What the West Point Address tells us about the Obama Doctrine and Obama’s Man Crush on the MPIC

The record is clear that the impact of Bush foreign policy both politically and economically, resulted in nothing good for America. The only tangible outcomes were destroying the government of Iraq under false pretense, disrupting the standard of living for tens of millions, tens of thousands Americans dead or permanently maimed, hundreds of thousands dead Iraqis, the entry of al Qaeda into Iraq where prior they had never existed, and hundreds of billions in wasted tax dollars.

Unfortunately, President Barack Obama, although in the beginning he made a point to continuously reinforce that he had no interest for interfering in the affairs of other nations, his foreign policy actions seem to out Bush, George W. Bush. Just this week he confirmed this for the entire world. In his address at West Point, Obama provided a picture of how after five years, he sees his foreign policy efforts, and in all aspects, it is troubling, neocolonialist, and in tone reminiscent of the Rumsfeld Cheney bravado of the previous administration.

Now I cannot blame Obama singular for this, in fact most of the blame should be placed on those who voted for him, for they never read his policy positions prior to running for President, or read his speeches delivered to groups like AIPAC in 2007.  They never concerned themselves with his limited, if any foreign policy experiences with the exception of a brief stint on the foreign relations committee or him having no military experience at all.  

He embraced the joint special operations view of pre-emptive war and expansionist foreign policy as manager in chief of the U.S. imperial empire. Rather than exploring who he actually was, progressives, whether because he was a democrat, or if he were black, or that he made promises that any pragmatic person would not believe based on his past statements, turned a blind eye towards the reality of his prism of executive action.

Several statements stuck out which may be a looking glass into the remaining years from a foreign policy purview for the standing commander in chief. The first was: “The United States is the one indispensible nation.” I can only say the question would be, in what manner? By definition, the President is stating that either the United States or he is absolutely necessary. I personally disagree, unless necessary is correlated to causing trouble around the world, incessant practices that reflect the violation of international law, human rights and the basic respect for others to do as they please without U.S. interference. This position in word actually brings him closer in line to the prior administration for as it is stated in a basic Theorem of trigonometry: the same named trigometric ratios of conterminal angles are equal (conterminal angles in this case being a democratic or republican commander in chief).

The President also added, that “It is impossible to ignore sectarian conflicts, failing states and popular uprisings.” This also makes one cringe with his understanding and implementation of U.S. foreign policy, national security and U.S. interest in terms of priority. History under the present administration has lucidly indicated that the President has a problem with reading the pulse of both the American people and the world around him.  The way he went about dealing with Egypt is just one example. First he supported the democratic elections which brought Mohamed Morsi to power, albeit a member of the Islamic Brotherhood and hesitantly supported the popular uprising against an autocratic dictator named Mubarak. All because it was evident the present administration did not have a pulse of what was going on in Egypt in real time and had allowed their unconditional support of Mubarak, even amidst his long record of human rights violations to cloud their understanding of what the people of Egypt wanted and had experienced under the man the U.S. supported.

Strangely, after giving support to the democratic desires of the people of Egypt albeit late, an Islamic fundamentalist theocrat was elected whom Obama placed full support and validation behind. Next we saw protest again in Egypt, but this time there was a coup, in which the Obama administration said nothing, did nothing and even gave the new government (coup) billions in military aid justifiably, by not referring to the overthrow as a coup. So although he openly said this in his West Point address, the fact assert otherwise. Now the Egyptian people hate the U.S. more, and channels of cooperation have increased between Egypt and Russia. This is a strange statement seeing that near the end of his address President Obama revealed: “America’s support for democracy and human rights goes beyond idealism – it’s a matter of national security.”

The President also said [It]...is not whether America will lead, but how we will lead, not just to secure our peace and prosperity, but also to extend peace and prosperity around the globe.” The how is evident. The Obama motto follows the Bush playbook like an AFC coach discovering the West coast Offense. Leadership via the Obama doctrine is dividing and conquering at home and unilaterally destroying and disrupting sovereign nations, even if against international law. This is no more visibly seen than what occurred in Libya in 2011.

