Exclusive: For nearly seven years of his presidency, Barack Obama has zigzagged from military interventionist to pragmatic negotiator, leaving little sense of what he truly believes. Yet, there may be some consistent threads to his inconsistencies, writes Robert Parry.
By Robert Parry
Nearing the last year of his presidency, Barack Obama and his foreign policy remain an enigma. At times, he seems to be the “realist,” working constructively with other nations to achieve positive solutions, as with the Iran nuclear deal and his rapprochement with Cuba. Other times, he slides into line with the neocons and liberal hawks, provoking ugly crises, such as his “regime change” tactics in Honduras (2009), Libya (2011), Syria (over several years) and Ukraine (2014).
Yet, even in some of those “regime change” scenarios, Obama pulls back from the crazier “tough guy/gal” ideas and recognizes the catastrophes such schemes could create. In 2013, he called off a planned bombing campaign against the Syrian military (which could have led to a victory for Al Qaeda or the Islamic State), and in 2014, he resisted a full-scale escalation of Ukraine’s war against ethnic Russian rebels resisting the new U.S.-backed political order in Kiev (which could have pushed the world to the brink of a nuclear war).
President Barack Obama talks with Ambassador Samantha Power, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, in the Cabinet Room of the White House, Sept. 12, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
Yet, Obama also won’t stand up to the neocons and liberal hawks by sharing crucial information with the American people that could undermine pro-intervention narratives.
For instance, Obama has held back the latest U.S. intelligence analysis describing who was responsible for the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin attack that almost precipitated the U.S. war on the Syrian military, and he won’t release the intelligence assessment on who shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 on July 17, 2014, the tragedy which ratcheted up the crisis with Russia over Ukraine.
In both cases, I’m told U.S. intelligence analysts have backed off early rushes to judgment blaming the Syrian government for the sarin attack, which killed hundreds, and the Russian-backed eastern Ukrainian rebels for the MH-17 crash, which killed 298 people. But Obama has left standing the earlier propaganda themes blaming the Syrian and Russian governments, all the better to apply American “soft power” pressure against Damascus and Moscow.
Thus, Obama’s foreign policy has a decidedly zigzag nature to it. Or as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger recently described Obama: “On the prudential level he’s a realist. But his vision is more ideological than strategic,” a typically cryptic Kissingerian phrasing that I interpret to mean that Obama is a prudent realist when it comes to major military actions but short of all-out war ideologically embraces neocon/liberal-hawk interventionism.
My view of Obama is somewhat different. It strikes me that Obama is what you might call a “closet realist.” He understands the limits of American power and wants to avoid costly military entanglements. But he also doesn’t want to challenge the neocon/liberal-hawk dominance of Official Washington.
In other words, he’s a timid opportunist when it comes to reshaping the parameters of the prevailing “group think.” He’s afraid of being cast as the “outsider,” so he only occasionally tests the limits of what the neocon/liberal-hawk “big thinkers” will permit, as with Cuba and Iran.
Obama is also fundamentally an elitist who believes more in manipulating the American people than in leveling with them. For instance, a leader who truly trusted in democracy would order the maximum declassification of what the U.S. intelligence community knows about the pivotal events in Syria and Ukraine, including the sarin attack and the MH-17 shoot-down.
An elitist would keep the public in the dark while letting the hasty initial judgments stand, which is what Obama has done.
Redirecting Conventional Wisdom
Obama never trusts the people to help him rewrite the narratives of these crises, which could create more space for reasonable compromises and solutions. Instead, he leaves the American public ignorant, which empowers his fellow “smart people” of Official Washington to manage national perceptions, all aided and abetted by the complicit mainstream U.S. media which simply reinforces the misguided “conventional wisdom.”
Despite his power to do so, Obama won’t shatter the frame of Official Washington’s fun-house mirror of reality. That’s why his attempt to invoke the memory of President John F. Kennedy’s famous “we all inhabit this small planet” speech at American University in 1963 fell so flat earlier this month when Obama went to AU and offered a pedestrian, point-by-point defense of the Iran nuclear deal without any of Kennedy’s soaring, universal rhetoric.
Presumably Obama feared that he would be cast as a starry-eyed idealist if he explained to the American people the potential for using the Iran agreement as a way to begin constructing a more peaceful Middle East. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Obama’s Pragmatic Appeal for Iran Peace.”]
These limitations in Obama’s personality and world view have probably doomed his legacy to be viewed as an overall failure to reshape America’s approach to the world, away from a costly and confrontational strategy of seeking endless dominance to one favoring a more respectful and pragmatic approach toward the sensitivities and needs of other nations.
I realize some Obama critics feel that he is simply a tool of American imperialism putting a slightly less offensive face on the same interventionist policies. And no doubt he has served that role in many instances. He even boasted during his Iran speech that “I’ve ordered military action in seven countries.” If some other world leader say, Russian President Vladimir Putin had made that claim, we would be hearing demands that he be dragged before the World Court as a war criminal.
But there is also the Obama whom Kissinger described as “on the prudential level he’s a realist.” And there is significant value in sidestepping the maximalist catastrophes that would be caused by policies favored by the neocons and liberal hawks, such as U.S. bombing to destroy the Syrian military (and open the gates of Damascus to a reign of Sunni terrorism) or a U.S. military escalation of the Ukraine crisis (to the point of a nuclear showdown with Russia).
While Obama’s modicum of “realism” may seem like a modest thing, it isn’t when you recognize that Official Washington’s favored choices could contribute to the mass executions of Syria’s Christians, Shiites, Alawites and other minorities under the swords of the Islamic State or could provoke a thermonuclear war with Russia that could end all life on the planet.
That acknowledgement aside, however, Obama has fallen far short of any profile in courage as he’s allowed dangerously false narratives to develop around these and other international conflicts. The most hazardous of all is the Putin-bashing storyline about Ukraine, which holds that the entire ugly civil war was part of some nefarious scheme cooked up in the Kremlin to recreate the Russian Empire.
