Tag Archives: Bill Clinton

Who’s behind the Obama Honduras policy?

The Obama Administration has made serious mistakes in its handling of the crisis in Honduras where it supports the return of the deposed president, Mel Zelaya. The Administration categorized the removal of Zelaya as a coup when, in fact, the Honduran military has had no role in governing the country.  The Honduran Congress and Supreme Court abided by their Constitution and rule of law and ousted Zelaya because he had violated the law. As a result, the crisis in Honduras today is almost unmanageable. So what does this behavior reveal about Mr. Obama’s respect for the separation of powers, as Mary Anastasia O’ Grady from the Wall Street Journal accurately points out, that he would instruct Secretary of State Clinton to punish an independent court because it did not issue the ruling he wanted? [1] Is this administration forcing a foreign nation to violate its own laws?

It astonishes legal experts and independent observers that President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton and their advisors have chosen to ignore a serious factual report filed at the Library of Congress by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) that states "Available sources indicate that the (Honduran) judicial and legislative branches applied constitutional and statutory law in the case against President Zelaya in a manner that was judged by the Honduran authorities from both branches of the government to be in accordance with the Honduran legal system," [2] writes CRS senior foreign law specialist Norma C. Gutierrez in her report.

Why is this administration siding with Zelaya and his main supporter, Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez? Chavez is known to be hostile towards the U.S while working closely with Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is on the brink of obtaining a nuclear weapon and has established a bank in Venezuela with Chavez to avoid the sanctions already imposed against Iranian financial institutions responsible for transferring funds to Tehran’s nuclear program. Actually, the Obama Administration and the Chavez regime sponsored a UN resolution that condemned the government of Honduras for legally removing Chavez’s puppet "Mel" Zelaya.

What is even worse, the State Department has suspended $30 million in aid to Honduras for standing by their constitution and has stripped current President Roberto Micheletti and fourteen members of the Supreme Court who ruled against Zelaya of their U.S. visas.

Since people are often policy, who are the individuals on the Obama team responsible for shaping our Latin American policy and specifically for the misguided decisions made regarding Honduras. 

The Obama Latin America Team is composed of: Thomas Shannon, Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs; Frank Mora, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs and most importantly Dan Restrepo, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs at The National Security Council.  Thomas Shannon, who was also Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs in the second Bush term, seems to have a kind of get along -go along approach with regards to Latin America. Indeed, some of Mr. Shannon’s highlights include:

  • In Honduras: remaining silent as Manuel Zelaya attempted to subvert democratic institutions and the Honduran Constitution and as the Congress and Supreme Court worked to remove Zelaya legally from office, the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and Shannon worked diligently to dissuade the Honduran Congress and protect Zelaya. [3]
  • In Venezuela, Mr. Shannon constantly promoted cooperation between the U.S. and Chávez relating to the drug trade despite evidence-and objections from other U.S. agencies-that the Venezuelan government itself was facilitating narcotics trafficking.  Mr. Shannon also denied support to Venezuela’s civil society and sat by as Chavez dismantled the country’s democratic institutions.  Today, the Mayor of Caracas still cannot get into his office to perform his duties.  In all this, Mr. Shannon’s rationale for shunning Venezuela’s civil society has been that the U.S. and Venezuela have a strategic relationship based primarily on energy. [4]
  • In Nicaragua, Mr. Shannon advocated the continuation of U.S. aid to the Sandinista government despite evidence of overwhelming fraud in the 2008 mayoral race in Managua.  Meanwhile, Mr. Shannon has sought to cut support to Nicaragua’s civil society, in order not to ‘antagonize’ President Ortega. [5]
  • In Bolivia, when President Morales expelled the U.S. Ambassador and DEA from the country, Mr. Shannon was against waiving trade preferences and U.S. aid.  Instead, he advocated that the Bush Administration sign a document by President Morales, which was essentially a ‘mea culpa.’ The U.S.  State Department’s Legal Advisor at the time overruled him and the U.S. didn’t sign the document. [6]
  • In Ecuador, Mr. Shannon has sought to accommodate and improve relations with President Correa despite his dismantling of democratic institutions and evidence that President Correa has connections to the FARC. [7]

However, since assuming the presidency in January of 2009, the Obama White House mainly follows the expertise of Mr. Daniel Restrepo on issues pertaining to Latin America.

 

Dan Restrepo and The Center for American Progress

Prior to moving to the National Security Council, Dan Restrepo was the director of the Americas Project at the Center for American Progress (CAP), a liberal think tank, whose President and Chief Executive Officer is John Podesta, who served as chief of staff to then President Bill Clinton. This think tank has become so influential making personnel appointments in the Obama Administration that Time Magazine recently declared "there is no group in Washington with more influence at this moment in history." [8]

One of CAP’s main contributors is billionaire speculator, George Soros. In fact, some independent groups that are more transparent, such as the Sunlight Foundation and the Campaign Legal Center, criticize the Center’s failure to disclose its contributors, particularly since it is so influential in appointments to the Obama administration.

 

Dan Restrepo, Honduras and Chavez

Restrepo’s complete lack of judgment with respect to issues in Latin America, especially with regards to Chavez, put the region, the US and its interests at risk. He actually thinks Chávez is only a nuisance and not a national security threat, despite the fact that Chávez said during a recent visit to Iran — his eighth since taking office — that he is discussing with Iran the creation of a "nuclear village" in Venezuela, which he claimed will be for "peaceful purposes." And there are recent claims made by New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau that Iran may be using Venezuela for "building and storing" weapons of mass destruction. So what does Restrepo think about the Iran-Venezuela nuclear cooperation? He actually "hopes that all countries in the Americas respect international rules, and their international responsibilities regarding nuclear energy." So, according to him, the U.S. should keep hoping and do nothing in the meantime. 

Why are Obama and Restrepo so eager to return Zelaya to power despite the overwhelming evidence against him? (For the case against Zelaya please See "The Americas Report" August 4, 2009 titled "All that is wrong with Insulza and the OAS.")

Despite the fact that what happened in Honduras was NOT a coup and that the actions taken against Zelaya were in accordance with the rule of law after he violated the Constitution by illegally trying to perpetuate himself in power with the help of Hugo Chavez, the Obama administration is sticking to its coup theory. It continues misrepresenting the facts with the help of some friendly media outlets. In addition, it has decided to ignore evidence provided by Honduras’ Foreign Minister Enrique Ortez who has charged that as President, Zelaya was involved with drug trafficking from Venezuela into the United States: "Every night, three or four Venezuelan-registered planes land without the permission of appropriate authorities and bring thousands of pounds…and packages of money that are the fruit of drug trafficking," he said. "We have proof of all of this. Neighboring governments have it. The DEA has it," adding that "the drugs arrive in Honduras from Venezuela, which has become a main drug transit center, and increasingly in speedboats from Colombia," according to the Key West, Florida-based Joint Interagency Task Force-South, which coordinates drug interdiction in the region. U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman Rusty Payne in Washington said he could neither confirm nor deny the DEA investigation. [9]

It is precisely this information involving Zelaya and drugs that could give us the key answer to what is truly going on behind U.S. policy regarding Honduras.

An extremely influential figure in Restrepo’s life is Center for American Progress’ strongman George Soros, who is an advocate for the legalization of illicit drugs. In fact, Soros is a member of the board of the "Drug Policy Alliance," a non-profit organization with the principal goal of ending the American "War on Drugs." As a side – note, George Soros financially contributed to the political campaign of Barack Obama, together with four other family members – daughter Jennifer, sons Jonathan and Robert and wife Susan. He has also financially supported John Kerry, Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton, Tom Daschle, Charles Schumer, Joseph Biden, Patrick Leahy and Barbara Boxer. Soros also funded Al Gore for President.

