While American and European interests sometimes coincide, sometimes they don’t.
During World War II, we and our European allies joined forces to defeat Nazi Germany, although the U.S. did most of the heavy lifting and big spending, with, ironically, the Russians — after they changed sides — playing a big part. (I intend no slight to the British and their superb leader, Winston Churchill, who sacrificed greatly.)
Since then, the U.S. has spent trillions in defense of Europe while most of our allies spend a relative pittance of their economies on the defense of the West, and coast under the protection of the American defense umbrella.
Europeans covet our market for their exports while throwing up protectionist barriers to keep our goods out of theirs. They harvest billions of dollars annually from our tourists while maligning them as “ugly Americans.” They posture grandly and sanctimoniously about reducing their carbon emissions, then fall far short on their promises while exploiting global warming alarmism to hobble our economy to their competitive advantage.
During the Cold War, U.S. foreign policy and the American military kept the Russian Bear at bay while our European friends, especially the French, did little more than talk when they weren’t carping or conniving. The U.S. sent combat troops to Bosnia to end the genocide and pacify the Balkans in the 1990s; the Europeans provided “support.”
How ironic that President Obama has now been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize at just the moment when he’s contemplating an escalation of America’s role in the war in Afghanistan. To the extent that the award was intended by the five Norwegians on the Nobel peace committee to influence Obama’s future behavior, one might infer that they hope to dissuade him from that course of action.
During the 2008 election campaign, Obama cast Afghanistan as the good war, even promising to pursue Osama bin Laden into Pakistan. He echoed John Kerry’s 2004 theme, that Bush had “taken his eye off the ball” by going to war in Iraq instead of focusing on terrorists in Afghanistan and worldwide. This was convenient. It immunized him from criticism as just another pacifist liberal while enabling him to hammer George W. Bush and John McCain for their continued support of the war in Iraq. But the wars have flip-flopped. The situation in Iraq has greatly improved while Afghanistan has deteriorated.
This places Obama at a crossroads. Afghanistan has become his war. In a speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars just two months ago, Obama described our mission in Afghanistan as “not a war of choice” but “a war of necessity,” declaring that the Taliban insurgency, if left unchecked, would provide “a safe haven from which al-Qaeda would plot to kill more Americans.”
Gen. Stanley McChrystal, whom Obama placed in command of the Afghan campaign in May, has insisted, publicly, that a surge of 40,000 additional troops is absolutely essential to avoid defeat. How can Obama ignore his field commander in a war he’s called a “necessity”? On the other hand, the anti-war left and even some conservatives are calling for an immediate drawdown of U.S. troops, while Obama’s political strategists are afraid that Afghanistan will become an albatross around their man’s neck just as Vietnam became LBJ’s.
So what’s Obama to do? Does he escalate or withdraw? The death toll and cost of the Afghan war is rising. But if we pull out prematurely and leave the region to the mercy of the Taliban, the costs could be much greater, destabilizing Pakistan as well.
Obama’s focus is on domestic issues: the economy, expanding government, socializing health care, taxing carbon and subsidizing enviro-fashionable energy, gagging Rush Limbaugh and Fox News, etc. Afghanistan is a distraction and a political liability. If he takes his general’s advice, the Norwegians might even revoke his ignoble peace prize.
Mike Rosen’s radio show airs weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon on 850-KOA.