There was no reason or compelling U.S. interest to go into Libya unless it was on the behalf of what I have called the military police industrial complex (MPIC). This is just all of the big banks, big corporations and big lobbyist that make sizable piles of loot on war, incarceration, insider trading and media manipulation. Not only would war make them loot but they would be able to use their neocolonial desires to destroy one of the world’s last state own central banks in Libya. Fact is we followed France and Germany and didn’t lead at all with respect to Obama’s intervening into Libya. But like a good politician, reasons we contrived and lies even told.  The biggest was human rights, protecting civilians, and people believed it although we can’t even help the innocent civilians we promised to aid in Haiti after their earthquake and even supported the U.N. to say that although Cholera never was in Haiti until U.N. troops arrived, they can’t even suit the U.N. to clean up the water and pay for the lives of 40,000 people who died as a result. Meaning, it is visible how we lead.

Libya is the perfect example of the Obama doctrine. If a nation is doing good for its region or country, then it must be destroyed because their success is a threat to U.S. national economy because Bush and Obama has fucked ours up miring our economy in debt for war. At no time was it mentioned by progressives that Gaddafi gave Libya the highest human development index in all of Africa, or that he stood in the forefront of the struggle for Africa against U.S. supported apartheid in Israel and South Africa.  This mean nothing to neo liberals and neoconservatives, because investment under neocolonialism only increases the gap between rich and poor nations, which in simple terms means foreign capital is used not for the people, but rather for the exploitation as opposed to the development of the undeveloped world.

So those who agree with this approach, or worse stay silent, are progressives who are in reality procolonialism. No matter what one says, Gaddafi was pan African and pan Arab and desired such to make all of Africa independent from the West.

Now the President also dropped that he wanted to continue his Libya model in other places. For in the Obama worldview, whether military force will be used anywhere, is for the president alone to decide. In the speech he noted “America’s failure to act in the face of Syrian brutality or Russian provocation not only violates our conscience, but invites escalating aggression in the future.”   First how can a Nobel peace prize winner that has used drones to kills thousands of women and children in Yemen, Afghanistan,Pakistan, and Somalia know anything about conscience, when by practices his foreign policy is to escalate aggression without invite whenever he feels, or needs to buttress his approval rating? As he said in the same speech, we know this is already the case given he said [The] “United States will use military force, unilaterally if necessary, when our core interest demand it.”

Obama’s foreignpolicy beliefs are clear. He said “The issue of transparency is directly relevant to a third aspect of American leadership: our efforts to strengthen and enforce international order.” This is how he perceives his role as commander in chief. Foreign policy is basically using counter-terrorism to stunt the economic growth of other nations and deepen their citizenry into poverty while making U.S. plutocrats even wealthier. He has established a large covert presence in North Africa in total secrecy (transparency), away from democratic debate, and without any Congressional approval or oversight. This is what he means by transparency.

Moreover, Obama has expanded drone attacks in Yemen, Somalia, and Pakistan. In simple terms has continued the practice and policy of the Bush administration with respect to foreign policy. He has invaded more countries and violated just as many if not more human rights and issues of state sovereignty that George W. Bush ever did. Ironically while asserting and pointing the finger toward Iran, China and Russia which I assume is a replacement for Bush’s “Axis of Evil” he described and referenced so frequently.

In sum, Obama uses military force whenever he wants, wherever he wants, and without anyone's permission. He ignores as Lincoln wrote, "The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress, was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object.” Obama's ongoing use of military force in multiple countries ensures that the posture of the US for the foreseeable future will continue to be one of endless war. This my friend, is the Obama doctrine in a nutshell.

The Doo-Doo Chasers

Now I may not be able to tell you what happened on some cable television program or pontificate of what I think may happen on some contrived artificial reality show, but I am in a position to conjure and offer perspectives on other contrived non-events such as what is frequently called politics. More specifically issues of somewhat basic precepts of democratic centralism and constitutional republics.
 

