Israel Matzav

Obama's foreign policy to get more radical?

Caroline Glick argues that until now, President Obama's foreign policy has been largely the same as the last two years of the Bush administration, with the notable exception of Obama's treatment of Israel. But with the resignation of Defense Secretary Robert Gates - who was also the architect of the last two years of the Bush policy - Glick argues that Obama's foreign policy is about to take a radical turn that will leave the United States a weakened second-tier power.

Aside from its basic irrationality, Obama’s policy of favoring the Palestinians against the US’s most dependable ally in the Middle East is notable for its uniqueness. In every other area, his policies are aligned with those adopted by his predecessor.

His decision to surge the number of US forces in Afghanistan was a natural progression from the strategy Bush implemented in Iraq and was moving towards in Afghanistan.

His use of drones to conduct targeted killings of terrorists in Yemen and Pakistan is an escalation not a departure from Bush’s tactics.

Obama’s decision to gradually withdraw US combat forces from Iraq was fully consonant with Bush’s policy.

His decision to engage with the aim of appeasing the Iranian regime while supporting the adoption of ineffective sanctions against Iran in the UN Security Council is also a natural progression from Bush’s policies.

His bid to “reset” US relations with Russia was largely of a piece with Bush’s decision not to oppose in any way Russia’s invasion of Georgia.

Obama’s courtship of Syria is different from Bush’s foreign policy. But guided by Rice and Gates, Bush was softening his position on Syria. For instance, Bush endorsed Rice’s insistence that Israel remain mum on the North Korean-built illicit nuclear installation at Deir-A-Zour that the Air Force destroyed in September 2007.

As for Egypt, as many senior Bush administration officials crowed, Obama’s abandonment of 30-year US ally Hosni Mubarak was of a piece with Bush’s democracy agenda.

Obama’s policy toward Libya is in many respects unique. It marks the first time since the War Powers Act passed into law 30 years ago that a US President has sent US forces into battle without seeking the permission of the US Congress. It is the first time that a president has openly subordinated US national interests to the whims of the UN and NATO and insisted on fighting a war that serves no clear US national interest.

Notably, Gates has been an outspoken critic of the war in Libya. In interviews in March he said that Muammar Gaddafi posed no threat to US interests and that no vital US interests are served by the US mission in Libya.

Yet even Obama’s Libya policy is not as sharp a departure from Bush’s foreign policy as his Israel policy is. Although Bush wouldn’t have argued that the UN gets to decide where US troops are deployed, he did believe that the US needed UN permission to deploy troops.

TO A degree, it is the basic incoherence of Obama’s Libya policy that puts it in line with all of his other foreign policies except Israel. Those policies – from Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay – are marked by inconsistencies. Like Libya, there is a strong sense that Obama’s foreign policy to date has not been guided by an overarching worldview but rather spring from ad hoc decisions with no guiding conceptual framework.

But if Gates’s words to Newsweek are any indication, all of this may be about to change. If Gates believed that Obama would continue to implement the policies of Bush’s last two years with minor exceptions while sticking it to Israel, he would likely not have spoken out against Obama’s policies so strongly. Apparently Gates believes that Obama’s foreign policy is about to undergo a radical transformation.

And this would make sense, particularly if, as Obama has said a number of times, he is more committed to transforming America than winning a second term in office.

Until the Republicans won control of the House of Representatives last November, Obama was able to concentrate on passing his domestic agenda. Obama’s willingness to lose the elections in order to push through his radical health care reform package demonstrated his commitment to implementing his policies at all costs.

With the Republicans in charge, Obama can’t even pass his 2011 budget let alone his far reaching plans to transform US immigration policy, labor policy, environmental policy and Social Security.

In these circumstances, the only place where the power of the presidency gives him wide-ranging freedom of action to transform the US is foreign affairs.

Read the whole thing.

What could go wrong?

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Robert Gates, US foreign policy

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:47 PM