The one hundred day mark of the Obama administration has arrived. This has always been a traditional time to evaluate a new President, and Mr. Obama certainly should not be denied that gauge. It has indeed been difficult to watch our new CINC fumble and stumble on the world stage, and I take absolutely no joy in it. Obama’s failures and missteps endanger us all. It is deadly serious business, lives hang in the balance, and this is what happens when the people elect a man with no international policy or military experience to be the leader of the strongest and finest armed forces the world has ever known. The stakes are colossal for us all, especially for our military men and women deployed around the world in the fight against Islamic terrorism.
Mr. Obama receives an “F” for failures in the defense budget process and international politics.
1. DEFENSE BUDGET: Mr. Obama’s proposed budget for FY2010 is clearly a fiscal exercise designed to siphon money away from the Pentagon and towards other spending at the expense of our national security and defense industry (See Gates’ budget statement here.) SECDEF Gates has been attempting to sell a set of cuts that indicate his thinking on future wars. Gates has proposed capping F-22 Raptor acquisition at 187, despite USAF contentions last fall that at least 80 more are needed to maintain air superiority against the Chinese and Russians. That move alone could cost the jobs of 95,000 employees at Lockheed and other contractors. Add another 5,000 defense jobs lost if production of the C-17 cargo aircraft is halted as well. Other potential cut victims could include the next generation of USN destroyers, a new USAF manned bomber program, and the Army’s Future Combat System (details here).
Most disturbing are the suggested cuts to missile defense. The plan caps deployment of further interceptors to Alaska and cuts deployment to Poland and the Czech Republic. At a time when America should be showing strength and taking steps to defend against the little dictator in North Korea and the apocalyptic cult in Tehran, Obama and Gates are choosing to drastically cut the only program of defense against one of them firing off a missile. In the absence of an effective missile defense, the United States and our allies are left completely naked to a nuclear missile attack and are left with overwhelming response as the only option. Though the attacker would certainly suffer a hellish counterattack, tens or hundreds of millions of Americans or Europeans would still die a horrible death. Our mighty response will be meaningless for them. The current program of missile defense is vital to our national security and should be treated as a top priority. Iran and North Korea are not the only nations developing missile and nuclear technology, and the future likely holds more proliferation. The program has shown repeated success in tests and deserves a budget increase, not a gutting like the one offered by Obama and Gates.
Overall the budget is focused on a counter-insurgency fight to the exclusion of a potentially large-scale land war. Why does Mr. Gates think China won’t take action against Taiwan or that Russia won’t invade one of our NATO allies? The defense budget must remain widely focused to cover all potential threats, not just on the combat in which we are currently engaged.
SECDEF Gates has proven to be an advocate of a plan that is misguided and threatens to jeopardize national security for decades to come. Mr. Gates is trying to divide opposition to the cuts by promising increases in other areas to offset the pain that will no doubt be inflicted on America’s defense workers at a time of continuing economic crisis. Mr. Gates should resign instead of continuing to push a program that turns the Pentagon into a source of revenue for new social spending for the Obama administration.
2. INTERNATIONAL POLITICS: Obama has traveled a fair bit, and he always seems to greet foreign crowds with an apology on his lips. Apparently America has been very bad, and Obama feels the need to apologize for us taking legitimate action to defend ourselves against terrorists or deposing brutal despots. The new policy seems to be a butt-kissing approach: shaking hands with the Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, bowing deeply to the Saudi King, attempting to engage the Islamic fascists in Iran. These “new” approaches do not enhance our security. Quite the opposite: it makes America look weak and conciliatory when we should be strong and stubborn.
As if the general apologies weren’t insulting enough, Mr. Obama told an audience in Strasbourg, France, that fixing the economy is his “number one job”. Actually it’s not his job at all, and anyone familiar with our Constitution would know that. The President’s duties are fairly limited. They’re all laid out in Article II, section II, and nowhere is the economy listed. It’s remarkable that any President, or for that matter any American, would show that sort of base ignorance of our founding document.
The administration completely failed to organize any sort of meaningful response to the latest North Korean missile launch. The NK program of simultaneously developing missile and nuclear capability proceeds without much objection. The message being sent is that the world is completely powerless to do anything about it. North Korea has no intention of halting any aspect of their program, and attempted negotiations are nothing more than a smoke screen to delay and confuse. A preemptive strike before the launch might be a bridge too far, but there is certainly nothing stopping us from intercepting the launch once it leaves NK territory. Bold steps need to be taken on the NK issue, and it seems none are forthcoming.
