The Final Collapse Of Obama’s Foreign Policy: A Nuclear Iran
BY Herschel Smith
12 years, 3 months ago
We’re all painfully aware of the impotence of the curent administration in the area of foreign policy. The world simply doesn’t listen to us – or, they do, but it’s only to gauge the timing of their next move.
But this recent signal from an administration representative is about as clear a statement of withdrawn interests and intentions as one can imagine.
Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of U.S. armed forces, said he does not wish to be “complicit” in a unilateral Israeli strike on Iran.
Dempsey said Thursday that such an attack would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program,” the London Guardian reported. He added, “I don’t want to be complicit if they choose to do it.”
This statement does three things. First, it demonstrates the administration to be liars when they have claimed that they will not allow Iran to go nuclear. Second, it clearly shows that if Israel launches an attack on Iran, she will go it alone. Essentially, Israel is thrown under the bus. The additional assertion in the report that we do not know Iran’s nuclear intentions, “as intelligence did not clearly reveal them,” is code for saying that we will never know because our intelligence community will never go on record saying that Iran has designs on a nuclear weapons program. Timing isn’t germane to this conversation according to the statement. The context is whether we know Iran’s “intentions,” a precondition that always supplies plausible deniability and makes everything else irrelevant.
Third, and most important, it explicitly acquiesces to a nuclear Iran. Read again: ” … such an attack would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program.” This also makes everything else about intentions an irrelevant obfuscation. The balance of the communication from Dempsey is just a smoke screen. This administration believes that they cannot stop an Iranian nuclear program.
The signals to the Iranian Mullahs couldn’t be clearer. Proceed apace with your nuclear weapons program, we don’t think you can be stopped anyway. There are others within the U.S. military community who foolishly believe that the U.S. can live with a nuclear Iran, John Abizaid for one ( I suspect that there are many more). But here, Dempsey is speaking for more than just himself. Despite what the administration has claimed, they do not believe they can know the intentions of the Iranian program, they do not intend to assist Israel for fear of appearing complicit, and they don’t even think they can stop Iran if they tried. Case closed.
Upon inauguration, Mitt Romney’s second duty should be the dismissal of the joint chiefs of staff, including the chairman, and replacement of them with men who have some backbone. That includes flag officers who work for them and make excuses for green on blue violence in Afghanistan by asserting that the pressures of the Ramadan fast made them do it.
But the 50,000 foot view is one of wreck. The Obama foreign policy has collapsed, and it is obscene and unseemly. It’s as if I am passing by some awful, bloody crash on the highway, and want to look away but can’t. It should shame every American to witness what our country has wrought.
On August 31, 2012 at 1:05 pm, Lisa Munley said:
Hello, I wanted to contact you but I can’t get your contact form to work. Could you possibly shoot me an email? Thanks!
On August 31, 2012 at 4:57 pm, Jean said:
There is no Foreign Policy or Domestic Policy, just an endless campaign to get elected again. This group of clowns had better get off their butts and start planning for a 60 day war in the Middle East. Get the “duck hunters ready”. Iran has accumulated an extensive missile inventory, that coupled with some persistent nerve agent from their friends in Syria and we will have some non useable real-estate in Kuwait and Kandahar….oops, there goes the resupply effort.
I won’t fire the JCS, send them to any COP in Kunar, arm them with 5.56 rifles and the rest of the Cold War junk and make them follow their stupid ROE. One of them can stay up all night and be the “Guardian Angel”. BTW, what a silly term. It could have been “Vigilant Sentry” or Shadow Guardian- or Airborne Warrior Protector. Had to throw a bone to my airborne brothers, they have re name every PX, latrine, and runway any place the they go…it’s a sickness.
Complicit – Really. Failure to deal with safe havens in Pakistan, entire village industries devoted to building IEDs, hospitals and training camps on the Iranian border….EFPs , remember that little gift from our Iranian friends, stupid ROEs and a confused doctrine- Complacent , Complicit, potato/tomato. Sorry for the rant….please note I did make not any ET or NWO references therefore I am exempt from the terrible swift sword of the Webmaster.
On August 31, 2012 at 10:56 pm, jj said:
Dempsey is such a dumb ass. Is he Biden’s cousin?
On September 2, 2012 at 9:59 am, jean said:
http://world.time.com/2012/08/31/exclusive-u-s-scales-back-military-exercise-with-israel-affecting-potential-iran-strike/
Not a huge fan Of Time, but there some good facts in this story.
On September 3, 2012 at 10:20 pm, jean said:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/03/us-lebanon-hezbollah-israel-idUSBRE8820KU20120903
On September 17, 2012 at 8:49 am, Mia T said:
Isn’t it obvious?
To keep our children safe, our cities safe, our country safe, our Constitution safe, we must fire our feckless, clueless, dangerous president.
The Obama-created power vacuum in Mideast is the proximate cause the global conflagration, yet Obama, in denial, keeps to his usual important schedule of fundraising, campaigning, demagoguing, hobnobbing and talk-show hopping, even as he spurns Israel, enables Iran, skips security meetings and watches the world burn.
In 2008, Hillary Clinton warned us about Obama (i.e., the 3 AM phone call, the ‘present’ votes). She was right, of course, although both points are part of a larger narrative of Obama incompetence and detachment.
Then there is the Weimar-esque Obama-Bernanke dollar. (Amazingly, Bernanke concedes that the returns from QE infinite will be diminishing, at best; the marginal returns will surely approach zero.) In 1923 Germany, the hyperinflation rate hit 3.25 × 10-to-the-6th percent per month, i.e., price doubling every two days. I suppose Americans will be able to use their dollars for kindling, or is that an Obama fossil-fuel no-no?
History will record Clint Eastwood’s devastating, brilliant, empty-chair improvisation the most accurate portrayal of the tragic failure that was the Barack Obama presidency.