 

Why is Zelaya’s return so important for Soros and Restrepo?

Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia are the region’s main producers of drugs, especially cocaine, and Mexico has become a major drug transit country and an important supplier of methamphetamine to the United States. In recent years, Honduras and other Central American nations have become major transshipment points for Colombian cocaine, particularly as Mexico’s government cracks down on cartels. So it is not surprising that one of Soros’ main interests would be to try to convince Latin American leaders that the U.S. Government’s war on drugs is wrong. Remember, he wants to legalize drugs. To this end, he is actively pushing to move away from the use of national and global law enforcement resources against the drug trade.  He is also fiercely opposed to Plan Colombia. To achieve this goal, he has purchased the services of several former Latin American government officials to campaign to end the war on drugs.

Actually, in October 13, 2008, then Honduran President Manuel Zelaya said at a Soros – funded Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy conference held in Tegucigalpa: "Drug use ought to be legalized as a way to combat violence." He proposed creating a regional counternarcotics plan that would displace the US-led efforts in Colombia and Mexico. It was in this conference that Soros presented his plan for a paradigm shift within democracies to accommodate legalization. A few weeks later Zelaya appeared with Soros at a U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean conference in the Dominican Republic openly calling for the legalization of drugs – supposedly to reduce violence. [10]

Many have been asking, what is behind Soros’ obsession with drug legalization? Does he have clients in his hedge funds that have links to illegal activities? Soros has categorically denied receiving money from drug cartels or any criminal network, but the fact remains, however, that at least some of his financial operations have been based offshore, in banking and financial centers that are widely reported to be considered conducive to money laundering.  The Soros fund is based in the Netherlands Antilles, a self-governing federation of five Caribbean islands. A CIA factbook describes the region as "a transshipment point for South American drugs bound for the U.S. and Europe; and a money-laundering center." In fact, Soros’ partner, Peter Lewis, considered by the Washington Post as "one of the country’s 10 most generous philanthropists," was arrested in 2000 in New Zealand for "importing" drugs, including hashish and marijuana. [11]

Soros and Lewis together founded "America Coming Together", a political organization designed to defeat George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election. Both have helped bankroll a campaign to legalize marijuana, featuring a public relations effort that falsifies the dangerous nature of marijuana and presents it as "medicine." Since 1991, Lewis has contributed $5 million to the ACLU to fight drug laws, and has made large contributions to drug "legalization" campaigns in Arizona, Nevada, California, Oregon, Utah, Florida, Maine, and Massachusetts. [12]

While it is often difficult in determining the exact motivating factors in driving an administrations’ foreign policy, these connections are interesting to consider. That the Obama Administration chooses to go along with Zelaya, who violated the Honduran Constitution and is a protégé of Chavez and would therefore employ all the same anti- American policies, appears to be working against our own national security interests. Certainly, without Zelaya in power Chavez has lost, for now, another country to the forces of democracy.

 

Nicole M. Ferrand is a research analyst and editor of "The Americas Report" of the Menges Hemispheric Security Project. She is a graduate of Columbia University in Economics and Political Science with a background in Law from Peruvian University, UNIFE and in Corporate Finance from Georgetown University.

 

[1] Hillary’s Honduras Obsession. Sept. 21, 2009. The Wall Street Journal. Mary Anastasia O’Grady.

[2] Honduras: Constitutional Law Issues. August 2009. The Law Library of Congress.

[3] Senate Continues to hold Tom Shannon’s nomination to be US Ambassador to Brazil. October 15, 2009. Council of Americas. Liz Harper.  

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Why The Center for American Progress Rules. November 26, 2008. Time Magazine. Michael Scherer.

[9] Honduras Coup Leaders Headed for Faceoff. July 1, 2009. CBS.

[10] What the old media is not reporting on Honduras. July 1, 2009. The World Tribune.

[11] Who is Peter Lewis? December 3, 2003. Accuracy in the Media. By Arne Steinberg.

[12] Ibid.

Assault on the military

The nation’s armed forces are under sustained attack.  Unfortunately, while the military is engaged in two conflicts overseas, the most serious fire they are taking comes from some of their fellow Americans, starting – incredibly – with their Commander-in-Chief.

In recent days, Team Obama’s hostility towards the uniformed services has been increasingly in evidence. Consider the following, illustrative examples:

Dissing his commanders:  Last spring, President Obama replaced the commander of U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan with a man skilled at waging counter-insurgency operations, General Stanley McChrystal.  He did so in pointed rebuke to what amounted to a "counter-terror" campaign waged by the Bush administration – trying to kill or neutralize key Taliban and al Qaeda operatives without having sufficient forces to clear or hold territory and protect the affected population.

At the time, President reinforced his contention that Afghanistan was a "necessary" war.  He assigned additional forces to the theater so as to enable his new commander to engage in the sort of operations required to win the "hearts and minds" of the Afghan people and defeat the insurgency.

But that was then, this is now.  Gen. McChrystal and his bosses, Central Command’s General David Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen, believe that as many as 60,000 additional troops are needed to avert failure in Afghanistan.  But President Obama and his key advisors, notably White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and campaign strategist David Axelrod, have evidently concluded that the public – or at least the Democrats’ base – has no stomach for such a build-up.

So the theater commander who thought Mr. Obama meant what he said five months ago has been left hanging in the wind.  His request has become a political football in Washington and the President’s partisans have reviled the general for making known his professional assessment of the situation.  Morale in Afghanistan has reportedly plummeted, compounded by Washington’s growing incoherence about the threat posed by the Taliban – who wants to be the last guy killed fighting an enemy it turns out we are happy to have run the place? – and by restrictive rules of engagement that are getting troops killed unnecessarily.

Hollowing out the military:  The Obama administration has secured congressional approval for virtually all the cuts it sought in defense spending.  Particularly hard hit have been the budgets for modernization and replacement of aging and worn-out equipment.  Some estimates suggest there is as much as a $50 billion shortfall in the procurement accounts.  History clearly teaches that these bills will come due over time, and be paid for in blood by inadequately equipped American servicepersonnel.

Two areas are of particular concern.  First, Team Obama has not only cancelled the NATO-agreed missile defenses in Poland and the Czech Republic.  It has cut over a billion out of other anti-missile accounts, incentivizing our enemies to continue their acquisitions of ballistic missiles and leaving America and its allies at ever-greater risk.

Second, President Obama reportedly rejected the military’s recommendations with respect to the size of the nation’s nuclear stockpile.  Determined to demonstrate his commitment to "a world without nuclear weapons" by accelerating the elimination of ours, he evidently is demanding that an entire wing of Minuteman III missiles be scrapped.  Were that decision to be adopted – especially in the absence of any modernization program for the U.S. nuclear arsenal – the robustness and credibility of our deterrent would be significantly degraded.

Attacking the Military Culture:  During his address to gay activists on October 10, Mr. Obama repeated his campaign pledge to "end ‘don’t ask, don’t tell.’"  By this, the President actually means that he will work to repeal the statutory prohibition on homosexuals serving in the military. 

Barack Obama, however, clearly does not want to repeat the mistake made by the last Democratic president to pander to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities.  When, to this end, Bill Clinton tried a frontal assault on the military early in his presidency, he was soundly defeated by those on Capitol Hill who took seriously the judgment of uniformed leaders who argued that such accommodations would seriously degrade the "good order and discipline" essential to the armed forces.