The other surviving member of the Axis of Evil, Iran, also continues to develop missile and nuclear technology without opposition. Despite the repeated assertions by various members of the administration that Iran cannot be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, again no concrete action is being taken. Instead Obama writes to Tsar Medvedev and makes a cowardly offer to sell out European missile defense for help on Iran. It’s time for Obama and the rest of the appeasement crowd to recognize neither Russia nor any other nation is going to help with Iran. The threats to America and Israel from Tehran are a daily occurrence, hardly even notice by the media anymore. It’s past time for military action against Iran. The last administration missed a golden opportunity for a surprise attack after the election. If action is not taken soon, we will be facing nuclear weapons in the hands of a messianic Islamic cult that supports terror on a global level. Obama is even trying to kill a lawsuit against Iran by former hostages, likely because it names Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as one of the participants. The consequences of inaction could eventually be catastrophic.
Since we’re consorting with tyrants and despots now, why not Cuba? Sure, it’s an old line Communist regime that keeps tens of thousands of political prisoners and has completely failed the Cuban people for fifty years, but that Raul seems nice. Offering to talk isn’t enough. Let’s allow more money to be sent home by Cubans living here, thus fattening the coffers of the Cuban government which takes a twenty percent transaction fee. The embargo should not be lifted and no talks should take place until the Cuban government reforms, period. The Cuban government has so far declined.
Pakistan is sliding toward disaster. Once Musharraf was removed, things began unraveling. The Paki government chose to cut deals with the Taliban instead of killing them. Now the Taliban hold sway over large areas of the countryside, the Paki intelligence services have in some cases cooperated, and the security of Paki nuclear weapons is ever more questionable. We may never be able secure Afghanistan if we can’t stop the support from Pakistan.
Speaking of Afghanistan, Mr. Obama has chosen to increase the number of U.S. forces on the ground. One can only hope he is listening to General Petraeus. The Soviets and the British before them discovered the hard way that massive numbers of troops are not the answer in Afghanistan. Most of our supposed allies in Old Europe have either declined to send additional forces or send only non-combat troops that are prohibited from deployment to the south of the country, coincidentally where most of the fighting takes place. At least those apologies worked. We have to hope Petraeus can have the same success as he did in Iraq, but the situations are vastly different.
Iraq continues to improve, perhaps justifying the troop withdrawals ordered by Mr. Obama. Time will tell. The only thing for sure is that it’s not sure. Obama is risking all the gains made in Iraq through the blood of our military to fulfill a campaign promise and satisfy his liberal supporters. Victory should be the only acceptable result, and pulling out too many troops too fast could cause a collapse. Caution and patience should be exercised when making an evaluation of the situation on the ground in Iraq. Of course, when success isn’t your primary objective, anything that makes the pacifist left happy will do.
3. TORTURE: I may be one of the few conservatives who has consistently spoken out against the use of torture. Torture is the method of the enemy. Building a free world is inconsistent with its use. For any who doubt that water boarding is torture, check for a video on YouTube. Any reasonable person who watches that knows it is. The Bush administration had absolutely no business delving into this dark arena, it is beneath us, and makes us no better than the enemy. That being said, the release of memorandum or photos related to the interrogations cannot and will not be a positive for America. Looking back and perhaps incriminating people or conducting some witch hunt will only result in further damage. This is part of the past that needs to remain in the past. Obama has clearly tried to play both sides of the fence on this one, attempting to soothe his liberal base crying out for a commission while playing to the vast majority of the American people who in poll after poll do not support further investigation. Sweeping it under the rug may not be the final answer, but feeding more data into the hopper will undoubtedly damage our security.
The dangers of inexperience are manifest. Mr. Obama is the emptiest suit ever to inhabit the office of President, and we are now and will continue to pay a heavy price for it. His lack of understanding of his role as CINC and appeasement based foreign policy is shameful. He is weakening America’s national defenses on a daily basis in order to spend more on domestic programs. We won’t need those domestic programs if we’re killed by terrorists. Security must come first. The real horror is that Obama will still be in office for years to come, and will likely have the backing of a liberal Democrat Congress as well. Defense and foreign policy decisions have impacts that reach far into the future. Our armed forces will be the ones who suffer most.
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