{"id":7530,"date":"2014-06-05T08:05:27","date_gmt":"2014-06-05T15:05:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=7530"},"modified":"2014-06-05T08:05:27","modified_gmt":"2014-06-05T15:05:27","slug":"partisan-politics-bad-ideas-the-bergdahl-swap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/partisan-politics-bad-ideas-the-bergdahl-swap\/","title":{"rendered":"Partisan Politics, Bad Ideas & the Bergdahl Swap"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The
The Tailban 5 and Obama Photo via tpnn.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

by Bruce S. Thornton \/\/ FrontPage Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n

President Obama\u2019s exchange of 5 high-ranking Taliban murderers for a soldier who possibly was a deserter and collaborator encapsulates everything that is wrong with this administration\u2019s foreign policy. The serial failures of the past 5 years reflect a toxic brew of partisan politics and na\u00efve ideology.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The staging of the announcement last Saturday in the Rose Garden obviously was intended to milk every drop of photogenic pathos and political gain from a decision rife with moral hazard and questionable legality. To reap political advantage from this disaster of a deal, lies and half-truths were necessary for creating the narrative behind the picture of Obama flanked by Bergdahl\u2019s joyful, if somewhat bizarre, parents. Contrary to the president and his supporters, Bergdahl was not a \u201chero\u201d or \u201cprisoner of war.\u201d Nor had he served with \u201chonor and distinction,\u201d or been \u201ccaptured on the battlefield,\u201d as the terminally mendacious Susan Rice said on a Sunday morning news-show.<\/p>\n

In fact, evidence continues to mount that Bergdahl voluntarily left his post to connect with English-speaking Taliban, a move consistent with his renunciation of his citizenship and disgruntled anti-American emails. Whether he is just a flake, as his earlier biography and strange comments suggest, or had more sinister motives will become clearer as more information surfaces. He may even be a traitor. His team leader on the night he disappeared, former Army Sergeant\u00a0Evan Buetow, has told CNN that radio intercepts revealed that Bergdahl was looking for the Taliban, and that after his capture, the Taliban\u2019s attacks on Americans became \u201cfar more directed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The serious questions about Bergdahl were known to the administration, if only from a 2012\u00a0Rolling Stone<\/i>\u00a0article. Yet consistent with Obama\u2019s foreign policy approach, facts are never an impediment to political advantage, as his record shows. The Benghazi disaster was created by politics and covered up for political reasons. Beefing up security for the diplomatic mission was nixed because it contradicted the political narrative that the multilateral \u201cleading from behind\u201d removal of Ghaddafi had started Libya on the road to Jeffersonian democracy and peace, when in reality it had unleashed hundreds of feral jihadists gangs now armed with missiles and other weapons. Likewise blaming the attack on an obscure video rather than an al Qaeda franchise reinforced the \u201cal Qaeda on its heels\u201d and \u201cbin Laden dead\u201d memes peddled\u00a0during the presidential campaign in order to prove the success of Obama\u2019s anti-Bush foreign policy.<\/p>\n

So too the Bergdahl weeper is another episode in the \u201cend the wars and bring the troops home\u201d political narrative\u00a0demonstrating the superiority of \u201c<\/span>collective action\u201d\u00a0and\u00a0\u201cdiplomacy and development, sanctions and isolation, appeals to international law, and, if just, necessary and effective, multilateral military action,\u201d as Obama said at West Point, over George Bush\u2019s alleged trigger-happy, blood-for-oil, Halliburton-enriching unilateralism. Just don\u2019t think about the 6 soldiers who died looking for Bergdahl, or the violation of legal protocols for releasing Guantanamo detainees, or the dismissal of the concerns of the intelligence community, or the snubbing of Congress in making the deal, or the moral hazard of paying ransom to hostage-takers. Never mind that under Obama\u2019s watch Iraq is once again an inferno of sectarian violence and is fast becoming a satellite of Iran. Just forget that the Taliban, given a date-certain for our withdrawal, are poised to reassert control over large swaths of eastern Afghanistan, squandering the sacrifices made by our troops. Those facts must be obscured in order to achieve a political advantage. So too the enormous risk to our soldiers\u2019 lives and our national interests that attends the release of 5 battle-hardened jihadist murderers does not figure in political calculations for firing up the base ahead of the midterm election.<\/p>\n

