Tag Archives: foreign policy

Selling Out Ukraine

Posted on by
Reply

German Chancellor Angela Merkel met with Russian President Vladimir Putin a few days ago in the Russian city of Sochi, which is next door to Russia-partitioned Georgia and a short Black Sea hop from Russian-occupied Crimea and eastern Ukraine.  While the two talked of many things: of cease fires—and peace keepers—and pipelines—of Iran—and deals—and things—and why the region is boiling hot (they didn’t get to flying pigs), one thing they discussed jumped out at me.  Deutsche Welle cited Merkel as insisting that

…the Minsk accord was the “only basis” to achieve peace in eastern Ukraine….

The Minsk accord (Minsk Protocol) is a 2014 “agreement” among Ukraine, Russia, and a rebel gang calling themselves Donetsk People’s Republic that implemented a cease fire in Ukraine’s Donbass region, comprised of the oblasts Donetsk and Luhansk on Ukraine’s border with Russia.  The accord codified Russia’s occupation of those two oblasts and the resulting partition of Ukraine with the rebel gang fronting for Russia.  The accord carefully did not address Russian-occupied Crimea.

Merkel plainly has walked away from the much prior (1994) Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances.  This agreement consists of three included agreements that guarantee the territorial and political integrity of Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, and it was signed by the US, the UK—and Russia.  The core of the Budapest Memorandum consists of these six guarantees as they pertain to Ukraine:

  1. Respect Ukrainian independence, sovereignty, and the existing borders
  2. Refrain from the threat or use of force against Ukraine
  3. Refrain from using economic pressure on Ukraine in order to influence its politics
  4. Seek immediate UN Security Council action to provide assistance to Ukraine, “if [it] should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used”
  5. Refrain from the use of nuclear arms against Ukraine
  6. Consult with one another if questions arise regarding these commitments

This is Germany’s sellout of Ukraine.  We need to start correcting our own failure regarding the Budapest Memorandum.  I’ve written elsewhere of the need for a NATO-like mutual defense pact among the US, the Baltic States, Poland, and Ukraine, among others in eastern (and eventually northern) Europe.  It’s time to get a move on.

“Iran deal: The European Union’s ugly options”

Posted on by
Reply

That’s the headline of a Deutsche Welle piece regarding the impact on Europe of President Donald Trump’s withdrawal of the US from ex-President Barack Obama’s (D) Executive Agreement that sought to codify Iran’s “right” to obtain nuclear weapons, if Iran were to have only a little patience and wait until the Agreement’s blocks, such as they are, expire in a few years.

Then Ten Schultz, the author of the article, opened with this statement.

The United States’ withdrawal from the Iran deal, despite the personal pleadings of Europe’s most powerful politicians, has provided one more example that President Donald Trump has no hesitation in dismissing European interests and trans-Atlantic concerns.

Of course, it couldn’t possibly be the case that Europe’s most powerful politicians have no hesitation in dismissing American interests and trans-Atlantic concerns.  No, of course not: those worthies are lily-pure.

Schultz then touts his false choice:

…stand up to Trump in efforts to preserve the deal…or to acquiesce to whatever Washington wants, even if it means abandoning a UN-approved agreement they brokered and believe in.

Never mind that for 16 months Trump has been trying to get those most powerful politicians to negotiate to shore up the deal and fill its glaring gaps and that those worthies have steadfastly refused to negotiate.  It’s certainly true that French President Emmanuel Macron came to DC offered pretty words about wanting to satisfy three of Trump’s four pillars that would have done the shoring up.  It’s also true that German Chancellor Angela Merkel came to DC to insist personally that the US stay with the deal.  Macron had nothing, though, other than his pretty words.  He had no concrete proposals to offer—just that willingness to keep talking in lieu of acting.  Merkel didn’t even have that much.

