Obama Does Not Need A New "Machiavelli"

In an opinion piece today in the WaPo David Ignatius suggests that Mr Obama needs a new (and, presumably, improved) version of Machiavelli. By this he means a post-modern form of Henry Kissinger or Zbigniew Brzezinski. Ignatius lauds both men for their creative duplicity and use of back channels which contradicted completely whatever was being done on the front channel.

While he admits that both men had their failures, Mr Ignatius is convinced that their use of free form approaches to diplomacy points the direction which the Obama administration needs to take. The emphasis on form which constitutes the subtext of the Ignatius view of what diplomacy is all about is, to put it mildly, wrongheaded. It places the cart anterior to the propulsive mechanism.

Mr Ignatius' analysis and recommendation also ignores the fundamental differences which existed between the presidents served by Dr Kissinger and Dr Brzezinski. Richard Nixon for all his faults did have a sound grasp of the realpolitik requirements of foreign relations. Jimmy Carter was so divorced from the gritty, down and dirty nature of foreign affairs that it scarcely mattered what Brzezinski did or how he did it.

Both Presidents Nixon and Carter were substantially different from Barack Obama. The Nice Young Man of the People From Chicago has neither Nixon's experience based grasp of foreign relations nor the ex-Georgia governor's mixture of morality and detachment from reality. Mr Obama has a concept of proper conduct of foreign affairs, believes that he has a complete understanding of what needs to be done and how to do it, and is devoid of any genuine comprehension of how international politics really works.

Mr Obama is wedded to the exceptional idea that the proper conduct of foreign relations depends upon pretending that all countries are created equal as regards their understanding of and commitment to the "rights and responsibilities" of a state operating as a member of the "international community." He subscribes as well to the idiosyncratic notion that all governments share an identical calculus of rationality. Beyond this he is convinced that nationalism, like the nation-state, is obsolescent at best, obsolete at worst. Finally, he is of the view that diplomacy is divorced completely from armed force.

In all these beliefs, Mr Obama is as wrong as a dog meowing.

The only positive assessment which might be made of Mr Obama's foreign policy theology is that of consistency. His intellectual (the term is used generically only) architecture of foreign policy is totally organic in its emergence from the president's post-modern, post-nationalist, multi-cultural, blame-America-first, "progressive" political perspective. The "progressive" basis of his world view is of a piece with his understanding of foreign policy and diplomacy.

But, to belabor the self-evident, mere consistency does not raise the Obama understanding of foreign relations from the bottomless pit of error in which it resides.

No Kissinger, no Brzezinski, no Machiavelli could help Mr Obama. Nor could any arrest the rapid loss of American influence and restore the US to its accustomed place of global leadership.

No diplomatic genius can ride to the rescue of Mr Obama and the US. The only source of rescue for Mr Obama--and the US--is Barack Obama. If and only if Mr Obama comes to the realization that his notion of the World According To Barack is wrong can their be even the slightest hope for improvement.

That this miraculous rescue is not likely to happen is apparent from the unpleasant fact that Mr Obama is laboring under the burden of anosognosia. Originally a purely medical term, the word now describes a condition in which a person is not only ignorant of something, (usually a matter of grave importance or centrality to the person) but, additionally, is ignorant of his ignorance. He knows not, and, worse, knows not that he knows not.

Mr Obama has demonstrated in fashions both deep and recurrent that he has no knowledge, no clue as to the way international politics works. His seemingly deliberate prolongation of self-induced ignorance gives rise to the suspicion that he still has no idea that he has no idea. Not knowing what is wrong, he cannot and has made no effort at remediation.

The amount of knowledge that Mr Obama needs to have in his onboard storage is not vast. It is, however, critical.

To cease being Clueless In The Oval and thus adrift at the policy level, Mr Obama needs to know a couple of simple--but to someone of his personal predilections, prejudices, and True Beliefs, quite unpleasant--facts. Here they are in a semi-bullet form.

-----States are not people, not individuals for whom hopes, fears, loves, and hates are palpable drivers of action. States are amoral collective entities for which interests are supreme. Typically, the height of a state's ethics is a not particularly narrow notion of what's-in-it-for-us?