Though this notion that the Ukraine crisis was simply a case of “Russian aggression” is held by virtually every important person in Washington’s current power circles, it was never true. The crisis was provoked by a U.S.-backed coup on Feb. 22, 2014, which overthrew Ukraine’s elected President Viktor Yanukovych. Putin reacted to that provocation; he didn’t instigate it.
Kissinger’s Take on Ukraine
And if you don’t believe me, perhaps you might listen to Henry Kissinger who explained the reality in a July interview with National Interest editor Jacob Heilbrunn, who noted: “we have witnessed a return, at least in Washington, DC, of neoconservatives and liberal hawks who are determined to break the back of the Russian government.”
Kissinger: “Until they face the consequences. The trouble with America’s wars since the end of the Second World War has been the failure to relate strategy to what is possible domestically. The five wars we’ve fought since the end of World War II were all started with great enthusiasm. But the hawks did not prevail at the end. At the end, they were in a minority. We should not engage in international conflicts if, at the beginning, we cannot describe an end, and if we’re not willing to sustain the effort needed to achieve that end. ”
Heilbrunn: “How do you think the United States can extricate itself from the Ukraine impasse, the United States and Europe, obviously?”
Kissinger: “The issue is not to extricate the United States from the Ukrainian impasse but to solve it in a way conducive to international order. A number of things need to be recognized. One, the relationship between Ukraine and Russia will always have a special character in the Russian mind. It can never be limited to a relationship of two traditional sovereign states, not from the Russian point of view, maybe not even from Ukraine’s.
“So, what happens in Ukraine cannot be put into a simple formula of applying principles that worked in Western Europe, not that close to Stalingrad and Moscow. In that context, one has to analyze how the Ukraine crisis occurred. It is not conceivable that Putin spends 60 billion euros on turning a summer resort into a winter Olympic village in order to start a military crisis the week after a concluding ceremony that depicted Russia as a part of Western civilization.
“So then, one has to ask: How did that happen? I saw Putin at the end of November 2013. He raised a lot of issues; Ukraine he listed at the end as an economic problem that Russia would handle via tariffs and oil prices.
“The first mistake was the inadvertent conduct of the European Union. They did not understand the implications of some of their own conditions. Ukrainian domestic politics made it look impossible for Yanukovych to accept the EU terms [for an association agreement] and be reelected or for Russia to view them as purely economic.
“Each side acted sort of rationally based on its misconception of the other, while Ukraine slid into the Maidan uprising right in the middle of what Putin had spent ten years building as a recognition of Russia’s status. No doubt in Moscow this looked as if the West was exploiting what had been conceived as a Russian festival to move Ukraine out of the Russian orbit.
“If we treat Russia seriously as a great power, we need at an early stage to determine whether their concerns can be reconciled with our necessities. We should explore the possibilities of a status of nonmilitary grouping on the territory between Russia and the existing frontiers of NATO.
“The West hesitates to take on the economic recovery of Greece; it’s surely not going to take on Ukraine as a unilateral project. So one should at least examine the possibility of some cooperation between the West and Russia in a militarily nonaligned Ukraine. The Ukraine crisis is turning into a tragedy because it is confusing the long-range interests of global order with the immediate need of restoring Ukrainian identity.
“When you read now that Muslim units are fighting on behalf of Ukraine, then the sense of proportion has been lost.” [For more on this reference, see Consortiumnews.com’s “Ukraine Merges Nazis and Islamists.”]
Heilbrunn: “That’s a disaster, obviously.”
Kissinger: “To me, yes. It means that breaking Russia has become an objective; the long-range purpose should be to integrate it.”
When Kissinger Makes Sense
It may be a little scary when Henry Kissinger makes relative sense, but that’s only in contrast to the current dominant neocon/liberal-hawk “big thinkers” of Official Washington.
For Obama the Realist, the most practical way to begin moving toward a pragmatic resolution of the Ukraine crisis would be to stop the endless propaganda emanating from the U.S. State Department and repeated by the mainstream media and start telling the public the full truth how the crisis really began, why the mantra “Russian aggression” is false, what on earth the U.S. government thinks it’s doing collaborating with neo-Nazis and Islamic jihadists in killing thousands of ethnic Russian Ukrainians, and who was responsible for the key escalating moment, the shoot-down of MH-17.
But Obama the Timid Soul afraid of being ostracized by all the well-connected neocons and liberal hawks of Official Washington doesn’t dare challenge the “group think,” what everybody knows to be true even if he knows it to be false. In the end, Obama the Elitist won’t trust the American people with the facts, so these international crises will continue drifting toward a potential Armageddon.
Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com). You also can order Robert Parry’s trilogy on the Bush Family and its connections to various right-wing operatives for only $34. The trilogy includes America’s Stolen Narrative. For details on this offer, click here.
Obama has nothing to do with it…..anymore than Bush did. This is a battle for survival of the fittest in a dog eat dog world of consumer crazed corporations owned by the jews.
The Washington Post (and some other mainstream media) publishes articles and photo stories by journalists in and around Kyiv-controlled eastern Ukraine. But the Post‘s journalists can’t seem to provide examples of how “Russia’s forces continue to shell and rocket Ukrainian positions on a daily basisâ€. Surely, if the situation is that severe, there must be no shortage of visual examples to provide to readers? And surely the U.S. government can provide satellite images to mainstream media of the “9,000 Russian soldiers†in eastern Ukraine as well as other examples of Russian intervention?
Unless… it’s all, or mostly, make believe.
On the rebel side of eastern Ukraine, there is no shortage of examples of grim, daily shelling by Ukrainian armed forces, which are backed by NATO. Alas, and not by accident, such reports never, ever grace the pages of the Western media.
Deadly Cheering for War in Ukraine by Western Press
By Roger Annis
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/08/21/deadly-cheering-for-war-in-ukraine-by-western-politicians-and-newspapers-editors/
We defer to the war criminal Kissinger now, to assess the war criminal Obama and his co-conspirators?
Obama should have been impeached, removed and tried for serious crimes a long time ago, as should Bush before him. Obama has directly helped AL QAEDA in at least two war theaters. He has also installed NAZIS in power in Europe.