Mr. Obama hopes in due course to euchre today’s commanders to go where their predecessors wisely refused to venture.  Can he do so while simultaneously slashing their budgets, exhibiting disrespect for their professional judgment and jeopardizing their missions?

Worse yet for Team Obama’s bid to compel the integration of people of every sexual predilection on the military, over 1100 distinguished retired generals and admirals have urged that the existing ban be maintained.  In a statement issued earlier this year, they wrote: "Our past experience as military leaders leads us to be greatly concerned about the impact of repeal [of the law] on morale, discipline, unit cohesion, and overall military readiness. We believe that imposing this burden on our men and women in uniform would undermine recruiting and retention, impact leadership at all levels, have adverse effects on the willingness of parents who lend their sons and daughters to military service, and eventually break the All-Volunteer Force."

The Commander-in-Chief has a responsibility to appreciate that we have but one military and wartime is an especially ill-advised moment to undermine, hollow-out or otherwise assault it.  His failure to do the former and willingness to do the latter will bring us all grief.

 

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy, a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated talk show Secure Freedom Radio.

Obama’s big UN adventure

President Obama’s upcoming visit to the 64th UN General Assembly, which opened yesterday, will be nothing if not entertaining. Substantively, Obama should be delighted. A confluence of recent events has brought to fruition his campaign promises to launch diplomacy with our adversaries: Negotiations without preconditions are blooming everywhere.

Whether these negotiations will benefit the United States is, of course, a different question. Nonetheless, Obama’s UN appearances will showcase that he now unambiguously "owns" (as he likes to say) our foreign policy.

The President’s speech to the General Assembly a week from today is his first major UN public event, and we can predict he will receive a rapturous reception. This was not true for President George W. Bush, who described his annual UN remarks as a "visit to the wax museum" because of the audience’s unenthusiastic response.

And why should we not expect a visible demonstration of Obamamania at the UN? He is giving them pretty much what they ask for, as did President Bill Clinton.

As Obama speaks, the General Assembly will be chaired by former Libyan Foreign Minister Ali Abdessalam Triki, who was elected president of that body yesterday. Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy himself addresses the General Assembly right after Obama, and they will certainly have a chance to speak together in the cozy waiting area just behind the General Assembly podium. This would be an excellent opportunity to discuss the health of recently released mass murderer Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, convicted of destroying Pan Am Flight 103 and killing 270 people, including 189 Americans, and now free in Tripoli, Libya.

Even if their paths don’t cross then, Khadafy will be only a few seats away from Obama at the Security Council table on Sept. 24, when the President chairs a meeting on nonproliferation and disarmament. Khadafy can easily walk over to Obama and present him, a la Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, with a copy of the "Green Book," Khadafy’s 1975 best seller (in Libya at least). They will certainly have a chance at the Security Council to muse about eliminating the U.S. and Israeli nuclear stockpiles, always popular subjects at the UN.

There is no word yet whether Khadafy is invited to our President’s traditional reception for heads of state and government. But certainly, now that the U.S. has accepted Iran’s offer for open-ended diplomacy with the Security Council’s five permanent members (and also Germany), there is no reason why Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should not be on the guestlist.

Perhaps he and Obama can have a photo together as Ahmadinejad goes through the receiving line and begin those direct, unconditional talks that Obama promised during the 2008 campaign. Ahmadinejad might well offer a few thoughts on his overwhelming presidential reelection victory on June 12, and his techniques for handling partisan opposition. Even if Ahmadinejad’s invitation gets lost in the mail, there are still photo opportunities in abundance, perhaps at the UN secretary general’s annual luncheon for visiting heads of state.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il is unlikely to attend the opening festivities, because, due to unfortunate "technicalities," his country is still at war with the UN, and has been since it invaded South Korea in 1950. Nonetheless, the Obama administration has enthusiastically embraced negotiations with Pyongyang over its nuclear weapons program, so perhaps Kim can be persuaded to come next year for a proper presidential photo.

With so many opportunities for a handshake and a big hug with authoritarian leaders, so many compromises and concessions to make and so much adulation to receive, it will be a busy time for the President.

One interesting question, especially for New Yorkers: Will Secretary of State Clinton be with Obama at all the key meetings, public and private, or will she be hard at work at her desk in Washington?

 

John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is author of "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad."

Snakes in the grass

The Florida Everglades are reeling from an explosion in the number of deadly Burmese pythons.  By some estimates, there may be as many as 140,000 of them slithering around in a place they don’t belong.  These particular snakes are believed to have gotten their start in the Everglades through the well-intentioned, but ill-considered, action of a few Americans who thought they were doing the humane thing by turning their pet pythons loose in the swampy wilderness.

This story of the Burmese pythons seems like an appropriate metaphor for our time.  After all, another sort of snake in the grass from Burma is currently making its presence known on the world stage for the first time in years, thanks to the Obama administration and its emissary in fact, if not in name: U.S. Senator Jim Webb of Virginia.  The motivating good intentions notwithstanding, our global neighborhood is about to get considerably more dangerous.

Over the weekend, Sen. Webb paid court to Than Shwe, the senior general in the brutally repressive junta that has misruled Burma (which it renamed Myanmar) since 1962.  The visitor was rewarded for "engaging" with this pariah regime by securing the release of an ailing American hostage, John Yettaw.  The Burmese arrested Yettaw – a reportedly mentally unstable Vietnam veteran – after he swam across a lake in Rangoon to visit democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, thereby violating the terms of the house arrest to which the latter has been subjected for over 14 years.

Although the junta apparently dismissed out of hand Sen. Webb’s suggestion that Suu Kyi be released, he was afforded an opportunity to pay her a brief visit.  Their conversation occurred shortly after the dissident learned of her punishment for Yettaw’s infraction: a further eighteen months in confinement.  That will be sufficient time to keep Burma’s leading opposition figure out of the so-called "elections" the autocrats have called for next year.

Unfortunately, Sen. Webb’s diplomacy appears to be part of a pattern being established under the Obama administration.   If you are a rogue regime and seize an American, chances are good you can arrange to have a high-level contact with a senior U.S. interlocutor.  Through the latter’s good offices, you can begin the process of "engaging" with the United States on your terms – or, as Candidate Obama famously put it, "without preconditions."

Give Sen. Webb credit for coupling his kow-tow to the Burmese despots with at least a nod to their opposition.  By contrast, during Bill Clinton’s recent visit to Pyongyang, the former president made no such public show of solidarity with the millions enslaved by Kim Jong-Il in North Korea.  Instead, he spent three hours hobnobbing with one of the planet’s most odious dictators, then departed with the two American reporters previously captured by Kim’s regime.  In both cases, however, the way now seems clear for "progress" to be made in normalizing relations with these snakes in the grass.

We must expect any day now a similar opportunity to present itself with the Islamic Republic of Iran.  It has recently taken not one, not two, but three Americans hostage.  The mullahs could be forgiven for thinking they are entitled to have a senior U.S. official (past or present) turn up in Tehran, holding out the prospect of better relations and promising to take back to Washington any demands the Iranian regime might convey.

Given Team Obama’s supine behavior in the face of deliberate and demeaning provocations by the North Korean and Burmese regimes, what it calls "the elected president of Iran" – Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – will doubtless seek to add to the ignominy of American diplomatic approaches aimed at freeing the latest American captives, fostering improved ties, ending the Iranian nuclear program, etc.

Which of the other rogue state snakes in the grass will be the next to pull this maneuver?  Will it be Syria (already being romanced by Special Envoy George Mitchell)?  How about Venezuela? Or maybe Cuba?

