US-UK Special Relationship Back On?

Churchill's bust is back in the Oval Office, and Theresa May will be the first foreign leader to meet Trump after inauguration.  This should prove interesting indeed in the light of Brexit.

Quote of the Day: Self-Debunking Middle East Policy?

My colleague Alessandra called this long ago: Obama's Middle East foreign policy debacles would induce the Saudis and Israelis to work more and more closely, even flat out openly, against Iran.  A common fear of a regional nuclear hegemon makes strange bedfellows?  Desperate times call for desperate measures.

There's also this observation (my emphasis in boldface):

Obama came into office convinced that U.S. influence in the Middle East, as well as regional stability, revolved around one problem: the plight of the Palestinians. Resolving their conflict with Israel was the president’s top foreign policy from his first day in office. His belief that the U.S. was too close to Israel and that by establishing more daylight between the two allies, he could help broker an end to the long war between Jews and Arabs. To accomplish that goal, he picked fights with Israel, undermined its diplomatic position, and did his best to pressure the Israelis into making concessions that would please the Palestinians. The failure of this policy was foreordained since the Palestinians are still unable to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn.

But the events of the past six years have also shown that his focus on the Palestinians as the source of the problem was a disastrous mistake. The Arab spring, civil war in Syria, the rise of ISIS, and the Iranian nuclear threat proved that the Palestinians had little or nothing to do with the most serious problems in the region. Indeed, by forcing Israel and the Saudis to cooperate against Iran with little attention being paid to the dead end peace process with the Palestinians, Obama has effectively debunked the core idea at the heart of his foreign policy.

Well-Known Right-Wing Rag Calls Iran Deal a Disaster

Call the deal what it is with a headline of "Obama’s Iran deal falls far short of his own goals."  So, yeah, even by his own stated standards.  Compare and contrast.

By the way, I was being sarcastic in the post title.  Nowadays I can never tell if people understand what sarcasm is.  

Oh, and the Onion nailed it 2 whole years ago.

Quote of the Day: The Strategic Value of Threat Deflation

From a lengthy essay by a professor of national security comes this thought:

... the rhetoric about ISIL has given the group prestige it does not deserve. Washington may inadvertently help ISIL’s recruiting efforts by hyping its capacity for mayhem.   

... The group has already proven adept at propaganda; it does not need our help and we should not give it.  

What say you?

3 Definitions of the Obama Doctrine

Admittedly, this is a rather difficult endeavour because it's trying to do a definition by default given that the administration seems to have no coherent pro-active strategic vision.  "Leading from behind" does NOT count.  Anyway, what do you think of:

(1) Definition the First

The Obama Doctrine is to ignore problems until they metastasize into vast international crises, then react with an ineffective spasm of concern. In this, the President has been consistent, be it Libya, Egypt, Boko Haram or Ukraine. The truly serious situations get a Twitter hashtag.

(2) Definition the Second

Asked seven years ago if the need to stave off potential genocide might convince him to change his mind about a total and precipitous withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, then-candidate Obama replied that it would not. “Well, look, if that’s the criteria by which we are making decisions on the deployment of U.S. forces, then by that argument you would have 300,000 troops in the Congo right now — where millions have been slaughtered as a consequence of ethnic strife — which we haven’t done,” Obama said. 

This cynical avowal, I wrote at the time, was an indication of what might become the “Obama doctrine,” which I described thusly: “The United States will remain passive in the face of genocide.” Seven years later, I regret to say, my prediction stands up pretty well.

(3) Definition the Third (OK, not so much definition as observation)

US respnse 2 Syria,Russia,Iraq: 1)Huh? 2)We're watching this closely 3)With concern. 4)Hey, stop- 5)We won't tolerate that! 6)Mmm. Whatever.
— Rosa Brooks (@brooks_rosa) June 13, 2014

Japan Gives Vietnam 6 Navy Ships

Japan and Vietnam cozy up against China? Who could blame them?  Don't take your eye off the South China Sea.

Taiwanese Defense and the UN Charter

Is it technically illegal?  Whatever. Does anyone really think the major players in Asia are going to care about use of force rules in the UN Charter if/when things get dicey?  Give me a break.

Satire Alert: "Everyone In Middle East Given Own Country In 317,000,000-State Solution"

Since the Middle East is going up in flames and the much-ballyhooed 2-state solution doesn't seem to be feasible, the humorists at the Onion have another proposal.