People who help Al Qaeda and Nazis should be seen, rightly, as enemies of humanity. Obama is the worst kind of scum. He puts a slick veneer on a barbaric, murderous empire, and he keeps his atrocities away from the cameras. As long as he relies on proxy forces, rather than on US personnel, he can get away with mass murder. That is the abomination of the Democrats in a nutshell. Instead of invading, they have their partners create proxy armies. Instead of US troops in body bags, a million brown civilians are turned into hamburger, while the Democrats wring their hands and exploit tragedies for propaganda purposes.
They are war criminals and should be written about and treated accordingly.
Just one more comment……..The USA more than needs the petrodollar…The life blood of the US dollar reserve currency….Israel has been a so called partner in keeping the middle east a disaster so the OPEC nations will need the mighty USA military…..But all those nations are waking up to this bull sh*t game…….The only option left is war……Listen folks the USA is drowning in debt ……the neocons will sacrifice you and your children…….Be ready to say NO WAY ……..
Finally, someone who “gets it” that this isn’t an “American Empire”, that we are indeed just one more, subjugated and EXPENDABLE Province, that’s been captured by a Global Empire of MANY Provinces that were, formerly, sovereign Nation-States. We (democratic republican Factions) have got to politically re-take D.C. and break Wall Street’s back (Sanders or O`Malley), while the UK does EXACTLY the same thing in Britain and to The City-of-London (Jeremy Corbyn). It’s our best chance to kill off this evil, “VIRAL”, Bilderbergers’ Western Empire that, just like a virus, USES the substance of formerly sovereign Nations, to do its’ own wicked deeds.
The sad thing is we elected Obama on promises made to up grade America….The infrastructure in the USA is crumbling daily but the entire governmental system has spent BORROWED MONEY on foreign policy…..WARS and more WARS……The credit bubble WILL POP and the citizens of this country will realize we had a chance to repair America domestically but our leaders were and are simply UNAMERICAN……The one chance….is over
Blessed are the peacemakers and builders of homes for the people vs satan’s warmongers and building estates for themselves while destroying homes and filling their bellies with the best food while cutting food for others…So what would have happened if General Lee and President Davis had won. Great Britain thought it was imperative to aid the south and Confederacy by selling destroyers including the Alabama. Charles Sumner chairman of senate foreign affairs committee claimed Britain owed United States 2 billion for its unneutral behavior and prolonging the war. Some thought we’d get Canada as payment. The issue was resolved in Treaty of Washington 1871.
Even before he became president he was a nobody a teacher at a college who had always a nice story to tell his students. He never had any decision making experience or leadership skills. He made nice speeches in Cairo raising the hope in the Middle East that he would – as a neo-Muslim – also represent the interests of the Muslims in that part of the world but he forget those of promises the moment he was back in Washington. He kept these empty rhetoric throughout his presidency and even his ‘Obamacare’ is a farce.
Once in the White House all his speeches and promises were forgotten and he became the ‘football’ of the major interest lobbies, rich bankers conglomerates and of course the 1% rich establishment. During his first election campaign he promised the people to make Washington more transparent another lie. Today the Obama Administration is even less transparent then under previous presidents because Obama is being manipulated by his staff and interest groups. The war lobby has won with NEOCONS in the State dept responsible for US Foreign Policy.Today US Foreign Policy is unpredictable and NOBODY in the West understands it anymore except for the fact that the West is now facing a serious risk for WW III and a confrontation with Russia and China. And here we have a Black President who received the Nobel Prize for Peace while he has initiated wars all over the Globe. Unlike Obama, President Carter always showed his Christian convictions and his desire for peace. For that reason he was bumped out of his second term by the macho media and of course the powerful defence industry lobbyists who need wars to keep their shareholders happy.
Mr. Parry, I always enjoy your excellent analyses.
March 12, 2012 The US claims it will go to North Korea after the Forgotten War MIAS
March 21, 2012 ThiS ADMINSITRATION SUSPENDS TALKS WITH NORTH KOREA
Oct 2014 NORTH KOREA Remarks it will move the remains of 5,000 MIAS EN Masse
{There are over 3,000 US MIAS Still left in NORTH KOrea}
AS of August 2015 no plans for US to go to North Korea
See Missing iN action Wikipedia {Korean War}
So what can John Public Do?
Contact your Congressman about this legacy-prehaps Congress can get talks going again to bring our missing sons home to the USA
Whilst I found the article interesting, especially in respect to Ukraine. I think you are far too kind or maybe polite about Obama.
My personal view is that he is just a career politician trying to appease everyone he thinks is worth appeasing with little or no knowledge of foreign policy. I also truly believe that he is fundamentally a Muslim that wants to follow in his Father’s footsteps.
His legacy is one of failure, whether it be domestically or Internationally, he has blood on his hands, he has brought the US to its knees both financially and diplomatically – never have so many people HATED the US in my 49 years of life.
He also pushed too hard, too quickly and too far with Russia and we have seen the results. The NWO is dead, long live the NWO 2
KIssinger’s comments also reveal a part of the problem. Referring to Russia: “the long-range purpose should be to integrate it.â€
Being “integrated” by a unipolar empire, i.e. the USA, is exactly what Putin has rejected, and on terms which, at face value, seem reasonable – that peoples of the world should have the freedom to determine their own interests, and that an international system must be based on a respect for this freedom. Putin has been relentlessly demonized for expressing this world view and, according to military and political leaders across the West, this world view is evidence of “aggression” which must be forcefully responded.
The AUMF passed by US Congress in 2002 seemed to be the vote for a policy of worldwide empire, and that is the policy which has, seemingly, tied Obama’s hands because responsible diplomatic activity would require stepping back from the empire concept, but it is the bi-partisan global empire consensus which remains policy. Therefore “Putinism” must be crushed because it will not integrate.
The on-the-surface switch in about 25 years, whereby the West became the paranoid surveillance state with limited political options, and Russia stands as the champion of self-determination. is quite remarkable.
