{"id":1726,"date":"2010-04-11T18:36:27","date_gmt":"2010-04-11T18:36:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com.108-166-28-151.mdgnetworks.com\/wordpress\/?p=1726"},"modified":"2013-03-12T18:37:15","modified_gmt":"2013-03-12T18:37:15","slug":"is-there-a-rhyme-or-reason-to-u-s-foreign-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/is-there-a-rhyme-or-reason-to-u-s-foreign-policy\/","title":{"rendered":"Is There a Rhyme or Reason to U.S. Foreign Policy?"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n

NRO’s\u00a0The Corner<\/em><\/p>\n

During the 2008 campaign, the Obama group argued that Bush & Co. were insensitive to allies and had acted in clumsy, unilateral fashion, permanently damaging our stature in the world. Given the first 15 months of foreign policy in the new administration, we can see now that Obama’s critique largely meant that we had damaged relations with supposed belligerents like Cuba, Iran, Russia, Syria, and Venezuela \u2014 inasmuch as right now, British, Colombian, Czech, German, Honduran, Indian, Israeli, Japanese, Polish, and South Korean leaders might privately prefer the good “bad” old days of the supposed cowboy Bush. All of which raises the question: Why Obama’s shift in foreign policy? I offer four alternatives, uncertain of the answer myself.<\/p>\n

a) Obama in 2007 and 2008 created a campaign narrative of Bush the cowboy, and then found himself trapped by his own “reset button” rhetoric, which meant he could hardly credit his maligned predecessor by building on the multilateral work that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had established from 2006 onward (cf. the similar quandary of libeling Bush as a war-mongering anti-constitutionalist and then using new, kinder, gentler anti-terrorism euphemisms to mask the adoption of Predators, tribunals, renditions, wiretaps, intercepts, and continuance in Iraq and Afghanistan);<\/p>\n

b) Obama sincerely believes that states that were pro-American under Bush are now somewhat dubious, while other states’ anti-American rhetoric during 2001\u201308 was understandable and so rightfully now earns them empathy and attention as a reward;<\/p>\n

c) Obama genuinely believes that those abroad who are more statist and voice rhetoric that dovetails with his own equality-of-result efforts at home are sympathetic, inasmuch as they too define “freedom” in holistic terms of state entitlements rather than individual liberty, free markets, and free expression \u2014 so to the degree a leader casts himself as a “revolutionary,” he finds resonance with an equally progressive Obama; or<\/p>\n

<\/em>d) Obama has no idea of what he is doing, and wings his way from one embarrassment to another, from snubbing Gordon Brown to gratuitously insulting Benjamin Netanyahu to abruptly changing the terms of commitments with the Czechs and Poles to constructing nonexistent Islamic historical achievements to browbeating Karzai to courting Putin to bowing to the Saudis, etc., all as he sees fit at any given moment \u2014 with an inexperienced but impulsive Hillary Clinton and gaffe-prone Joe Biden as catalysts rather than arresters of Obama’s own haphazardness.<\/p>\n

Whatever the reasons, I think the seeds have been sown and the harvests will soon be upon us. Any initial delight that the world’s masses found in a post-national, post-racial, charismatic young American president will begin to be eclipsed by their leaders’ realpolitik calculations, both old friends and enemies \u2014 namely, that the U.S. will probably not assist (other than in soaring rhetorical cadences of empathy) any past ally in its hour of need, and will probably not oppose (other than in meaningless deadlines and melodramatic contextualization) any past enemy in its newfound efforts to readjust regional realities. (If only Obama treated Iran or Syria as he does Bush,\u00a0Sarah Palin<\/a>, and the top 10 percent of American taxpayers.)<\/p>\n

So as the U.S. completes its metamorphosis into a much larger version of the E.U., we should expect to see something of the following:<\/p>\n

Karzai or Allawi will look more to Iran, which will soon become the regional and nuclear hegemon of the Middle East.<\/p>\n

Eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics had better mend fences with Russia.<\/p>\n

The E.U. should finally start on that much-ballyhooed all-European response force.<\/p>\n

Taiwan, the Philippines, and South Korea should strengthen ties with China.<\/p>\n

Buffer states in South America had better make amends with a dictatorial, armed, and aggressive Chavez.<\/p>\n

Israel should accept that the U.S. no longer will provide support for it at the U.N., chide the Arab states to cool their anti-Israeli proclamations, remind the Europeans not to overdo their popular anti-Israeli rhetoric, or warn radical Palestinians not to start another intifada. (In other words, it’s open season to say or do anything one wishes with Israel.)<\/p>\n

As for bankrupt, wannabe national defaulters, don\u2019t worry \u2014 we are rapidly catching up, and have neither the credibility nor the desire to lecture you about artificial constructs like \u201cdebt,\u201d \u201cbonds,\u201d \u201ctrust,\u201d and other archaic financial euphemisms manipulated to protect the international capital of an overseer class.<\/p>\n

Sowing a new crop takes a while, but the sprouting has begun and the bitter, 1979-like harvests will soon be upon us.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a92010 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson NRO’s\u00a0The Corner During the 2008 campaign, the Obama group argued that Bush & Co. were insensitive to allies and had acted in clumsy, unilateral fashion, permanently damaging our stature in the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[590],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-rQ","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1115,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-george-w-bush-fixation\/","url_meta":{"origin":1726,"position":0},"title":"The George W. 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Obama was to assure the world that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Foreign Policy"","block_context":{"text":"Foreign Policy","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/foreign-policy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":720,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obamas-hypocritic-oath\/","url_meta":{"origin":1726,"position":2},"title":"Obama’s Hypocritic Oath","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 17, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Barack Obama has a habit of identifying a supposed crisis in collective morality, damning straw men \u201cthem\u201d who engage in such ethical lapses, soaring with rhetorical bromides \u2014 and then, to national quiet, doing more or less the exact things he once swore\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Second Term Policies"","block_context":{"text":"Second Term Policies","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/second-term-policies\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1217,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-gift-of-obamas-foreign-policy\/","url_meta":{"origin":1726,"position":3},"title":"The Gift of Obama’s Foreign Policy","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 8, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online The Obama reset foreign policy has, in an unintended way, brought clarity to America\u2019s traditional role in the world. After 2004, \u201cblame Bush\u201d proved an easy way for Europeans and American liberals to delude themselves into thinking the world\u2019s problems neither predated nor\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "October 2010"","block_context":{"text":"October 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/october-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7805,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-madness-of-2008\/","url_meta":{"origin":1726,"position":4},"title":"The Madness of 2008","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 26, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"A nation became unhinged by trivialities like \u201chope and change.\u201d It has now awakened. \u00a0 by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online America is suddenly angry at the laxity, incompetence, and polarizing politics of the Obama administration, the bad optics of the president putting about in his bright golf\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Obama Administration"","block_context":{"text":"Obama Administration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"On the campaign trail, October 2008 (Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/pic_giant_082614_SM_Barack-Obama-2008-G.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3165,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/campaign-rhetoric-and-presidential-reality-a-brief-history\/","url_meta":{"origin":1726,"position":5},"title":"Campaign Rhetoric and Presidential Reality: A Brief History","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 28, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services American presidential election rhetoric always paints the incumbent as incompetent in foreign policy, the challenger insightful and skillful. 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