Where have you gone, Tony Blair?

Tony Blair gave a speech yesterday to the Council on Global Affairs. Almost to the day ten years previously,in April 1999, Blair spoke to the same group and laid out his ideas on "liberal interventionism". At the time you may remember, NATO was actively engaged in deposing Slobodan Milosoevic in the former Yugoslavia.  The attacks on 9/11 and the war in Iraq were still to come, of course, but Blair understood then -- as he does now -- that there are cases when military intervention is necessary to defend our interests. His concept of interventionism was the basis for Blair's steadfast support of the war in Iraq in 2003, and remains a key concept in his morally-centered vision of foreign policy. In a foreign policy establishment that has recently been taken over by idealists and apologists, Blair's view reminds me of how much I miss this courageous statesman on the world's stage. It is worth reading some of Blair's speech yesterday -- courtesy of the Wall Street Journal. It lays out clearly a view of the threat of Islamic radicalism that I completely agree with, and the importance of being resolute in combating it.  It is also the antithesis of Barack Obama's personality-driven foreign policy, where the power of Obama's simple presence is supposed to tame dictators and despots into "seeing the light".

"President Obama's reaching out to the Muslim world at the start of a new American administration is welcome, smart, and can play a big part in defeating the threat we face. It disarms those who want to say we made these enemies, that if we had been less confrontational they would have been different. It pulls potential moderates away from extremism.

But it will expose, too, the delusion of believing that there is any alternative to waging this struggle to its conclusion. The ideology we are fighting is not based on justice. That is a cause we can understand. And world-wide these groups are adept, certainly, at using causes that indeed are about justice, like Palestine. Their cause, at its core, however, is not about the pursuit of values that we can relate to; but in pursuit of values that directly contradict our way of life. They don't believe in democracy, equality or freedom. They will espouse, tactically, any of these values if necessary. But at heart what they want is a society and state run on their view of Islam. They are not pluralists. They are the antithesis of pluralism. And they don't think that only their own community or state should be like that. They think the world should be governed like that.

In other words, there may well be groups, or even Governments, that can be treated with, and with whom we can reach an accommodation. Negotiation and persuasion can work and should be our first resort. If they do, that's great, which is why if Hamas were to accept the principle of a peaceful two state solution, they could be part of the process agreeing it [sic]. But the ideology, as a movement within Islam, has to be defeated. It is incompatible not with "the West" but with any society of open and tolerant people and that in particular means the many open and tolerant Muslims."

This should be required reading in the salons of Europe, the halls of the UN and the corridors of the White House. It is critical for our security that we are able to speak openly and honestly about the nature of the threats arrayed against us. Diplomacy has its place, but comes with very real limits when interests, values and ideology are diametrically opposed. And while the left may believe that we can find some "rapport" and "accommodation" with Islamic radicals who seek to create an Islamic world, the reality is that this is a clash of civilizations that will have only one winner.

It is "us" or "them". This Blair understands. Pity that our president doesn't get it.

Obama in wonderland

We've long known that Barack Obama is a man for whom image is everything. His appearances are carefully scripted down to the last detail,from the backdrop behind him during speeches to the adoring crowds at the front nearest the podium. He is coiffed and elegant, married to his teleprompter and ever-conscious of every utterance he makes. Barack Obama is the nation's actor-in-chief -- playing the role of American idealist, a role he is certain that will make America (and himself) more popular in the eyes of the world. But will it make us safer? This is the key question, because it is now apparent that our national security policy is now based not on the hard tactics of counter-terrorism, but on our popularity. This is now clear after his recent "apology tour" through Europe, and his glad-handing of dictators at the Americas Summit last week, where he allowed the prestige of his office to be downgraded to the likes of Hugo Chavez. And now, with the release of the "torture memos" that detail Bush administration interrogation techniques, Mr. Obama has now made it clear that he'd rather be popular than be safe.