I have been told by the brain trust in the vicinity of the Beltway that self-determination means nothing anymore, unless it is decided upon by individuals who have no stake on such self-determination. I say this because from the President down, seems that the SEO meter is running on a simple phrase that the referendum in Crimea is illegitimate and illegal, and even that as such, the United States will not (never ever ever ever even) recognize its right to self-determination.

This is not only sociopathic but also inconsistent with the plurality evinced in our own constitution, but even more so in the articles of confederation, the bill of rights as ascribed via the Treaty of Paris.  It is as if just by saying such, it makes it a fact or truism.

Since the PEOPLE of Crimea voted over-whelming for their independence from the Ukraine, every nut and bolt politician in the United States has been saying the same thing, which can be summed up by the statement made by Obama’s press secretary, Jay Carney, who openly informed the world that the Obama Administration would not recognize the results of the referendum in Crimea calling what Russia did as being “dangerous and destabilizing”. Thus by fiat extending the assertion that the population of Crimea has no right to conduct a democratic referendum via the ballot, to decide if it wants to remain with the Ukraine or join Russia.

Fascinating, I mean a constitutional scholar (in theory) asserting anti-constitutional beliefs. This when, if it wasn’t for Washington, and even the EU helping to overthrow a democratically elected leader of another sovereign nation (Ukraine), we wouldn’t even be in this mess. Moreover, what makes even more absurd in the logic offered for this position by the Obama administration, which for the record asserts that the referendum cannot be valid unless the entire population of Ukraine votes and agrees with the decision by Crimean’s. A funny and strange position to take when you study past U.S. history with respect to the South Sudan (all of Sudan didn’t vote) and Kosovo from Serbia (no Serbians were allowed to vote via U.S. dictate). 

Then we have the audacity (like hope) to ridicule Putin for what Bill Clinton did in in Serbia, Bush in Iraq, and by Obama in Afghanistan, Libya, and trying to do currently in Syria. Were we this up set in 1967 when Israel committed a real act of war when it took Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, the Syrian Golan Heights and the Jordanian-administered West Bank, or in 1981 when the same nation, Israel took the Golan Heights.  

The simple fact of the matter is that we, America, should mind our own business and tend to the home front where we have real interest and not just the plutocratic interest of the ultra-wealthy. From a historical perspective WE KNOW that the two elephants in the room that no one is really discussing are: (1) the historical US/NATO desire to be able to surround Russia militarily and (2) access to the Artic, in particular since all these international bodies being so concerned with ‘global warming”, have green lighted more drilling there. These folks have to contain the Russian military because it will be the only way they can try and get all of the natural gas it has as well as access the infinite northern border Russia has with the Arctic.

Again, the United States has no interest that is national in the Ukraine when compared to Russia. Not only do the Russians have a large naval facility in Crimea, the folk there do speak Russian and it was conquered originally by Catherine the Great. Moreover, Moscow is not about to invade Ukraine and we all know this, it just sounds good to make folk believe that should be a reason for us to be upset. Outside of that, what is our national interest in the Ukraine? Is it to spread democracy like we did in Libya and Somalia? I mean fact is where ever we try to spread democracy all we get is a lot of dead Americans, a destabilized nation, and large Blackwater contracts.

We should just stay out of this and admit our only goal is really western control of oil and gas in the region. The Crimean Supreme Council is already on record saying Crimea wants Gazprom to develop the peninsula's oil and natural gas deposits and not any western (US company).

This time we have messed with the wrong cat, a cat from a nation with conviction, who has very strong leadership skills, and even more than this REAL national interest in the region.  This is aint no doo doo chaser, this is Putin.

Again or Still? Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Libya

Seems like there is rarely a mention of Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Libya in the mainstream news anymore, and more importantly, from the oral cavities of U.S. politicians. Maybe we might hear about the occasional bombing that happens in Iraq each day nationally since U.S. forces invaded the country and left, in particular in Sunni dominated areas, to live along side al Qaeda just to survive, or a word or two from a lame-brained republican about Benghazi, but really that is about it.