The trouble, as Henry Kissinger recently observed in a Washington Post op.ed. following Bill Clinton’s foray in Pyongyang, is that this process makes every American a potential hostage.  The former Secretary of State wrote:

"It is inherent in hostage situations that potentially heartbreaking human conditions are used to overwhelm policy judgments. Therein lies the bargaining strength of the hostage-taker. On the other hand, at any given moment, several million Americans reside or travel abroad. How are they best protected? Is the lesson of this episode that any ruthless group or government can demand a symbolic meeting with a senior American by seizing hostages or threatening inhuman treatment for prisoners in their hand? If it should be said that North Korea is a special case because of its nuclear capability, does that create new incentives for proliferation?"

The truth of the matter is that the Obama administration – by facilitating if not actively encouraging the Clinton and Webb missions – has indeed invited more hostage-taking.  And, as Dr. Kissinger surmises, it has also created new incentives for nuclear proliferation by establishing that nobody trifles with those who have such weapons (or are about to get them).  It is no coincidence that the next snake in the grass to go nuclear with North Korea’s help may well be Burmese.

 

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy, a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated Secure Freedom Radio show.

Clinton’s unwise trip to North Korea

The Obama administration characterized Bill Clinton’s unexpected visit to Pyongyang to secure the release of two American reporters, held unjustifiably by North Korea for nearly five months, as a private, humanitarian mission. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has insisted that the fate of the women who strayed into the North (whether accidentally or deliberately is still not clear), should be separated from the unresolved issue of the North’s nuclear weapons program.

But North Korea has seen it very differently. Former president Clinton was met at Pyongyang’s airport by notables led by Kim Kye Gwan, the North’s long-time chief nuclear negotiator, an unmistakable symbol of linkage. In Pyongyang’s view, the two reporters are pawns in the larger game of enhancing the regime’s legitimacy and gaining direct access to important U.S. figures. The reporters’ arrest, show trial and subsequent imprisonment (twelve years hard labor) was hostage taking, essentially an act of state terrorism. So the Clinton trip is a significant propaganda victory for North Korea, whether or not he carried an official message from President Obama. Despite decades of bipartisan U.S. rhetoric about not negotiating with terrorists for the release of hostages, it seems that the Obama administration not only chose to negotiate, but to send a former president to do so.

While the United States is properly concerned whenever its citizens are abused or held hostage, efforts to protect them should not create potentially greater risks for other Americans in the future. Yet that is exactly the consequence of visits by former presidents or other dignitaries as a form of political ransom to obtain their release. Iran and other autocracies are presumably closely watching the scenario in North Korea. With three American hikers freshly in Tehran’s captivity, will Clinton be packing his bags again for another act of obeisance? And, looking ahead, what American hostages will not be sufficiently important to merit the presidential treatment? What about Roxana Saberi and other Americans previously held in Tehran? What was it about them that made them unworthy of a presidential visit? These are the consequences of poorly thought-out gesture politics, however well-intentioned or compassionately motivated.

The Clinton visit may have many other negative effects. In some ways the trip is a flashback to the unfortunate 1994 journey of former president Jimmy Carter, who disrupted the Clinton administration’s nuclear negotiations with North Korea and led directly to the misbegotten "Agreed Framework." By supplying both political legitimacy and tangible economic resources to Pyongyang, the Agreed Framework provided the North and other rogue states a roadmap for maximizing the benefits of illicit nuclear programs. North Korea violated the framework almost from the outset but nonetheless enticed the Bush administration into negotiations (the six-party talks) to discuss yet again ending its nuclear program in exchange for even more political and economic benefits. This history is of the United States rewarding dangerous and unacceptable behavior, a lesson well learned by other would-be nuclear proliferators.

We cannot presently foretell whether or not Clinton’s visit will lead to renewed negotiations over North Korea’s nuclear program, but that appears to be the conclusion the Obama administration hopes to draw. Ironically, both Kim and Obama may well want to kick start bilateral negotiations, or, failing that, at least renew the six-party talks. Obama’s "open hand" promise in his inaugural address isn’t having much success around the world, and North Korea can always use new infusions of economic aid, which may well be the hidden cargo of the Clinton mission.

The point to be made on the Clinton visit is that the knee-jerk impulse for negotiations above all inevitably brings more costs than its advocates foresee. Negotiating from a position of strength, where the benefits to American interests will exceed the costs, is one thing. Negotiating merely for the sake of it, in the face of palpable recent failures, is something else indeed.

 

Originally published in The Washington Post

John Bolton, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, was U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from August 2005 to December 2006.

Obama’s losing streak and Israel

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech Sunday evening at Bar-Ilan University had one goal: To get US President Barack Obama off of Israel’s back.

Netanyahu’s speech was an eloquent, rational and at times impassioned defense of Israel. For Israeli ears, after years of former prime minister Ehud Olmert’s and former foreign minister Tzipi Livni’s continuous assaults on Israeli rights, and their strident defenses of capitulation to the Palestinians and the Syrians, Netanyahu’s address was a breath of fresh air. But it is hard to see how it could have possibly had any lasting impact on Obama or his advisers.

To be moved by rational argument, a person has to be open to rational discourse. And what we have witnessed over the past week with the Obama administration’s reactions to both North Korea’s nuclear brinksmanship and Iran’s sham elections is that its foreign policy is not informed by rationality but by the president’s morally relative, post-modern ideology. In this anti-intellectual and anti-rational climate, Netanyahu’s speech has little chance of making a lasting impact on the White House.

If rational thought was the basis for the administration’s policymaking on foreign affairs, North Korea’s decisions to test long range ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons, send two US citizens to long prison terms and then threaten nuclear war should have made the administration reconsider its current policy of seeking the approval and assistance of North Korea’s primary enabler – China – for any action it takes against Pyongyang. As Nicholas Eberstadt suggested in Friday’s Wall Street Journal, rather than spending its time passing UN Security Council resolutions with no enforcement mechanisms against North Korea, the administration would be working with a coalition of the willing to adopt measures aimed at lowering the threat North Korea constitutes to regional, US and global security through its nuclear and ballistic missile programs and its proliferation activities.

But the administration has done no such thing. Instead of working with and strengthening its allies, it has opted to work with North Korea’s allies China and Russia to forge a Security Council resolution harsh enough to convince North Korean leader Kim Jung Il to threaten nuclear war, but too weak to degrade his capacity to wage one.

Similar to Obama’s refusal to reassess his failed policy regarding North Korea, his nonreaction to the fraudulent Iranian election shows that he will not allow facts to interfere with his slavish devotion to his ideological canon that claims that no enemy is unappeasable and no ally deserves automatic support. Far from standing with the democratic dissidents now risking their lives to oppose Iran’s sham democracy, the administration has reportedly expressed concern that the current postelection protests will destabilize the regime. Obama has also refused to reconsider his decision to reach a grand bargain with the ayatollahs on Iran’s nuclear weapons program that would serve to legitimize their continued grip on power.

His refusal to make a moral distinction between the mullahs and their democratic opponents – like his refusal in Cairo to make a moral distinction between a nuclear-armed Iran and a nuclear-armed America – makes clear that he is not interested in forging a factually accurate or morally clear-sighted foreign policy.

ALL OF THIS brings us back to Israel – and Netanyahu’s speech about the nature and causes of the Palestinian conflict and the conditions that must be met if peace is ever to be achieved. His address aimed in two ways to lower US pressure while averting an open confrontation with a president whose approval ratings remain above 60 percent. First, Netanyahu demonstrated that through their consistent rejection of Israel’s right to exist as the Jewish state, the Palestinians – not us – are the side responsible for the absence of Middle East peace.