Barack Obama and his administration are now on a quest to show once and for all that America seeks redemption for past "sins" after 9/11 where (in the president's words) "we lost our moral way". In doing so, he has now unleashed the furor of the left and the partisan attack dogs in Congress, and you can expect endless hearings and show trials to bring former Bush administration officials to account for their crimes. And what crimes are these? Endeavoring to keep the nation safe after a series of coordinated terrorist attacks on American soil that killed over 3,000 innocent Americans.

Some crime that is.

The decision to release these interrogation memos -- while leaving open the possibility of prosecuting the Bush administration lawyers who wrote them -- is based on a core belief that such actions before the court of world public opinion will make us safer. As Dorothy Rabinowitz points out today in the Wall Street Journal, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said on last Sunday's "This Week" that the White House is being guided by "higher concerns" than whether or not our past interrogation techniques yielded important intelligence that saved American lives. Rather, we are seeking to elevate our image in the eyes of the world and improve our status with the terrorists who want to destroy us. As Rabinowitz says:

"This would undermine al Qaeda, Mr. Emanuel explained, because those interrogations of ours helped to enlist terrorists to their cause. All of which was why the publication of the memos -- news of which would presumably touch the hearts of militants around the world -- would make America safer."

Thus in Obama's world, some quid-pro-quo actually exists with terrorists who behead their captives and wantonly commit mass murder against innocent civilians. This is the "blowback" school of thought -- that we have brought terrorism upon ourselves because of our hubris, our aggressive nature, our imperialist foreign policy, or our willingness to use loud music and cold temperatures in questioning detainees we've captured on the battlefield. This is the idealism of the left -- and Obama has now taken American national security smack into the middle of it. If it makes you feel better to take some moral high ground on this issue, fine. But don't delude yourself into thinking that it makes us safer. Al Qaeda and its minions hated us before "enhanced interrogation" and will hate us long after we become more popular in the court of world public opinion.

As I have written many times before, Islamic fundamentalism is an ideology that seeks our total destruction so that a world Islamic order can be formed. It isn't a popularity contest -- it is a clash of civilizations and a battle for our very future. And even more importantly, it is a battle where our enemy preys on our every weakness -- like our belief that we can talk our way into some accommodation with them. You can bet that somewhere in a cave on the Af-Pak border, Osama Bin Laden is laughing out loud at his good fortune to now have Barack Obama in the White House. Bin Laden and his ilk know the folly of what we have now embarked on. While it may make us feel better to have our values front and center, it also makes us weaker. And we are more vulnerable because of it.

We are now officially in Wonderland, headed down the rabbit-hole into a world that is actually well-known to us. We saw it in the 199os when we treated terrorism as a law-enforcement issue. We saw it in the first WTC attack in 1993, the Kenyan Embassy bombings, the Khobar Towers attack and the bombing of the USS Cole. We saw it all during the Clinton years, when we were popular but also vulnerable. Well before the first use of "enhanced interrogation", our enemies were working to destroy us. We've seen this all before.

Through his looking glass, Barack Obama apparently believes that past is not prelude, choosing to bet our security that we can be both popular and safe.

In Wonderland, of course, anything is possible.

Sorry for saving the world

One of the most frustrating things about the left is that they seem to have little use for history and even less regard for objective facts. Facts have little use when you just "know" -- in your gut and with every fiber of your being -- that you are right. Emotion trumps rationality every time. How well policies work is always less important than how they make you feel. Try telling a liberal, for example, that the evidence is clear that socialism in Europe has led to flat economic growth, falling birth rates and a 1970s-style economic and social malaise, and you will get a retort about social justice, the moral imperative of universal health care and the "progressive enlightenment" of European environmental policies. On the left, its better to be enlightened than it is to be rich, I guess. In an academic exercise, such tripe is irritating but tolerable. But when such denial of reality becomes the dominant force behind U.S. government policy -- on almost every issue of importance -- it is time to take notice.  I've written many times that Barack Obama lives in a "parallel universe" inhabited by lots of feel-good imagery, moral clarity and social justice. This is the universe of Europe, and his recent trip showed him quite at home among the hand-wringers and apologists who value symbolic gestures over concrete action.

