Obama Has Lost The World

After the 2010 elections, it’s not exactly news that Obama has lost America. But in a less public referendum, he also lost the world. Obama’s cocktail party tour of the world’s capitals may look impressive on a map, but is irrelevant on a policy level. In less than two years, the White House has gone from being the center of world leadership to being irrelevant, from protecting world freedom to serving as a global party planning committee.

Even the Bush Administration’s harshest critics could never have credibly claimed that George W. Bush was irrelevant. He might have been hated, pilloried and shouted about– but he couldn’t be ignored. However Obama can be safely ignored. Invited to parties, given the chance to show off his cosmopolitan sophisticated by reciting one or two words in the local lingo, read off a teleprompter, along with some cant about the need for everyone to pull together and make the world a better place, and then dismissed for the rest of the evening.

As a world leader, he makes a passable party guest. He has a broad smile, brings along his own gifts and is famous in the way that celebrities, rather than prime ministers and presidents are famous. On an invitation list, he is more Bono than Sarkozy, Leonardo DiCaprio not Putin. You don’t invite him to talk turkey, not even on Thanksgiving. He’s just one of those famous people with a passing interest in politics who gets good media attention, but who has nothing worthwhile to say.

The only countries who take Obama seriously, are the ones who have to. The leaders of Great Britain, Israel and Japan– who have tied their countries to an enduring alliance with America based on mutual interests and values, only to discover that the latest fellow to sit behind the Oval Office desk no longer shares those values and couldn’t give less of a damn about American interests. It’s no wonder that European leaders ignore him as much as possible. Or that Netanyahu visited America, while Obama was abroad. Or that Japanese politics have become dangerously unstable.

On the enemy side, the growing aggressiveness of China, North Korea, Iran, Hezbollah and Al Qaeda can all be attributed to the global consensus that no one is at home in the White House.And if no one is at home in the White House, then that’s a perfect time to slap the big boy around the yard. China is doing it economically, the rest are doing it militarily. They’re all on board with Obama’s Post-American vision of the world. But unlike him and most liberals, they have a clear understanding of what that means. The America of some years back, which actually intimidated Libyan dictator Khaddafi into giving up his nuclear program, without lifting a hand against him is long gone. So is the Cedar Revolution. Syria and Iran are back in charge in Lebanon. And in Afghanistan, the Taliban are laughing at our soft power outreach efforts.

Obama’s soft power approach emphasizes the ‘soft’ and forgets the ‘power’. It neglects even Clinton era understandings about the role of America in the world, and reverts instead to a Carter era sense of guilt that bleeds into hostility toward American interests and allies. While the rest of the world puts their own interests first, they act like a cog in some imaginary global community, turning and turning toward the distant horizon of international brotherhood. While China, Russia and most of the world walk down their backs and up their jellyfish spines, laughing all the way. And America’s allies gird themselves and prepare for the worst.

From the first, this administration has curried favor with America’s enemies by betraying and humiliating its allies. But these hideous acts of moral cowardice have not won Obama the approval of America’s enemies. Only their contempt. And a Nobel Peace Prize from a committee of elderly left wing Swedes, awarded not for any accomplishment, but for the lack thereof. For being a man without a country, a leader without a spine and a representative of America who gives no thought for the interests of that country.

Now that the Koreas stand on the brink of war, Iran continues its drive toward a nuclear bomb, Al Qaeda is going global, Hezbollah is on the verge of taking Lebanon and Mexico is on the verge of imploding– the impact of America’s absence on the global stage is all too clear. The countless cocktail parties and toasts have not changed the world. All they’ve done is highlighted the transition of the White House from world leadership to global party guest. Trip after trip has ended in photo ops and policy failures. Instead Obama is stuck dumpster diving into the futile quest for a Palestinian state, not because such an entity will make the world any better, but because it will make him look good.

Obama has no mandate at home, and he has even less of one abroad. America’s enemies do not fear him. Only our allies do. Kim Jong Il does not sit up nights worrying what Obama will do. Because the consensus in North Korea, Iran and the rest of the world is that the sea will rise, the sun will set and Obama will do nothing. Except maybe write a strongly worded letter, offset by some quiet backchannel diplomacy from his coterie of international left wing stooges reassuring the offender that, “No, Barry really isn’t mad at you. He’s just concerned. Really, really concerned.”