Second, Netanyahu tried to decrease US pressure on his government by conditionally accepting the idea of a Palestinian state. Clearly, it was Netanyahu’s acceptance of the idea of a Palestinian state – albeit a demilitarized one – that was supposed to do the most to fend off US pressure. After all, Obama and his advisers have made the swift establishment of a Palestinian state their primary foreign policy aim.

Irrespective of its impact on the Obama administration, Netanyahu’s speech was a positive contribution to the general discourse on the Middle East and Israel’s place in it. He made good use of his opportunity to address the nation above the heads of the uniformly leftist media to forge a new definition of the national consensus. Whereas his defeatist predecessors consistently spoke of the people’s willingness to make painful concessions for peace, and treated the establishment of a Jew-free Palestinian state as their primary duty as Zionists, Netanyahu recast the national consensus along patriotic lines.

He echoed the sentiments of the vast majority of Israelis when he refused to end building inside of Jewish communities located beyond the 1949 armistice lines; when he asserted that he would make no concessions on sovereignty over Jerusalem; would insist that we retain defensible borders; would refuse entrance of so-called Palestinian refugees to our territory; and demanded Palestinian recognition of our right to exist as the Jewish state.

He stridently and eloquently corrected Obama’s false characterization of this country as the product of the Holocaust during his speeches at Cairo and Buchenwald by recalling the 3,500 year old Jewish ties to the Land of Israel. And he made clear that the association Obama made between the Holocaust and this country’s founding was a precise inversion of the historical record. It is not Israel that owes its existence to the Holocaust. Rather, the Holocaust was only able to happen because there was no Israel.

NETANYAHU’S SPEECH was a much-needed strong defense. But it was not a perfect defense. It suffered from two flaws that may come back to haunt the premier in the years to come. First, his demand that the US lead the international community in guaranteeing that the Palestinian state is demilitarized provided the Obama administration with a new means to trick Israel into making suicidal concessions.

The only way to ensure that a Palestinian state is demilitarized is to send in forces to demilitarize it. Obviously the Americans won’t take such a step. In Gaza, a militarized Palestinian state already exists and the Americans have no intention of demilitarizing it for us. As for Judea and Samaria, today, the only thing the emerging Palestinian state has to show for itself is its US-built army.

The only force that would ensure a Palestinian state (or states) stays demilitarized is the IDF. But by appointing the US the guarantor of its demilitarized status, Netanyahu is inviting the US to lie and so make it impossible for us to take the steps necessary to ensure that the Palestinians lack the means to threaten the country.

In requesting that the US guarantee disarmament, Netanyahu repeated a mistake he made in his first term in office. In 1996 he conditioned his willingness to move forward with peace talks with the PLO on the terror group’s amendment of its charter calling for the destruction of Israel in line with its commitment under the initial Oslo agreement. Netanyahu empowered Bill Clinton to judge Palestinian compliance with this demand. In due course, Clinton travelled to Gaza and mendaciously announced that the PLO had in fact amended the charter. No such action had been taken, but Netanyahu was in no position to accuse Clinton of lying.

While his decision to appoint Obama arbiter of Palestinian demilitarization was ill-conceived, things could have been much worse.

Netanyahu ignored the so-called road map peace plan. That plan is one long list of Palestinian commitments that the US is empowered to judge compliance on. From terror fighting to ending incitement, the road map places Israel in the position of being forced to take America’s word on issues paramount to its national security. By ignoring the road map, Netanyahu managed to avert the need to call Obama a liar directly.

The other problem with Netanyahu’s speech is that by accepting the idea of a Palestinian state, and embracing Obama’s fantasy that it is possible to reach a deal with the Palestinian Authority, Netanyahu blocked the possibility that Israel will be able to forge a new policy that will move it to a more advantageous status quo in the coming years. That is, Netanyahu’s conditional acceptance of Obama’s false and ideologically motivated two-state paradigm damns Israel to the position of foot dragger in relation to someone else’s policy rather than trailblazer for its own policy.

In fairness to Netanyahu, in light of Obama’s ideological commitment to the two-state paradigm which blames Israel for the absence of peace, it is far from clear that he has any choice other than to go along with the president and just play for time. Were Netanyahu to apply Israeli law to the large settlement blocs and the Jordan Valley or establish security zones along Gaza’s borders with Israel and Egypt, he would likely instigate a full breach of relations with Washington.

At this point, it is up to the public and our representatives in the Knesset to pave the way for a better policy in the future. This we can do by rejecting the two-state paradigm and conducting a public discourse relevant to our national interests. For Netanyahu, however, buying time with a hostile administration may be the best he can aspire to during his current term in office.

Of course, buying time in and of itself is no great accomplishment. The voters did not elect Netanyahu to lead us simply to buy time. We elected him to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. If his speech succeeded in blunting US pressure on Israel – even temporarily – on the Palestinian front, and in light of the results of the Iranian presidential race, Netanyahu has gained the opportunity to act on the Iranian front. If during his current term he prevents Iran from becoming a nuclear power and makes no concessions in Judea, Samaria, Jerusalem or the Golan Heights, he will be remembered as one of our greatest leaders and his speech will be remembered for posterity as a pivotal event.

On the other hand, if Netanyahu sits on his laurels, he will be surprised to see how quickly Obama – desperate for a foreign policy achievement after being laughed out of Teheran and Pyongyang – forgets his happiness at Netanyahu’s address. In no time flat, Obama will try to force Israel make him look like he knows what he is doing. At that point, an open confrontation with the White House will become unavoidable.

Originally published in The Jerusalem Post.

Obama’s Arabian dreams

US President Barack Obama claims to be a big fan of telling the truth. In media interviews ahead of his trip to Saudi Arabia and Egypt and during his big speech in Cairo on Thursday, he claimed that the centerpiece of his Middle East policy is his willingness to tell people hard truths.

Indeed, Obama made three references to the need to tell the truth in his so-called address to the Muslim world.

Unfortunately, for a speech billed as an exercise in truth telling, Obama’s address fell short. Far from reflecting hard truths, Obama’s speech reflected political convenience.

Obama’s so-called hard truths for the Islamic world included statements about the need to fight so-called extremists; give equal rights to women; provide freedom of religion; and foster democracy. Unfortunately, all of his statements on these issues were nothing more than abstract, theoretical declarations devoid of policy prescriptions.

He spoke of the need to fight Islamic terrorists without mentioning that their intellectual, political and monetary foundations and support come from the very mosques, politicians and regimes in Saudi Arabia and Egypt that Obama extols as moderate and responsible.

He spoke of the need to grant equality to women without making mention of common Islamic practices like so-called honor killings, and female genital mutilation. He ignored the fact that throughout the lands of Islam women are denied basic legal and human rights. And then he qualified his statement by mendaciously claiming that women in the US similarly suffer from an equality deficit. In so discussing this issue, Obama sent the message that he couldn’t care less about the plight of women in the Islamic world.

So, too, Obama spoke about the need for religious freedom but ignored Saudi Arabian religious apartheid. He talked about the blessings of democracy but ignored the problems of tyranny.

In short, Obama’s "straight talk" to the Arab world, which began with his disingenuous claim that like America, Islam is committed to "justice and progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings," was consciously and fundamentally fraudulent. And this fraud was advanced to facilitate his goal of placing the Islamic world on equal moral footing with the free world.

In a like manner, Obama’s tough "truths" about Israel were marked by factual and moral dishonesty in the service of political ends.

