Foreign Policy In Focus

In his report on the Oval Office meeting between President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu for the New York Times, Mark Landler writes:

Mr. Netanyahu, according to the official, argued that the West should not reopen talks with Iran until it agreed to a verifiable suspension of its uranium enrichment activities — a condition the White House says would doom talks before they began.

In other words, don't hold talks until a goal of the talks has been reached before the talks themselves. In the United States we're familiar with that practice from the Bush administration. It also parallels the Iran Threat Reduction Act of 2011 which prohibited U.S. diplomacy with "any Iranian official who poses a threat to the United States."

In the same vein, in his interview with Jeffrey Goldberg at the Atlantic a few days before, President Obama said (emphasis added):

When you look at what I've done with respect to security for Israel, from joint training and joint exercises that outstrip anything that's been done in the past, to helping finance and construct the Iron Dome program to make sure that Israeli families are less vulnerable to missile strikes, to ensuring that Israel maintains its qualitative military edge, to fighting back against delegitimization of Israel, whether at the [UN] Human Rights Council, or in front of the UN General Assembly, or during the Goldstone Report, or after the flare-up involving the flotilla -- the truth of the matter is that the relationship has functioned very well.

"Deligitimization of Israel"? As what? A legitimate, certified tyranny? President Obama has not only drunk but regurgitated the deligitimization Kool-Aid. The other Rosenberg -- M.J. wrote about the concept in 2010 for the Los Angeles Times.

Suddenly, all the major pro-Israel organizations are anguishing about "delegitimization." Those who criticize Israeli policies are accused of trying to delegitimize Israel, which supposedly means denying Israel's right to exist.

The concept of delegitimization has been used as a weapon against Israel's critics at least as far back as 1975, when then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Daniel Patrick Moynihan accused the international body of delegitimizing Israel by passing a "Zionism is racism " resolution. That may have been the last time the term was used accurately.

After all …

Israel achieved its "legitimacy" when the United Nations recognized it 63 years ago. It has one of the strongest economies in the world. Its military is the most powerful in the region. … So why are the pro-Israel organizations talking about it? The answer is simple: They are trying to divert attention from the intensifying world opposition to the occupation of the West Bank and to the blockade of the Gaza Strip, both of which, by almost any standard, are illegitimate. They are trying to divert attention from the ever-expanding settlements, which are not only illegitimate but illegal under international law. They are trying to divert attention from the ever-louder calls for Israel to grant Palestinians equal rights.

In any event, the New York Times reported yesterday (March 6):

The global powers dealing with Iran’s  disputed nuclear program said Tuesday  that they had accepted its offer to resume negotiations broken off in stalemate more than a year ago — a  move that could help relieve increased pressure from Israel to use military  force against Tehran.

“I have offered to resume talks with Iran on the nuclear issue,” said Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s foreign policy chief,  who represents the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany as the contact on the nuclear issue with Iran. “We hope  that Iran will now enter into a sustained  process of constructive dialogue which will deliver real progress.”

Quoted for the article, Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council and author of A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama's Diplomacy with Iran, said.

"If the two sides fail to establish a process rather than just another meeting, the risk of war will rise significantly.”

In other words, if unsuccessful, talks with Iran could "delegitimize" diplomacy.

This week, there is a surging Republican chorus blaming President Obama for the rise in gas prices. To understand how absurd the finger pointing is, let’s for argument’s sake substitute the word gas with chocolate and imagine that the price of chocolate is going up. 

Sometimes called the “food of the gods,” chocolate comes from the “beans” – actually the seeds - of the cocoa pod. West African countries Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire produce about 70 percent of the world’s cocoa. However when you bite into a bar of chocolate, you can’t tell the origin of the cocoa beans that produced it. All you think about is how sweet, delicious and flavorful the chocolate is. In the same way that chocolate comes from the processing of cocoa, gas comes from the refining of crude oil. When you fill your vehicle’s gas tank, you can’t say that the gas originated from Nigeria as against Saudi Arabia. All you know is that the gas enables your car to run.