Liberal pundits mock the rough and ready style of conservatives like Reagan, Bush or Palin in world affairs, but what they fail to realize is that the over-educated naivete, trendy cosmopolitanism and buzzword rich approach of a Kerry or Obama come off as laughably pathetic on the world stage. Republicans might be hated, but they can’t be ignored. Democrats on the other hand are catspaws and pawns, fools who are so sure of their cleverness and determined to embrace every culture in the way that only the graduates of Ivy League institutions can, that any Third World vendor could twirl them around his fingers.

World leaders are rarely liked, but effective ones are respected. And effective world leaders don’t lead with appeasement, don’t compromise before the other side has even made an offer and negotiate on behalf of their country, rather than some intangible global consensus. They understand that they represent a country, not a popularity contest. They don’t travel abroad to be adored or be greeted with parades and gifts, but to achieve tangible results on specific issues. To do otherwise is not to be a world leader, but a celebrity who happens to have picked up a big title along the way.

To be a proper American president on the world stage, means choosing to be respected, rather than liked. Obama always chooses to be liked, rather than respected. Because respect comes from accomplishment and character, while ‘liking’ is a function of appearance and image. Aiming to be ‘liked’ is playing to Obama’s strengths. But being liked is irrelevant outside of an afterschool special. World affairs is not a networking seminar, it is a negotiation between countries who have billions of dollars and millions of lives on the line. And Obama has no idea how to play that game. Like the kid who never fit in anywhere, he’s still trying to be liked. And he’s willing to sell out American interests and allies to get the cool UN kids to like him.

Unfortunately Obama’s irrelevance is also America’s irrelevance. A Republican House of Representatives cannot do what Obama should be doing. And any attempt to show strength gets shouted down by the liberal punditocracy as treason and undermining the White House. As if anyone, anywhere could undermine Obama internationally as much as he undermines himself. The same liberals who considered Ted Kennedy’s treasonous offer of cooperation with the Soviet Union or Kerry’s trip to Latin American Marxist terrorists to be acts of courage, damn Republicans who supported allies in Ecuador and Israel as traitors. And so Obama must have a free hand to do it all on his own. To do what Kennedy or Kerry could have only dreamed of.

Obama has lost the world. He has made the country that he claims to represent into a shadow of its former strength and glory. And his irrelevance endangers American lives. Not just those of soldiers in war zones, laboring under restrictive Rules of Engagement, written so as not to offend Muslims. Not just those of Americans at risk for domestic terrorism under an Attorney General who sympathizes with terrorists, more than with Americans. But to everyone living in a world where countries like North Korea and Iran feel free to do what they want, where our economic rivals such as Russia and China advance their interests and their espionage, and where terrorists across the Muslim world grow in boldness and number because they have no one left to fear anymore. In America and around the world– Barack Hussein Obama endangers us all.

 

Rising India Must Tap Full Potential Of Ties With France

Kanwal Sibal
03 December 2010

President Sarkozy’s impending visit to India (December 4-6) should be seen in the larger perspective of India’s rise and the external environment that has facilitated this. India-France relations have strong foundations built over many decades. Until now, despite good political understanding based on mutual respect, equality, shared attachment to independent positions on international issues and recognition of reciprocal benefits of close engagement in diverse fields, the full potential of the relationship has remained unachieved. India’s steady ascendance opens up new opportunities to forge qualitatively different ties with its partners. An upsurge in India-France relations should normally occur, catalyzed by mutual goodwill built over the years, of which an integral part is the intensity of high level exchanges with India as well as the robustness of French political support for a greater Indian global role that President Sarkozy has maintained under his watch.

India’s rise is part of the rise of Asia on which western attention is now rivetted for a better understanding of how it is altering established global political, economic and security equations. A rapidly growing India, with its huge market, its entrepreneurial skills, its human resources, the advances it has made in the knowledge economy, its fast rising outward investment etc, has now become important as an economic partner for major powers. China has a head start over us, but China’s economic strategy is now being widely attacked as a cause of the economic and financial imbalances that currently afflict the global economy. Wariness about China is growing because of its mercantilist policies, violation of intellectual property rights and absence of a well defined legal sysytem in the country. India, which in any case, has a geographic and demographic footprint in Asia next only to China, is receiving more attention despite its poorer infrastructure and greater entry problems for businesses. A general desire to see a better balance in Asia is playing in India’s favour.