Bob: your comment about what would elicit calls to send Putin to the World Court begs the question: then why not your putative timid realist Barark? Seems like a pulled punch?
“Yet, Obama also won’t stand up to the neocons and liberal hawks by sharing crucial information with the American people that could undermine pro-intervention narratives.” Robert Parry
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“Kennedy and Khrushchev, in almost choosing total darkness, had been moved to see the light. They had then reached an agreement whereby they could lead by example, in the presence of all nations, in seeking the moral equivalent of war—using the test ban as a lever to move the world to a just and lasting peace. Thanks to John Kennedy’s and Nikita Khrushchev’s mutual turning away from nuclear war, they now had the power to make peace. But with determined Cold Warriors surrounding them, neither man would long retain that power. Their time for making peace would soon pass” James W Douglas, JFK the Unspeakable; Why he Died Why it Matters
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Could President Obama be walking on egg shells? Is President Obama outnumbered? Just how strong is the Military Congressional Industrial Complex? Who are these Neocon’s? Is the president of this country just a figurehead?
The only good excuse President Obama could have, is that he is avoiding another fate, such as JFK’s. If Obama was to get caught back channeling with Putin or Xi Jing, would his own government consider him a traitor. At best would they throw him out of office using a scandal, whether real or invented. There are some now a days saying that Wategate was the establishments way of booting Dick Nixon out of office. Whether there is something to that or not, it would be a clever way to rid a person from office. No matter Obama certainly doesn’t fair well for all his promises, but are his failed promises an example of just how bad it really is in our American government. We all talk about the ‘Dark State’, well are we witnessing that when paying attention to what or whatnot our president can or won’t do? I hope that if Obama truly is a good guy, and that the Neocon’s are honestly holding a gun to his head, that someday the truth will come out. Other than that lets hope, if even by accident, that peace may prevail.
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Nobel Peace Committee, said that US President Barack Obama “should really consider†an immediate surrender of his Nobel Peace Prize Medal. According to the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet, Jagland, accompanied by four other members of the Committee, said that they had never asked for the return of the Peace Prize before, “even from such a war criminal as Henry Kissinger.†The Committee awarded the Peace Prize to Barack Obama in 2009 after he had managed to convince everyone that he was supporting “the creation of a new environment … of multilateral diplomacy†and emphasized the role of the United Nations, and such tools for resolving international conflicts, as dialogues and negotiations.
But reality has shattered the illusions of not only members of the Nobel Prize Committee, but also of the majority of the international community that is witnessing barbarity, cynicism, impudence, frank insolence, demagogy, cheap manipulation of facts incompetent members of the administration and the President himself freely use. “During the Obama’s reign, and through the fault of the United States, the world has become even more insecure place,†noted the Indian newspaper, Hindustan Times. “ It is scary and creepy to live in it, and the future looks bleak, pessimistic and hopeless.â€
Let’s, for example, take a look at last actions of Barack Obama (who will soon be gone for good) in the once tranquil but now turbulent Middle East. When foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) gathered in Doha (Qatar) for a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry to resolve the situation in the region, none other than Barack Obama generously poured oil to the fire of the conflict. According to his new order, the US armed forces can now respond to any hostile action taken against the Syrian “moderate†opposition. In addition to that, the Pentagon also reserves the right to protect opponents of Bashar al-Assad from the air and retaliate in the event they are attacked by either radicals from the Islamic State (ISIS), or the Syrian army. In essence, this means the US can now be directly involved in the civil war in Syria on the side of the Syrian opposition. It should be noted that Washington had received consent for its actions neither from the UN nor from the official Syrian government. In other words, the “world gendarme†has decided to threaten the world with its military club once again. Apparently, the “highbrow professionals†from the banks of the Potomac River have not learned their lesson from the situations with Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and now Syria.
[…] Thorbjorn Jagland said that the members of the Committee were “roaring drunk†on the day when they voted for Barack Obama, just as it was the case during the annual Norwegian wine tasting festival AQUAVIT. “Completely stoned†Committee members kept listening over and over to a record of the Obama’s speech he had given in Cairo, envisioning a glorious future: a man leading America and the whole world to a new era of peace, hope and goodwill. “Within a few hours we all felt like wide-eyed 18-year-old students on the campus of the beautiful, sunny University of Bergen! Oh, how we wept with joy!â€
The Chair said that Mr. Obama could send the medal back in a simple package by regular mail if it would help him to overcome the embarrassment and shame of a public return. But here the esteemed Thorbjorn Jagland is deeply mistaken. Members of the Washington administration as well as their boss have long forgotten the meaning of such categories, as shame, honor and common decency. Instead, they have adopted lies, demagoguery and the commonplace hoax with threats to use their military and possibly even nuclear club in any corner of the world.
Middle East: Two Approaches to the Resolution of the Conflict
By Viktor Mikhin
http://journal-neo.org/2015/08/20/middle-east-two-approaches-to-the-resolution-of-the-conflict/
Kissingers comments were interesting. Where was he during the Viet Nam war which he helped to keep going.. Here are some links to remind you.
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=christopher%20hitchens%20henry%20kissinger
Exactly, Sanford…Thanks.
Your reply and link is what make the combination of Robert Parry’s reporting and this commentary so valuable. This is a great forum…Thanks to all.
“These limitations in Obama’s personality and world view have probably doomed his legacy to be viewed as an overall failure to reshape America’s approach to the world, away from a costly and confrontational strategy of seeking endless dominance to one favoring a more respectful and pragmatic approach toward the sensitivities and needs of other nations.”
There’s no “probably” about it. That Obama’s legacy will be viewed as an absolute failure is guaranteed. It’s already viewed as an absolute failure by any person with a real brain; and his legacy is not going to improve with age.
Obama is great and he is good. Now let us thank him for our food.
Amen.
Seems many here are still under the false impression that we can dictate world events and have them come out the way they were planned. That seldom if ever has worked in our history. The law of unintended consequences always comes back to bite us in the ass.
I think Obama has been very nuanced in what he decided to do and also has a great grasp on the limits of American power on the rest of the world. He decidedly has a more world view than did GWB (if he had any at all) and except for Libya has pretty well refrained from using muscle although even there he was nuanced.