These similarities are pointed out to demonstrate that, as physically different as chocolate and gas may be, they are both commodity goods. A commodity has full or partial fungibility; that is, the market treats it as equivalent or nearly so no matter who produces it. Other examples are coffee, copper, and sugar. The most striking feature of all of these is that their price is largely influenced by world commodity markets and is dependent on factors such as global supply and demand, political instability, and the economies of producer countries. For example, if for one reason or another there were a massive cocoa crop failure in either Ghana or Côte d’Ivoire, there isn’t a single country in the world that could step in to replace the deficit, and chocolate prices would be sure to rise. Don’t for a moment imagine that the major chocolate producers like Mars are not concerned about such a scenario.  

In the same manner, manipulations by OPEC or the present worries about Iran can cause a rise in gas prices. President Obama is about as responsible for the price of gas as he is the price of chocolate. There is little or nothing he can do about either one. Crude oil prices affect gas prices, and neither the United States nor its President play a significant role these days in determining the price of crude oil. It is the height of deceit for Republicans to suggest that President Obama’s energy policies are “causing” the rise in gas prices. Think about that the next time you have a Hershey’s Kiss.

Kwei Quartey is a physician, novelist, and Foreign Policy in Focus columnist.

(Pictured: Libyans seeking refuge in Tunisia.)

Part one here.

Obama: The U.S. Is Bombing Libya But This Isn't War

The U.S. Congress's informal protest over Obama's sidestepping the War Powers Act concerning U.S. participation in the NATO bombing campaign in Libya included elements of the surreal. First, the president was charged with violating the law in what could be classified as an impeachable act; then in spite of this slap in the face, Congress, showing its more genuine colors, turned around and voted to approve the funding of the U.S. military action in Libya for the next year, suggesting that when all is said and done, the protest vote didn't amount to much.

The Obama Administration's response to the criticism was, if one thinks about it, something approaching pathetic. No, the Administration need not get congressional approval, the argument went, because the United States does not have troops 'on the ground' and without troops on the ground, the United States is not at war with Libya. It appears that Congress lamely accepted this logic.

Actually we do not know that the United States does not have troops on the ground. Are the Special Forces, whose mission is secret, involved? Are there U.S. military advisors there? But the bombing missions are not considered war. Al Qaeda did not have 'troops on the ground' when they sent hijacked civilian airliners careening into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, which Congress labeled an act of war.

Using the cover of humanitarian interventionalism, – it seems to play well in Peoria – the United States has launched deadly airstrikes against the Libyan military; provided military aid to the Libyan rebels; pressed sanctions against Libya, froze its assets and called for the overthrow of Khadaffi. According to the Obama Administration and the president himself, these acts do not constitute 'war', thus the War Powers Act does not apply.

Looks like war. Tastes like war. Smells like war, but if Obama says it's not war, I guess it just can't be war.

But what if the United States and/or its NATO allies bring the air war down to the ground, and introduce ground troops? If they are American, will Obama seek the authorization as required under the War Powers Act, or when the time comes, will he seek another 'out' from Congressional scrutiny? Out of the question? Sending U.S. ground troops to Libya is going beyond a line the Obama Administration will not cross?  Will what begins as humanitarian interventionalism morph into permanent U.S./NATO military bases in Libya?

German, Russian Press Worried the U.S./NATO Planning to Send Ground Troops to Libya

Articles are beginning to appear in German and Russian press suggesting that there might be plans afoot for NATO, through various means, to introduce ground troops in the fall into both Libya and Syria (Syrian situation will be treated in a forthcoming piece) to accelerate the overthrow of Khadaffi in Libya and to 'support the process of reform' in Syria.  Both U.S. and NATO spokespeople deny these claims as do a number of Middle East experts asked to comment. Given recent history (Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia), such denials should not be taken too seriously.

