Leading the mendacity list today is the sermon on radio marking the end of Ramadan given by Iran's Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Khamenei. In his view the US knows perfectly well that it is lying when it alleges the mullahocracy is pursuing nuclear weapons. As is customary in such matters, the ayatollah hid behind the scrim of Islamic religious tenets, averring that possession of nukes would contravene the word of the Prophet. Of course, Khamenei conveniently ignored the Approved By Islam doctrine of lying to protect believers and the belief from infidel inflicted harm.
The ayatollah did hint at some possible slackening in the persecution of anti-Ahmedinejad demonstrators, but his support for the Master Of Mendacity did not relax in the slightest. The "re-elected" Orator-in-Chief holds a tie for Blatant Lie of the Week with his well-rehearsed denial of the Holocaust as a "myth" and a fiction created by the West in order to foist the "Zionist Entity" on the Arab Mideast. The Ahmedinejad version of history was so blatantly false that even the European Union--not noted for its unquestioning support of Israel--joined the US, the UK, and even the original home of the pogrom, Russia, in denouncing it. The Swedish president of the EU did the job even though his native country has had problems over anti-Semitic publications based on falsehoods recently.
Muslims--Islamist jihadists, to err on the side of accuracy--also head the list in the hypocrisy department albeit indirectly. The venue is the geographic expression dubbed "Somalia," but the hypocrites are not the al-Shabaab gun slingers and suicide bombers. Not this time. This time the Hypocrite of the Week Award goes to the UN and the African Union.
The reason for the award is simply the title given the personnel sent to Somalia under the rubric of African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM.) These unfortunate souls are termed "peacekeepers." Given that there is no peace to keep in the bloody sands of Somalia, the term is singularly inapposite. Calling the troops from Uganda and Burundi "targets" or "bomb catchers" would be accurate, but the name "peacekeeper" is as wrong as calling a T-bone steak a watermelon.
Of course it is equally hypocritical to call the the UN created Transitional Federal Government in Somalia a "government." A body appointed by foreigners which controls only a small section of the "capital" and a slice of two of nearby desert is scarcely a government. It may be a convenient fiction of the "international community" or even a government-in-waiting, but it is certainly not a functioning entity exercising sovereign control of a territory and a people.
The recent al-Shabaab suicide bombing of an AMISOM base using purloined UN vehicles should give the word to both the UN and the AU. The US and other parties which have played a role in Somalia had best heed the word as well.
The word is simple. Accept that al-Shabaab exercises de facto control and stop the fiction of the Transitional Federal Government or go for the alternative. The alternative is one that no state, let alone supra-national bodies, wish to consider. The alternative is to go into Somalia in force and destroy al-Shabaab. Go into Somalia in force and impose peace. Only then can the peace be kept.
The third option, the option currently being pursued by the outsiders is to hope that the TFG can be kept in some twilight existence long enough that foreign trainers and foreign supplies might pump life into a new Somalian national force capable of suppressing al-Shabaab and other Islamist jihadist groups. So far the third option has shown little probability of ultimate success, but at least it limits non-Somali casualties.
Naivety blooms in the Obama administration's proposed Security Council resolution on nuclear non-proliferation. It demonstrates a touching faith in the efficacy of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), related conventions, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to prevent states from joining the ever-expanding Nuclear Club. More, the draft resolution, which will be on the table when President Obama chairs the Security Council meeting during his star turn at the Tower of Babel By The Hudson, exhibits an overly great faith in the willingness of states to renounce their own economic and political interests by enforcing provisions of the new expansion of the NPT.
For example, should Iran either be found in violation of any of the provisions of the NPT, or should it withdraw from the NPT, Russia would be required to remove the nuclear reactor and other equipment sold to Iran prior to the declaration of violation or the country's withdrawal from the treaty. The same would be required of other countries whose businesses sold single or dual use equipment employed by Iran in any of its nuclear activities--even those arguably permitted by the NPT.
