Obama finally hails American Exceptionalism

After years of downplaying America’s supposed exceptionalism, Obama’s recent West Point speech finally confirmed once and for all where he stands in this who-gets-to-police-the-world creed.

From a belief in everyone else’s exceptionalism, last week’s West Point speech calls for Obama’s belief in “American exceptionalism with every fiber of my being.” He elaborated on what this means for the unsuspecting world: the US military has “the power to launch unilateral attacks when America’s interests are directly threatened.” Notice the subtle word changes: from the right to intervene when America’s “security” is directly threatened to “interests” directly threatened.

Indeed it is astonishing how American elections can mask the fundamental differences between the Democrats and the Republicans. It can be remembered Obama distinguished himself (and his party) from McCain’s and Bush-Cheney’s global conquest bidding when he famously decalred “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism” in a NATO summit in 2009.

At the time, this disbelief in a sole American exceptionalism and the enduring threat of isolationism ruffled some feathers, especially among conservatives, and was widely interpreted as vindication of Obama’s plan to retreat America from the world. This meant, first and foremost, the rolling back of the US war machine from overseas deployment, especially from the dreaded adventurism in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Despite Obama’s proposal to retreat from the Middle East, it can be recalled that during his first few years in office, he proposed and got Congress approval for an increase in the number of troops deployed in Afghanistan, famously known as the ‘surge’, lasting until 2012. 

Now halfway into his second term, Obama is no longer a wolf hiding in sheep’s clothing – the guessing game on what his intentions for America’s global military domination is finally over: American will remain the sole policeman of the world whether you (Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela) like it or not.

Another word change worth nothing includes the shift from “war on terror” of the Bush-Cheney years to “the capacity of terrorists to do harm” and from “coalition of the willing” to “mobilize allies and partners to take collective action.”

Obama’s term, marketed as a move away from Bush’s imperialist policies, have so far been defined by more violations of international law and by increases of some kind, including more eavesdropping (even of allied leaders), astronomical increase in the Pentagon budget, the refusal to close illegal overseas prisons, the hijacking of popular uprisings, and support for disputes against its perceived long-term enemies.

Obama ends his West Point speech in a reassuring note, just in case his audience elsewhere doubts his exceptionalism revelation: “the military that you have joined is and always be the backbone” of US “leadership.”

Russia’s Near Abroad Foreign Policy

Much has been going on in Russia’s borders in recent months:  from last year’s violent “Euromaindan” protests sponsored by the West, to the annexation of Crimea, the Eastern and Southern Ukraine’s invalid independence referendum, the sorry (at least in the Western eyes) Sochi Olympics, the relentless economic and political sanctions, and the stepping up of military patrols in Eastern Europe by NATO.

Not long ago did the West portray Russia as rebuilding a “Soviet ‘empire” when it went to war with Georgia in August 2008. Since then, Western politicians and the mainstream media have spread their usual fear-mongering propaganda against Russia.

What’s missing from this narrative is the question of why Russia is forced to tackle its present challenges, especially along its borders. For one, centuries of Russian empire and the 20^th century’s Soviet experiment solely points to the immense and legitimate influence Russia has on its near abroad frontier, be it in greater Eastern Europe or former Soviet republics, which include Ukraine.

What the West fails to understand is Moscow’s right and obligation to protect ethnic Russians outside the country, especially in the former Soviet republics. When the USSR collapsed in 1991, millions of Russian suddenly found themselves second-class citizens in other former Soviet republics, including in Ukraine.

For instance, back in February, one of the first “legislation” of the new illegitimate government of Kiev was to ban Russian language in Ukraine. Seriously, can language alone be of matter national security concern? The judgment and intentions of those in power can be in doubt especially if your country’s new leaders do not even know the right flag for a country he is visiting. And yet the West has the nerve to spread lies about Russia being the aggressor in the Ukraine crisis rather than the other way around.