The Middle East Friendship Chart

Obviously it's reductive and imperfect (where is Jordan?  I didn't see Lebanon either), but this chart is an interesting attempt to begin to think about the complexity of relationships in the Middle East.  I kind of want to add "Frenemies" as another relationship option and "Kurds/Kurdistan" as another player.  Note, though, how ISIS is pretty much hated by everybody.

Quote of the Day: US Foreign Policy in the Middle East

Or, more accurately, lack of it:

While other administrations have shown weakness or had failures in the region, “This is the first administration to see the region as inconsequential.” Believing our “real” interests lay elsewhere (e.g. Asia) has led to a lack of focus and engagement in the Middle East. We continue to appear unserious because, in essence, we are.

YOU DON'T SAY!

Quote of the Day: Sanctions and Success

Oh, dear:

"Experts are divided into two groups: those who think sanctions usually fail and those who think they almost always fail."

The Geopolitics of Winter Olympics Medal Counts

Oh, the medal count is always geopolitically charged.  Let's not pretend otherwise, mmmkay?

Short Version: "Your Foreign Policy Sucks"

You know, when the Saudi ambassador calls you out in the New York Times, that's probably not a good sign, hmmmm?

And yet rather than challenging the Syrian and Iranian governments, some of our Western partners have refused to take much-needed action against them. The West has allowed one regime to survive and the other to continue its program for uranium enrichment, with all the consequent dangers of weaponization.

A Tale of Two Speeches at the UN

It's obvious who's living in a perilous fantasyland and who's living in grim reality.  Here's a piece of Netanyahu's speech.  

Israel will never acquiesce to nuclear arms in the hands of a rogue regime that repeatedly promises to wipe us off the map.  Against such a threat, Israel will have no choice but to defend itself.  I want there to be no confusion on this point: Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons.  If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.  Yet in standing alone, Israel will know that we will be defending many, many others.

Such clarity is rare indeed nowadays.  I can only wish our own wretched leadership were capable of it.  (Video of Netanyahu's entire speech here.) 

Denial Is Not Just A River in Egypt

This speaks for itself, really:  Obama at the UN said that the world is a more stable place than it was 5 years ago.  We're living in the total defiance of reality, people.

How bad is bad?  Even the New York Times said he was "a somewhat diminished American president who faced a skeptical audience."  You don't say!

The Onion's mockery is now online.

Syria Analysis: Assad Is "Fortunate In His Enemies"

Hey, with enemies like these, who needs friends?  Ahem:

[Sarkis] Naoum {a Lebanese journalist} says that Assad has been singularly fortunate in his enemies: a fragmented Syrian opposition, divided Arab countries, and a Turkish government whose reach exceeds its grasp. 

"He is fortunate because he has Iran, which is willing to go all the way to support him, while there isn't a single Arab country that has this kind of determination to enter the battlefield on the side of the opposition", Naoum said. 

"He is also fortunate because there is an American president who has no appetite for war and because Russia wants to settle its scores with America (via Syria)".

A Political Cartoon From France

This was apparently in Le Monde.  It pointedly shows Obama and the UN poring over chemical weapons while Assad is off busy slaughtering his countrymen by conventional means.

Am I A Jacksonian?

A disgruntled one?

Tweet of the Day: Garry Kasparov on Syria

The Russian chess master, human rights advocate, and opponent of Putin has been on Twitter speaking his mind, and he's not happy:

Dictators love a vacuum. Putin & his client al-Assad didn't have to do anything. They just stepped into the big open space left by Obama.
— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) September 14, 2013

Putin showed up to put out a fire in Syria, smelling of gasoline and with a big box of matches in his pocket.
— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) September 14, 2013

In Soviet Russia, Cards Play You

And, boy, have we been played.  Ugh.  The craptacular Russian deal on Syria is now officially a thing.  I don't even know what to say.  

What a total mess.  Hell, a fictional Starfleet engineer knows more about diplomacy than the clowns that we've seen lately:

How Assad will now regard any attempt to stop him:

Meanwhile in the Kremlin, this is the look on Pooty-Poot's face:

And this is what is happening to America's standing in the world:

Oh, and this is me ... and maybe you too: