There must be a reason…
Tag: foreign policy
Biden’s First Foreign Policy Speech Vows Forever Wars
US foreign policy has clearly continued in the same direction, without missing a beat. Unlike in previous transitions in the White House, this time US President Joe Biden has not even really tried to promise even the faintest hope that it wouldn’t.There were a few glimpses of remote hope – particularly regarding the possibility the US wouldn’t abandon its last arms treaty with Russia, New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) – and Biden’s promise of returning to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as the Iran Nuclear Deal.
However, in Biden’s first speech regarding foreign policy since taking office, now posted on the White House’s official website and titled, “Remarks by President Biden on America’s Place in the World,” reveals that, if anything, US belligerence on the global stage is set to only expand.
“America is back. Diplomacy is back at the center of our foreign policy.”
Biden’s opening remarks attempt to suggest that America has drifted away under his predecessor US President Donald Trump. But when he says “America is back,” we are left to assume he means “back” to what the US was doing under the administration of US President Barack Obama under which he served as vice president.
This was a president elected into office by the American people to end the wars of his predecessor, US President George W. Bush. Not only did he fail to end those wars – one in Iraq and one in Afghanistan – he expanded both. He also started several new wars including in Libya, Syria, and Yemen.
Under the administration of Obama-Biden, the US also overthrew the government of Ukraine in 2014 precipitating deadly violence in the nation’s eastern region.
Obama also continued Bush-era policies aimed at overthrowing the government of Venezuela and instituted the so-called US “pivot” to Asia in which US meddling was expanded in a bid to peel Southeast Asian states away from China’s orbit – or create an arc of chaos to disrupt China’s rise, trying.
And in Biden’s recent foreign policy speech – he has vowed to continue all of this.
Yemen.
Queen of Chicken Hawks: Victoria Nuland Had A Hand in Every US Intervention in the Past 30 Years
President Joe Biden’s nomination of Victoria Nuland for Under Secretary for Political Affairs, the third-highest position at the State Department, is a dangerous sign. Nuland exemplifies the neoconservatives who have led American foreign policy from one disaster to another for the past 30 years, all while evading any shred of accountability.
As a top-level appointee, Nuland must still be confirmed by the Senate. And while pro-peace groups have waged a campaign to stop her confirmation, reflecting on her career in public service makes clear why she is incompetent, highly dangerous, and should not be confirmed.
Biden’s Iran Policy Is Just Trump’s Iran Policy With A Rainbow Flag Emoji
In a new interview with CBS Evening News, President Biden confirmed that his administration will not be lifting sanctions imposed upon Iran in order to bring Tehran to the negotiating table for the restoration of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal.
“Will the U.S. lift sanctions first in order to get Iran back to the negotiating table?” Biden was asked by CBS’s Norah O’Donnell.
“No,” the president replied.
“They have to stop enriching uranium first,” asked O’Donnell.
Biden nodded in response.
Atlantic Council Pens Anonymously Authored Expose Calling for Regime Change in China
Influential D.C. think tank the Atlantic Council has printed a 26,000-word report laying out its strategy for combating China. Published anonymously, the report states that “the single most important challenge facing the United States” in the twenty-first century is China’s growth to rival their own power.
To do so, the report states that the U.S. must use “the power of its military,” the dollar’s role as the global reserve currency, and American control over technology and communication to suffocate the nation of 1.4 billion people. It advises President Biden to draw a number of “red lines” past which the U.S. would directly intervene (presumably militarily). These include Chinese attempts to expand into the South China Sea, an attack on the disputed Senkaku Islands, or moves against Taiwan’s independence. A North Korean strike on any of its neighbors would also necessitate an American response against China, the report insists, because “China must fully own responsibility for the behavior of its North Korean ally.” Any backing down from this stance, the council states, would result in national “humiliation” for the United States.