Still, the prospect of NATO ground troops in the Middle East cannot be written off so easily. Nor would it be especially surprising that the United States and its NATO allies would try to downplay or deny the allegations. The arguments against a more direct U.S. led military intervention are weighty enough. The U.S. is already overextended with its open military commitments in Afghanistan, Iraq; its less publicized activities in Yemen and Somalia. It cannot afford – either economically or politically –  to open another military front at this time, especially with an upcoming presidential election. Recent surveys suggest that here in the United States, people are tiring of U.S. foreign military intervention and their spiraling costs, rightly associating the money wasted on war with funds that could be better used here at home. True enough.

But there are counter arguments of what the United States could gain strategically from upping the ante and sending in ground troops to Libya. Those who write the possibility off as frivolous do so at their own risk. There are those within the Obama Administration who argue for a kind of Shock Doctrine approach to the current Arab Revolt, i.e., to use the current crisis in the Middle East and North Africa to ultimately reshape and strengthen the U.S. position in the region. The United States might have been caught unprepared for the uprising, but it is still possible to manage it and even for the U.S. to come out 'ahead' strategically. The signs that more direct military intervention is at least on the drawing board are growing and with them, increased alarm in the international press.

Deutsche Welle ran a piece on June 27, 2011, 'Rumors For U.S. Plans for Libya, Syria Cause Concern,' detailing the extent of the U.S. naval build up in the Eastern Mediterranean and enhanced activity at Fort Hood, Texas where military preparations are allegedly gathering steam. The article also notes the changing nature of the NATO involvement, more 'mission leap' than mission creep.' An article in the Russian press on June 29, 2011,  entitled 'Democracy By Order Of Washington,' doesn't give details but ends with a note of concern: “The next plan of the U.S is the redrawing of the maps of North Africa, the Middle and Near East. America is counting on the support of its most loyal allies.”

NATO's role has already morphed from securing a no-fly zone over Libyan air space – a somewhat defensive step to defend civilians – to the more offensive operations of targeting Khadaffi's forces, attempting to assassinate him by cruise missile attack and the introduction of French and British attack helicopters. The goal of the mission has also shifted from protecting civilians from attacks by pro-Khadaffi forces to regime change – a euphemism for overthrowing Khadaffi. But then once wars start, they tend to have their own merciless logic, don't they?

Not many more conceptual shifts are needed to defend the introduction of ground troops, especially if the military stalemate on the ground in Libya continues. The longer Khadaffi can hold out, the more sympathy he has been able to garner, especially in Africa and the Middle East, complicating the NATO mission and its humanitarian cover. At a certain point, NATO might feel mounting pressure to move towards sending ground troops to break the stalemate, of course, under the cover of an increasingly cynical 'humanitarian intervention' excuse.

Ground Troops or Not, Will NATO Set up an "Enduring" Military Base in Libya?

Tactically, it would be much simpler for the United States and NATO if the Libyan rebels can overthrow Khadaffi without NATO sending troops but it might not be possible. So while it might be possible for NATO to avoid sending ground troops, the notion that it simply won't happen or can't happen is becoming less and less tenable – the opinions of experts aside.  Whether Khadaffi is overthrown with or without sending NATO ground troops, the strategic implications of a 'post Khadaffi' Libya are beginning to come into focus.

Should Khadaffi's rule be overthrown one way or another, any rebel government would be exceedingly weak and could not rule without support and 'supervision' by its NATO 'allies'. The end game could, in many ways, resemble what has been played out in Iraq.

• For starters, there will be a much tighter control of Libyan oil and the profits thereof by Western oil companies. That has already started. In the areas it controls, the rebels are already selling oil to Western companies at rock bottom prices to pay for arms and supplies. Western hold over Libyan oil will tighten. OPEC will be weaker, etc.
• The likelihood of permanent NATO/US military presence – excuse me – 'enduring' military bases in Libya is a more than likely possibility regardless if ground troops are introduced or not. If NATO ground troops are introduced, there simply will be some pretext for them to stay, in the name of supporting the rebel government. There is the possibility that even if NATO ground troops are not necessary to overthrow Khadaffi the rebel government, almost certain to be shaky – will invite them in anyway as advisors in one capacity or another. Regardless the presence will be substantial.