On Sunday, for example, Obama spoke in Prague before a huge crowd and talked about setting the stage for nuclear disarmament -- a long-time moral imperative of the left -- even as North Korea was launching a test missile capable of delivering one of its newly-developed nuclear warheads as far as Tokyo. Mr. Obama responded to this clear violation of U.N. resolutions by referring it back to the U.N. for "further action" -- meaning more hand-wringing backed by timidity. In Obama's world, of course, the U.N. has a special moral authority, and is the arbiter of choice in this kind of crisis. Forget about its track record. The symbolism of China, Russia and France -- not to mention Syria, Gabon and Tahiti -- being in charge of global security is the kind of image that brings smiles to those who believe that the United States is "just another nation". You know who those people are, right? They are the ones now in charge of your government.

Image, as it turns out, is everything on the left. So you will forgive Obama for apologizing all over himself for American "transgressions". He goes to Turkey and apologizes in effect for America's war on terror -- saying that we "are not at war with Islam" -- when, in fact, we are at war with a significant, virulent strain of the religion. He apologizes for the excesses of American capitalism as the root of the current economic crisis, when in reality the engine of the American economy has lifted the standard of living across the world.

Obama is so sorry. In the ultimate irony, the most hubristic of presidents in modern times want to walk the globe with humility. He wants the world -- the same world that America, with its blood and treasure, has saved repeatedly from extremism of all kinds -- to know how badly we feel and how sorry we are. We feel badly for being exceptional, for leading and for fighting for human freedom.

We're sorry for saving the world. I guess next time, we'll leave you with Hitler, Stalin and Saddam Hussein.

Let's make a deal!

"Part of the success in Iraq involved reaching out to people that we would consider to be Islamic fundamentalists," said Obama, "but who were willing to work with us." That's from President Obama's interview with the New York Times on March 7, 2009. I guess he didn't get the memo about Islamic fundamentalism not being the kind of ideology that lends itself well to compromise and deal making. Of course, when you are The One and operate on a higher plane closer to God (and Muhammad, presumably), you come to really believe that your words are capable of doing the impossible -- the things that mere mortals (like George W. Bush and other conservatives) could never possibly do. Barack Obama belongs to the Monte Hall school of foreign policy: if you have five hair clips and a thimble in your purse, we can certainly make a deal!

The truth in Iraq, of course, is that we reached out to religious leaders who wanted to restore security and who had tired of the radical violence of Al Qaeda in Iraq and other Islamic fundamentalist groups. We weren't working with the radicals who were beheading hostages and killing American troops. Rather, the surge (which Obama opposed, still can't bring himself to call a "success" and apparently doesn't fully understand) convinced Shia and Sunni tribal leaders that it was a better bet to cooperate with us than with the Islamic fascists who didn't care how much innocent Iraqi blood they had to shed in accomplishing their goal of a totally lawless, unstable Iraq. These tribal leaders made a rational calculation that it was better to be "with us" than "against us" -- and helped to turn the tide againt both Al Qaeda and some of the more radical internal militias that were working to destabilize the country. We didn't sit down with Al Qaeda in Iraq and "work together" as the President apparently believes.

This is typical idealistic nonsense from the new president -- who firmly believes that symbols backed by the power of his presence can turn the world inside out into a better, kinder place. We've now dropped the term "war on terror" so as not to further upset the Islamic world (which would love us if we just spoke nicely to them), we're pulling out of Gitmo and making efforts to join the UN Human Rights Commission -- the sole purpose of which is to bash Israel while giving a pass to Iran, Syria, Libya, North Korea and other human rights abusers. Its all in the effort to change the "tone" of our dealings with the world. Lots of soft music and dim lighting.

Unfortunately, this president is full of intellectual hubris, and is absolutely, positively certain that he knows best. He believes that Islamic fundamentalists are people he can "work with", as if they are folks at the local PTA meeting who are parsing the menu for school lunches. He doesn't seem to understand that Islamic fundamentalism is the heart of a radical belief system that seeks to create a world Islamic state governed under strict Sharia law. It represents a total rejection of Western culture, society and religion. It is a radical, revolutionary ideology. You can't "make a deal" with those who want to utterly destroy you.