Politics may be all there is to Obama\u2019s foreign policy. With some justification, he may calculate that despite a few occasional bleats of protest, the ovine press corps will always watch his back and deliver the political dividends his actions seek. The scandal of Benghazi\u2013\u2013both the incompetence that lead to 4 dead Americans, and the blatantly dishonest cover-up afterwards\u2013\u2013that unfolded a few months before the 2012 elections should have put his reelection at risk. Yet with an indifferent press corps downplaying the story, and partisan hack Candy Crowley watching his back during the presidential debates, the worst scandal of his presidency had no effect on the election. So we shouldn\u2019t be surprised that team Obama thinks this latest shameless political stunt will work too. As Guy Benson at\u00a0Townhall.com<\/span><\/a>\u00a0analyzes the Obama crew\u2019s thinking, \u201cThey figured that the feel-good nature of the \u2018POW\u2019 returning home narrative would be blindly seized upon and enabled by a media exhausted by the egregious VA scandal story. Unpleasant details would be whitewashed or mostly ignored, and the only real outrage would emanate from the usual suspects on the Right. They thought they could counter critiques of the nature and terms of the trade with faux-indignant questions about whether skeptics were in favor of \u2018leaving Americans behind.\u2019\u201d In short, the White House\u2019s political\u00a0modus operandi<\/i>\u00a0on every bonehead decision for the past 5 years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet there is also an ideology behind Obama\u2019s foreign policy, one shared by most progressives. This na\u00efve view assumes the whole world is just like us, wants freedom, human rights, leisure, and prosperity as much as we do, and is kept from achieving those boons by environmental forces, lingering superstitions like religion, and the fallout from historical crimes most of which have been committed by the West.\u00a0Thus\u00a0<\/span>it assumes America\u2019s guilt and need to atone for its neo-colonial and neo-imperialist sins, and its racism, plunder of resources, and militarist adventurism, the very attitude struck in Obama\u2019s infamous 2009 Cairo speech. Then follows the imperative for American withdrawal and retreat, a dangerous dereliction of global duty rationalized with the magical thinking of \u201cinternational law,\u201d \u201cengagement,\u201d \u201cmultilateralism,\u201d \u201csmart diplomacy,\u201d \u201csanctions,\u201d \u201cinternational pressure,\u201d and all the other camouflage for an unwillingness to make the tough, risky choices necessary in a hard world of bad men. This ideology bespeaks a monumental failure of imagination, and a parochial inability to understand that different peoples and cultures have different mores and goals.<\/p>\n

Every one of Obama\u2019s foreign policy debacles reveals this shopworn idealism. It explains the impulse to rely on negotiations and concessions with enemies like Iran, who only yield at the point of a gun; the reliance on bluster and bluff with killers like Bashar al Assad, who can read every tell announcing a weak hand; or the feeble threats of disapproval from an international community issued to Vladimir Putin, whose past brutal behavior in Chechnya and Georgia shows that he cares nothing for the estimation of some imagined \u201cinternational community\u201d that still wants to buy his oil. And now comes Obama\u2019s absurd claim that releasing 5 seasoned killers will \u201copen the door for broader discussions among Afghans about the future of their country by building confidence that it is possible for all sides to find common ground.\u201d That Obama thinks the Taliban\u2013\u2013who brutally murdered their own people in a soccer stadium, stone homosexuals, throw acid in the face of schoolgirls, honor-kill their own wives and daughters, and blow up women and children\u2013\u2013 can have any \u201ccommon ground\u201d with anyone not sharing their barbarous religious ideology is profoundly delusional.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As the Bergdahl fiasco shows yet again, partisan politics and bad ideas make for a world dangerous to our interests and security.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Bruce S. Thornton \/\/ FrontPage Magazine President Obama\u2019s exchange of 5 high-ranking Taliban murderers for a soldier who possibly was a deserter and collaborator encapsulates everything that is wrong with this administration\u2019s foreign policy. The serial failures of the past 5 years reflect a toxic brew of partisan politics and na\u00efve ideology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","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":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[844,146,842,22,145,23,285,46],"tags":[965,1055,1021,918,967,197],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-1Xs","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7523,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-bergdahl-release-is-just-the-beginning\/","url_meta":{"origin":7530,"position":0},"title":"The Bergdahl Release Is Just the Beginning","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 3, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ The Corner (National Review Online) There has been a lot to think about during these years of Obama\u2019s foreign policy. But the problem is not just the existential issues, from reset to Benghazi, but also the less heralded developments, such as young non-high-school graduate Edward\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Commentary","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/europe\/commentary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/download-2.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7547,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/fictions-as-truth\/","url_meta":{"origin":7530,"position":1},"title":"Fictions as Truth","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 9, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"For the Obama administration narrative to be accurate about the swap of five Taliban\/al-Qaeda-related kingpins for Sgt. Bergdahl, we are asked to believe the following: by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ PJ Media For the Obama administration narrative to be accurate about the swap of five Taliban\/al-Qaeda-related kingpins for Sgt. Bergdahl,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "America's Future"","block_context":{"text":"America's Future","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/americas-future\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Photo by eddriscoll.com via PJ Media","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/obama_us_flag_crossed_fingers_6-8-14-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7562,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obama-quits-afghanistan\/","url_meta":{"origin":7530,"position":2},"title":"Obama Quits Afghanistan","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 12, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Bringing Bergdahl home was useful for closing Gitmo and winding down the war. by\u00a0Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online Soon we shall get to the bottom of the swap of five Taliban kingpins from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility for one Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. In time we will learn\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Middle East"","block_context":{"text":"The Middle East","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Photo via AFP Photo by Peter Muhly","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/2obama-gitmo-hunger-strike.si_-500x281.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7515,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/our-bad-habit-of-negotiating-with-terrorists\/","url_meta":{"origin":7530,"position":3},"title":"Our Bad Habit of Negotiating with Terrorists","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 2, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bruce Thornton \/\/ FrontPage Magazine \u00a0 Every parent should be happy for the Bergdahl family, whose son was returned to them after five years of captivity among the Taliban. 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To the degree Obama was involved in overseeing events in Libya, his involvement was most\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The World"","block_context":{"text":"The World","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"photo by Getty images via NRO","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/pic_giant_061014_A_0-500x291.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7530"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7530"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7532,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7530\/revisions\/7532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}