Barack Obama's Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech was better than I expected, but then I suddenly realized why. It's another George W. Bush speech, with lines like this: "I–like any head of state–reserve the right to act unilaterally if necessary to defend my nation." Or:
I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people. For make no mistake: evil does exist in the world. A non-violent movement could not have halted Hitler's armies. Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda's leaders to lay down their arms. To say that force is sometimes necessary is not a call to cynicism—it is a recognition of history; the imperfections of man and the limits of reason.
Actually, that sound a bit more like Dick Cheney to me. But also note this section:
Yet the world must remember that it was not simply international institutions—not just treaties and declarations—that brought stability to a post-World War II world. Whatever mistakes we have made, the plain fact is this: the United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms. The service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform has promoted peace and prosperity from Germany to Korea, and enabled democracy to take hold in places like the Balkans. We have borne this burden not because we seek to impose our will. We have done so out of enlightened self-interest—because we seek a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if other peoples' children and grandchildren can live in freedom and prosperity.
Does that last bit sound just a little like the Forward Strategy of Freedom? Well, this sure does:
In some countries, the failure to uphold human rights is excused by the false suggestion that these are Western principles, foreign to local cultures or stages of a nation's development. And within America, there has long been a tension between those who describe themselves as realists or idealists—a tension that suggests a stark choice between the narrow pursuit of interests or an endless campaign to impose our values.
I reject this choice. I believe that peace is unstable where citizens are denied the right to speak freely or worship as they please; choose their own leaders or assemble without fear. Pent up grievances fester, and the suppression of tribal and religious identity can lead to violence. We also know that the opposite is true. Only when Europe became free did it finally find peace. America has never fought a war against a democracy, and our closest friends are governments that protect the rights of their citizens. No matter how callously defined, neither America's interests—nor the world's—are served by the denial of human aspirations.
So even as we respect the unique culture and traditions of different countries, America will always be a voice for those aspirations that are universal.
If only Obama actually meant it! But he ends up spending the whole conclusion of his speech arguing for diplomatic "engagement" with aggressors and dictatorships and for more foreign development aid. And he also wants global "cap and trade" restrictions, so I guess we can forget the part about economic development.
This fits the pattern Obama established with his big speech last week on Afghanistan, which I labeled as "Bush without the conviction." The best parts of Obama's foreign policy are borrowed wholesale and without attribution from the previous administration—but with much less effect because Obama isn't able to back them with the kind of personal conviction and commitment that President Bush had.
Thus, after delivering a speech in which he simultaneously promised to surge troops into Afghanistan and to withdraw them, he discovered that the withdrawal was the only part anyone was really paying attention to and taking seriously. Obama spent the better part of four months supposedly weighing every little aspect of America's policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan—yet he didn't anticipate that the biggest thing our allies would want is a clear indication of America's commitment to stay and finish the job.
So for the past week, he has had to dispatch America's top national security officials to Europe and Pakistan and Afghanistan to reassure everyone that we're not actually planning to pack our bags and bug out in 18 months.
See the article below, and Secretary of Defense Bob Gates's remarks in Afghanistan:
The defense secretary has stressed repeatedly that the United States will not abandon Afghanistan as it did in 1989, when Soviet forces left the country. "Our government will not again turn our back on this country or the region," Gates said. "We will fight by your side until the Afghan forces are large enough and strong enough to secure the nation on their own."
Translation: all of that stuff about withdrawing troops was just to appease the anger of the anti-war left. We didn't really mean it.
But I'm not so sure. Are you? And are you comfortable with a commander-in-chief whose wartime resolve is such a question mark?
"No Firm Plans for a US Exit in Afghanistan," Mark Mazzetti, New York Times, December 6
The Obama administration sent a forceful public message Sunday that American military forces could remain in Afghanistan for a long time, seeking to blunt criticism that President Obama had sent the wrong signal in his war-strategy speech last week by projecting July 2011 as the start of a withdrawal.
In a flurry of coordinated television interviews, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other top administration officials said that any troop pullout beginning in July 2011 would be slow and that the Americans would only then be starting to transfer security responsibilities to Afghan forces under Mr. Obama’s new plan….
“We have strategic interests in South Asia that should not be measured in terms of finite times,” said Gen. James L. Jones, the president’s national security adviser, speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We’re going to be in the region for a long time.”
Echoing General Jones, Mr. Gates played down the significance of the July 2011 target date.
“There isn’t a deadline,” Mr. Gates said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”…
The president’s speech set off alarms inside Afghanistan and Pakistan, as some officials worried about an American pullout before Afghan troops were ready to fight the Taliban on their own….
During weeks of wrenching internal debate, administration officials decided on the July 2011 benchmark in part to send a signal to Afghanistan’s government that the clock was ticking for Afghan troops to take a greater role against the Taliban. The message was intended equally for domestic consumption: assuring skeptical Democratic lawmakers and many Americans that the United States military presence in Afghanistan was not open-ended.
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