On the surface, Obama seemed to scold the Muslim world for its all-pervasive Holocaust denial and craven Jew hatred. By asserting that Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism are wrong, he seemed to be upholding his earlier claim that America’s ties to Israel are "unbreakable."

Unfortunately, a careful study of his statements shows that Obama was actually accepting the Arab view that Israel is a foreign – and therefore unjustifiable – intruder in the Arab world. Indeed, far from attacking their rejection of Israel, Obama legitimized it.

The basic Arab argument against Israel is that the only reason Israel was established was to sooth the guilty consciences of Europeans who were embarrassed about the Holocaust. By their telling, the Jews have no legal, historic or moral rights to the Land of Israel.

This argument is completely false. The international community recognized the legal, historic and moral rights of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel long before anyone had ever heard of Adolf Hitler. In 1922, the League of Nations mandated the "reconstitution" – not the creation – of the Jewish commonwealth in the Land of Israel in its historic borders on both sides of the Jordan River.

But in his self-described exercise in truth telling, Obama ignored this basic truth in favor of the Arab lie. He gave credence to this lie by stating wrongly that "the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history."

He then explicitly tied Israel’s establishment to the Holocaust by moving to a self-serving history lesson about the genocide of European Jewry.

Even worse than his willful blindness to the historic, legal and moral justifications for Israel’s rebirth, was Obama’s characterization of Israel itself. Obama blithely, falsely and obnoxiously compared Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to white American slave owners’ treatment of their black slaves. He similarly cast Palestinian terrorists in the same morally pure category as slaves. Perhaps most repulsively, Obama elevated Palestinian terrorism to the moral heights of slave rebellions and the US civil rights movement by referring to it by its Arab euphemism, "resistance."

BUT AS disappointing and frankly obscene as Obama’s rhetoric was, the policies he outlined were much worse. While prattling about how Islam and America are two sides of the same coin, Obama managed to spell out two clear policies. First, he announced that he will compel Israel to completely end all building for Jews in Judea, Samaria, and eastern, northern and southern Jerusalem. Second, he said that he will strive to convince Iran to substitute its nuclear weapons program with a nuclear energy program.

Obama argued that the first policy will facilitate peace and the second policy will prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Upon reflection, however, it is clear that neither of his policies can possibly achieve his stated aims. Indeed, their inability to accomplish the ends he claims he has adopted them to advance is so obvious, that it is worth considering what his actual rationale for adopting them may be.

The administration’s policy toward Jewish building in Israel’s heartland and capital city expose a massive level of hostility toward Israel. Not only does it fly in the face of explicit US commitments to Israel undertaken by the Bush administration, it contradicts a longstanding agreement between successive Israeli and American governments not to embarrass each other.

Moreover, the fact that the administration cannot stop attacking Israel about Jewish construction in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, but has nothing to say about Hizbullah’s projected democratic takeover of Lebanon next week, Hamas’s genocidal political platform, Fatah’s involvement in terrorism, or North Korean ties to Iran and Syria, has egregious consequences for the prospects for peace in the region.

As Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas made clear in his interview last week with The Washington Post, in light of the administration’s hostility toward Israel, the Palestinian Authority no longer feels it is necessary to make any concessions whatsoever to Israel. It needn’t accept Israel’s identity as a Jewish state. It needn’t minimize in any way its demand that Israel commit demographic suicide by accepting millions of foreign, hostile Arabs as full citizens. And it needn’t curtail its territorial demand that Israel contract to within indefensible borders.

In short, by attacking Israel and claiming that Israel is responsible for the absence of peace, the administration is encouraging the Palestinians and the Arab world as a whole to continue to reject Israel and to refuse to make peace with the Jewish state.

The Netanyahu government reportedly fears that Obama and his advisers have made such an issue of settlements because they seek to overthrow Israel’s government and replace it with the more pliable Kadima party. Government sources note that White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel played a central role in destabilizing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s first government in 1999, when he served as an adviser to then president Bill Clinton. They also note that Emmanuel is currently working with leftist Israelis and American Jews associated with Kadima and the Democratic Party to discredit the government.

While there is little reason to doubt that the Obama administration would prefer a leftist government in Jerusalem, it is unlikely that the White House is attacking Israel primarily to advance this aim. This is first of all the case because today there is little danger that Netanyahu’s coalition partners will abandon him.

Moreover, the Americans have no reason to believe that prospects for a peace deal would improve with a leftist government at the helm in Jerusalem. After all, despite its best efforts, the Kadima government was unable to make peace with the Palestinians, as was the Labor government before it. What the Palestinians have shown consistently since the failed 2000 Camp David summit is that there is no deal that Israel can offer them that they are willing to accept.

So if the aim of the administration in attacking Israel is neither to foster peace nor to bring down the Netanyahu government, what can explain its behavior?

The only reasonable explanation is that the administration is baiting Israel because it wishes to abandon the Jewish state as an ally in favor of warmer ties with the Arabs. It has chosen to attack Israel on the issue of Jewish construction because it believes that by concentrating on this issue, it will minimize the political price it will be forced to pay at home for jettisoning America’s alliance with Israel. By claiming that he is only pressuring Israel to enable a peaceful "two-state solution," Obama assumes that he will be able to maintain his support base among American Jews who will overlook the underlying hostility his "pro-peace" stance papers over.

OBAMA’S POLICY toward Iran is a logical complement of his policy toward Israel. Just as there is no chance that he will bring Middle East peace closer by attacking Israel, so he will not prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons by offering the mullahs nuclear energy. The deal Obama is now proposing has been on the table since 2003, when Iran’s nuclear program was first exposed. Over the past six years, the Iranians have repeatedly rejected it. Indeed, just last week they again announced that they reject it.

Here, too, to understand the president’s actual goal it is necessary to search for the answers closer to home. Since Obama’s policy has no chance of preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, it is apparent that he has come to terms with the prospect of a nuclear armed Iran. In light of this, the most rational explanation for his policy of engagement is that he wishes to avoid being blamed when Iran emerges as a nuclear power in the coming months.

In reckoning with the Obama administration, it is imperative that the Netanyahu government and the public alike understand the true goals of its current policies. Happily, consistent polling data show that the overwhelming majority of Israelis realize that the White House is deeply hostile toward Israel. The data also show that the public approves of Netanyahu’s handling of our relations with Washington.

Moving forward, the government must sustain this public awareness and support. By his words as well as by his deeds, not only has Obama shown that he is not a friend of Israel. He has shown that there is nothing that Israel can do to make him change his mind.

La Creciente Afganizacin en Amrica Latina

Version in English

Cuando el Presidente Barack Obama fue criticado por su interacción amigable con Hugo Chávez durante la Cumbre de las Américas, él respondió diciendo que Estados Unidos no tenia nada que temerle a un país con una economía seiscientas veces menor que la Americana.

Esta curiosa observación por parte del Sr. Obama nos hace pensar entonces: ¿qué tan grande es la economía de Al Qaeda en comparación a la norteamericana? Lo más probable es que los activos de este grupo terrorista sean mucho menores que los de Venezuela. Asimismo, la economía de Irán no es comprable a la de Estados Unidos, aunque se esté viviendo una recesión económica.

Es lógico que nos preguntemos: ¿la seguridad nacional o regional corren peligro en relación a la capacidad económica o en tiempos de guerras asimétricas?  ¿Debe un país o una entidad ser económicamente o militarmente superior para poder generar una situación de inestabilidad y amenaza?

