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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| The US is bogged down in the Middle East — and China knows it |
| 2016-09-08 |
| [BusinessInsider] Many years ago, the Obama administration had a good foreign policy idea. Remove your jaw from the floorboards and stay with me on this one. Barack Obama was elected during a period of tense ceasefire in the Middle East. The violence in Iraq had dwindled, and new sanctions on Iran quickly rendered Tehran economically impotent. After years of immersion in Mesopotamia, it seemed we could finally move on, and so the Obama administration redirected its efforts towards East Asia. Early Obama gestures towards Asia seemed astute. Having inherited America’s strongest relationship with China since before the Tiananmen Square massacre, Obama set about trying to expand our channels of cooperation. Washington also joined negotiations over the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which the White House saw as a way to unleash commerce and, later, as a restraint on China, which wasn’t party to the talks. This was sound policy, but it also rested on a mirage: that Obama’s overtures towards the Middle East and Asia would allow us to decamp from the former and swoop into the latter. Today, neither of those propositions has borne out: the Middle East is ablaze, East Asia is a far more dangerous neighborhood than before, and we’ve spent another eight years staring glassily into the Mesopotamian sand. Part of it has to do with events beyond the White House’s control. The Arab Spring can’t be blamed on Obama (though our daft abandonment of allies like Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak certainly can), and, contra the hawks, ISIS’s rampage isn’t his fault either. Obama also isn’t culpable for our invasion of Iraq, which sparked the current Sunni-Shia cold war. But Obama’s naiveté and missteps fueled this fire, too. When he should have been avoiding vacuums that might have been filled by jihadists, the president cheered and encouraged the Arab Spring. When he should have been worrying about al Qaeda in Northern Africa, he invaded Libya and helped depose Moammar Gaddafi, leading to a proliferation of terrorism there. Where he should have seen extremists in the Syrian rebels, he instead saw democrats, and wasted more than two years arming an al Qaeda-infested insurgency. He also assumed what was left of the war on terrorism could continue via drone, never accounting for the blowback that’s left extremists in Yemen and Afghanistan even more fortified than before. It’s a shame. Rather than going another six rounds in Iraq, the United States should have really and truly pivoted to Asia, bolstering its relationships with Asian Pacific nations like Vietnam and South Korea, and banding them together to form a front against Chinese and North Korean aggression. That doesn’t mean doing something stupid, like provoking Beijing or starting a trade war, and it doesn’t mean a return to nation building. But it does mean strengthening our allies to check Beijing. Instead, the Middle Eastern millstone weighs around our necks and Chinese ambitions seem almost peripheral. We have few serious interests in the Middle East, especially now that fracking has made us a petro-power. We don’t need to abandon it to its fate, but we also can’t ignore the problems mounting in East Asia, where China is building militarized islands in waters crucial for international trade, and North Korea, Beijing’s yapping little dog, has a longer leash than ever. Encouragingly, some Asian nations are stepping up to balance the Chinese threat. Unfortunately, those are pebbles in the pond and they’ve only heightened Chinese aggression. Meanwhile, the Obama administration’s failure to sell the TPP to the public could scuttle an important economic counterbalance to Chinese power. It is clear that the future of American foreign policy will be decided in Asia, not necessarily in the Middle East. But thanks to 15 years of foolish interventions and besotted idealism, that pivot is proving difficult. The next president should spin us on our heel. |
| Posted by:Pappy |
| #10 Hey, #2 Joe! Missed ya'. |
| Posted by: Barbara 2016-09-08 15:52 |
| #9 That doesn’t mean doing something stupid, like provoking Beijing or starting a trade war, and it doesn’t mean a return to nation building. But it does mean strengthening our allies to check Beijing. Got it. Cut n' Run from the Middle East and tell your new |
| Posted by: magpie 2016-09-08 15:10 |
| #8 You forgot Egypt in your list RJ. That was Obastards biggest F*up. Luckily the military looks to have saved the day. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2016-09-08 11:19 |
| #7 Bogged down in the middle east, no. F'd up the middle east by withdrawing from Iraq and destabalizing Libya and Syria, yes. China is seeing the US become oil independent due to fracking and realizes we probably won't even try to keep the peace much longer so if they want a safe and steady flow of oil they better do something themselves. They are welcome to try. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2016-09-08 10:15 |
| #6 Agree on the firebreaks and burnout strategy. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2016-09-08 09:52 |
| #5 We have few serious interests in the Middle East, especially now that fracking has made us a petro-power. We don’t need to abandon it to its fate.... Less Israel, that is PRECISELY what needs to happen. Establish 'fire breaks' and let it burn itself out. Why is such a strategy so difficult to understand or employ ? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2016-09-08 09:34 |
| #4 I don't buy any of this guy's B.S. China is not going well and the Mideast is a disaster in foreign policy. The Iran agreement (or debacle) is a disaster. Moreover, we have had elitist chronic liars lying about everything to us. They don't trust the American people to come up with the right answers. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2016-09-08 09:21 |
| #3 it also rested on a mirage: This is true of everything Obumbles touches. He lives in the mirage of his narcissistic.universe where he truly believes that he knows everything about everything. All problems are caused by others who failed. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2016-09-08 08:20 |
| #2 As per the TOM SULLIVAN SHOW on Fox Radio this AM, the Bammer = US was perceived or sensed as weak by the majority of the G20 Nations in Beijing, something which could still lead to major, unresolvable FP problems for the Bammer Admin + spill over into a Trump or Hillary Admin. Perceived US strategic weakness is something the Bammer supposedly does not want for his "legacy". |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2016-09-08 00:28 |
| #1 The only thing I can parse from the article is that the author thinks the world sucks and the most charitable explanation for US Policy is that the Obama crew were well-meaning idiots. Is the fact that this was in BusinessInsider mean that is what the Hamiltonians are currently thinking? |
| Posted by: magpie 2016-09-08 00:21 |