The UN? That’s just a debating society for politicians with nothing else to do with their countries’ payroll money.  It’s certainly been unwilling to do anything serious about Iran’s threats—and lately outright attacks—against Israel, or about Iran’s missile attacks on Saudi Arabia via their client terrorists in Yemen (itself wracked by an Iranian-caused and supported civil war).

That debating society refuses, also, to deal with Iran’s active missile development program (for which the Yemen launches serve as excellent OT&E evaluations).  Keep in mind that, for all of Iran’s future nuclear weapons—they could build dozens of them—those bombs are useless without a means of delivering them to Iran’s targets.  Missiles are a central such means.  Oh, and this: the most powerful politicians’ UN also has barred Iran from doing missile development.  Those politicians are conveniently silent about that.

And never mind that Iran has never signed the Obama Agreement.

No, it’s all Trump’s fault.  It’s all America’s fault.

We had enough of that during Obama’s eight years.  It’s about time we regained our willingness to act unilaterally when our allies won’t even talk seriously with us about joint action.

The Irrationality of the European Left

Posted on by
Reply

It’s epitomized by a carefully unsigned piece in Spiegel Online, coming only from “Der Spiegel Staff.”  After you’ve read it, you’ll see why the author(s) were too embarrassed to sign their names to it.

…Trump’s Tuesday announcement that the US was withdrawing from the nuclear agreement with Iran, one of the core pieces of international diplomacy in recent years….

Indeed it was.  And it was one of the core pieces of failure in international diplomacy.  Even the authors’ term “nuclear agreement” gives the game away.  All the JCPOA accomplished was the codifying of Iran’s right and ability to obtain nuclear weapons—the “agreement” expires, after all, in a few short years; even were Iran abiding by it, after that expiration, they would be free to develop nuclear weapons with no further hindering from the international community.  But we can’t even know Iran is abiding, since the “agreement” bars inspections, particularly of military bases, which is where weapons development occurs.  The only inspections the “agreement” allows is of sites for which Iran will give permission, and then only after the inspectors say “pretty please” some months in advance.

Oh, and we paid Iran the princely sum of $140 billion—in cash—for the privilege of being snookered by them.  American money, too, keep in mind.  France, Germany, and Great Britain paid not a cent or a pence into that fund.

The risk [from our withdrawal] is very real that the move will worsen tensions in an already unstable Middle East and lead to an American-led war against Iran.

The instability is Iran’s doing, and no one else’s.  See their recent unprovoked Quds Force attack on Israeli installations.  See their use of their militias inside Iraq to keep that nation unstable.  See their funneling of money and weapons to their client terrorist organization, Hezbollah.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was quick to threaten a return to industrial-scale uranium enrichment and few doubt that such an eventuality could lead to conflict.

We don’t know that Iran isn’t already enriching apace.  See “inspections” above.

An attack on the Iran deal is an attack on the pride of European foreign policy.

This is risible.  If Europe feels like its foreign policy is under attack, it’s only their hysteria getting in the way of their thinking.  They’re united in their insistence, in the present case, on staying in the Iran nuclear weapons deal—the anonymous authors of the piece at the link brag about that.

She [EU High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini] then appealed to Iran to continue to adhere to the deal. “Stay true to your commitments, as we will stay true to ours.”

This ignores a basic fact: Iran isn’t in the deal, and it has made no commitments regarding the deal.  Iran has not signed the JCPOA.

Trump has humiliated Europe to a greater degree than any US president before him. Macron fawned over him recently in the White House, Merkel swung by for a working lunch and British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson also made the trip across the Atlantic in an attempt to save the deal and somehow find some kind of a compromise.

Humiliated?  Because our government, after listening very carefully to these leaders, decided no to do what they instructed him to do or asked him to do?  This is precious snowflakery at its best.

In Aachen on Tuesday, Merkel essentially repeated the sentences she uttered last year during an appearance in Bavaria: “Europe can no longer rely on the US. It must take its fate into its own hands.”

