The president offered to put European ballistic missile defense deployments on the table if Russia would take a more helpful role with Iran, mitigating – to a large degree – their necessity.
U.S. President Barack Obama has sent President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia a letter suggesting that the proposed U.S. missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic may not be necessary if Moscow can convince Iran to curtail its nuclear aspirations…
Obama’s reported letter to Medvedev similarly was no maverick gesture from an inexperienced new U.S. president. It was certainly floated, discussed and approved by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and senior staffers in the White House, the National Security Council, the State Department and the Department of Defense. Obama’s willingness to scrap those two proposed bases in Central Europe also reflects the unanimous opinion of the Democratic Party foreign policy establishment.
One could call it a bold stroke. Mavericky, even. The UPI certainly seems to think so.
Not a particularly helpful one, however:
The Russian president welcomed the “positive signals” coming from the Obama administration with which he said he hoped to reach “agreements.” “Haggling,” however, was “not productive,” added Medvedev on Tuesday, March 3.
There are two parts to this: First, the only reason to park BMD systems in Europe – as Russia knows perfectly well – is to prevent small scale attacks by rogue states. The linkage between BMD and Iran is obvious: Without the threat from the latter, the former becomes unnecessary.
Second, someone in government leaked to the press the contents of a “secret” presidential letter.” This may have been intended to raise public pressure on the Russians, but in the event it has offered them the opportunity to publicly smack the new guy down, along with the rest of them: SecState, SecDef, senior White House Staffers and the “Democratic Party foreign policy establishment.”
It should come as no surprise that the Russians are playing a hard-eyed game of geopolitics based on national interest. That’s how most governments work, while looking for circles of shared interest in which to collaborate. Iran is a Russian client, they equip the mullahs with both nuclear technology and the advanced surface-to-air defense systems to protect its derivatives.
Russia resents its fall from superpower status at the end of the Cold War, and will do whatever they can – while they can – to assert global economic and regional political pre-eminence while attenuating our own – a goal it shares with Iran. Neither have they any stake in protecting their clients in Europe from Iranian threats, since instability drives up energy prices whose revenues both countries depend upon.
We, on the other hand, amateurishly fumble around conceding our national interest up front in the name of pressing some mythical “reset button” on international relations – concessions which are consumed far more rapidly than the appetite for them abates.
We used to know how to play this game.
Ponies. We were all promised hope and change and ponies. And rainbows.
The Russians don’t really give a fig whether the US can help Europe defend against a small scale attack from Iran. What they realize is that any BMD system in Europe brings Europe and the US closer, and they are striving mightily to drive a wedge between them. After all, the more influence the US has there, especially in Eastern Europe, the less Russia has.
As to Iran, I’m not at all convinced the Russians are in any position to prevent Iran from achieving their stated goals of nuclear weapons. So we’re trading away our best option to a team that isn’t even in the game.
Amateur hour………
Too bad its our amateurs.
Why doesn’t our so-called leaders bother to read history – even recent history – or, if they do bother, to so recklessly avoid abiding by its lessons that even a schoolkid could ascertain?
I suppose the Russians are doing us a favor by reverting to form. They could just string us along garnering even more concessions until, once the hook fairly being set. they embark on some geo-political adventure adding to the global instability that is so in their narrow interests. Maybe then we will get treated to our ever more naive looking President to declaring, ala Carter, his astonishment at their actions even as the left clamors for yet another reason to make it all our fault.
If only our payment for such folly was to repeat the mistakes of the past – we now seem to want to do so in an era of incalculable risk given the terrorists tendencies of our adversaries and their clients. Will it take a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv, or our own soil to let the lesson sink in, albeit, too late to avoid its catastrophic
repercussions?
Koom-bye-ah, my Lord,
Koom-bye-ah.
(Foreign policy mantra of the Clinton/Obama adminstrations)
Don’t forget Jimma!
As the boy said while digging around in the stable for his birthday gift…
There must be a pony in here somewhere…
At what point does Koom-bye-ah become Kaboom-bye-all?
That would be real funny if it weren’t so scary!
The President seems to think he lives in a world where political favors are traded like poker chips, that being the currency of our “mean” society, to get an election in your resume, or a friend a special good deal.
He seems to not comprehend that once he moves beyond the water’s edge, the currency can most likely, and often be, another tool of diplomacy, that Bismark wielded quite effectively. Ask Denmark and the pre-Modern Germany states.
He seems to be a lawyer who either cared little for history, or paid it no mind, seeing it as a distraction to his main efforts to become history himself.
In either case, lives, at home and abroad, are at risk and in mortal danger. The sooner he understands this aspect of his position, the better off the world shall be.
And sequestering himself in the Oval Office at night, not partying, but reading many of the books GWB and Rove read, might be a way to get up on step more quickly.
But…I’m just a citizen, what can I understand of international geopolitical interactions?
Obama has always been against missile defense systems. He’s going to save our economy by not spending money on such trivial things.
He knows a large contingent of his supporters don’t care to defend Europeans, or Israel for that matter.
Then, Obama gets on the good side of Russia and Iran = he (personally) can’t lose!
Chicago politics, anyone?
Having watched some of that “fear to make a decision” up close, I’m wondering if we even have any chips to bargain with on this one. We still have a long way to go before being even ready to field a system in Europe. Plus both the Poles and Czechs still have to give their consent-and that is in and of itself a long row to hoe.
These are some important points to the Russia/Iran ordea. I am mostly concerned about the U.S. quite possibly distancing its Eastern European friends in attempts to halt Iran’s nuclear-energy development. As the article points out, we do not know what exactly Iran has or does not have at this time–although, certainly, it would be wise of us to find out quickly. But since we do not, the question of whether or not it is smart for us to make agreements with Russia that could potentially alienate or endanger other nations is one to take seriously. I watched an interesting video on this situation at newsy.com. It’s worth watching:
http://www.newsy.com/videos/u_s_russia_trade_off/