And how Western politicians and mainstream media portray Russia’s fictitious ambitions is pretty much the same as how they portray China’s assertiveness in the South China Sea: that hot foreign policy conceals and overrides domestic concerns; a way to consolidate public support against a foreign aggressor while forgetting the troubles at home.

And yet all that protection for minorities outside Russia is seen as part of Vladimir Putin’s “empire building", which in contrast to the West’s military and covert interventions abroad pretty much vilifies those accusing the Russian president instead.

Now that Russia is firmly out of the G8, eyes are focused on where Russia’s economic potentials will go instead. Indeed, Russia is part of the greater and more important G20, as well as the economic collective known as the BRICS. For at least the past decade now, Russia and China has been busy building new pipelines to transport energy to countries East of Russia, which will help Moscow diversify its economy to where the global economy is happening most: in the East.

And of course talks of a new Cold War with Russia (and China) has been circulating in the Western mainstream media. Politicians up to the highest levels, including Barack Obama himself, are trying to blame (or deny) the new Cold War. Indeed, for some politicians in the West, the old Cold War with the Soviet Union really did not go away.

 A Reemerging Russia is indeed what they fancy; after all, the fear of enemies abroad means the sustainment of the military industrial complex which Eisenhower feared will sustain America’s insatiable appetite for a permanent war economy.

Obama Ignores China in Asian Tour

US President Barack Obama has recently concluded a four-country tour of Asia, ending it with a rather undeniable reassuring that America will remain the dominant military force in the region.

The visit does not pretend to be about anything else, with a first-stop visit to Japan (presently involved in tense territorial disputes with China) and ending with a renewed military agreement with the Philippines.

Obama’s visit also reassured the region besides military obligations, including the muddled Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement which aims to lower trade barriers between the most economically dynamic region in the world and the US.

In hindsight, all of these ‘high-profile’ gestures highlight what was missing: the involvement of China.

Military Intimidation Shrouded in Neutrality

The message is clear since Obama’s ‘Pivot to Asia’ proclamation in 2011: lest it forgets, the US must reassure China that no other power should try to ‘change the status quo’, for better or for worse. This ‘rebalancing’ of power, a shift of US military emphasis from the Middle East to the Pacific (China’s borders, from the Pacific to South Asia), has been cheerfully greeted by the region’s leaders.

Obama’s visit to Japan finally shows that the Washington is not neutral in the island disputes in the region. In a press conference in Tokyo, he stated that the US and Japan have a mutual security treaty that covers the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands–a complete about-face to his past statements regarding territorial disputes between China and Japan.

Benigno Aquino, President of the Philippines, (son of former President Corazon Aquino who was put to power by the American government in the late 1980s), hailed a new ten-year defense pact with the US as an agreement that “reaffirms our countries’ commitment to mutual defense and security, and promotes regional peace and stability.”

One common theme in this is their willingness to be part of Washington’s new focus on Asia. Indeed it seems to ‘work’ both ways: with the waning of American military power the US pushes these countries to be more aggressive against China, while the same countries can focus on developing their economies and outsource their defense and security needs to Washington.

Economic Partnership a “Bridge to Far”

Actively promoted by the United States, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) aims to give China’s neighbors an alternative to Beijing’s economic clout through less trade barriers and bureaucracy. China’s economic might, role, and influence in the global economy is undeniable. As such, a trade agreement that fails to include the second-biggest economy in the world (some speculate it to surpass the US as early as 2016), is a failure in itself already.

For instance, in the bilateral trade between Japan and the US, there has been suspicion on both sides about unfair government protectionist policies (Japanese automobile industry) and unfair government subsidies (US agriculture). Obama’s latest visit just showed how difficult it is to accomplish anything beyond the trade barriers.

And history is on the side of the free trade skeptics: today it is widely accepted that free trade agreements are discriminatory by nature, which is the reason why most economists today prefer to call the free trade agreements (FTAs) as preferential trade agreements (PTAs).

Indeed, the more Obama denied his visit was not about China, the more it was perceived as being about militarily and economically containing China.