Redrawing the Political Map of North Africa, Strategic Considerations

A NATO permanent military presence in Libya would in many ways be the beginning of redrawing the map of North Africa – as the Russian press piece cited above alleges. Such a presence would have a number of potentially profound consequences, among them:

• Within Libyan context it would prevent, at all costs, any move to re-instate Khadaffi or those close to him to power. Such a presence would go far to insuring a 'U.S.-friendly' government would be ruling Libya and its sizeable amounts of low sulphur oil for a long time into the foreseeable future
• The US and NATO would be in a position to monitor – if not manage – the Arab Revolt in its strongest manifestations – Tunisia and Egypt. Placed squarely between the two countries, a U.S. military presence in Libya could be easily mobilized to counter political developments Washington finds objectionable. This is not insignificant as, remember how, events that started in 'little Tunisia' exploded region wide and were for several month seemingly beyond U.S. influence
• On a broader scale, a NATO military presence in Libya becomes an important springboard for the alliance in Africa, a continent whose strategic mineral resources, oil and gas cannot be underestimated. Competition for these resources between Europe and the USA on the one hand, India and China on the other will only intensify in the years to come. It is noteworthy  (as mentioned in the first part of this series) that Khadaffi's Libya sells 60% of its oil to China, a situation certain to change should Khadaffi be removed
• There have been strong tensions inside NATO with the United States trying to internationalize security operations (under Washington's direction), with Afghanistan being a kind of test case for taking the alliance outside of Europe and making into a worldwide police force. Although NATO reps claim the contrary, within the coalition there has been strong reservations and opposition to being forced to fight in Afghanistan. A NATO military base in Libya (or military 'presence') would give the alliance another lease on life outside of Europe and draw the Europeans into shouldering some of the costs of U.S. security strategy in Europe.

A peace movement in the United States split over the U.S./NATO intervention in Libya only makes it more likely for Washington to implement its program.

Rob Prince is the publisher of the Colorado Progressive Jewish News.

Like many people, I expected little from Obama’s performance at AIPAC. He has to straddle parallel universes: the real one, in which most countries recognize Israel as tantamount to an international scofflaw, and the American domestic political universe in which Israel is always right. The US’s real allies and the rest of the world have long wearily resigned themselves to how, as with his speech at the State Department, the President has to pander to pro-Israeli organizations and the Congress members whose support he needs on domestic issues. 

Obama congratulated himself, deservedly, for continuing to raise unpalatable issues with elections in the air, and while pandering in a traditionally nauseous way, there was some reassurance from the sound of silence in his speech.

AIPAC’s conference is a mind-numbing experience. “My country right or wrong” is a rightly derided principle. But at AIPAC ten thousand people are assembled dedicated to the proposition that someone else’s country should be supported, right or wrong, even if it flouts every principle they support at home -- and even if its civil laws on marriage  and conversion deny the branches of Judaism to which most practicing American Jews adhere.

The organizations tend to be donor-driven rather than grass roots motivated. American Jews, true to their liberal roots, voted for Obama in higher proportions than any other ethnic group -- even as a raucous minority of the community questioned Obama’s citizenship and Christianity. That minority is disproportionately represented in the counsels of AIPAC and many of the “official” organizations and tends to Republican, Likudnik hawkishness.

But they also tend to think in slogans and catchphrases, without comparing them to reality, let alone with Robert Burns’s “giftie to see oursel’s as others see us.” They have been helped to remain in their parallel universe because presidents and secretaries of state have pandered (with the notable exception of James Baker) for decades to AIPAC -- and no one notices. As is customary, dogs are biting men.

The media attention to President Obama’s address is significant since for the first time in twenty years, there is visible crack showing between the White House and AIPAC -- and Israel. It is going too far to say that Obama is biting the dog -- but he is sinking his gums into the Lobby and Netanyahu. He is doing so to the background of an American Jewish community that is split more than ever before, and certainly more so than the “official” spokesmen and organizations reveal.

