“What’s Next for Syria?” the New York Times headlined its latest editorial on the subject this week. Its answer reflects the mushy-headed thinking that all too often emanates these days from America’s “paper of record.” “With the apparent collapse of the United Nations-mediated peace talks on Syria,” the Times opined, “the United States and its …
Continue reading “New York Times Defaults To Insanity On Syria”
WASHINGTON — America’s top foreign policy to-do’s in 2014 include preventing Iran from reaching the nuclear threshold, addressing the humanitarian disaster in Syria, containing an expansionist Russia, managing a rising China and reclaiming its own voice on human rights. Let’s take these one at a time. Preventing a nuclear Iran: The global agreement over Iran’s …
Continue reading “Unwavering democratic doctrines will let US shape events again”
In the messy aftermaths in Iraq and Afghanistan, critics of U.S. interventionism abroad have exerted great influence over the direction of U.S. foreign policy, putting interventionists on the defensive. The anti-interventionist ascendancy has clearly influenced U.S. policymaking toward Iran (where President Obama seems determined, at all costs, to avoid military action in response to Tehran’s …
Continue reading “Non-intervention facilitated a victory for tyrants and terrorists in Syria”
The U.S.-led six-month agreement with Iran over its nuclear program reflects not just Washington’s limited aspirations for its relations with Tehran but also its affinity for the regional status quo over possible change. Throw in its policy toward Syria both before and after the start of its horrific civil war, and we see an administration …
Continue reading “Obama’s Narrow Focus On Iran’s Nukes Misses The Larger Point”
The startlingly open breach of recent days between the United States and its once-solid allies in Israel, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere in the Middle East reflects region-wide concerns not only about President Obama’s current policy path but, more broadly, about what they regard as his sinking credibility and rising naivety. The breach is rooted less …
Continue reading “America’s allies are drifting thanks to Obama”
With U.S. attention no longer focused on Syria, Washington is now preparing to fill itself with more misguided hope that Iran finally wants a deal with the West over its controversial nuclear program. In the public sphere, the issue of Iran’s nukes is taking center stage as that of Syria’s chemical weapons recedes into the …
Continue reading “Iran Likely Seeking to Exploit U.S. Weakness Over Syria”
The growing focus, at home and abroad, on a proposal under which Bashar al-Assad would subject his chemical weapons to international control seems an all-too-fitting next step in the clumsy U.S. effort to punish the Syrian strongman for using those weapons against his own people, killing more than 1,400 of them in late August. The …
Continue reading “New proposal for Syrian chemical weapons won’t produce anything good”