La administración Obama sabe la respuesta correcta. De lo contrario, el Presidente y su equipo de Seguridad Nacional no estarían agresivamente luchando contra el Talibán en Afganistán y Pakistán. Lo que esta administración más teme en esta región sudoeste Asiática es el colapso del estado en Pakistán y la inhabilidad de producir gobernabilidad en Afganistán. Ambos países están localizados a miles de kilómetros de distancia de los Estados Unidos pero, aún así, el gobierno americano reconoce que una situación de anarquía o de gobierno de los Talibanes en ambos casos podría llevar a una inestabilidad en toda la región. Al mismo tiempo, esta situación podría causar caos con el peligro adicional que grupos radicales podrían, no sólo, tomar posesión de un arma nuclear, sino que también, podrían ocupar los lugares que la autoridad dejara libres.

Las relaciones públicas de Obama con respecto a América Latina, la mayor parte de ellas dirigidas a abrir una nueva página en las relaciones de Estados Unidos con sus vecinos del sur, es consistente con las políticas de Bush. En ambas administraciones, la agencia encargada de la región parece ser el Departamento de Estado, cuya filosofía es tratar de mejorar la imagen de Estados Unidos en America Latina para mitigar el efecto de antiamericanismo. Al no confrontar a Hugo Chávez y sus aliados, parece ser un mecanismo dirigido a presentarlos como instigadores y a Washington como el civilizado y razonable actor. La actitud apologética de Obama en Trinidad y Tobago era consistente con esta concepción.

Pero hay un número de elementos que faltan en esta ecuación. En ediciones anteriores del "Reporte de las Américas," hemos descrito las intenciones de Chávez de revolucionar el área apoyando a grupos anti-sistema y candidatos como él por toda la región. También hemos informado acerca de las acciones de Chávez en su país, donde se han instalado el absolutismo y la eliminación de las libertades civiles y políticas, mientras que se evangelizan los ideales antidemocráticos al mismo tiempo que intentan remover a Estados Unidos en la lucha anti-drogas y en presencia militar. Su deseo de eliminar la esfera de influencia Americana e invitar a otros actores como China, Irán y Rusia, para que tengan un rol importante es más que evidente. Sin embargo, hay un aspecto que no ha sido previamente mencionado y que merece más atención, especialmente para los encargados de política exterior de los Estados Unidos; esto es la expansión de la anarquía a expensas de la autoridad del estado.

Un ejemplo es la introducción del Plan Colombia por el gobierno de Bill Clinton para ayudar a Colombia en su lucha contra los cárteles de drogas y las FARC, que para entonces, habían tomado el control del 40% del territorio. En aquel momento, peligrosos agentes no-gubernamentales tomaron el control de gran porción de estos terrenos en un estado democrático en el Hemisferio Oeste. Es gracias al arduo trabajo del Presidente Colombiano Álvaro Uribe que esa situación se revirtió de gran manera. En Venezuela y otros países aliados con Chávez, no sólo estamos siendo testigos de la consolidación de una autocracia socialista sino también de la proliferación de agentes no – gubernamentales peligrosos.

Hoy, los aeropuertos Venezolanos están siendo abiertamente utilizados por los narcotraficantes para exportar drogas a Estados Unidos y Europa; Chávez y Correa han ayudado a las FARC en su lucha contra Colombia; células de Hezbolá han  incrementado su recaudación de fondos y otras actividades en la región con el apoyo de Hugo Chávez; Irán y los carteles de drogas cooperan bajo los auspicios de Chávez; los terroristas de Sendero Luminoso en Perú, probablemente con la ayuda de elementos asociados con el líder Venezolano. En Venezuela, Hezbolá y otros grupos islámicos potenciados por el régimen mientras el mismo Chávez ha hecho del caos política oficial.

Ha sido reportado que 454 lideres sindicales independientes han sido asesinados por "sindicatos" oficiales paralelos.  También existe información que un líder sindical representando a los trabajadores de Toyota, fue asesinado por llegar a una solución pacifica con la compañía Japonesa. Al gobierno no le gustó el acuerdo que esta persona había logrado en forma pacífica. Los asesinos eran criminales reclutados en las prisiones por el gobierno de Chávez. La criminalidad en Venezuela ya tienen vida propia que va a ser muy difícil de controlar así Chávez se va del poder y puede bien ser utilizada a los carteles de drogas, las FARC y grupos radicales islámicos como Hezbolá.

De ser este el caso, ¿cuál será la situación en América Latina? Quizás, esto signifique que el síndrome anárquico Colombiano de los ’80 y los ’90 se expanda aun más. En otras palabras, una situación similar a la de Afganistán y Pakistán es muy probable que se convierta en omnipresente e irreversible. Si en Afganistán y Pakistán el peligro viene del Talibán, de Al Qaeda, de los auto llamados "lideres espirituales" y de otros agentes no gubernamentales poderosos, ¿qué nos hace pensar que en América Latina podremos controlar una coalición similar de los cárteles de drogas, las FARC, Hezbolá y otros criminales del régimen de Chávez?

Curiosamente, el Presidente Woodrow Wilson estaba muy preocupado por los acontecimientos en México durante la Revolución Mexicana temprano en el siglo 20. El orden y la estabilidad eran cruciales para los legisladores Americanos. Hoy, el desafío es más serio aun ya que los narcotraficantes y terroristas son mas sofisticados. Los países Latinoamericanos parecen indiferentes ante esta posibilidad o pueden estar esperando que otro país los rescate.

La OEA (Organización de Estados Americanos) y su Presidente José Miguel Insulza han mirado para el otro lado cuando estos sucesos han ocurrido; no sólo la OEA ha ignorado las agresiones de Chávez contra sus vecinos, pero también ha desconocido los asaltos a la democracia. Como el ejemplo de Chávez demuestra, el colapso de la democracia leva no sólo al autoritarismo pero también el caos y a la criminalización de la sociedad.

Los lideres latinoamericanos ¿no están preocupados? El avance de los carteles de drogas, grupos terroristas y criminalidad a expensas de la autoridad del estado es, en las mentes de los lideres de la OEA, sólo un problema norteamericano. Ellos parecen estar mas preocupados por el intento de Estados Unidos de influenciarlos en vez de ver el peligro real de los elementos mencionados anteriormente. Por eso, estaban contentísimos por el "acercamiento diferente" de Obama como si EE.UU. fuera realmente su problema. Por el contrario, es de su interés colectivo trabajar con Estados Unidos en contra de este fenómeno mientras que todavía hay posibilidades de hacerlo pacíficamente.

 

Luis Fleischman es un asesor senior del Proyecto Menges para la Seguridad Hemisférica en el Centro para Políticas de Seguridad en Washington DC. 

Nicole M. Ferrand es analista y editora del "The Americas Report" del Menges Hemispheric Security Project en el Center for Security Policy en Washington DC. Se graduó de la Universidad de Columbia en Economía y Ciencias Políticas. Estudió Derecho en la Universidad UNIFE y Finanzas Corporativas en Georgetown University.

Gays and the military: a bad fit

With the nation engaged in two wars and facing a number of potential adversaries, this is no time to weaken our military. Yet if gay rights activists and their allies have their way, grave harm will soon be inflicted on our all-volunteer force.

The administration and some in Congress have pledged to repeal Section 654 of U.S. Code Title 10, which states that homosexuals are not eligible for military service. Often confused with the "don’t ask, don’t tell" regulations issued by President Bill Clinton, this statute establishes several reasons that homosexuality is incompatible with military service.

Section 654 recognizes that the military is a "specialized society" that is "fundamentally different from civilian life." It requires a unique code of personal conduct and demands "extraordinary sacrifices, including the ultimate sacrifice, in order to provide for the common defense." The law appreciates military personnel who, unlike civilians who go home after work, must accept living conditions that are often "characterized by forced intimacy with little or no privacy."