Addressing the democratic deficiency of EU elections

Years of public spending cuts and unimpressive economic recovery has not only changed the minds of EU citizens regarding the legitimacy of the whole European Union experiment but also how its leaders try to engage the public in the European project as a whole.

Under the slogan “This time it’s different”, there is an attempt to persuade voters to go to the ballot box this coming May, which EU leaders hope to increase the EU’s legitimacy.

Such inadequacy was expressed recently by the European Commission’s vice president, Maros Sefcovic, stating that the ‘democratic deficiency’ of the Commission’s actions had been regularly raised in the past four years, in a statement to Reuters.

In a statement made in Brussels, Sefcovic expressed that “the recent strengthening of European integration means the Commission is playing more and more a political role and all of Europe needs to boost democratic legitimacy more than ever.”

But more than increasing the democratic deficiency of the EU project, there has been a progressive decrease in electoral participation by the public and overall attitude towards the EU. In a PEW research conducted last May, it showed that positive views of the European Union are at or near their low point in most EU nations, even among the young, the hope for the EU’s future.”

The research blamed the public distaste on prolonged economic crisis which “has created centrifugal forces that are pulling European public opinion apart.”

Also reasoned is the general disillusionment toward elected leaders, where Europeans “are losing faith in the capacity of their own national leaders to cope” with economic woes, including the inability of leaders to address the lack of employment opportunities in the continent.

As for the coming elections itself, some observers caution that “if any political party is looking forward to the EU election, it has to be the hard right, anti-EU National Front”, as exemplified in France these days. The general mood there is that “France has lost its sovereignty since the EU was created.” Polls show that the French public has lost their ‘faith’ in the ability of the EU to solve the country’s economic crisis.

In Britain, Nigel Farage, the leader of the UK Independence Party, said the mood in France is shared by Southern ‘peripheral’ economies, which are at the receiving end of the financial bailouts.

In Germany, feelings of burdensome tax payer bailouts to help ailing economies across Europe stem from factors including lack of transparency through to doubts in the merits of the EU-US free trade agreement (TIPP).

Indeed, it will be exciting to see how the decision to include the election of the Commission President in the ballots will turn out this May. 

The Language of Western Double Standards

By now Obama has addressed Europe’s elites in Brussels for the G7 summit, which excluded Russia because of disagreements with Moscow’s stance on the Ukraine crisis. The Crimean referendum is perhaps the pinnacle of this almost half-a-year old Ukrainian fiasco–an essentially chessboard game between European powers and America. Depending on your news sources though, it can be hard to know who is telling the truth or spreading propaganda.

Of course, for those of you who manages to extricate yourselves from the claws of the mainstream Western media, reading ‘between the lines’ is more like an exercise on deciphering and disgust than simple curious observation and impartiality–what used to be news has now been transformed into outright and shameless propaganda.

Whether you are sitting pretty on your couch watching the evening news, or attending a press conference of US officials, here is a fun exercise on learning “the language of Western double standards.”

When Obama calls for “de-escalating the Ukraine crisis”

•          Dig on the facts, the ‘cause and effects’ of the crisis: the Ukraine protests late last year was ‘escalated’ by the West by its support for the Ukrainian anarchists, perhaps starting with John McCain’s visit to Kiev. Russia went to protect Crimea after the fact; triggered by the takeover of the Ukrainian self-proclaimed government

When the president of the United States calls for tougher sanctions if Russia engaged in “deeper incursions” into Ukraine

•          Using the language “deeper incursions” denies the fact that Russian armed forces are permitted to maintain a base for mutual defense with Ukraine, a ‘responsibility to protect’ pact as the US calls it, until at least the year 2042.

When Obama mentions the existence of “the principles that have meant so much to Europe and the world must be upheld”

•          He should’ve protested loudly against Bush Jr.’s incursions in Afghanistan and Iraq, and to his policy makers during the so-called Arab Spring of Libya and Syria. Or do we need to mention Reagan’s CIA incursions in Latin America?