That will happen on the same day the Geek looks out and sees a whale majestically flying with the hawks over the canyon outside his windows. Can we say, "Naive?"
In principle the draft resolution is fine. It looks good on paper. It reads better than most UNSC gibberish. But...
It is as Bismarck famously quipped, "a piece of paper." A treaty to be observed as long as necessary and ignored whenever convenient--provided ignoring can be done without undue penalty.
Iran has shown a fine ability to ignore assorted Security Council and other pieces of paper without inordinate consequences. It will be able to do so as long as enforcement of agreements relies upon the collective action of nations each of which follows the dictates of its own self-defined national and strategic interests.
If Iran is run by a government which is rational no matter how radical its rhetoric and some of its actions might be, there is no great additional danger presented to either the region or the world by its joining the Nuclear Club. Pakistan has done so without any great perturbation of either regional or global political order.
Sure, the existence of weapons grade fissile materials in Pakistan gives rise to legitimate anxiety regarding its security from the grasping fingers of Islamist jihadist groups. The same would be true in the case of Iran. However, that threat is far more manageable than would be the aftermath of attacks on the Iranian nuclear complex and related targets.
In any event the draft resolution which President Obama will present is no particular threat--as long as no one actually believes it will have any real world impact. The problem comes in that diplomats tend to think that what they do in the shuffling, presenting, and voting on pieces of paper has a real world effect. They are so invested in the process of diplomacy, of achieving some sort of result on paper, that they overlook the actual outcome of the process and its effects on the behavior of states in the real world of power politics.
The otherworldliness of diplomats has its place. As long as your life does not depend on it.
Comes now the subject of ideological blindness. The cause of ideological astigmatism this time is the Obama administration's cancelling of the land-based ABM system in Central Europe. There has been an outpouring of opposition to this. Most of it is misplaced in its basis.
While the cancellation may be questioned as to its diplomatic import on US relations with the countries on Russia's western frontier, it is not, in and of itself, a capitulation to Russian demands. Nor have have the Russians seen it this way as is illustrated by their modest response to it--the decision not to deploy Iskander missiles on the Polish border.
The original decision by the Bush/Cheney administration to deploy the land-based system was itself faulty on several levels. The first was the length of time necessary to reach initial operational capability (IOC). The second was simply that the system was inherently inflexible. The third was the effect it had on Russian paranoia.
The proposed replacement is technologically superior, takes less time to reach IOC, and has built in flexibility. Being sea-based it takes advantage of American superiority in maritime technology and the inherent flexibility that using the sea confers. Tactically, the use of sea-based systems provides a capacity for defending the defense which is absent in fixed base systems. Politically, the use of the sea avoids the unpleasant necessity to rely upon and periodically stroke the governments of host countries.
Far from weakening the American capacity to credibly defend Europe, the Mideast, and, eventually, the CONUS itself, the dropping of the Central European option in favor of a maritime one strengthens it. At the same time, going back to sea eliminates the factor of political winds from disturbing defense systems--a not inconsiderable factor given the potential for radical political change which is resident in many of the Central European states.
Paradoxically, considering the charges of abject surrender to the Russians, the beefing up of naval ABM capacities has the extra effect of providing additional defensive capabilities against a Russian short- or mid-range missile attack on either Europe or the Mideast. As the maritime systems evolve in the next few years, it may even provide an additional complication for any Russian planner contemplating an attack on the US.
Reflexive accusations of "surrender," of "weakening" the US come easy to those who automatically oppose any initiative offered by the Obama administration. Considering all of the really, really bad ideas which have issued from the current administration in the foreign policy realm, it is easy to see how attractive automatic opposition may be. In this case it is not--except as regards the impact on the diplomatic center of gravity as seen from Central Europe.
There have been many other examples of hypocrisy, mendacity, naivety, and ideological blindness this past week or so. The above have been only the cream of the slime on the top of the pond.
More than that the Geek could not take. He is a sensitive soul.
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