While there have been changes in civilian society since this statute was adopted by wide bipartisan majorities in 1993, the military realities it describes abide. If anything, they are more acute in wartime.

In our experience, and that of more than 1,000 retired flag and general officers who have joined us in signing an open letter to President Obama and Congress, repeal of this law would prompt many dedicated people to leave the military. Polling by Military Times of its active-duty subscribers over the past four years indicates that 58 percent have consistently opposed repeal. In its most recent survey, 10 percent said they would not reenlist if that happened, and 14 percent said they would consider leaving.

If just the lesser number left the military, our active-duty, reserve and National Guard forces would lose 228,600 people — more than the total of today’s active-duty Marine Corps. Losses of even a few thousand sergeants, petty officers and experienced mid-grade officers, when we are trying to expand the Army and Marine Corps, could be crippling.

And the damage would not stop there. Legislation introduced to repeal Section 654 (H.R. 1283) would impose on commanders a radical policy that mandates "nondiscrimination" against "homosexuality, or bisexuality, whether the orientation is real or perceived." Mandatory training classes and judicial proceedings would consume valuable time defining that language. Team cohesion and concentration on missions would suffer if our troops had to live in close quarters with others who could be sexually attracted to them.

We don’t need a study commission to know that tensions are inevitable in conditions offering little or no privacy, increasing the stress of daily military life. "Zero tolerance" of dissent would become official intolerance of anyone who disagrees with this policy, forcing additional thousands to leave the service by denying them promotions or punishing them in other ways. Many more will be dissuaded from ever enlisting. There is no compelling national security reason for running these risks to our armed forces. Discharges for homosexual conduct have been few compared with separations for other reasons, such as pregnancy/family hardship or weight-standard violations. There are better ways to remedy shortages in some military specialties than imposing social policies that would escalate losses of experienced personnel who are not easily replaced.

Some suggest that the United States must emulate Denmark, the Netherlands and Canada, which have incorporated homosexuals into their forces. But none of these countries has the institutional culture or worldwide responsibilities of our military. America’s armed forces are models for our allies’ militaries and the envy of our adversaries — not the other way around.

As former senior commanders, we know that the reason for this long-standing envy is the unsurpassed discipline, morale and readiness of our military. The burden should be on proponents of repeal to demonstrate how their initiative would improve these qualities of our armed services. This they cannot do.

Consequently, our recent open letter advised America’s elected leaders: "We believe that imposing this burden on our men and women in uniform would undermine recruiting and retention, impact leadership at all echelons, have adverse effects on the willingness of parents who lend their sons and daughters to military service, and eventually break the All-Volunteer Force."

Everyone can serve America in some way, but there is no constitutional right to serve in the military. The issue is not one of individual desires, or of the norms and mores of civilian society. Rather, the question is one of national security and the discipline, morale, readiness and culture of the U.S. armed forces upon which that security depends. It is a question we cannot afford to answer in a way that breaks our military.

 

Originally published in The Washington Post

Retired Army Gen. James J. Lindsay was the first commander of U.S. Special Operations Command. Retired Adm. Jerome Johnson was vice chief of naval operations. Retired Lt. Gen. E.G. "Buck" Shuler Jr. was commander of the Strategic Air Command’s 8th Air Force. Retired Gen. Joseph J. Went was assistant commandant of the Marine Corps. They are founding members of Flag and General Officers for the Military.

 

 

Will Obama revive the ICC threat to the military?

In one of his last official acts as President, Bill Clinton signed the so-called "Rome Statute" creating an International Criminal Court (ICC). A supposed instrument of "international justice" for perpetrators of war crimes and crimes against humanity, the ICC is instead a massive power grab by an unaccountable pseudo-judicial body lacking the most elementary protections found in the U.S. Constitution.

President George W. Bush’s wise decision to withdraw the Clinton signature from the ICC prompted howls of protest from the usual quarters, notably proponents of world government and, not surprisingly, many Democrats in Congress. Unfortunately, with a Democrat now in the White House – and Mr. Clinton’s wife in charge at the State Department – there is a danger that President Obama will sign the Rome Statute and railroad it through the Senate.

The ICC’s kangaroo-court claim of power and jurisdiction is almost beyond belief. Defenders of the ICC say that it would have jurisdiction only when a given country’s judicial process – the U.S. court system, for example – has failed. But who decides when such a failure has occurred? That’s right, the ICC itself, in violation of American sovereignty and overruling the U.S. Constitution.

An American soldier hauled before the ICC would be subject to a "judicial process" featuring no right to a jury trial; retrials allowed for errors of fact (i.e., double jeopardy); admission of hearsay evidence; no right to a public trial (effectively providing for inquisition-like proceedings); and no right to a speedy trial or reasonable bail, amounting to unlimited detention. These features already are standardized in United Nations Tribunals for Rwanda and Yugoslavia, which advocates for the ICC point to as precedents.

Also relevant is the record of some of the champions of the ICC who have already served notice of their intended operating procedure. For example, in 2001 Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon agreed to become honorary head of a group promoting the ICC. For the ICC proponents it was a good choice. Judge Garzon is a virtual apostle of extraterritorial jurisdiction, the heart of the ICC’s threat to Americans.

Judge Garzon’s claim to universal jurisdiction includes: an attempt to prosecute former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (for alleged atrocities by anticommunist forces in Central America); Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi (for supposedly evading taxes); and our U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay and in Iraq. He even has indicated possible criminal prosecution of businessmen for, if you can believe it, excessive carbon emissions.

Lest anyone think we exaggerate the danger to American military personnel being hauled before the ICC on legally specious grounds should take into account Judge Garzon’s penchant for upending the presumption of innocence – the very core of American jurisprudence. For instance, last October, he issued a summons to appear for questioning for Russian State Duma Deputy Vladislav Reznik. Judge Garzon contended that Mr. Reznik had received payments from businessman Gennady Petrov, who Judge Garzon had earlier arrested in a nighttime raid, during which he, his wife and 10-year-old daughter were forced at gunpoint to stand naked while police officers ransacked their house. Under Franco-era laws still in effect, Mr. Petrov, who has been accused of money laundering despite all transfers of funds being declared to the Bank of Spain and Agencia Estatal de Administracion Tributaria in utmost transparency, can be held without charges or bail for up to four years. Mr. Reznik, who, as a Duma deputy enjoys immunity from prosecution, had simply purchased property from Mr. Petrov in full accordance with both Spanish and Russian laws, nonetheless, prompting Judge Garzon’s judicial inquiry.

So, why should Americans care about a Spanish judge targeting a couple of Russians who may or may not be guilty of any wrongdoing? Just this: the same standard Judge Garzon has put into practice in Spain will become standard operating procedure by the ICC against American military personnel. Forget guilt or innocence, the Constitution or any relevant treaty obligations. Just make a wild accusation against an unpopular target, chuck him in the slammer, and worry about the proof later. After all, in view of the strident anti-Americanism that prevails in many parts of the world, the arrest of an American soldier, whether justified by credible evidence or not, would be greeted with general acclaim.

The fate of an American serviceman should not become the football of a global popularity contest or of megalomaniacal political agendas. It is imperative that any effort by the Obama administration to pull the stake out of the heart of the ICC be quickly killed.

 

James Lyons, U.S. Navy retired admiral, was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, senior U.S. military representative to the United Nations, and deputy chief of naval operations, where he was principal adviser on all Joint Chiefs of Staff matters. Adm. Lyons is chair of the Center for Security Policy’s Millitary Committe.