I see that Pat Lang is about as perplexed by our foreign policy in the Middle East as I am:
In pursuit of our new/old post modern goals we have spread havoc across the world while fostering the revolutionary change that we imagine all mankind eagerly awaits.
– Russia/Ukraine. The NED and the doyenne of neocon missionary work have actively sought regime change in Ukraine and Russia and have not felt the need to disguise their intentions. Can we doubt that POTUS is an active backer of this policy? If he were not, then Nuland would be returned to hanging out with her husband at one or another of their lobbies or think tanks.
– Tunisia, place of martyrdom of the poor green grocer man, the western style democracy sought there hangs by a thread.
– Egypt, sanctified by the hysteria of the mob and western press; that went well did it not? Now Sisi, who owes Saudi Arabia and the other Gulfies a lot, makes menacing noises about intervention in Yemen. Has the Egyptian Army forgotten what happened to them in Yemen fifty years ago? Nasser called it his” Vietnam.”
– Libya, I thought that one was a good idea. I was wrong.
He continues in that vein. Just to refresh your memory, Col. Lang is a former Green Beret, the first ever instructor in Arabic at West Point, and has extensive knowledge of the Middle East, particularly Yemen. I suspect his post was prodded by the goings-on in Yemen now and our role in them.
Col. Lang had me at these opening paragraphs:
We are often told (by Barack Obama among others) that our ancestors sought a “more perfect union” in the creation of the United States. The implication is that they sought a worldly and more or less secular utopia. They did not. The contemporary meaning in those words from the constitution of the United States was that the framers sought a more efficient and effective government than that which had existed under the Articles of Confederation. The framers were solely concerned with the practicalities of government in their new country. The “more perfect union” phrase is one of a number of goals listed and is clearly not intended as the governing theme of the Constitution.
Having chosen to misunderstand the preamble to the constitution, and therefore the “purpose” of America, much of our ruling class now profess to believe that it is the purpose of the country to “reform” our society to their taste and to inflict the same norms on the rest of the world. To that end it is held to be more or less self-evident that ancient motivations for international policy are at an end and that all, all of mankind should re-organize itself to our taste.
That’s about the best description I’ve seen of the problems with the ideology of today’s Democrats along with some of the Neocons on the right in recent years.
Interesting CStanley, that is where I stopped reading. He falsely attributes something to his opponents in order to knock it down. Obama used the phrase in a race speech to recognize the unfinished work of ending slavery and its consequences. I’ve never heard Obama or anybody else use the phrase outside of the race issue or in anyway that resembles what Lang writes. It’s like he’s gone full George Will.
I think I read with a different filter than y’all. I tend to read the whole thing and separate the wheat from the chaff as I go. Although my eyes tend to glaze whenever I read the words “the Left” or “the Right” (and worse when I read the words “Marxists”) or when somebody is complaining about how awful the Republicans or Democrats or whoever are I tune back in again when they get to the meat of whatever it is they’re saying.
I respect Pat for his battlescars and for his area knowledge. Otherwise he’s a pretty classic Jacksonian and a paleocon. As a Jacksonian he has a strong sense of honor and no regard whatever for those who do not share that sense of honor.
What can I say, I am easily distracted.
And yes I doubt very much Obama is actively pursuing regime change in Russia. The weak point of conspiracy-mongering is the interpretation of all events as being the intended consequence of concerted action.
My own view of the Obama foreign policy is that the president is an ideologue who relies very heavily on himself and doesn’t have the background of information necessary to arrive at informed judgments about other countries. How in the world could anyone have ever expected the Russians to react any way other than the way in which they have to an anti-Russian regime in Kiev?
I also think the president has far too much confidence in what the Europeans are telling him but that’s a different subject.
I see your point, PD- but I’m not as inclined to think that the Obama he describes is made of straw. I don’t know if there are other instances of the use of that phrase, but it is about the ideology (with evidence in actions), not that one turn of phrase. Maybe you don’t think he proved his point but it rang true for me.
Lang doesn’t like Abraham Lincoln, who also thought the phrase “more perfect union” was a key to understanding the Constitution. Frankly, Lang has many different assumptions about things that I don’t share and I find him a chore to read. I think I’m in the vast minority here on that one.
For example, how is Obama’s internationalism that different from the last several Presidents? How is saying that Assad must go different from calling for Qadafi’s removal? Americans have long thought we had a good set-up here, and we’ve tended to incorporate that value in our foreign policy. I’m not saying that international idealism has been our dominant policy to the exclusion of all else, but Obama didn’t invent it.
At least as far as Russia goes, it was Obama who was criticized for trying to work with Russia. For saying it would be easier to work with them after his election. We have gotten Russian cooperation on the Iran negotiations and sanctions, so I don’t think we are out to unseat Putin per se. We may have provided some verbal (email?) support for some of what has happened in Ukraine, but I don’t think we should flatter ourselves into thinking they did everything to please us. I think most of what has gone on is secondary to their own internal politics. I don’t think Nuland has been dictating their policy.