You mentioned Yemen…well in that case we knew who the worst actors were but the choices weren’t good. A lousy, pseudo government was “in charge” if you can call it that. Hell, Pakistan has more control over their territories than the government of Yemen had over the country. We were droning known Al Qaeda targets more than anything and while I’m not crazy about drones, I’m also realist enough to know that while you can’t kill them all you can sure kill some of the worst ones. Yemen is lost for awhile and there’s nothing we can or should do about it now.
As for Syria, Obama did the right thing in retrospect although the same voices that think he was timid are still yelling. Taking out Assad would have left the door completely open for ISIL to take the entire country and “arming the rebels” sounds good but would have been foolish because ISIL would have taken those arms also. There was never a way our arming them would have taken out Assad or stopped ISIS. Now that Turkey is in the game so to speak, ISIL will go down eventually. They are virtually surrounded now with the combination of Jordan, Turkey, Iraq (with Iran’s help) and the Kurds. Now if we can just keep Turkey and the Kurds from killing each other we might just have something.
(Before giving me grief for using ISIS and ISIL, I’m id’ing what formed inside Syria as ISIS and the entirety that now has part of Syria and Iraq to id ISIL. They aren’t separate at this time but once were much more distinguishable.)
I overall liked the article and I would remind all of us of a quote from Emerson in regard to foreign policy tactics as opposed to strategy. “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” I.E., different situations call for different actions. The overall strategy is not to be the bully and let allies as well as enemies help us when it is in our best interests as we define them.
Turkey has been in the game all along…on the side of ISIL. Or…did you think that caravan of Toyota trucks driving back and forth across the border was just a Toyota commercial?
F. William Engdahl writes about Erdogan’s deceiving tactics. Apparently the French had a plan entitled “Juppe-Wright Plan’, and this is regarded as Erdogan’s work sheet. Erdogan’s son is in charge of selling ISIS/ISIL/Daesh stolen Iraqi oil to such countries as Japan. On top of that Erdogan’s daughter is working in a field hospital nursing ISIS’s wounded terrorist. So, yes Turkey is aiding and working along with the bad guys. With friends like this who needs enemies.
http://journal-neo.org/2015/08/24/erdogan-s-dirty-dangerous-isis-games/
There is nothing predictable going on in Syria. Russia is now joining in on the Syrian fight against the terrorist. Russia and the White House are also working (a bit) with each other. Read this article……
http://www.voltairenet.org/article188522.html
Robert Parry’s focus on discovering Obama’s true self and motives, such as they are, distracts from a much more important factor in explaining recent diplomatic progress in certain areas: The U.S. has budged on Cuba and Iran because its declining ability to dominate and impose conformity on the world at large meant that continuing with the status quo would increasingly isolate, not the targets of U.S. displeasure, but the ostensible superpower itself.
This was made crystal clear by the impending boycott of the Summit of the Americas this past April by most of the hemisphere if the U.S. had not made progress on Cuba. I haven’t seen such explicit ultimatums from Europe and China about Iran, but I think it’s pretty clear that if the U.S. had refused (or still ends up refusing) to agree to a reasonable enrichment and inspections regime under the NPT, sanctions discipline was/is going to start falling apart. I read a quote by Kerry just this week to the effect that if Americans expect the rest of the world to just wait around indefinitely if the U.S. dumps the current deal, they are much mistaken.
I believe that the U.S.’s having held back on large-scale military assistance to Kiev, to the extent it has, is also at least as plausibly attributable to the influence of Germany and other “Old
Europe” allies as to Obama’s innate character.
All that said, Obama and Kerry do deserve credit for responding to these cues constructively, working out agreements that reflect the new reality, albeit one that is basically being imposed on the calcified Beltway establishment by the rest of the world. It is hard to imagine the Bush Jr. mob doing as well.
I totally agree with your assessment here.
Parry steps up his criticism of Obama but remains a steadfast apologist for Obama. Can hardly bear to read him.
“We should not engage in international conflicts if, at the beginning, we cannot describe an end, and if we’re not willing to sustain the effort needed to achieve that end. …â€. Henry Kissinger
Wow, just wow. After thousands of deaths under Henry’s watch; we get this from him? I say we begin War Trials with him first. “Dominos” was a great metaphor for a seriously flawed policy. It seems that some “serious” intellect like Henry Kissinger or Zbigniew Brzezinski always comes up with a great thought that moves “their career” along, at serious cost to us commoners. Enough, they were Always Wrong, are still wrong. I don’t think they have a clue. And, President Obama and his three dimensional chess, forget it!
Thank you again Robert Parry…
Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperative
A Blueprint for World Dictatorship
Zbigniew K. Brzezinski
From the Publisher
The heart of The Grand Chessboard is Brzezinski’s analysis of the four critical regions of Eurasia and of the stakes for America in each arena – Europe, Russia, Central Asia, and East Asia. The crucial fault lines may seem familiar, but the implosion of the Soviet Union has created new rivalries and new relationships, and Brzezinski maps out the strategic ramifications of the new geopolitical realities.
Synopsis
This geopolitical strategist and former national security adviser offers a new global vision for securing American preeminence into the next century. Includes maps and tables.
From The Critics
Publisher’s Weekly
Not everyone will agree that the U.S. must “perpetuate own dominant position for at least a generation and preferably longer,” but former National Security Adviser Brzezinski offers a meticulously detailed argument for how and why we should. He begins with a quick review of every empire in history and how they compare with America, which he concludes is the first truly global power. He then argues that “Eurasia is… the chessboard on which the struggle for global primacy continues to be played,” and moves on to equally brief but comprehensive accounts of political developments there, ranging over entire histories and concluding with how America can best balance power in the region. While it seems overly ambitious to attempt to cover this much ground in a short work, Brzezinski succeeds. He is less convincing, however, when he strays from geopolitics and claims that America is internally threatened by being “fixated on mass entertainment… heavily dominated by hedonistic and socially escapist themes.” Those who are uncomfortable with his initial premise will be relieved by his conclusion: America’s ultimate destiny is to give up its primacy in exchange for “an enduring framework of global geopolitical cooperation.” (Oct.)