Here is Merkel joining Mogherini in foolishness.  Europe has been freeloading off the US ever since its economic and political recovery from the ravages of Europe’s roll in the wars of the mid-20th century.  Ever since that time, Europe has been at least morally obligated to see to its own fate, and they’ve been shirking their duty.

The anonymous piece goes on in that vein, but you get the idea.

Europe must, indeed, see to its own future in accordance with its own imperatives.  We’re happy to help them, and we’re happy to contribute to the political, economic, and military defense of Europe.  But that’s not helped by, for instance, Germany’s toadying up to Putin in their snit over our withdrawal from a dangerously bad “deal.”

Dismantling?

Posted on by
Reply

Northern Korea has announced that it will dismantle “its nuclear test site” sometime between 23 and 25 May.  It’s one of several sites, though, not its only one.

Still, it’s a hopeful move, to be sure.

On the other hand, it also could be a disingenuous con job.  Northern Korea has lied before about dismantling its nuclear facilities; it also has dismantled and then rebuilt nuclear facilities.  In the present case, the facility Baby Kim is purporting to dismantle is the same site that People’s Republic of China researchers have indicated is already ruined by earthquakes and collapses from northern Korea’s latest nuclear bomb test.  That test generated an explosion far greater than the mountain under which the test occurred could handle.

We’ll see.

The JCPOA, Trump, Europe, and Progressive-Democrats

Posted on by
Reply

Most of you are aware that President Donald Trump has taken the steps required to withdraw from the Obama-Kerry-engineered arrangement whereby Iran would be delayed—maybe—from getting nuclear weapons instead of getting them sooner.  Among those steps are a 90-day window within which several existing business arrangements can be wound down before a set of sanctions gets reinstated and a 180-day window within which the rest of the business arrangements can be wound down before another, more stringent, set of sanctions gets reinstated, or added.

Now we have the European signatories, Great Britain, Germany, and France decrying the withdrawal and insisting that we should have stayed in the thing.  Never mind the evident weaknesses in the JCPOA (including in particular an inability to inspect thoroughly and on a no-notice basis, so we have no way of confirming that Iran is complying at all) and the additional factors of concern—that Iran is actively pursuing a missile delivery system for its nuclear weapons, actively funding its client terrorist entities around the Middle East, and directly fomenting unrest and open rebellion around the Middle East.

We should have been willing to renegotiate rather than withdraw.  This is disingenuous.  Great Britain, Germany, and France have had the 16 months since Trump’s inauguration to renegotiate; they’ve refuse to do so.  Even French President Emmanuel Macron, who claimed to be willing to renegotiate, turned out to be only talking; he made no concrete proposals.  Never mind that Iran has said it will not renegotiate.

Meanwhile, Great Britain, France, and Germany are conducting their separate negotiations with Iran.

Now we also have Progressive-Democrats decrying the withdrawal and insisting that the Trump administration should use those windows to conduct negotiations (with the Progressive-Democrats, too) with a view to improve the JCPOA and plug its weaknesses and address those additional factors of concern.  Never mind that Iran has said it will not renegotiate.

Never mind, either, that the Progressive-Democrats have already had those same 16 months in which to renegotiate, and they’ve refused to do so.  All these worthies have been willing to do is insist that the JCPOA be kept intact, until very lately—and even lately, on claiming that the thing’s weaknesses could be plugged, they’ve declined to offer any solutions, only to make demands to…talk.

Trump took a lot of heat for not acting immediately on his inauguration to keep his campaign promise to withdraw from the JCPOA.  Instead, he gave our European partners and our Progressive-Democrats those 16 months to negotiate and arrive at a better arrangement vis-à-vis Iran’s nuclear weapons programs and its serial and concurrent misbehaviors.  They refused.

It’s no wonder that the United States had to act unilaterally, and that this administration has had to act in the face of active Progressive-Democrat obstruction.