While admitting there are problems with a unity  Palestinian government, “We will continue to demand that Hamas accept the basic responsibilities of peace: recognizing Israel’s right to exist, rejecting violence, and adhering to all existing agreements,” Obama did not exclude negotiations, but in effect put conditions, which Hamas has, in reality, already gone a long way to meet and is on the way to go further.

One hopes that he realizes that the key phrases he used, such as the need to accept Israel’s “right to exist,” were introduced by Israeli leaders precisely because they were unacceptable to Palestinians. He might even have noticed how quickly Israel switched from refusing to negotiate because the authority was divided, to refusing because it is united! It is like demanding that American Indian tribes accept that their dispossession was right and goes beyond acceptance of the obvious fact of Israel’s existence and its now nearly universal acceptance as an established state. 

Such phrases have traditionally been used in the Levantine blame game in which the purpose of negotiations is not to reach a solution but to blame the other side for failure. But there is always a way to wiggle -- a phrase that would irk some Israelis would be for the Palestinians to recognize Israel’s “right to exist under UN Decisions!”

One hopes that the president is now playing this game with Netanyahu. One also hopes he harbors grudges. For the world’s most benefitted welfare queen to publicly dress down the president of its benefactor at the White House should give most Americans some frisson of indignation. 

While in the real world, Obama’s insistence on the 1967 boundaries as a basis for negotiation for land swaps has been generally accepted, Palestinians irate at this admitted denial of the “inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by force,” may have missed, along with nuance-free AIPACers, his endorsement of the Palestinian people’s “right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state,” which presumably implies that in return for giving up some of the settled area, the Palestinian state will have a land bridge between Gaza and the West Bank. One can see why he might not have chosen to spell that out for AIPAC!

While he stated a fact, “No vote at the United Nations will ever create an independent Palestinian state,” he did not state a principle. He said, “The United States will stand up against efforts to single Israel out at the UN or in any international forum. Because Israel’s legitimacy is not a matter for debate.” He did not say that the US would veto a UN acceptance of Palestine as a member state.

Indeed, he challenged the sloganeers with reality. “The number of Palestinians living west of the Jordan River is growing rapidly and fundamentally reshaping the demographic realities of both Israel and the Palestinian territories. This will make it harder and harder – without a peace deal – to maintain Israel as both a Jewish state and a democratic state.” Secondly he pointed to how atavistic the old obsession with territory as security is since “technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself in the absence of a genuine peace,” and finally, he pointed to the changes in Israel’s neighbours, so peace can no longer be bought with few local kleptocrats. “Going forward, millions of Arab citizens have to see that peace is possible for that peace to be sustained.”

If the US is retain influence in the region, it can no longer pay exclusive attention to Israeli public opinion while sending a few billion to local rulers. It, and Israel, have to show ordinary Arab citizens that they are serious about peace. Obama cannot regret the consequences to Palestinians of occupation while carrying on passing the ammunition to Israel.

It is unlikely that Netanyahu will voluntarily relinquish the not so secret Likud desire for an Arab-free state all the way to the Jordan. Obama has, perhaps deliberately and adroitly, maneuvered the Israeli Prime Minister into insulting the President of the US. He now has to follow up and show that there are consequences for Israel.

Obama balked at his best opportunity, which was the UN resolution on the settlements. He should stop equivocating and come out plainly with a declaration that if Netanyahu continues to refuse to come to terms with reality in the region, then he cannot take a US veto in the Security Council against Palestinian membership for granted nor even a nay vote in the General Assembly against a declaration of statehood. 

Ian Williams has written for newspapers and magazines around the world. He is currently writing a book on the Americans who blame the UN for all the US's ills. For more by Ian Williams visit Deadline Pundit.

Last week Barack Obama announced that he wants to cut $400 billion in military spending and said he would work with Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and the Joint Chiefs on a “fundamental review” of U.S. “military missions, capabilities and our role in a changing world” before making a decision. 

Spokesman Geoff Morrell responded by hinting that Gates was displeased with having to cut that much from his spending plan.  Gates “has been clear that further significant defense cuts cannot be accomplished without future cuts in force structure and military capability,” said Morrell, who volunteered that the Secretary not been informed about the Obama decision until the day before.  

