Obama’s Ship of State Sinks in Shallow Waters

Today, Barack Obama makes it official: his overall strategy for achieving world peace is to travel the globe and beg dictators, tyrants, and democracies alike, “Can’t we all just get along?” As a potential a captain of our ship of state, perhaps we should expect more from Obama, but he continues to demonstrate that he is anything but a seasoned foreign policy sailor.

That anyone would take Obama seriously when he speaks on foreign policy issues is disturbing enough, but more troubling is that Obama appears to take himself seriously and may actually believe the views he espouses. In a speech at DePaul University today, Obama will make an outrageous claim for which voters, liberal or conservative, should demand clarification or retraction.

Obama’s speech, as reported by the New York Times, sets forth his alleged goal to eliminate all of the world’s nuclear weapons. While such a goal in itself merely places Obama in the pantheon of liberal pie-in-the-sky dreamers, it was one of his stated reasons for why the United States should take the lead in eliminating its own weapons that caught our attention.

According to a preview of the speech provided to the Times by Obama’s aides, Obama will tell DePaul students and faculty that “the United States should greatly reduce its stockpiles to lower the threat of nuclear terrorism." This statement is problematic for Obama regardless of how one interprets it. Either Obama believes that the world is somehow threatened by a possibility of America using its nuclear weapons to carry out terrorist attacks, or he believes that terrorists are more likely to seek nuclear weapons to use against America simply because we possess such weapons.

That's a pretty ominous iceberg in your foreign policy waters, Captain Obama.

The obvious extension of that lamentable logic is that if America would purge itself of nuclear weapons, radical Islamic terrorists would stop seeking the most powerful weapon they can find to destroy America. If Obama truly believes this, then one must also assume by his logic that if Israel were to publicly acknowledge its nuclear arsenal and likewise publicly destroy it, then radical Islamic terrorists across the globe would halt their quest to acquire nuclear weapons and cease preaching the destruction of the Jewish state.

Obama’s foreign policy as it applies to nuclear weapons is simple and easily recognizable: as with all world conflict, somehow, in some way, America is to blame: the world is stockpiling nuclear weapons because we invented them; the world must arm itself to the teeth with nuclear weapons because we have a large number of them and, gasp, we used them twice to end a war; the world’s terrorists would not be seeking nuclear weapons to further their goals if we would just disavow such weapons as dangerous and stop making them; if we are ever victimized by a terrorist nuclear detonation, it will be our own fault for fueling the world’s need for the ultimate weapon to defend itself from America’s dangerous stockpiles.

The “blame America first” theme is rampant among the candidates for the Democratic nomination in 2008. Every world crisis or the response to it is America’s fault. We intervened when we should have restrained ourselves, or we failed to intervene when we should have, or we failed to intervene quickly enough, or when we intervened we did too little or too much. The candidates, Obama in particular, fail to recognize that as powerful as America is, it is not and cannot be directly or indirectly responsible for every facet of international politics or conflict, including nuclear weapons development and arms races between nations.

Certainly we should seek to assure that nations with nuclear weapons are accounting for them, storing them safely, and understand the consequences for attempting to use them for offensive purposes. One does not negotiate such arrangements from a position of weakness or worse, disarmament.

The world is not in more danger of nuclear terrorism because America has large stockpiles of nuclear weapons. To make such a statement was irresponsible and naïve. To conclude that terrorists will stop seeking nuclear devices of their own to use against America was naïve and dangerous. Nation states we have competed with in this arena will not be talked out of their best technologies. Stubborn and sly world leaders such as Putin, Kim Jong-Il, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Pervez Musharraf, and a host of others must be salivating at the prospect of potentially competing in the international policy arena with the transparent Obama, who appears to think that if he can just sit down and use his charm and charisma on world leaders, they will agree to disarm themselves of the ultimate deterrent from attack. He may as well ask them to give up radar and satellites as well since they should have no fear of any incoming attacks in his Utopian fantasy world.

