"No Longer Even 'Leading From Behind'"

The ongoing mess in Libya.

3 Definitions of the Obama Doctrine

Admittedly, this is a rather difficult endeavour because it's trying to do a definition by default given that the administration seems to have no coherent pro-active strategic vision.  "Leading from behind" does NOT count.  Anyway, what do you think of:

(1) Definition the First

The Obama Doctrine is to ignore problems until they metastasize into vast international crises, then react with an ineffective spasm of concern. In this, the President has been consistent, be it Libya, Egypt, Boko Haram or Ukraine. The truly serious situations get a Twitter hashtag.

(2) Definition the Second

Asked seven years ago if the need to stave off potential genocide might convince him to change his mind about a total and precipitous withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, then-candidate Obama replied that it would not. “Well, look, if that’s the criteria by which we are making decisions on the deployment of U.S. forces, then by that argument you would have 300,000 troops in the Congo right now — where millions have been slaughtered as a consequence of ethnic strife — which we haven’t done,” Obama said. 

This cynical avowal, I wrote at the time, was an indication of what might become the “Obama doctrine,” which I described thusly: “The United States will remain passive in the face of genocide.” Seven years later, I regret to say, my prediction stands up pretty well.

(3) Definition the Third (OK, not so much definition as observation)

US respnse 2 Syria,Russia,Iraq: 1)Huh? 2)We're watching this closely 3)With concern. 4)Hey, stop- 5)We won't tolerate that! 6)Mmm. Whatever.
— Rosa Brooks (@brooks_rosa) June 13, 2014

Syria: Thoughts and Quotations

A few quotations instead of an actual personal essay because your humble hostess needs to finish her schoolwork before she can watch football:

Quote of the Day: Libya as Exemplar

That's just great:

As world attention focused on the coup in Egypt and the poison gas attack in Syria over the past two months, Libya has plunged unnoticed into its worst political and economic crisis since the defeat of Gaddafi two years ago. Government authority is disintegrating in all parts of the country putting in doubt claims by American, British and French politicians that NATO’s military action in Libya in 2011 was an outstanding example of a successful foreign military intervention which should be repeated in Syria.

"Lawlessness and ruin," as the article describes the place.  Ugh.

Quote of the Day: Peacefullest Peace Prize Winner Ever

Do you feel this way too?

"It's hard to keep track of the Nobel Peace Laureate's manifold wars, kinetic actions, and drone assassinations."

This Is What "Leading From Behind" Gets You

I'm a few days behind, but this is still worth a look.  This administration's foreign policy (such as it is) is looking more and more amoeba-like every day - stimulus, response, stimulus, response, purely reactive, lacking higher cognitive functions.

The Post-WWI Map That Ruined the Middle East?

Cartography matters: thoughts from a PhD candidate in international relations at Georgetown.  The collapse of the Ottoman Empire opened a Pandora's Box.

Mark Steyn on the Benghazi Debacle

Pretty much what I want to say, only with far more flair. A bon mot: 

"The government dispatched more firepower to arrest Nakoula Basseley Nakoula in Los Angeles than it did to protect its mission in Benghazi."

Watching the Benghazi Hearings

So far, this is pretty much indicative of the behavior of the witnesses versus the behavior of some of the politicians:

Holy @#%, we've got testimony about people being mortarted to death and Maloney's prattling on about "e-mail etiquette."
— jimgeraghty (@jimgeraghty) May 8, 2013

*Headdesk*

Oh, and FYI, here's some live-blogging.

Quote of the Day: Benghazi and the Big Picture

A reminder that Benghazi occurred in the context of major lapses in foreign policy:

We are interested in seeing some political accountability for what increasingly looks like a deliberate attempt to mislead the American people on a matter of national security for the sake of political gain, but we care even more about a serious national discussion about our Middle East strategy.

Benghazi Debacle: Hicks' Testimony

Breaking from Sharyl Attkisson at CBS News:

The deputy of slain U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens has told congressional investigators that a team of Special Forces prepared to fly from Tripoli to Benghazi during the Sept. 11, 2012 attacks was forbidden from doing so by U.S. Special Operations Command South Africa. 

The account from Gregory Hicks is in stark contrast to assertions from the Obama administration, which insisted that nobody was ever told to stand down and that all available resources were utilized. 

Quote of the Day: On the Benghazi Debacle

From Dignified Rant's post:

With tens of thousands of troops in Europe, we really couldn't scrape up a platoon or a company to fly out to Benghazi without preparing them with a week of rehearsals and a PowerPoint briefing about what to expect? 

"What Difference Does It Make?" The Difference Between the Truth and a Lie, Madame Secretary

That Benghazi hearing was disgraceful. 

Recall this and this too. Oh, and this. UPDATE: Cartoonist Michael Ramirez nails it.

Quote of the Day: the US and the Arab Spring Aftermath

Oh, dear (as quoted here):

"... the United States has somehow managed to alienate both sides of the Arab cold war: Dictators think we’re naively pro-revolution, and Arab protesters and rebels worry we’re still siding with the dictators."

2012: A Retrospective of Foreign Policy Follies

Reason picks its top 5 foreign policy flops.  Just 5?

Headline of the Day on Libya

I present the following New York Times (!) headline without comment:

"U.S.-Approved Arms for Libya Rebels Fell Into Jihadis’ Hands"

Foreign Policy Chickens Coming Home to Roost

As depressing as it is unsurprising:

... the terrorist attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11 should have been a red flag to all who believe this president has invented a successful new model for U.S. leadership. Far from being an aberration, Benghazi was a toxic byproduct of the light footprint approach — and very likely the first in a series of boomerangs.

You don't say!  The entire piece looks at other such "red flags."  Remember, Libya's supposed to be the "success story" of Obama's approach to foreign policy.  Frankly, I'm pessimistic about foreign policy in Obama's second term and getting more pessimistic all the time.

The New Cover of "Foreign Policy": What We Found in Benghazi

Check out this new report by two journalists with Foreign Policy.

Oh No They Di'nt!

OH YES THEY DID.  I know I said no more posting about newspapers, but I finally got around to reading this new editorial by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and I couldn't believe what I was reading.  It's basically a passionately infuriated rant, and it pulls no punches about what it thinks.  Even more surprising is the editorial plainly calling the Obama Administration out for the Benghazi fiasco - something that many media outlets are apparently not covering.  Oh, my!  

Two Journalists on the Middle East and Foreign Policy

The always-interesting Michael Totten has a new article on the persistence of the Islamist threat, while Canadian journalist Terry Glavin in his piece "On the Front Line of a Global Struggle" surveys a number of good books.  He also notes this portion of an interview chronicled in one of those books:

“S.D.”, in Iran, writes directly to those of us who live in the West: “While you are fighting for the rights of pandas over there, people are still being stoned to death here in my country.”

That's more perspective than you'll get in many a classroom or thinktank these days.  RELATED: Lara Logan on Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.