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry… >http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearc…isbn=04650…
Brzezinski is also a past attendee and presenter at several conferences of the Bilderberger group – a non-partisan affiliation of the wealthiest and most powerful families and corporations on the planet.
Zbigniew Brzezinski and the CFR Put War Plans In a 1997 Book – It Is “A Blueprint for World Dictatorship,” Says a Former German Defense and NATO Official
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/zbig.html >http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/zbig.html
THAT’S THE WAY IT IS….
“Obama is also fundamentally an elitist who believes more in
manipulating the American people than in leveling with them.
..”–Robert Parry (above)
The fact is that there have been few ( to none) American
Presidents/leaders to whom this does not apply. In fact, there
are few (to none) leaders anywhere who are not elitist in
some sense and who make their policies and actions in terms
calculated to manipulate their bases (nations etc.).
In this context ( accepting this as a given) modified in
different lands and eras according to factors peculiar at
that place and time, the details of these Obama years
cannot be measured as though there were some mythical
non-illusory leader who did not manipulate to his advantage.
What is left for us who are merely human and limited in
our abilities, is to fight on issues we see as especially
blatant.
We can as one observer wrote (Michael Prior) hope
for improved situations. “Justice” will have to wait. (In
context of his book, “Justice” would require the
total elimination of Zionism as a belief and its
settler-colonialist appologetics for its oppressions).
It would be helpful if those of us who are analyzing
a “legacy” —anyone’s— stopped using the mysteriously
“perfect” figure (who shares everything with something
called “the American people”).
No future US leader as I see it would ever embrace any
of the goals recently outlined in an essay by Noam
Chomsky of the last few days (printed in many publications).
—-Peter Loeb, Boston, MA USA
With some luck Jeremy Corbyn will break the mold in the UK. http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/08/21/panic-attackers-grass-roots-challenge-sparks-high-level-hissy-fit/
That would be a GREAT boon to democratic republican Factions throughout the Nations of Western Civilization, especially the five, English-speaking sister Nations (UK, USA, Canada, Australia, NZ). We can cover his flank with a Sanders or O`Malley Presidency. Together, between UK and USA, we can bury this Empire for good…after all, the two Nations house the “Two Towers” of this evil Western Empire (The City and The Street). The biggest battles will occur on our respective Home Turfs.
The Obama Administration STARTED the Ukrainian civil war when it sponsored a coup de tat to depose the Ukraine’s democratically elected Head of State. This will leave a bloody stain on Obama’s “legacy” for generations to come.
Likewise for the Obama Administration’s sponsorship of the 2009 coup de tat of the democratically Head of State of Honduras. Honduras has been a bloody mess ever since then, and the refugees that were created as a result of this Obama-mess have been have been pouring over our southern border ever since then. Obama can’t claim to be a “defender of democracy” without LYING!
Best comments
Robert Parry just can’t get over being conned by Obama. He is a neo con creating more havoc than george bush!! Look at the facts, but he gets a free pass in the media for some reason.
Do they feel they can’t say anything about him because he is black? I find it curious that 7 wars and counting obama gets away with it.
I thought it was obvious within several months of taking office, that he is a Wall Streeter, or at the very least, too beholden to, and buffaloed by, Wall Street (the American branch of the Bilderbergers’ “Western Empire” of financial houses and military/security corporations; I don’t at all consider it to be an “American” Empire, nor any other Nation’s Empire. We’re all just inconsequential, expendable “Provinces” of a global Empire). It was obvious to me, within several months, that he was no “Roosevelt”; that he was a “Hoover”, listening to his own “Andrew Mellon” and the other “savvy businessmen” of Wall Street (the same kind of criminals that Roosevelt forced into bankruptcy re-organization, breaking their power with Glass-Steagle. FDR’s efforts ultimately failed though, because you can’t kill an Empire within just one of Its’ single “Provinces”, and it’s hard to get the other Provinces to see this “Stealthy Empire” problem; they simply believe it’s an American problem inflicted upon them, not recognizing their own contributions to the problem, remembering that Bilderbergers started in EUROPE, as did Fascism; the old Imperial Roman Fasces, NOT America). Obama’s only useful service has been as a “sandbag” to slow the onslaught of insane, right-winger fascism. I chose him over Romney (who actually visited the Bilderbergers; no-doubt to pick up his “marching orders”) in 2012 because he had the impeachable record, and could be tossed out immediately after election, and Romney would get to start with a clean slate…Tarpley convinced me the smooth-talking Romney would already have had the H-bombs falling on our heads by now. And Obama’s timidity is a result of the bad endings for JFK, RFK, and MLK. It has been, and is, a very long war, within Western Civilization, between The Republic and The Empire…and we democratic republicans have lost more battles than won. But we haven’t been knocked out yet…but neither has The Empire, yet.
I thought it was obvious within several months of taking office, that he is a Wall Streeter, …
This was obvious within days of Obama’s election and long before inauguration day.
I’m a slow learner.
I suspect that Obama’s reticence about taking on the foreign policy establishment stems from his personal insecurity–he had limited experience in foreign affairs and none at all in the military. Time after time he trusted experienced but misguided advisers rather than his own instincts, and we’ve all paid the price.
The Internet offers a ubiquitous, inexpensive and anonymous “open source†method for rapid propaganda dissemination.
Western governments now disseminate propaganda by making it “publicly available†via “social media”.
Obama’s foreign policy is based on “social media” and “open source” analysis by faux “citizen journalist†deception operative Eliot Higgins.
Higgins’ “investigations” of the 2013 chemical attack in Ghouta, Syria and 2014 MH-17 aircraft incident in eastern Ukraine provided “open source” support for Obama’s foreign policy decisions.