China’s spectacular economic success has bolstered its political confidence, making it more self-assertive, backed by its expanding military capabilities. With the economically morose US embroiled in Iraq and Afghanistan, China’s rise is now seen as a threat by many. After its recent confrontation with Japan, claims about its peaceful rise seem less credible. India’s non-export dependent economic model and its exchange rate policies are not a source of distortions in global trade and financial flows. India’s pluralism and democracy give comfort to its partners who have therefore a much more benign view of its rise.

France has had some turbulence in its relations with China, having been at the receiving end of its bullying tactics, but because of the powerful allure of the Chinese market, it has a larger presence there than in India. The Chinese President was in France a few weeks ago and according to reports the visit produced substantial economic results, which is not surprising as the Chinese are adept at making political statements through economic deals. But France has been devoting increasing attention to India not only to secure an appropriate share for itself of the expanding Indian market, but also because of political understanding and increasing faith in India as a partner, even if the results are relatively slow to show.

Opportunities are opening up for India, but India has to exert itself to exploit them durably. We must not be carried away by all the heady talk of our inexorable rise, the size of our economy racing to second rank in the decades ahead, our vital contribution to global growth as the west battles recession, our demographic dividend -all this in the context of the West’s decline. It would be wise to remember that India’s rise is not solely on account of changed economic thinking and policies that have unleashed the dynamism of its entrepreneurial class, it is as much a result of globalisation led by the West featured by open markets, curbs on protectionist policies, flows of investment and technology, consultancy services, management expertise, educational opportunities etc. India’s continuing rise depends on maintaining cooperative and productive ties with its western partners. The West may be losing ground relatively with the emergence of new players, but the global game cannot be carried on without it. It would be disastrous for all if the West, unnerved by the challenge it faces, discards the economic principles it has long espoused and countries like India that are on the cusp of forging ahead decisively suddenly find themselves hitting against protectionist walls. All this points to the need for India to develop so-called win-win scenarios in dealing with our western partners.

If President Obama could make job creation for America the justification for his India visit, President Sarkozy should not be faulted if he too looks for tangible results resulting from his Indian foray, just as we look for “deliverables” when our own leaders make visits abroad. Having invested a lot of political capital in helping open civilian nuclear doors for India, the French would have hoped for closure on a commercial nuclear agreement on the supply of French reactors in time for the Sarkozy visit. Similarly, closure on the stretched out negotiations for the Mirage Upgrade contract would have been keenly hoped for. The Kaveri engine project for the LCA is another project of interest. On the short range surface to air missile(SR-SAM) project which involves co-development and production with Bharat Dynamics Limited(BDL), the French have been hoping for decisive progress. With the US in the fray, and Russia and Israel competing, the French are naturally keen to retain their share of India’s defence market, especially as the experience of our defence services of French supplied equipment has been very positive.

At one level, the Indian side is uncomfortable with pressure generated by high level political visits to artificially accelerate negotiations on complex defence deals or their processing by the governmental machinery. The inclination therefore is not to encourage the practice of signing defence deals during such visits. But then the question of timely decisions remains, as our procedures are very dilatory, without sufficient regard at times to the cost to the country of unwarranted delays in acquisitions and without those responsible for bureaucratic lethargy or ineptitude being held to account. What might emerge from the Sarkozy visit in terms of specific nuclear and defence agreements remains uncertain, though some positive announcements may come. In space it is not clear if new ground will be broken, though in this area France has impressive capabilities. With the US decision to ease export controls on transfer of high and dual use technologies to India, the potential for meaningful cooperation with France in this area can be usefully explored. Education is another thrust area of cooperation. Let us also remember that French support for India’s UNSC permanent membership- as well as that of others- has played some role in prodding the US to bend.

India has so far failed to deal with France from a longer term strategic perspective. It is time that a rising India did so, as part also of our relationship with a powerful pillar of the global order- Europe.

The writer is a former Foreign Secretary(sibalkanwal@gmail.com)