When the West declares the Crimean referendum to secede from Ukraine is “illegal and against international law”

•          They should be reminded how they split Kosovo in the 90s. Despite Vladimir Putin’s firing back at Western double speak on the Crimean referendum, so far no Western politician courageous enough has rebuffed the Russian president’s reference to Kosovo
•          In a similar situation, the Falkland Islands near Argentina is claimed by Great Britain, despite the former’s protests. Just imagine the location of those Islands in South America. In a similar secession referendum held last year, Falklanders voted to remain part of Britain. Of course they had the right to decide their own fate, just as with Crimeans in Ukraine

When the West says Russia is expanding its influence in the region

•          Then Soviet president Gorbachev and George Bush Sr. discussed, albeit informally, that NATO will not expand “an inch” towards Russia if the USSR supported the reunification of Germany. By simply looking at the map of Europe today, even former Soviet republics are now members of this imperialist military alliance.

There is no denying that the inclusion of Ukraine as part of the European Union is only a pretext to its NATO membership in the future, and this Russia will fight at all cost. Here again, the principle of ‘cause and effect’ plays a role: Being in its region of influence, naturally Russia has the right to increase its military readiness amid NATO preparations near Russia’s borders.

NATO’s Expansion to Ukraine

While the American invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, the intervention in Libya and the supply of illegal weapons to Syrian rebels are relatively fresh in our memory, here we are again being bombarded by words of deceit about the crisis in Ukraine.

By now we should be familiar that Washington, like the fallen angel from heaven, is at its best when it deceives.

By now we should’ve learned how Lucifer tricked the earliest people, by how he careful used words to poison his victims.

By now we know that when America uses the words ‘humanitarian intervention’, ‘democracy’, ‘peaceful protests’, ‘isolation’,  ‘rebel moderates’, ‘international community’, ‘all-inclusive minority-protecting’, it is exercising its right of spreading lies, double standards, and hypocrisy.

NATO’S Expansions to the East

Perhaps the earliest incursion and betrayal of Russian trust regarding Eastern Europe can be traced back to the reunification of East and West Germany in 1989. At the time, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to a united Germany, as long as Western powers maintain non-incorporation of the united German state into NATO. Nevertheless, Germany joined NATO in 1990, despite previous assurances from George Bush Sr. together with then US Secretary of State James Baker, and then German Chancellor Helmut Kohl.

At issue then was the Soviet withdrawal from East Germany, which they had the right to protect under a treaty negotiated between the allies after World War II. The Soviet leader agreed to pullout 380,000 Soviet troops in the East, under the condition the US and NATO will not expand to a united Germany.

Conn Hallinan best summarizes the exchanges at the time:

The Russians were willing to exit their troops, but only if US and NATO forces did not fill the vacuum. On Feb. 9, Gorbachev told Baker “any extension of the zone of NATO would be unacceptable.” Baker assured him that “NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastward.”

The Baker-Gorbachev meeting was followed the next day by a meeting between Gorbachev and West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who assured the Soviet leader that “naturally NATO could not expand its territory” into East Germany. And, in a parallel meeting between West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze, Genscher told Shevardnadze “for us, it stands firm: NATO will not expand to the East.”

But no one anticipated that the USSR will disintegrate a mere two years later. Having faced an existential challenge after the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO needed to take a decision on how to become a relevant organization after. And by now, it is clear its interests lie in expanding to the East, to Russia’s very borders.

In 1999 NATO membership was given to former Soviet bloc countries, including to Poland, Czech Republic, and Hungary. The Atlantic alliance further ate into former Soviet republics with the incorporation of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia in 2004, together with other former Russian allies Slovakia, Bulgaria and Hungary. Another decade would pass until Albania and Croatia joined the NATO. Not to mention big American bases in Turkey, the West now has a united front against Russia, from the Baltic to the Black Sea.