Citing “Bellingcat’s MH17 investigationâ€, Higgins declared that “a relatively small team of analysts is able to derive a rich picture of a conflict zone†using online information. Higgins extolled the virtues of this “new evidence base†of “open source†information:
Social media and conflict zones: the new evidence base for policymaking
By Eliot Higgins
https://blogs.kcl.ac.uk/policywonkers/social-media-and-conflict-zones-the-new-evidence-base-for-policymaking/
The “overarching point†concludes Higgins, is that “there is a real opportunity for open source intelligence analysis to provide the kind of evidence base that can underpin effective and successful foreign and security policymaking. It is an opportunity that policymakers should seize.â€
With no credible evidence of the Syrian government responsibility for the 2013 Ghouta attack or the 2014 MH-17 incident, Obama enthusiastically seized the opportunity provided by deception operatives like Higgins to blame Syria and Russia.
Simply stated, Obama’s foreign policy is based almost entirely on propaganda.
A sensible article on the sad record of the first black president, one he could still clean up nicely if he could throw out the rightwingers who surround him, but we have said that since the end of his first 100 days, to no avail. He would have to admit endless complex errors. Now he is in so many messes around the globe that he can make no move without screams from all sides.
He could still wind down military aid in favor of intensive multilateral negotiations.
He could still found a College of Policy Analysis to prevent DC groupthink.
He could still turn over the mass media to the universities on charges of economic conspiracy to deceive the people, and demand an Amendment to restrict their funding to registered limited individual contributions,
He could still shut down all political funding groups, demand new Congressional elections based upon the above funding restrictions, and demand an Amendment for that purpose.
These are all national emergency solutions within the presidential powers.
Nothing less will correct the anti-constitutional revolution of economic gangsters that has ended democracy in the US.
So far there is no sign that he has the courage to handle the emergency.
Just more hopey-changey stuff.
With no one better than Sanders on the horizon, Obama has the last chance to solve these problems, and failure to do so will be remembered for centuries.
Thank you for this article. For 8 years I have struggled to make sense of Obama’s actions. His lack of respect for the American majority stands out in his contrasting openess to the
influence of Washington insiders and the 1 per centers. I find it difficult to see how he
will be recognized as an outstanding president with an outstanding legacy.
Obama can only follow orders and be the mouthpiece for the Deleterious Cabal that has designed this murderous insanity. -I’m sure you all really know this in your heart of hearts… .
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EXCERPT:
Insouciance Rules The West. The Insanity of Government Policy
By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts
,August 20, 2015
PaulCraigRoberts.org
Europe is being overrun by refugees from Washington’s, and Israel’s, hegemonic policies in the Middle East and North Africa that are resulting in the slaughter of massive numbers of civilians. The inflows are so heavy that European governments are squabbling among themselves about who is to take the refugees. Hungary is considering constructing a fence, like the US and Israel, to keep out the undesirables. Everywhere in the Western media there are reports deploring the influx of migrants; yet nowhere is there any reference to the cause of the problem.
The European governments and their insouciant populations are themselves responsible for their immigrant problems. For 14 years Europe has supported Washington’s aggressive militarism that has murdered and dislocated millions of peoples who never lifted a finger against Washington. The destruction of entire countries such as Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan, and now Syria and Yemen, and the continuing US slaughter of Pakistani civilians with the full complicity of the corrupt and traitorous Pakistani government, produced a refugee problem that the moronic Europeans brought upon themselves.
Europe deserves the problem, but it is not enough punishment for their crimes against humanity in support of Washington’s world hegemony.
In the Western world insouciance rules governments as well as peoples, and most likely also everywhere else in the world. It remains to be seen whether Russia and China have any clearer grasp of the reality that confronts them.
Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, Director of the US Defense Intelligence Agency until his retirement in August 2014, has confirmed that the Obama regime disregarded his advice and made a willful decision to support the jihadists who now comprise ISIS. (https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/officials-islamic-state-arose-from-us-support-for-al-qaeda-in-iraq-a37c9a60be4 )
Here we have an American government so insouciant, and with nothing but tunnel vision, empowering the various elements that comprise Washington’s excuse for the “war on terror†and the destruction of several countries. Just as the idiot Europeans produce their own refugee problems, the idiot Americans produce their own terrorist problems. It is mindless. And there is no end to it.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/insouciance-rules-the-west-the-insanity-of-government-policy/5470272
So well said Mr. Roberts.
Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion edited by Jeffery St. Clair and Joshua Frank published in 2012 might have helped over the last three years.
Mr. Parry didn’t mention another country Obama is helping destroy – Yemen. The US has been giving Saudi Arabia major assistance with the bombing campaign, all the while wringing its hands about all the death and destruction.
Ukraine gives every indication of making one last effort to draw force Russia to defend the Eastern rebels.
http://thesaker.is/is-an-ukronazi-attack-imminent-yes-so-what-else-is-new/
At the same time, NATO – a total US puppet – is warning Russia to stay out. What possible interest does NATO have in the Ukraine? Only the one where it’s itching for the chance to harm Russia. It’s hard for me to believe that organization is foolish enough to start an actual war, but the neocons have shown they have incredible leverage to get things they want to happen – happen.
hxxp://www.rferl.org/content/nato-warns-russia-ukraine-landgrab/27197953.html
Meanwhile, Israel has been bombing Syria again. Probably they figure Hezbollah will be an easier target there. And in any event, they really do want to make another land grab. I’d expect the Republicans to fall all over themselves supporting this, and most of the Democrats too.
No, I have precisely zero confidence in BHO and his neocon administration.
Since I can’t edit the previous post, this addition will have to do.
What specifically do the neocons have in mind this time to hurt Russia? According this brief story, it may be to kick that nation out of a banking program called SWIFT.
hxxp://www.mnogovbloge.com/?p=14186&lang=en
What does that mean?
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-19/russian-cutoff-from-bank-backbone-said-to-be-ruled-out-as-option
Is this something Obama wants to happen? We’re likely to find out before the end of the year.
Excellent summation of the state of play with respect to mind of Obama and his foreign policy MO. Especially pertinent are the comments from Kissinger, which really brings into sharp relief the anomalies and inconsistencies we’ve come to expect from the president and the considerable shortcomings inherent in his response to some of these key foreign policy matters.