-----Relations between states are predicated upon coinciding national interests. All diplomacy consists of either identifying and expanding upon coinciding national interests or, in the alternative, employing coercion such as to create a simulacrum of coincidence.

-----It follows that all diplomacy consists of either (1) the vanilla sort, the variety which emphasizes coinciding interests and expands/deepens these over time--the diplomacy which leads to the Obama decried "special relationship," or (2) the chocolate sort, the variety which relies upon coercion to establish a climate such that one's interlocutor modifies his policies and behavior to meet one's requirements.

-----All coercive diplomacy ultimately rests upon the credible capacity and political will to use force, military force. No lesser form of coercion has any effect absent the clear capability and will to use armed force in support of diplomatic objectives and foreign policy requisites.

-----The foreign policy of a Great Power (which the US still is seen to be despite recent attempts to resign that status) must be consistent. It must be consistent over time as a Great Power must be seen as predictable and reliable. And, there must be consistency between declaratory policy (words, including even the most expendable sort of remark by a president or secretary of state) and actions.

-----In a democracy the foreign policy of an administration must be congruent with the will of We the People. It must comport itself well with the expectations, values, and fears of the politically articulate public generally and not simply a subset of that public, the self-appointed "elite" of media, politics, academia, and business.

-----It follows from the two foregoing items that while a change of policy is acceptable, sometimes even necessary, it must be undertaken with deliberate speed and not as a bolt-from-the-blue tectonic shift.

-----Foreign policy must be characterized by consistency, patience, clear goals, definite lines drawn not on shifting sands but upon immovable granite. Further, policy must be explained fully and accurately not only to foreign audiences but to We the People. This is even more critical when changes in policy, even slight shifts in nuance, are contemplated.

-----There is no such thing as an isolated event in foreign policy. The threads of the foreign relations tapestry are so interconnected that a tug on one will result, intentionally or otherwise, in a tug on all.

There it is. All the president needs to know about foreign relations and diplomacy. It isn't hard to grasp fully and effectively. Anyone, not simply a Machiavelli or a Kissinger can get the concepts and use them effectively.

The pity and tragedy is that Mr Obama does not know yet that he does not know any of these simple, but central principles. And, he shows no realistic probability of waking up, smelling the coffee, and getting a grip on Foreign Policy For Dummies.

When Does It Get To Freezing In Israel?

At least one report of the Israeli government having agreed to a temporary, total freeze on new construction in the "settlements" on the West Bank as a "confidence building" measure is bumping the Obama administration's joyometer up. As is so often the case with Israeli government promises to end or reduce or limit or stabilize or naturally grow the "settlements," there is less than meets the eyes of the NYT.

In a move worthy of a world-class prestidigitator, the Government of Israel (GOI) waves its right hand while deftly shoving a rabbit into the hat with the left. Presto! One "illegal" so-called "outpost" constructed by nationalist Israelis is gone. And, shazaam! fifty new homes are approved for the displaced families. The new subdivision has been approved by the GOI's Defense Ministry for inclusion in a "settlement" near Jerusalem.

At the same time, almost to the minute, GOI announced it is expropriating some land near the Dead Sea. To read GOI's version of the land in question, all fifty-four square miles is somewhat less desirable real estate than some crater on the backside of the moon.

The Arabs don't see it that way.

As if it were stop-the-presses-I've-got-a-remake-of-page-one-for-the-bulldog level news, the Arabs resident in the affected region are hacked off. Royally. But, the GOI crooned in response that those who are annoyed by this latest bit of thaumaturgy have forty-five days in which to appeal the adverse impact upon them.

Put together the three related developments put a thumb in the Obama administration's eye. It shouldn't though. Not if the administration had the slightest bit of historical sense.

The real deal is simple and easily seen on the great videotape of history. Israel and its government, not just this government, but any of the many governments going all the way back to the thirty years of Labor Party domination has had no, repeat, absolutely no interest in losing the land of the West Bank. One ministry after another has firmly rejected any commitment to exchanging land for peace where the West Bank has been concerned.