I am even more assured that we will not hear about Afghanistan (with the exception of their lunatic of a President Hamid Karzai) or Libya. In particular from the hawkish John McCain, Lindsey Graham and more exacting, from the lips of President Obama.  Especially now with the feces hitting the proverbial Ukrainian fan.

America is really in a leadership, or even more basically, hand-holding vacuum.  See real leaders, or better yet statesmen can walk the walk while holding the hands of folks who require baby steps to make any progress on anything. In Iraq for example, it is coming to pieces, it may be three or even four states by time all the smoke clears. Last year alone, more than 10,000 people died, and most likely many more. And just in the first month of 2014 alone, more than 1000 Iraqis were killed in car and suicide bombings, most of which were civilians.

If we were hearing about Iraq, we would be reminded of how we meddle into affairs that were not ours, on a completely other side of the globe and which we leave in shabbles. If Obama or the media mentioned Iraq, they would have to show how the al Qaeda group the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has taken over the region, a region were al Qaeda never existed be for the U.S. Invasion and occupation of Iraq. Or how refugees from the Western part of Iraq and in the Anbar provinceare making fast motion to become refugees in Jordan. Or even worse, how the man we installed as Prime Minister (Nouri al-Maliki) has provided no service to Sunnis, made them focus of attacks, and used government troops to squash any open and “democratic” protest against his government. Now unbelievably, Sunni side with ISIS against another U.S. backed regime. And Libya is definetly out of the question with the Islamic extremist being in control of ALL the oil and even shipping it to North Korea. And God forbid i mention that the Libyian Parliment ousted Prime Minister Ali Zeidan out of office Tuesday. 

Now back to Ukraine, am I the only one that considers the hypocrisy of U.S. Foreign policy with respect to the rhetoric hurled towards Russia?  If my history is correct, the only nation I recall Russia, since the break-up that is going to war with was Georgia in 2008.  For Obama to say that Russia needs to respect the borders of sovereign nations is kind of lames, and like someone not living in my home telling me what to cook: given the U.S. has had at least four wars (all undeclared) with Iraq, Libya, Yugoslavia and Afghanistan and currently bomb without any respect of “territorial integrity” to use the words of Secretary of State John Kerry of places like, Yemen, Somalia, Kosovo, Serbia Bolivia and you name it.

It is even more ironic when one includes U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland (wife of Robert Kagan), be caught and recorded telling the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine which leaders of the Ukrainian coup should be placed in a new government and which ones should not when she quipped, “Fuck the EU.” How is it that a simple statement is considered more news worthy than the content of her telling a “sovereign” nation to put who the U.S. want in office and not the people of said nation?

Even to consider the Ukraine as a ground for the start of a “liberal democracy” is ridiculous, when we all know it will only become a western puppet nation run by feudal oligarchical landlords. Not to mention everybody seems to forget that if the EU and America were not sitting on their hands, they would have been able to have played a role other than watching the game from their living room sofa’s.

U.S. hypocrisy regarding the Ukraine is shameful and beyond ridiculous. We say or Describe Putin as being like Hitler (Hillary Clinton’s historical inaccuracy) yet taking U.S. tax payer money to the tune of $1 billion to send to a government filled with nationalist fascist yet they don’t have any money to spend on behalf of American job seekers. We say it is anti-democratic and wrong for people to desire and practice self-determination in the Crimea but ok for all else in Egypt, Libya and Syria. Which suggest according to this Administration and the many before him, self-determination is only cool when it serves the U.S. and no one else? We all know that it was Obama that described the desire of the Crimean people to vote, and want to vote on their future as “undemocratic” and “illegitimate.”

But none of this won’t be told or mentioned by our government or news media. The reality is if they did bring up Syria, or Libya, or Iraq, or Afghanistan, out hypocrisy would be on the red carpet for all to watch and document and equal to them shooting themselves in the foot..

Putin Seahawks versus the Obama Broncos

If I may, I would like to explain the terse yet strange relationship between President Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin. To use a basic football analogy, like the Seahawks, Putin has scored on his first five possessions: Syria and Assad, Edward Snowden, Sochi Olympic with no overt terrorism, China and recently the Ukraine.