Yet along with ‘coming to expect’ such from the POTUS, at this juncture in his tenure, we may also have to accept it as well. Even if at such a late stage the president were to stand up and be counted (“grow some” as the expression goes?) and put the Neo-Cons and ‘Lib-Ints’ in their place, much damage has already been done by allowing them such free rein. As for “damage”, it is difficult to see how such a dithering, inconsistent and timid approach to such important issues with such far reaching implications as these is going to augur well for his legacy. Surely this reality has not escaped his attention.
Very fine article.
I sense that of all of his predecessors, Obama is in some ways closest to Eisenhower, who also favored clandestine coups, under cover of the ideological rhetoric of John Foster Dulles (who was Ike’s lightning rod if anything went wrong, as it did in Hungary). The CIA under Eisenhower (and Truman before him) relied on operatives such as Archibald and Kermit Roosevelt, Miles Copeland, etc., to work its post-WWII black magic all over the Middle East, including in Iran, Egypt and Iraq- though it did get knocked on its ass in Syria. (Some good materials on Truman’s early misadventure in Syria may be found at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2011/06/the_baby_and_the_baath_water.html )
The fact that these ‘clandestine’ wars have been so bloody and destructive, and Obama has not had neither the good sense to anticipate their horrific consequences before starting them, nor to end them and the terrible carnage they have wrought after starting them, tells me that his ‘realism’ is, at best, deeply flawed, or, to put it bluntly, stinks (and, no I don’t give him high marks with Iraq, since ISIS is a child of his own making).
It is good that he has tried to reengage with Iran and Cuba, but I have no doubt that his agenda also includes containment, regime change, the destruction of their alternative political and/or economic systems – and interference in their relations with any of America’s putative independent competitors (e.g., Russia, China, or regional organizations like Mercosur, BRICS, etc.)- and, as well, exploitation of their resources by our multinationals and financial institutions.
It is precisely these “neocons and liberal hawks of Official Washington” and their seeming permanence that makes me scoff at the prospect of a progressive efficacy of even a Bernie presidency. We have to flush these personalities out of d.c. and dissuade the adoption of such ideology in future bureaucrats. A gargantuan task for sure when you consider the myriad defense and security contractors, extraction industries, career politicians, etc. that are enriched by and thus defensive of permanent war policies.
Obama will not finish his second term! Banned independent documentary reveals the truth. This will scare millions! Current Events Linked to Ancient Biblical Prophecy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dWwkX3oUtI
But, there is a precaution you can take which must be followed to the letter of the inscription discovered on the Stone of Scone and attributed to the Oracle of Thebes. When the nuclear Armageddon threatens to extinguish all life, these ancient remedies will become the obligation of every True Believer. A clean white sheet from a virgin’s bed is carefully unfolded and spread in the center of the room. Then, you must dissolve three aspirin tablets in a half glass of tepid water, and drink the contents. Then, remove your clothing and cover yourself with the sheet. When the nuclear flash occurs, bend over as far as you can, always remaining fully covered by the sheet. Once this posture is fully achieved, proceed to kiss your sweet rear-end goodbye!
I was certified in radiological civil defense in 83. I will add;
Take a package of microwave popcorn and place it close to your stomach. When it’s fully popped, you will know it’s over.
Estimates were 17% die in the MAD exchange and 50% more will die in the first winter.
Kissinger ought to know that the fluidity of events call for flexibility. Obama ‘ s changes in approaches is not necessarily a bad thing. Rigidity is. Obama tends to look at the big picture.
Get professional help.
Current events ARE linked to ancient Biblical Prophecy!
Check out the new IMAX trailer for 300: The Achaemenid Empire Strikes Back.
http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Iranian-propaganda-clip-shows-what-a-Muslim-invasion-of-Israel-would-look-like-412589
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards, the Iranian-backed Shia Badr Organization, Hezbollah, and the Hamas movement’s Kassam Brigades are ready to march on Jerusalem!
This shocking, disturbing, chilling (insert adjective) video will scare millions of Jews to convert to Christianity!
But don’t you worry none, you Bible believers.
Republican President X’s first foreign policy acts will be to bomb Tehran, Moscow and Beijing for Jesus!
Then Jesus will return and reign in Glory for a thousand years.
Hallelujah! It’s the End of Days!
Because it says in the Bible that Israel is America’s greatest ally
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA8l3nU4Kc0
God’s view of Israel is best seen in Matthew’s Gospel (around Mt 23) when Jesus discusses the behavior of the wicked tenants of the Vineyard.
For a more accurate understanding of what the Bible says about the End Times, read the book, “Rapture” with the subtitle, “The error that leaves the Bible behind.” by David Currie. This is the best book on the subject and makes the most sense. Most of the Old Testament prophesies have already been fulfilled.
On a whim I typed in the name and author of the book into my public library’s search page. I wasn’t really surprised they didn’t have it, for under the new management the place has gradually turned into a right-wing ‘christian’ community center. For example, a search for “Tim LaHaye” yielded over 100 books and videos. “Sarah Palin” produced nearly two dozen ‘hits’, as did “Ayn Rand”. Once I counted over a dozen different ‘christian’ magazines on display, and the science mags have been disappearing.
The cult of the “rapture” is totally nutty, but few people read their Bibles enough to realize that it’s a recently invented pile of baloney.
I studied under Henry Kissinger while under scholarship at Harvard University circa 1965. He convinced me of the “domino theory” in the spread of universal collectivism. I believed Henry and estranged myself from the anti-war faction. Then came the teach-ins supported by real, live resident scholars. Kissenger has some virtues, but it can never be the “real deal”. He still deserves respect for his contribution, but a new order must replace the old. Anarchy is not going to cut it, unfortunately.
Getting the US off its oil addiction and restoring some sort of broad base to our economy are both essential before anything sane can be done in foreign policy. We have to be able to tell the Saudis to pound sand and we have to defuse the culture of fear that has been created in our people. No, electing Bernie won’t fix everything, but it will let us get started.