Perhaps most notably, however, the report also envisages what a successful American China policy would look like by 2050: “the United States and its major allies continue to dominate the regional and global balance of power across all the major indices of power;” and that head of state Xi Jinping “has been replaced by a more moderate party leadership; and that the Chinese people themselves have come to question and challenge the Communist Party’s century-long proposition that China’s ancient civilization is forever destined to an authoritarian future.” In other words, that China has been broken and that some sort of regime change has occurred.
When Hawks Advocate a Human Rights-Oriented Foreign Policy, You Know It Isn’t About Human Rights
Foreign policy tends to be complicated and messy. International issues create an explosive imbroglio mixing economic, political, and security controversies. Human rights upsets almost every calculation since America’s friends can be even crueler than its foes.
The Trump administration cared not at all about humanitarian issues. Political prisoners were only convenient weapons, useful against adversaries but forgotten with allies. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s cynicism was exceeded only by his sanctimony when it came to the issue.
Members of the Biden administration care more about such issues but have little credibility to preach to the world. The president and most of his top officials were drawn from the Obama administration, which aided the murderous Saudis in their aggressive war against Yemen. The Obama retreads supported radical jihadist insurgents against Syria’s Assad government. U.S. officials refused to call Egyptian Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s coup a coup. And they supported a gaggle of America’s “usual suspects,” allies which killed and jailed opponents with equal aplomb.
In fact, the Obama administration made little pretense about supporting human rights. Its claim to have entered Libya’s civil war for humanitarian purposes was a shameful fake and fraud. Muammar Khadafy was a dictator, but contra the administration he had massacred no civilians and his threats of future retribution were directed against combatants. Nevertheless, the Obama administration misled China and Russia into approving a UN resolution which authorized an operation to protect civilians – and used the opportunity to impose regime change. It was cynical Trumpism before Trump.
Moreover, the practical difficulties in promoting human rights are enormous. Some advocates seem to believe that the president merely need pronounce his or her judgment and humanity will rush to comply. However, that isn’t the way of the world. History didn’t work that way during the early American republic, Cold War, or unipolar moment. And it certainly doesn’t work that way now.
US and Colombian govts supported botched invasion of Venezuela: Bombshell testimony from coup-plotter
Awitness at the heart of the botched invasion of Venezuela in May 2020 has stated that the US and Colombian governments were involved in the regime-change operation. Coup-plotter Yacsy Álvarez said she met with officials from the FBI and DEA in Florida and informed them of their plans.
Álvarez also revealed that Colombia’s President Iván Duque and his powerful mentor Álvaro Uribe, who is closely linked to drug cartels and death squads, were aiding the Venezuelan coup-plotters. Colombia’s top intelligence agency supported the conspirators before and after the attempted invasion, and Álvarez explained that “they knew everything.”
But the Colombian government later turned on Álvarez and her fellow coup-plotters and arrested them. Her lawyer has accused Colombia’s intelligence services of setting a “trap,” so Bogotá could pin the blame on her and her associates and wash its hands of the operation.
The failed invasion, which aimed to violently overthrow Venezuela’s elected President Nicolás Maduro, was spearheaded by a Florida-based private military company called SilverCorp, led by former US Army Special Forces officer Jordan Goudreau.
Goudreau said in a breach-of-contract lawsuit that he had met with two Donald Trump administration officials at the former US president’s National Doral Miami golf resort to discuss the coup plans, and was told that the White House supported it.
It’s a mystery…
Biden’s Foreign Policy History and What it Portends for his Presidency
While front-line soldiers are often tormented for decades by the horrors they experience in endless wars conducted by the U.S. government—not to mention the hundreds of thousands who have been maimed and/or lost their lives—the political elite in the U.S. is not known to suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) because they are, perhaps in their own minds, too far removed from the scene. The events of January 6 seem to have left factions with a taste of their own medicine.
Notwithstanding, newly-elected president Biden characteristically does not appear to be haunted by any of his past actions; rather he is often boastful about policies that caused great misery. In this exclusive series of articles reviewing Biden’s positions on U.S. foreign policy, Kuzmarov focuses on some of the skeletons in Biden’s political closet.
Hellbound and Down 
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