm more jihadists and throw in more advanced weaponry that can be used against us or our only true ally in the region – Israel.  If you’re not willing to do what’s necessary for an outcome you want, then you’re better to stay out of a mess like this.  We should have learned in Iraq and Afghanistan that we can’t install democracy – it’s got to come from within.