Much of world, at the dawn of 2013, is a dangerous place. The Middle East is a cauldron bubbling over with Islamic fundamentalist poison, with the evident potential to erupt into mayhem at any moment. The autocratic People’s Republic of China is resorting to militarism to quell internal rebellion, even a potential civil war. In consequence, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, South Korea, and Taiwan are each preparing themselves for defensive wars.The drums of war should be beating loudly in President Obama’s surely receptive ears.
Now whether the appropriate form of strategic response to such unrest and naked militarism should take the form of chess or of wei qi – and Henry Kissinger has weighed in recently with strong support for the latter over the former – there should be no question but that a powerful United States presence is essential, not only in the broader international interest, but specifically in the narrower national interest.
By nominating former Senator Chuck Hagel as Defense Secretary, President Obama signals that his ears are closed to those beating drums of war, that the United States will retreat into the same policy of isolationism pursued so disastrously by FDR over the period 1932-1940. The FDR experience may well have ended with all Americans speaking German (and Japanese) had it not been for the far-sighted wisdom and leadership skills of Winston Churchill and the stalwart resistance of the Royal Navy and the British Empire, which alone stood in the path of the axis of fascist-socialist evil, forged between Germany and the USSR, over those fateful years 1939-1940.
Now, with his last election won, President Obama is free to show his true colors. Domestically, the color is the red of socialism. Internationally, the color is the yellow of cowardice. Hagel fully reflects that yellow in the Obama spine.
The Hagel-yellow in the developing Obama doctrine is especially evident with respect to three pressing foreign policy issues, the resolution of which will determine the future of the United States and of the wider world situation.
1. Military spending</strong
“Current Defense Secretary Leon Panettasaid in August 2011 that the scheduled automatic $600 billion defense cuts (sequestration) would result in ‘hollowing out the force,’ which would be ‘devastating’. And he strongly hinted that he might resign rather thaan enact them. Asked about Panetta’s remarks, Hagel called the Pentagon ‘b;oated’ and needing ‘to be pared down’. Just the man you’d want to carry out a U.S. disarmament that will shrink America to what Obama thinks is its proper size on the world stage; i.e., smaller.” Charles Krauthammer, ‘The meaning of Hagel’, The Washington Post, January 11, 2013
2. Israel
“At the height of the second intifada, a relentless campaign of indiscriminate massacre of Israelis, Hagel found innocence abounding: ‘Both Israelis and Palestinians are trapped in a war not of their making…Just last month, Yasser Arafat’s widow admitted on Dubai TV what everyone has long known – that Arafat deliberately launched the intifada after the collapse of the Camp David peace talks in July 2000…In July 2002, with the terro still raging, Hagel offered further exquisite evenhandedness: ‘Israel must take steps to show its commitment to peace.’ Good God.” Charles Krauthammer, ibid.
3. Iran
“Hagel doesn’t just oppose military action, a problematic options with serious arguments on both sides. He actually opposed any unilateral sanctions. You can’t get more out of the mainstream than that. He believes in diplomacy instead, as if he alone will deter the mullahs. He even voted against designating Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization at a time when they were supplying and supporting attacks on U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most tellingly, he has indicated that he is prepared to contain a nuclear Iran, a position diammetrically opposed to Obama’s first-term, ostensibly unalterable opposition to containment. What message do you think this send to the mullahs?” Charles Krauthammer, ibid
No doubt this was the outline of the new Obama-doctrine whispered into the ear of his Russian friend, Dimitry, prior to the 2012 elections. Now, President Obama has announced his isolationist doctrine to the entire world. President Harry Truman must be turning in his grave! Thanks be to God, Harry Truman and not Barack Obama was U.S. president in those treacherous early postwar years when the Iron Curtain divided continental Europe into free and servile souls.
