Looking at the Bright Side of the "Obama Doctrine"

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Like a lot of people, I was interested to read the Atlantic piece on President Obama's emerging approach to foreign policy. 

While I have often been critical of some aspects of Obama's foreign policy, the Atlantic piece serves as a reminder, I think, of how much worse things would like be now had voters made different choices during the elections--both primary and general--of 2008. In particular, I liked the manner in which he usually avoided the sort of empty and counter-productive bluster that American politicians are often so fond of. 

So here are some of the occasions references by the article in which I think that Obama's words and/or actions have made sense to me. If I get the chance, I hope to put up a second part to this post later on this week in which I explore some of the disadvantages that I associate with Obama's approach to foreign policy. 

And now what happens in Libya?

Thursday, August 25, 2011  Well, it looks like the moment folks have been waiting for has finally arrived: Muammar Qadaffi appears to have left Tripoli, and perhaps right now is hiding in a spider-hole somewhere. Who knows? It wasn't long ago that the US government was trumpeting Qadaffi as a success story in the war on terrorism In a post put up yesterday, Juan Cole--someone whose views I have a lot of respect for despite Cole's consistent support for the Libya war--discusses how to avoid the mistakes of Iraq in Libya.

Obama's Afghanistan Speech

Wednesday, June 22, 2011  I was driving through southern Pennsylvania, watching the sun set over West Virginia to my right, while I listened to President Obama's speech on Afghanistan over the radio. The speech appealed to me in some ways but bothered me in others. On the one hand, I appreciate Obama's efforts to place emphasis upon the theme of withdrawal. He's setting expectations for continued withdrawal, rather than continued occupation, and that's a good thing. Tonight, I can tell you that we are fulfilling that commitment. Thanks to our men and women in uniform, our civilian personnel, and our many coalition partners, we are meeting our goals. As a result, starting next month, we will be able to remove 10,000 of our troops from Afghanistan by the end of this year, and we will bring home a total of 33,000 troops by next summer, fully recovering the surge I announced at West Point. After this initial reduction, our troops will continue coming home at a steady pace as Afghan Security forces move into the lead. Our mission will change from combat to support. By 2014, this process of transition will be complete, and the Afghan people will be responsible for their own security. Okay, good. No one expects the US to leave tomorrow. Personally, I was upset by the surge and wished, at the time it was announced, that Obama had instead focused on withdrawal. But what's done is done. While it's too bad that so many Americans seem to think that Osama bin Laden's death is the difference-maker with regard to whether or not the US should be occupying Afghanistan, at this point I welcome any pressure that Obama might put on his administration to get 'combat troops' out of there.

NATO money and the Libya war

Monday, June 13, 2011

I saw an interesting piece in Juan Cole's Informed Comment yesterday. Cole wrote a really sensible response to Robert Gates' recent speech, in which Gates criticized NATO allies for not emulating the United States in spending lavish sums on defense. 

This is part of what Gates said:

"The blunt reality," he continued, "is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the US Congress – and in the American body politic writ large – to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense - nations apparently willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."

The funny part of this, of course, is that the money that NATO countries have been spending lately has absolutely nothing to do with "their own defense," but rather has gone towards a seemingly endless occupation of Afghanistan and a war against Libya, a country which had attacked no one. So yeah, it does seem strange that American officials would seriously expect anyone to follow their lead.

Erdogan and Libya

Sunday, March 20, 2011 There's been a fair amount of chatter in the Turkey-related blogosphere lately about Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's allegedly soft line regarding Qaddafi and his reluctance to sign off on force in Libya. Louis Fishman, echoing the sentiments of many people in Turkey, called upon Erdogan to return the "peace prize" (and the money associated with it) that Qaddafi awarded him last year, calling into question Erdogan's integrity in the process. Meanwhile, a couple of days ago in Juan Cole's Informed Comment blog Howard Eissenstat argued that Erdogan is more interested in Turkey's trade and financial dealings with Libya than in the cause of freedom: With only the barest lip service to democratic values, Turkey has made clear its opposition to international action in support of the revolution in Libya. It used its effective veto to stifle discussions within NATO and Erdoğan publicly and loudly criticized the unanimously approved UN Security Council sanctions on Libya imposed on February 26. It has made its continued opposition to international intervention clear, arguing that sanctions will only bring more pain to the Libyan people. To its credit, Turkey has indeed been at the forefront of sending humanitarian aid to Libya. True, true, all true, both Fish and Ice make good points here, particularly with respect to the necessity of at least calling on Qaddafi to step down (something that Erdogan has now done).  But as far as the question of intervention is concerned: is it really necessary for Erdogan to be corrupt, or to only be interested in money or trade, in order to oppose NATO (or non-NATO) air strikes on Libya? Is it not possible that there might be other, less nefarious, reasons behind this opposition? Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi may well be on his way out--but only if he can take some Jack Daniels with him