Five world flashpoints confront Obama

(Washington, Mar. 1) While it seems strange to be hailing the prophetic gifts of Joe Biden, his prediction last fall about very serious foreign policy challenges to a President Obama within six months of his inauguration retrospectively appears as one of the most astute and honest insights of the election year. While the buzz in this company town remains dominated by Democratic self-congratulation over their world historical spending spree there is yet detectable an underlying apprehension that further socialist triumphs could be jeopardized by unanticipated eruptions on the international front.

Let us glance quickly at five areas of potential crisis in ascending order of probable importance. North Korea, Russia, Mexico, Israel and, worst of all, Afghanistan head the list of places where Biden's prophecy could soon come true.

Hillary Clinton’s recent visit to the Far East brought renewed attention to continuing instability in the Korean peninsula. The indefensible Bush blunder of formally removing North Korea from the list of terror-sponsoring nations against all evidence and in return for absolutely nothing gravely disturbed Japanese-American relations, validated the blackmailing policies of Kim Jong-I L, and sent strong signals of American inconstancy and indecisiveness throughout the region.

Copying a play patented by fellow nuclear wannabe Iran, North Korea recently announced that its’ “Space Program” would soon be testing a new rocket that incidentally has the capacity to reach the West Coast of the United States. Secretary Clinton boldly described this move as “unhelpful”.

As President Obama has his first personal encounters with Western European leaders a major topic will be how to deal with the ever feisty Vladimir Putin. Currently the Obama Administration is “studying” the Bush promise to install an SDI-like missile defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic. The result of this evaluation will tell all of East Central Europe, particularly Ukraine, the extent of their “aloneness” vis a vis their former masters in the Kremlin.

In general beyond “feeling their love” President Obama will find that regarding increased military assistance in Afghanistan and elsewhere, the NATO allies aren’t going to do anymore for him than they did for George Bush- probably even less considering their withdrawal timetables on current troop commitments and their continually shrinking defense budgets.

When a recent National Intelligence Estimate declared Mexico to be in a flat footed tie with Pakistan as the world’s leading candidate for “Failed Nation” status, America was suddenly awakened to the fact that things haven’t been going swimmingly for our amigos south of the border. In a bizarre act of collective non-attention the U.S. media paid almost no heed to thousands of assassinations (including many spectacular beheadings), nonstop violence by drug cartels who effectively rule large parts of the country, the total ineffectiveness of the corrupted National Police and the recent calling out of the Army to regain control of certain provinces along the U.S. border. Even worse, multi-billion dollar drug smuggling into the U.S. has caused a wave of violence to spill hugely across our borders. Today Phoenix has the second highest kidnapping rate of any city in the world.

In the Middle East the post-election emergence of Benjamin Netanyahu as leader of a very hawkish Israeli government dashes the hopes of the Obama Administration for advancing the endlessly fruitless “Peace Process”.

While Netanyahu will bide his time pending talks with Obama and the Iranian elections in June virtually all Israelis have been persuaded by the 7,000 rockets that landed on their country that talking to the Palestinians is useless until Iran’s proxy Hamas is destroyed.

Finally the number one foreign challenge for President Obama is clearly Afghanistan. In a masterful political sleight of hand during the campaign Obama demonstrated his toughness by defining Afghanistan as the “Right War” that he would “win”, while Iraq was the “Wrong War” that George Bush had “lost”. It would be a supreme irony if in the end History records Bush as the “Victor of Iraq” and Obama as the man who had “lost” Afghanistan ( and Pakistan as well).

A recent USA Today story on Afghanistan was titled “Obama’s War”. That story and several others have noted that the anti-war passions that have been the hallmark of the Democratic Party for over forty years are already rising. The exceedingly low key announcement of 17,000 more troops going to Afghanistan and the ongoing “strategic re-evaluation” suggest that the President is very aware of his dilemma.

As the world watches the Obama Drama continues to unfold.

William Moloney’s columns have appeared in the Wall St. Journal, USA Today, Washington Post, Washington Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, Baltimore Sun, Denver Post, and Rocky Mountain News.