The portion of Obama’s DePaul speech that best illustrated how unlikely he will be to sail the ship of state through his foreign policy shallowness was his description of how he would deal with Iran:

In his speech, according to a campaign briefing paper, Mr. Obama also will call for using a combination of diplomacy and pressure to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and to eliminate North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs. Aides did not say what Mr. Obama intended to do if diplomacy and sanctions failed.

The last sentence sums it up nicely. Obama’s entire foreign policy strategy is to talk and keep talking, because he appears unable or unwilling to reassure the American people that he would act to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of any radical Islamic government, not merely Iran’s. Perhaps Obama and his aides have overlooked the fact that our approach to Iran has already utilized “a combination of diplomacy and pressure,” including UN Security Council resolutions and sanctions, divestment of terror funds, frozen assets, carrier groups repositioned to the region, and overt statements from President Bush and other officials that we will act if Iran does not change course and renounce its uranium enrichment program.

That Obama plans to “call for using a combination of diplomacy and pressure” on Iran is no plan at all. Only a first term Democratic senator with no foreign policy experience would call for America to do what it is already doing and try to pass that off as a plan worthy of entrusting him with the title of Commander in Chief.

Is the advocate for a nuclear-free world willing to enforce the removal or prevention of nuclear weapons by military action? Is he willing to wage war for peace? If not, he learned nothing from the Cold War, where one nation could not reduce arms unless the other did so simultaneously. Likewise, even in Obama’s anti-nuclear utopia one nation will never dismantle its nuclear arsenal unless all other nations do so.

Rather than referring to Republican candidates as “warmongers” for their hard line stances on Iran, Obama and his fellow Democratic candidates should come to a decision and share with voters what they will do when Iran or any other nation refuses to comply with UN sanctions and resolutions already in place and is on the verge of a viable nuclear weapon. That is a question the next president will undoubtedly be forced to deal with decisively, but decisiveness requires a decision and it is clear that Obama has not made his yet.

America is not the problem. America's arsenal is not fanning any terrorist flames. Terrorists seek the most efficient and formidable means for killing mass quantities of those they hate. Obama will likely still be shaking their hands and smiling warmly at them in negotiations when a Western city disappears in a flash and a cloud.

As waders at beaches in Florida or Australia can attest, danger can lurk even in the shallowest waters. The same is true in politics. The shallowest policy positions usually portend grave danger if followed to their conclusions. Rather than arrogantly believing he can seal missile silos with his dripping charisma, Obama should demonstrate leadership by making a commitment to take all necessary actions to prevent the further spread of nuclear weapons beyond those nations that already possess them. A broad smile, sanctions, and political pressure will not deter governments or terrorist organizations determined to become world powers by building fearsome weaponry.

If Obama wants to pilot the ship of state, he should develop a more substantive foreign policy and spend more time navigating in deeper waters than he has attempted to explore thus far in his campaign.

Technorati Tags:
Barack Obama, Presidential Candidates, 2008 Presidential Campaign, Foreign Policy, Nuclear Disarmament, Terrorism, Iran, Nuclear Weapons

General Thinks Mullahs Rational Enough for Nukes

Retired General John Abizaid is working hard to disprove the old adage that “Old generals never die, they just fade away.” Unfortunately, many otherwise astute minds are relying on the former CentCom Commander’s outdated worldview to formulate their own policy positions, particularly in our looming confrontation with Iran over that nation’s nuclear ambitions. If America follows Gen. Abizaid's advice, we may all "just fade away" much sooner than we had envisioned.