Now I know many will say that Obama’s pre-democratic party happy hour cocktail party was or sent a strong message to Putin, but in reality, his words are like mythology of the U.S. criminal justice system which asserts that everyone is treated equally, regardless of race or class

First, the United States need Russia more economically than Russia needs the United States. Russia is the world’s largest supplier of Iron ore, coal, and maybe even fish. Not to mention that in general, Russia is the largest mineral supplier and has more than twenty percent of the world’s oil and more than fifteen percent of the world’s coal. I would add that they also have more than 20 percent of the world’s timber and nickel as well, and I won’t even mention Zinc, or natural gas (did I do that?). Because when you really have a trump card to play economically, it would be natural gas.  Russia supplies most of the Natural gas to Europe and if they decided to cut it off, it would be a big problem for European industry, which happens to be America’s largest trading partner. Even if Russia doesn’t cut off the gas, folk in the Central Ukraine might, which still manifest in the same result.

Putin has masterfully played Obama’s weakness and shown the world how empty his rhetoric is. No US propaganda spouted from main stream media can undo this. While Obama speaks of respecting the sovereign boarders of independent nations, he does the opposite in Somalia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq, and Pakistan. Thus any credibility in his oratory pertaining to the Ukraine is disingenuous.

In Syria, Obama has thrown his support behind Al Qaeda against the will and majority of the Syrian people and in Ukraine; he has thrown his support being mostly fascist neo-Nazis. It is well documented that most of the key positions in the newly formed Ukrainian government have been given to neo-Nazis via the tacit financial support of the United Sates government. I mean ask yourself, who comprises the Svoboda political party?  Then, most of the popular protest openly is against what Obama is for politically.  The  demands of the Ukranian people in Kiev are anti-abortion, anti-welfare, closed immigration, “ethnic mongrolization”, homosexuality and abortion. Yes, Obama has thrown his backing behind the largest population of ultra-nationalist, fascist, and racist in Europe who don’t even support his progressive belief orientation.

Now on the day that I am about write and post this essay, we find out Putin has sent as many as 6000 troops to the Crimea and earlier on Saturday, the speaker of the Russian State Duma Council Valentina Matvienko supported his actions. Elsewhere China has filed a case against Ukraine at the London Court of International Arbitration for US$3 billion from Ukraine for the breach of a loans-for-grain contract signed in 2012. Plus, the Swiss financial regulator FINMA, has started a money-laundering investigation into ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.

Truth be told, in my ignorant opinion, the Ukraine , like Syria is a no win situation. In fact it may evince to be 1853 all over again. And we all know what that means.

South Sudan: Foreign Policy via Hollywood

Over the past several years I have written about the foreign policy modus operandi of the Obama Administration. I have examined it in general and in specific relations with Pakistan, Afghanistan, Libya, Iran, Iraq and China among others.  I have also proffered my examination on the United States policy as it pertains to the Sudan as well, both holistically and from the practices of past and the current executive administration.  However, given the recent developments of strife and in-fighting among the major ethnic and political leadership of the recently formed nation of South Sudan, I have been inspired to describe my perspective more clearly.

As we are aware, it was only three years ago this month when the South Sudanese people held a referendum and voted overwhelmingly to form an independent nation state free from the rest of Sudan. The United States helped negotiate this referendum, which ended more than 20 years of brutal conflict between north and south of Sudan. This in essence was the primary goal of the foreign policy objective of the Obama Administration pertaining to the Sudan – nothing more and nothing less.

Unfortunately, due to several factors including but not limited to the false and dichotomous narrative that the situation of South Sudan was singularly a function of people wanting freedom (good Christians) from the evils of Khartoum (bad Muslims) was all that was needed to be addressed. This limited and myopic perspective consequently was coupled with flawed political intelligence gathering and has resulted in the chaos and likelihood of an ethnic-political civil war developing in South Sudan. There was even little if any historical cloak of understanding as to how and why Africa's largest state and former British Colony, came to this dire predicament in the first place.  The question then is how this could happen with the resources and presupposed intellectual capital freely available to the United States State department and executive leadership?

