RE: http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,188059,00.html

quote:

IF you think reactions to President Obama's arrival on the world stage from the likes of the Russian, Chinese, Iranian, Venezuelan and even European leaders have been lukewarm at best, check out the North Koreans.

And to think how well everything was going BEFORE President Obama took office. Really makes you wax nostalgic over the multitudes of foreign policy successes of the Bush Administration doesn't it? Hint: re-read the recently released C-SPAN Presidential Rankings.

The neoconservative's had their chance over the past 8 years w/r/t policy in this country, and took advantage of the weakest president in memory to have them implemented (the aforementioned C-SPAN Presidential Rankings listed G W Bush far below the much maligned J E Carter, who's record now looks downright enviable in comparison). The results are obvious, and America's enemies must be dancing in the streets because those policies have brought this country to the brink of disaster.

President Obama is right to not openly react to the N. Koreans - because that is exactly what they want.

G W Bush put the N. Koreans, Iran, and Iraq on the so-called "axis of evil" list to appease the neoconservatives (many of them notable chicken-hawks) in his state of the union speech that started the US on the road to foreign policy (and political) disaster. Informing ones enemies (real or otherwise) that they are in the crosshairs was a deeply stupid thing to do: it was stupid at the time, and even dumber in retrospect.

Providing foreign (or even national) policy advice is obviously not the forte of the Heritage Foundation.

Mr. Brooks expresses a faulty thesis based on faulty reasoning. Faultiness squared, so-to-speak. His presumptuous statement, "One thing's absolutely clear: Obama's notion that the world's troublemakers would naturally "change" course once he took office continues to crumble" represents this misguided thinking. 1) Nothing is "clear" except the biases of Mr. Brooks; 2) Obama's reality based "notion" is that the U.S. needed to change course for any chance to restore our leadership status in the world, restore our overstretched, misused Military, finish what we started in Afghanistan, avoid Iraq becoming what Afghanistan became to the USSR, refocus on our dire interenal needs (economy, healthcare, education, infrastructure, energy needs) sorely lacking sufficient attention under Bush/Cheney; 3)the only thing crumbling is the failed agenda of so-called neoconservatives (Cheney, et al) who had no compunction about threatening the world with Pax Americana. [refresher: Pax Americana is openly taken from Pax Romana and Pax Bitannica... as in Empire?]

Everyone is still blaming Bush, but I don't remember the DPRK launching a missile during his tenure?

I hope PBO doesn't sit around like Clinton did and let terrorists attack our military compounds and embassies without any retribution.

quote:

Originally posted by yanqui69:
Everyone is still blaming Bush, but I don't remember the DPRK launching a missile during his tenure?

I hope PBO doesn't sit around like Clinton did and let terrorists attack our military compounds and embassies without any retribution.

Here's a refresher for you: Wall Street Journal N. Korean Missile Program

Not only did N. Korea launch a missile during Bush's tenure, but they lit off a NUKE as well, and Bush didn't do ANYTHING about it. JMHO, but I have to consider setting off a nuke vastly more significant than simply launching a rocket.

FYI - the N. Koreans were abiding by their part of the bargain negotiated by President Clinton, until G W Bush decided that he didn't like the deal (and ceased living up to the American part of the bargain). Then he had the gall to act surprised that the N. Koreans went and restarted their reactors. So Bush had to go back to negotiating (this time with 6 parties involved) and ended up no better a deal than Clinton got, except now the N. Koreans had nukes.

Not exactly what could be termed a "foreign policy success".

As a general comment, I just love how what passes for the conservative of today rails on Obama for not retaliating when their own laddie did nothing, except follow the advice of the conservatives who's policies put us into the mess we face today. It seems to me that they set the perfomance expectation bar for a president at a horrifying low for GWB, but then they turn it around and set it unattainably high for President Obama.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: PolicyWonk,

Policy Wonk,

Thanks for the reminder, touche`! I did not research effectively enough that day.

As far as this being Bush's problem, we might want to think back to President Harry Truman's days in dealing with the DPRK. Now we must think ahead. My personal opinion is hit next rocket launch with our own missile defense systems in accordance with UN mandates.

China and Russia, heck, Iran and Pakistan might take a look and see that we are serious. OR....we can starve them again. Bush was a wimp and gave them food thinking it would work. I have no idea why PBO thinks he can talk to these guys if Bush couldn't.

quote:

Originally posted by yanqui69:
Policy Wonk,

Thanks for the reminder, touche`! I did not research effectively enough that day.

As far as this being Bush's problem, we might want to think back to President Harry Truman's days in dealing with the DPRK. Now we must think ahead. My personal opinion is hit next rocket launch with our own missile defense systems in accordance with UN mandates.

China and Russia, heck, Iran and Pakistan might take a look and see that we are serious. OR....we can starve them again. Bush was a wimp and gave them food thinking it would work. I have no idea why PBO thinks he can talk to these guys if Bush couldn't.

You are welcome - always happy to help!

I can't blame every problem on G W Bush - he simply wasn't around long enough to create them all - he just created far more (with far more serious consequences) than his fair share

W/r/t President Obama talking to them (i.e. using diplomacy), if there is one thing that the GW Bush Administration got tragically wrong: not talking to our adversaries was deeply shortsighted at best. Diplomacy is vastly cheaper than war. The position that talking to Iran, etc, shows weakness denies centuries on historical fact. They could've learned from the Godfather character Vito Corleone: "Keep your friends close - keep you enemies closer...".

You are right that we must look forward - but we have to constantly look back to understand the errors of the past to ensure we don't repeat mistakes that caused us more damage than whatever the original problem was.

Cheers.

I think China and Russia have become interested in what we have to say or do after the launch...