The Washington Times’ Arnaud de Borchgrave, whom we have praised previously for sound analysis on other topics, quoted Ret. Gen. Abizaid extensively in his recent column on potential conflict with Iran, “Networked and Lethal.” De Borchgrave subscribes to the view that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has aroused international scorn and sympathy in equal portions, is merely a powerless puppet whose strings are controlled by Iran’s Supreme Religious Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

This analysis, by itself, is relatively accurate and approaching diplomacy with Iran from that perspective is a somewhat prudent course to follow. However, de Borchgrave draws upon Gen. Abizaid to support his position that military action against Iran would be a mistake. According to both men, using force against Iran to eliminate uranium enrichment sites would be foolish and dangerous because, somewhere under the lecherous layers of power represented by Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, lies a trickling rivulet of revolution that seeks peace with the west and only civilian use of nuclear power for electricity.

We will set aside for the moment the fact that this optimistic view of Iran’s underlying potential for political reform requires, to borrow from Hillary Clinton’s lexicon, “the willful suspension of disbelief.” Senator Clinton used that phrase to bludgeon General David Petraeus’ report to congress on progress in Iraq, where despite abundant evidence of silver linings, critics choose to see only the dark cloud. By contrast, in evaluating Iran’s potential for peaceful coexistence with the West and its Middle East neighbors as a nuclear nation, those same critics embrace wishful thinking and cite historical references to Persian culture and traditions that they conveniently forget have long since been replaced by radical Islamic ideology.

Ret. Gen Abizaid is a strong advocate of what is, for a leader who was previously so instrumental in the War on Terror, a remarkably reckless and illogical policy toward Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Gen. Abizaid sees no reason why Iran should not be allowed to develop nuclear technology, apparently including nuclear weapons, because he mistakenly equates Iran with the former Soviet Union and the current standoff with Iran as just another iteration of the Cold War. The following excerpts set forth de Borchgrave’s and Gen. Abizaid’s reasoning for choosing a nuclear Iran over military conflict to prevent that eventuality:

Mr. Ahmadinejad, who today will put in his third appearance in three years before the U.N. General Assembly, has little power in Iran's theocracy. The key levers are in the hands of Supreme Religious Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Everything from media to intelligence and including the armed forces and parliament is in his hands. And former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani, who lost the presidential election to Mr. Ahmadinejad in 2005, was elected chairman of Iran's Assembly of Experts, the body that elects the supreme spiritual leader. Mr. Rafsanjani defeated a hard-line cleric who was Mr. Ahmadinejad's friend and protector.

Unlike Mr. Ahmadinejad, who would seem to welcome a military showdown with the United States, if only to force the entire Middle East to side with Iran against the U.S., both Messrs. Khamenei and Rafsanjani are apparently worried about the voices calling for the bombing of Iran's estimated 23 widely scattered underground nuclear facilities.

…Former CentCom commander Gen. Abizaid, who speaks fluent Arabic and whose command extended from Afghanistan to Iraq and the rest of the Middle East and took in a large chunk of Africa from Egypt to the Horn of Africa down to Kenya (27 countries), said bombing Iran would be catastrophic. It would set the entire Middle East ablaze and bring millions more recruits to al Qaeda's anti-U.S. bandwagon.

Gen. Abizaid, now retired, says: "We can stop Iranian expansion. We contained the Soviet Union with tens of thousands of nuclear warheads in missiles targeted against the United States. But we kept talking to Soviet leaders throughout the worst of the Cold War. And we blocked Soviet expansionism and we also learned to live with China after President Nixon restored diplomatic relations."

Iran, the general explains, is a dangerous power that seeks weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and to dominate its neighbors much the way the Soviet Union developed satellite and client states. The United States should deliver clear messages. One or two Iranian nukes should not rattle us. If they fired them, Iran would be instantly vaporized.

"The ayatollahs are heirs to a great civilization," he said in a colloquy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, "and they are not in the business of collective suicide. Using suicide bombers against Western or pro-Western countries is one thing, but committing national suicide quite another. They aren't mad." And we should talk turkey with Iran at the highest level as soon as possible.