Of course treaties and bases are a different matter from actually conducting wars. The Cold War triumphalism of the Reagan years extended well into the Clinton era, which was marked by Western incursions exploiting Russian weakness in the 1990s, namely the Bosnian War and Kosovo War. Perhaps a reality check is useful for determining which block of countries pose a threat to international peace and order.

In the case of the ‘humanitarian intervention’ in Kosovo, Adam Roberts asked the right questions:

Was NATO right to launch Operation Allied Force without at least making an attempt to get authorization from the Security Council? The argument for having at least tried is that the effort would have shown respect for the UN and would have enabled people around the world to see exactly which states were refusing to authorize action to stop atrocities.

Finally the US will be in Russia’s borders

Indeed it may not be a surprise now that the West’s exploitation of the events in Ukraine is part of a larger pattern of expansion and aggression towards Russia. Except for Belarus, Ukraine is perhaps the last straw Russia will be tackling in the relentless military expansion of the West.

Stephen Kinzer of Brown University sums it up accurately:

From the moment the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the United States has relentlessly pursued a strategy of encircling Russia, just as it has with other perceived enemies like China and Iran. It has brought 12 countries in Central Europe, all of them formerly allied with Moscow, into the NATO alliance. US military power is now directly on Russia’s borders.

Although the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania hosts active forward NATO air bases, seeing the fall of another former Soviet republic presents perhaps the completion of Russia’s suspicion of the West’s intentions.

As if it’s true the West is ‘just all rhetoric’ and ‘all bark but no bite’, in the recent weeks we are witness to NATO advances towards Russia by deploying forces in the Baltics and Poland as well as sending a guided missile destroyer into the Black Sea, an area where Russia sees as the central issue of the Ukraine crisis.

As for Russia’s strategy in the region, with almost all of the former Soviet republics in Eastern Europe now a part of NATO, it is clear it has no intentions to expand. Russian forces are in Ukraine under a treaty, which the Western media often portrays as an ‘invasion force’ except that such a force has been there for the past 15 years.

RT News summarizes the facts well:

• A Russian naval presence in Crimea dates to 1783 when the port city of Sevastopol was founded by Russian Prince Grigory Potemkin. Crimea was part of Russia until Nikita Khruschev gave it to Ukraine in 1954.
• In 1997, amid the wreckage of the USSR, Russia & Ukraine signed a Partition Treaty determining the fate of the military bases and vessels in Crimea. The deal sparked widespread officer ‘defections’ to Russia and was ratified by the Russian & Ukrainian parliaments in 1999. Russia received 81.7 percent of the fleet’s ships after paying the Ukrainian government US$526.5 million.
• The deal allowed the Russian Black Sea Fleet to stay in Crimea until 2017. This was extended by another 25 years to 2042 with a 5-year extension option in 2010.
• Moscow annually writes off $97.75 million of Kiev’s debt for the right to use Ukrainian waters and radio frequencies, and to compensate for the Black Sea Fleet’s environmental impact.
• Russia has two airbases in Crimea, in Kacha and Gvardeysky.
• Russian naval units are permitted to implement security measures at their permanent post as well as during re-deployments in cooperation with Ukrainian forces, in accordance with Russia’s armed forces procedures.

Unfortunately, we can only look back at the concern of Khrushchev in the 1960s and Gorbachev in the 1980s being played out today by the West and Russia, not to mention, perhaps, during the thug war that defeated Russia during the Crimean War in the mid-19^th century. We only hope Crimean history does not repeat itself.

Questioning the West’s Intervention in Russia’s Sphere of Influence

While being bloodily engaged in other countries’ affairs, the  hypocrisy of the United States looms ever larger over Russia’s protection of its own interests, doing away with their own morality twisting, and continuing on with a single-sided war of words against Moscow’s legitimate foreign policy.

Not that its mainstream media is to blame for sensationalizing and sugar-coating what in all practical terms is the overthrow of an elected leader by ultra-violent forces in Ukraine, this double standard is a favorite theme of America: from incompetently-informed field reporters (or propagandists?) hailing their news channel’s merit in a world of ever-divided opinion and activism, to its lunatic politicians struggling for relevance (McCain) and consistency (Obama, Kerry).