But it is difficult to believe that open display of tension between Obama and Gates was not scripted. In the background of those moves is a larger political maneuver on which the two of them have been collaborating since last year in which they gave the Pentagon a huge increase in funding for the next decade and then started to take credit for small or nonexistent reductions from that increase.    

The original Obama-Gates base military spending plan – spending excluding the costs of the current wars – for FY 2011 through 2020, called for spending $5.8 trillion, or $580 billion annually, as former Pentagon official Lawrence Korb noted last January. That would have represented a 25 percent real increase over the average annual level of military spending, excluding war costs, by the George W. Bush administration.  

Even more dramatic, the Obama-Gates plan was 45 percent higher than the annual average of military spending level in the 1992-2001 decade, as reflected in official DOD data. 

The Obama FY 2012 budget submission reduced the total increase only slightly – by $162 billion over the four years from 2017 to 2020, according to the careful research of the Project on Defense Alternatives (PDA). That left an annual average base military spending level of $564 billion – 23 percent higher than Bush’s annual average and 40 percent above the level of the 1990s.

Central to last week’s chapter in the larger game was Obama’s assertion that Gates had already saved $400 billion in his administration. “Over the last two years,” he said, “Secretary Gates has courageously taken on wasteful spending, saving $400 billion in current and future spending. I believe we can do that again.”

The $400 billion figure is based primarily on the $330 billion Gates claimed he had saved by stopping, reducing or otherwise changing plans for 31 weapons programs. But contrary to the impression left by Obama, that figure does not reflect any cut in projected DOD spending. All of it was used to increase spending on operations and investment in the military budget. 

The figure was concocted, moreover, by using tricky accounting methods verging on chicanery. It was based on arbitrary assumptions about how much all 31 programs would have cost over their entire lifetimes stretching decades into the future, assuming they would all reach completion. That methodology offered endless possibilities for inflated claims of savings.

The PDA points out that yet another $100 billion that Gates announced in January as cost-cutting by the military services was also used to increase spending on operations and new weapons program that the services wanted. That leaves another $78 billion in cuts over five years also announced by Gates in January, but most of that may have been added to the military budget for “overseas contingency operations” rather than contributed to deficit reduction, according to the PDA. 

Even if the $400 billion in ostensible cuts that Obama is seeking were genuine, the Pentagon would be still be sitting on total projected increase of 14 percent above the profligate level of military spending of the Bush administration. Last week’s White House fact sheet on deficit reduction acknowledged that Obama has the “goal of holding the growth in base security spending below inflation.”   

The “fundamental review” that Obama says will be carried out with the Pentagon and military bureaucracies will be yet another chapter in this larger maneuver.  It’s safe bet that, in the end, Gates will reach into his bag of accounting tricks again for most of the desired total.

Despite the inherently deceptive character of Obama’s call for the review, it has a positive side: it gives critics of the national security state an opportunity to point out that such a review should be carried out by a panel of independent military budget analysts who have no financial stake in the outcome – unlike the officials of the national security state. 

Such an independent panel could come up with a list of all the military missions and capabilities that don’t make the American people more secure or even make them less secure, as well as those for which funding should be reduced substantially because of technological and other changes. It could also estimate how much overall projected military spending should be reduced, without regard to what would be acceptable to the Pentagon or a majority in Congress.  

The panel would not require White House or Congressional approval. It could be convened by a private organization or, better yet, by a group of concerned Members of Congress. They could use its data and conclusions as the basis for creating a legislative alternative to existing U.S. national security policy, perhaps in the form of a joint resolution. That would give millions of Americans who now feel that nothing can be done about endless U.S. wars and the national security state’s grip on budgetary resources something to rally behind.

Three convergent political forces are contributing to the eventual weakening of the national security state: the growing popular opposition to a failed war, public support for shifting spending priorities from the national security sector to the domestic economy and pressure for deficit and debt reduction. But in the absence of concerted citizen action, it could take several years to see decisive results. Seizing the opportunity for an independent review of military missions and spending would certainly speed up that process.