That said, I can’t figure out why Obama keeps the neocon’s neocon in place in his admin. Inasmuch as Nuland has played a role, it has been negative AFAICT. It certainly lends weight to Lang’s complaints about Obama. Of course if we put the GOP back in the executive branch, they will all be Nulands so there is not much hope for change.
I alos don’t think we had that much to do with the regime change in Egypt. Surely Pat doesn’t think that we call the shots there. The Egyptian military runs things.
Steve
At least Lang admitted wrong in supporting the Libyan destruction; it’s more than Juan Cole ever did.
PD,
“For example, how is Obama’s internationalism that different from the last several Presidents?”
If you think Lang is hard on Obama, you should go back into his archives and read what he had to say about the Bush administration.
While I can see where you are coming from in your criticism, I tend to look at the big picture behind the rhetorical flourishes – that is probably because I’ve been reading him for many years. Lang’s description is about the foreign policy establishment more generally which is dominated by the neocons and R2P adherents, most of whom are academics or beltway insiders with little experience outside the US and Europe. Lang often writes about the “international relations” disease afflicting Washington and the defenestration of people with real regional knowledge and experience, like him.
Dave,
“My own view of the Obama foreign policy is that the president is an ideologue who relies very heavily on himself and doesn’t have the background of information necessary to arrive at informed judgments about other countries.”
One criticism of President leveled by many insiders (including Gates, Clinton and, IIRC, Panetta) is that he relies too heavily on his NSS which is composed primarily of young academics (what Lang derisively calls the “children’s brigade”). From what I remember of Gate’s memoir, the NSS was primarily concerned about putting the President “on the right side of history” in FP decisions and that drove him to overrule his senior cabinet officials on a few occasions.
steve,
“I alos don’t think we had that much to do with the regime change in Egypt. Surely Pat doesn’t think that we call the shots there. The Egyptian military runs things.”
Well, Lang understands that the military is the political arbiter in Egypt, but he would disagree with you that we didn’t have much to do with “regime change” in Egypt and our “assistance” afterward. I’ve pointed to them before, but there is ample evidence the administration was an active player in forcing Mubarak out. The President called Mubarak and told him he had to go and then publicly said the same thing. Do you think that the arbiters of Egyptian politics heard that message? Coincidentally, a few days later he was gone. The private and public withdrawal of political support, tied with concrete demands to step aside, are not passive actions by a player with no influence. In addition to the news reports and public announcements, there are more details in the memoirs by Gates and Clinton. While they saw Mubarak’s fall from power as inevitable, they advocated for a longer transition to promote stability and allow time for political groups (besides the MB) to prepare for elections. They were overruled by the President on the advice of his NSS and Mubarak was out within days.
Also, read Lang’s archives on Egypt over the last 5 years – his analysis was almost completely accurate. He said back at the beginning that Egypt would end up with a military strong man and that the MB would live in prison. He knew the administration’s support for elections and then the Mursi government would fail and come back to bite us in the ass and he was right.
Finally, with respect to regime change in Russia, consider this. Yes, from our viewpoint we don’t want, for instance, in a coup in Russia or the kind of “regime change” that we’ve come to associate with that term. However, US policy is perceived differently by others, particularly Russians, who believe the US is trying to weaken Russia, box it in and remove it’s historic sphere of influence, and get rid of Putin in favor of a more naive and compliant leader like Yeltsin.
Hmm, then why don’t we just call up Putin and ask him to leave? I kind of think Obama doesn’t like Netanyahu, so why not ask him to leave? More seriously, I am not saying we had zero influence, but if the army had really wanted Mubarak to stay, he would still be there. They decided early on that they were not going to kill large numbers of civilians to keep him in office. Once that was decided it was when, not if. Could we have influenced a longer transition? Maybe. I read the Gates book too and while that may be what was wanted, we certainly didn’t have the ability to stop the protests and we weren’t going to encourage a military crackdown. Which brings up the question, can you really think of many times when a harsh dictator was overthrown in a long controlled process as you suggest?
Steve
Egypt was a client state, Israel and Russia are not. The US made Mubarak a “dead man walking” – that could not be more obvious. At the same time we were engaging with the military to ensure there was no crackdown on demonstrators and set the stage for elections. One can argue that was the right or wrong thing to do, but to suggest that Mubarak’s fall was all the Egyptian military and the US as just along for the ride is against pretty much all the evidence we have on the event. We also shouldn’t forget US influence post Mubarak to include the election of the MB and our recognition of them as legitimate (conveniently forgotten later when the Egyptian military finally had enough). The US was involved from the beginning.
Similarly, Iran used to be a client state and our influence (along with others) in bringing the Shah to power through a military coup is something you frequently point out. Strange that when it comes to the end of our client in Egypt you see little US influence and suggest it was all the Egyptian military. That just helps my argument as the military was in the bag for us and they weren’t going to jeopardize their relationship with the US, even to save Mubarak, who was a military man himself.