All the way back during the international war phase of the two stage Israeli War of Independence, the government and many citizens of Israel wanted the West Bank and the Old City of Jerusalem (or East Jerusalem, if you prefer the alternate denomination) so bad they could taste it. When King Hussein made the major blunder of joining the other "confrontation states" in the Six Day War of June 1967, Israel satisfied its long standing desire for the land--and the Old City.

As the Israeli government well knew from its never-ending "secret" meetings with Jordan's King Hussein, the monarch was willing to break ranks with the Arab states generally and sign a separate peace with Israel in exchange for the lost territory of the West Bank and the Old City with its Number Three In The World Muslim holy site. From Golda Meir on each and every Israeli prime minister said, "No!"

Even when King Hussein sweetened the deal by allowing some border changes to acknowledge the new "facts on the ground" created by the GOI's "settlement" plan as well as allowing IDF outposts in the West Bank, the Israeli's remained totally rejectionist. GOI's intransigence in large measure depended upon the continued support of the US.

The Nixon and Ford administrations, which contained Henry Kissinger as National Security Advisor and later SecState, backstopped the Israeli position with vigor and determination. In the wake of the Yom Kippur War of 1973, Henry Kissinger redoubled his efforts to assure that the West Bank would stay under Israeli occupation. Declassified documents detail how Kissinger cozened, manipulated, and flatly lied to King Hussein in order to separate the sticky subject of the West Bank from the matter he really wanted to address.

Peace with Egypt. Kissinger wanted to pull off the "deal of the decade" by gaining a trade of land for peace between Israel and Egypt. In this ambition he was joined by Anwar Sadat, who had scant regard for either the Arabs of the West Bank or Jordan and an offsetting great regard for himself.

In the conduct of the Yom Kippur War Sadat had lied to his cobelligerent, Assad of Syria, as well as King Hussein. Then, after the Egyptian army reclaimed its testicles in the first few hours of the attack across the Suez Canal, Sadat was more than willing to do what was necessary to extract Egypt from its Soviet mentors, sign a deal with Israel, and scarf up American money.

The deal went down and peace was made. The losers were the Arabs of the West Bank and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

Life for the West Bankers and Jordan did not improve any with the coming of President Carter and his Camp David Accords. Intentionally, Jordan was excluded so that glittering generalities could be made about the West Bank without any necessity of actually doing anything. Both Israel and Egypt were happy with the West Bank status quo albeit for different reasons.

And so it went year after year. No GOI had any interest of seeing the West Bank effectively removed from Israeli domination even should physical occupation come to an end. Certainly no GOI contemplated the most remote possibility of the "settlements" either being abandoned or their expansion materially decreased. Indeed, no GOI would have politically survived any move in that direction.

Trading Sinai for peace was one thing. Trading the West Bank was and is something quite different. Bear in mind that it took thirty or so years for Israel to finally agree that a pure Arab city such as Jericho should be under non-Israeli rule. The notion was first discussed by King Hussein and his Israeli interlocutors in the wake of the Six Day War but the reality did not come to pass until a new century dawned.

The Obama administration is now finding out what the Carter administration did in the days after the shake-and-grin over Camp David. GOI is long on promising--or seeming to promise--an end to the "settlement" plan and very, very short on delivering these commitments. Jimmy Carter went ballistic when he discovered that GOI had flat out lied about the "settlements." The American president thought he had a guarantee of a permanent halt. GOI said it had never intended more than a short term hiatus "for confidence building" with the Arabs.

So, there you have it, Mr President, short and not at all sweet. If you go to the videotape you can see the entire drama of deceit, duplicity, ambition, greed and politics, Israeli style. You can also see the key players who lurk on the edge of the camera's view, the Israel Lobby, the Congressmen and Senators seeking election and the money that takes, the media misleaders, all the motley crew which serves to condition and limit American foreign policy and constrain the means by which it may be conducted.

It's all there, Mr President. There is no need for you to be surprised or see yourself as President Carter did, a victim of world-class hornswagglers. Yeah, land for peace sounds so fine. Too bad it's not going to happen soon--or perhaps, ever.