First, the formulating of a good versus bad indices for evaluating political required action is problematic from the start.  It reduces the scope of vision to evaluate all parties equally. This is not uncommon when it pertains to the US and Africa because in most cases we place our own interest in front of all nations we assist in Africa that are of perceived geopolitical importance to our material needs. Most significantly the geopolitical advantages that a nation state will have supporting a nation that not only has the Nile River flowing through it, but also which is rich in Silver, Gold, Zinc, Copper, Chromium and last but not least, petroleum among others. South Sudan produced 85% of Sudanese oil output, with oil revenues comprising more than 98% of the government of the South Sudanese budget. These were our entry points on the one hand without applying equal consideration to other factors, namely that the economy of South Sudan is one of the weakest in the world, with one of the highest maternal mortality and female illiteracy rates around the globe where there is very limited infrastructure. In addition, there was understanding at all of the historical ethnic problems in the region between South Sudan's Dinka and Nuer tribes.

Second, and what may be more impactful, is that the charge for South Sudan’s Independence was not led by the leadership of Africa or Washington, DC, but rather by a limited coterie of famous and wealthy Obama campaign donating celebrities out of Hollywood. George Clooney and others have done more to create the nation of South Sudan than any figures in the United States Federal Government or the citizens of South Sudan.

The acting ability of the Hollywood elite was able to persuade politicians, in particular the current administration to look at the issue simply from the binders of more than twenty years of war that the inhabitants of the region had been engaged in against the predominantly Islamic North who was led by an “indicted war criminal” intent to do what it take including rape and genocide of the mainly Christian South to take back its lost oilfields. Thus, for America and the Obama administration, the issue of dealing with South Sudan was simply a matter of human rights as opposed to establishing and maintains security instruments or functioning non-sectarian instruments of executive political leadership required to sustain a democracy.

Since December, when the fighting began, over a 1,000 people have been as a consequence of the US limited understanding which facilitated a power struggle between the ethnic Dinka President SalvaKiir and his former deputy, Riek Machar, who is Nuer.

This is the typical US mantra when human rights are lifted above political and historical realities. Although Hollywood and the American Religious right yelled Christian versus Muslim and Arabs foe, the issue for the people on the frontlines of the battle field, mainly John Garang and the Sudan People'sLiberation Army (SPLA) desired and shed their blood for a unified, new and democratic Sudan – not two nations.  This like movies was created from thin air by Hollywood entities. Then, which may be more disturbing if the US State Department didn’t know, they were not even fighting against Sudanese military by rather other rival militia groups. In simple terms, it was not the people of the South who wanted an independent state, but rather Europe, the UN, the US and to some extent other regional players the likes of Ethiopia and Kenya.

Thus, either intentionally or unintentionally, the US as well as the Hollywood middle men that pushed for a separate South Sudan never acknowledged, admitted to, accepted or even worse, never knew or even lied when it concerned the existence of ethnic tensions and animosity in the South. The goal and objective was separation at any cost, in particularly given Susan Rice’s history with the Sudan while serving in the Clinton Administration.

And after the state was formed in 2011, we have ignored the reality on the ground. We have turned a blind out to political incompetence and government dysfunction and mismanagement and bribes and cronyism. The Obama administration and its Hollywood supports said nothing when the newly elected President Kiir openly claimed the governmental theft of billions in state money and foreign aid. Likewise when he began to serve the needs of the Dinka over the rival ethnic group the Nuer, again there was silence. All the while the likes of George Clooney were still raising money for “humanitarian” purposes.

Finally, President Kiir removed all of those he felt were a threat and wanted to take over the government ( vice-president, Riek Machar), that was the straw that broke the camel’s back and may result in what could prove to be worse than what we saw in the 1990s. Especially since the former vice President control the oil fields in the country.

America may need to step back a little and slow down when it comes to just implanting foreign policy for the sake of pleasing campaign donors, especially when the folk they aim to please are movie stars from Hollywood.