It is stunning that a man with the mindset that “one or two Iranian nukes should not rattle us” was ever selected as the CentCom commander. His comparison between the former Soviet Union and the current Iranian regime is frighteningly naïve, especially from one who many look to as an “expert” on Middle Eastern matters. Ret. Gen. Abizaid either conveniently or cunningly ignores the fact that during the Cold War nuclear capability belonged to only a handful of nations and was a jealously and fanatically guarded secret. There was virtually no concern within the intelligence community that the Soviets would develop a nuclear weapon, sell it to Islamic or other terrorists, and help them to smuggle it out of country to be used against the United States or its allies.

Quite simply, the Soviets feared that any nuclear weapon used against the United States would be blamed on them and retaliation would not be long in coming. Thus it was in the self-interest of the Soviets not to share nuclear technology with radicals who might strike the United States rashly. Though dangerous in its own right, the Soviet Union wielded nuclear weapons in large quantity as a demonstration of national strength. There is far more fear that a nuclear Iran would use or sell its weapons than there ever was that the Soviets would do so. The Soviets likewise did not harbor any sympathy for or ally themselves with Muslims and were understandably alarmed by the potential consequences of any nuclear Islamic nation.

Ret. Gen. Abizaid seems to think that our ability to “instantly vaporize” Iran should make us confident that Iran would never be irrational enough to use nuclear weapons against America. In essence, the general advocates applying the strategy of deterrence, or Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) to Iran. MAD was crafted to defend against an enemy's all out assault, an attack intended to cripple America with strikes against multiple cities simultaneously. It was never meant as a deterrent against terrorists who would be perfectly satisfied with a random detonation in just one American city. To equate MAD's capacity to deter the Soviet Union with a similar effect on radical Islamic terrorists is illogical in the extreme.

It is baffling why this so-called expert would not prefer keeping nuclear weapons out of Iranian hands in the first place. Radical Islamic terrorists are not known to be reasonable, rational people. Gen. Abizaid would like to believe that the Iranian nation as a whole is not suicidal and that “they aren’t mad.” He forgets, however, that the weaponry of Iran is in the hands of a small number of religious zealots who preach loudly of their role in ushering in an apocalyptic future. The Iranian nation may not be bent on collective suicide, but its radical leaders have no such qualms about martyring themselves and their nation to fulfill prophecy.

The general’s portrait of Iran as an inherently peaceful nation fails to address what is undeniably the greatest source of concern regarding Iran: that it will provide nuclear weapons and/or technology to terrorist groups who would not hesitate to use them against America and its allies. A nuclear-armed Iran would be unlikely to engage in a tactical nuclear conflict with America, but most Americans would not share Gen. Abizaid’s opinion that we should not be rattled by “one or two Iranian nukes.” Which cities in Europe would Gen. Abizaid be so casually willing to lose? What would be left of Israel after “one or two Iranian nukes?” The nuclear devices would detonate and we would face then the same question we face today: Should we take action to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment and nuclear technology sites? The only difference would be the tragic loss of millions of lives due to a nuclear terrorist attack that would have been preventable.

Given Iran’s well-documented record of funding, equipping, training, and transporting terrorists who attack American civilians and military forces on a daily basis and who have struck at Israel for decades, it requires the willful suspension of disbelief to think Iran would not sell or give freely its future nuclear weapons to terrorist groups it already supplies with weapons. The confusion after a nuclear terrorist attack would be paralyzing to America. Some would blame it on Russians; others would insist it was a preemptive strike by an increasingly aggressive China; Al Qaeda would naturally be suspected, but in the aftermath of such an attack it would be difficult to establish who orchestrated the event and how to respond. The knee-jerk reaction would be to annihilate whatever nation produced the weapon and supplied it to terrorists.

