And it is a mistake which will have serious consequences for Decades... Instead of a new "smart" Realism, Obama have show plain old and profound rookie errors that he will refuse to accept or deal with due to his pride...
Obama is quickly on the way in making the world a less safe place... http://newledger.com/2009/04/obamas-india-pakistan-mess/ >>> hile I recognize that the President believes that enough jaw-jaw will not >>> merely forestall, but make pointless war-war, even jaw-jaw requires some >>> understanding of the area. For five years, India has shut down “effective >>> dialogue” because the dialogue turned out to be not-so-effective, not least >>> in failing to deter Pakistan’s ISI from its ongoing shadow war against >>> India. Pakistan liked the dialogue because it provided a veneer of >>> legitimacy to that failing state, and made any move by India to forcibly >>> resolve issues look evil and ill-considered by definition. In other words, >>> whether he realizes it or not, President Obama just sided with Pakistan and >>> against India, and put America’s foreign policy position on the side of a >>> country that is sheltering al Qaeda. The Obama Administration has sided >>> with the tyrant to the North and the terrorists to the West. The Indians >>> have noticed. All of these concessions and wasted opportunities would be brilliant maneuvers if they actually yielded anything; after all, the point of Realpolitik is to get the most from other countries while giving the least from one’s own. It’s all right to give as long as you get. Instead, the story of the early Obama Administration’s foreign policy is one of apologies and concessions for nothing in return, as others have noted. Pakistan and Afghanistan are merely pointless fronts in this aggressive policy of preemptive surrender. Indeed, the remarkable thing is that not only is Obama not winning ground for traditional American foreign policy, he is not doing all that well for his stated goals either. Any reasonable observer, two months gone, having listened to the candidate’s, President-elect’s, and President’s speeches on the subject, would have said that Obama had three foreign policy goals for the region: First, win the war in Afghanistan (and Pakistan, when he focused on the topic); second, shore up the global economy there with his emphasis on government spending; and, finally, bringing China and India on board with a global carbon emissions scheme. Today, Obama is negotiating with warlords with $25MM bounties on their heads in Afghanistan and, in an unsurprising move, disavowing “victory” there; giving up fiscal stimulus to bow to the developing world’s demands for handouts; and, oh yeah, China and India have rejected any carbon limitations scheme. In the interest of charity, I won’t dwell on the fact that the stepped-up military operations in Pakistan – that’s the Pakistan with whom Obama has thrown in America’s lot – are less than wildly popular there, nor that Pakistan is spending U.S. aid money paying off the fanatics running the regions being hit by American strikes, nor that the next indictment of Administration lawyers will likely come from Islamabad. This is not a foreign policy, it is a mess. It is not realism, but a resignation to the way the world wants to go, a rejection of the idea that America can influence it. It is a destruction of years of bipartisan effort to align democracies with common interests against failed states and rising tyrants, from which no good is coming. It is a failure. God help us – and God help India – if that failure lasts four more years. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
