Will Obama Stay the Course?
President Obama tried to engage--appease and actually align with--Iran, and it went on developing nuclear weapons and long-range missiles.
He tried to reconcile with the Taliban, and its Pakistani branch attempted to car-bomb Times Square.
He restored relations with Syria, and it drew closer to Tehran.
He encouraged Turkey's crypto-Islamist government, and it tilted even more towards Iran.
He reached out to organized, fundamentalist/fascist Islam, and it massacred American soldiers in Texas.
His policy is an utter failure. Will he scrap it or stay the course?
He tried to reconcile with the Taliban, and its Pakistani branch attempted to car-bomb Times Square.
He restored relations with Syria, and it drew closer to Tehran.
He encouraged Turkey's crypto-Islamist government, and it tilted even more towards Iran.
He reached out to organized, fundamentalist/fascist Islam, and it massacred American soldiers in Texas.
His policy is an utter failure. Will he scrap it or stay the course?
Saturday, May 08, 2010
On Obama and Iran, With Apologies to Churchill
Regarding the Iranian problem, as Winston Churchill might have said, when President Obama entered the White House, he was given a choice between shame and war. He chose shame, and we will get war--on Iran's terms.
Is Iran Starting a Mideast Nuclear Arms Race?
Abbas Djavadi's commentary for RFL is important reading:
Will Iran's uranium-enrichment work, which has provoked much alarm that Tehran could be seeking to build nuclear weapons, trigger a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East?
So far, the answer is no. Since 2005, more than a dozen countries in the region have announced new or renewed interest in building nuclear power plants for civilian use. But no serious voices in Cairo, Ankara, Riyadh, or other capitals have been urging the development of nuclear weapons as a way to counter the possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran.
Turkey, Egypt, and the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (the GCC comprises Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf emirates) are among those considered desirous of civilian nuclear energy. Experts and politicians in these countries have argued that they need to diversify their sources of energy, in part to increase electricity production or run seawater desalination plants. Other countries lack either the technological and human infrastructure for such an undertaking or are too instable domestically to consider it.
But for many in the countries that are pushing toward nuclear technology, the quest has become a matter of national pride, a way of boosting the political prestige and influence of a country and its leadership. In the case of the GCC countries, their oil wealth bolsters the argument that what they are really after is political capital. In Egypt, the proposed nuclear project has become a major subject on the domestic political agenda of Gamal Mubarak, who reportedly seeks to succeed his father as president.
Continue reading here, with the following in mind: international politics--politics among nations--is about power. Countries are constantly seeking to acquire, maintain, and demonstrate power through military means, diplomacy, propaganda and public relations. When a country tries to reverse its power relations with its neighbors and adversaries, that is, to become more powerful than those other countries, it is pursuing an imperialist foreign policy. The bloody history of the 20th century shows that imperialist powers can't be appeased. Instead, they must be defeated, as in the case of Nazi Germany, or contained until they collapse from within, as in the case of the Soviet Union.
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