Gen. Abizaid appears to have great respect for Iran and its Persian culture and traditions. He should recognize that the best way to preserve Iran’s people and culture is to prevent its current radical regime from ever developing nuclear weapons that, through their existence and potential use or sale, would jeopardize the future of the entire Iranian nation. Neither the world nor the Iranian people can afford to take the risk that mullahs with nuclear weapons would act responsibly in possession of nuclear weapons. Their record terror sponsorship, their stated vision of a world without Israel, and their hatred for America should rattle us out of our diplomatic course that has allowed Iran to bring over 3,000 centrifuges online and race toward sufficient uranium enrichment for weapons production.

Gen. Abizaid is a trusting soul, but trust in the intentions of Islamic radicals in pursuit of nuclear weapons may prove suicidal. This may be the only situation in recorded history where America should take the word of Ahmadinejad and his mullah puppeteers at face value and ignore the advice of one of our decorated retired generals.

Technorati Tags: General John Abizaid Iran Ayatollah Khamenei Ahmadinejad Iranian Nuclear Weapons War on Terror Cold War

"Sneaky Bastard" Iran: Too Late to Stop Nukes, May Have Ties to JFK Bombers

I thought the quote of the day winner would be an easy choice today, but now there is real competition. I highlighted Newt Gingrich’s blunt assessment of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s “bow to reality” approach to illegal alien amnesty in an earlier post today. In case you missed that quote, here is a portion of it: “but we hire leaders to change reality to fit our values, not to change our values to fit their failures.”

As eloquent and well constructed as Newt’s quote was, it may have been upstaged by a far less eloquent but certainly impassioned remark, an assessment of Iran provided by former FBI counterterrorism head Kenneth Piernick to the New York Sun. To provide a brief summary of the context for Piernick’s statement, the FBI, in its investigation of the recently disrupted plot to destroy New York’s JFK Airport, the FBI is reportedly attempting to determine why one of the plotters was attempting to flee from Guyana to Iran through anti-American Venezuela before being captured. According to the suspect’s wife, he stopped in Guyana to obtain an Iranian visa, but the FBI is seeking further information about the suspect’s Iranian ties. The New York Sun reported that the suspect currently has two sons “studying” in Iran.

When asked for his opinion about whether the JFK attack plotters may have had ties to the Iranian mullahs and President Ahmadinejad, Piernick made it clear that he would not be surprised if such a connection were identified:

"The fact of the matter is that the Iranians are a bunch of sneaky bastards. They are going to take care of anyone who hurts us. I am not at all surprised that they might have been trying to provide him cover to get out of the region," he said in a telephone interview.

Given Iran’s continued march toward nuclear weapons and Ahmadinejad’s taunting of America, maybe the choice for best quote of the day is not so difficult after all.

While Iran may have been “sneaky” by quietly assisting the JFK attack planners, Ahmadinejad roared like a lion at America and other nations who have vowed to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapon capabilities. Ahmadinejad warned the world today that it “is too late” to stop Iran’s nuclear program, and that further international sanctions against the regime will only make the future more difficult for the west. As reported by Fox News via AP, he added that more sanctions would be as unwise for the west as “stepping on a lion’s tail”:

”We advise them not to play with the lion's tail," Ahmadinejad said, prompting applause from a room of reporters, Iranian officials and foreign dignitaries at a Tehran news conference.

"It is too late to stop the progress of Iran," Ahmadinejad said. "Iran has passed the point where they wanted Iran to stop."

It would appear that neither the subtle (UN sanctions) nor the sneaky (covert ops) approaches have worked for the U.S. in slowing down or destroying Iran’s suicidal nuclear quest. The Bush administration has demonstrated that it is good at “bowing to reality” on one important national security issue, immigration, and wants to throw up its arms in surrender through amnesty. The world must hope that this administration has more backbone on this national security issue by preventing through all available means the reality of a nuclear Iran. Bowing to that reality by granting Iran nuclear amnesty would result in the end of reality for Israel, America, and freedom.

Ahmadinejad Photo by AP

Technorati: Ahmadinejad Kenneth Piernick FBI Counterterrorism JFK Airport Terrorist Plot Bush Administration Mullahs Iranian Nuclear Program