Never mind the political stunts of American politicians against their own president in the midst of an international crisis, there is a united front against anything about Russia in Ukraine–they just all come in different sour-tasting flavor.

The relentless bad mouthing has been around since the very beginning of the Ukraine crisis, a political calamity hailed in the Western media as a second ‘Orange Revolution’ but which today more looks like a confused ‘blue-yellow-white-red’ colors of the combined flags of the European Union and the United States.

How the West describes ‘Democracy’ in Ukraine

Since when did you describe a protest that has been known for not just harming its own police (as opposed to the violent and quick crackdown by American police against Occupy Wall Street protesters) but also destroying government property? Seeing the footage of warzone Kiev and then later listening to Kerry’s empty description of it as ‘standing peacefully against tyranny’ sure makes for an uncomfortable bowel movement. Since when did you call Molotov-throwing a form of peaceful protest?

Global vs. Regional ‘Intervention’

Quickly describing the Russian involvement in Ukraine as “a 19^th century act in the 21^st century”, Kerry seems to have forgotten that the opening acts of this decade was his country’s involvement in two major conflicts (Afghanistan, Iraq) that so far has set new records in unraveling the American empire. In fact, he was among those in Congress who voted for the baseless intervention in Iraq.

And how to do you reconcile the geographical proximity of Ukraine to Russia and the United States’ proximity to ‘all’ countries of the world, in intervention and ‘legitimate interests’ terms–words that are so favored by America? Does it seem America is a little bit all over the place while Russia’s interest is a little bit just around its borders?

 International Law: More about That

It is convenient to cite snippets of violations of ‘international law’ thrown by Obama and Kerry against Putin’s intervention in Ukraine. For one, just in case they skipped that page of international law, Russia and Ukraine has standing, legitimate, and mutually-beneficial military agreement.

To begin with, does the United States even recognize the International Criminal Court? It is a fact that the United States has no obligation and does not recognize the ICC, and obviously its mandates and decisions, such as the imposition of war crimes and crimes against humanity verdicts against individuals and/or countries.

So now we have Obama (a former law professor) who throws his self-righteous punches against Putin’s alleged violation of international law? It is not just a forgivable doubles-standard: Russia has a legitimate military agreement with Ukraine. As RT describes it “especially unwelcome is the fact that the so-called ‘invasion force’ has been there for 15 years already.’ It further adds that the military deal between Ukraine in Russia, ‘was extended by another 25 years to 2042 with a five-year extension option in 2010.’

And what about Obama’s continuous violation of the sovereignty of other countries with his drone army with his targeted killings? How do you then question your rival when you yourself don’t even have the decency to hide your own war crimes, instead bragging that I’m ‘really good at killing people’.

Crimea’s Historical Ties with Russia

The same goes for the skipping of facts to fit the mainstream Western media’s narrative of Russia being the aggressor in the Ukraine crisis. For centuries, Crimea and/or the region south of Ukraine has been part of Russia. Crimea was gifted to Ukraine during the Soviet period, and when the USSR ceased in 1991, Crimea was granted autonomy, even culminating in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea in 1999.

Fast forward today, the supposed ‘Russian protest tourists’ in Crimea practiced their very own democratic process by voting, by majority, to make Crimea a part of Russia. Instead of reviewing the facts, the West has started its sanctions against Russia and Crimean citizens ranging from visa-free talks to bank assets freezing.

Crimea’s Prime Minister sums up the situation beautifully: “We live here; we can choose our future on our own – since when is it punishable by sanctions…As soon as the Russians for the first time concentrated on defending their interests – and not just Russians, the Ukrainians living here also, everyone got agitated and started talking sanctions. Do we advise America or Germany how to deal with their autonomous regions and tell people what to do?”

EU Reluctance to Follow Washington’s Sanctions

At least the crisis in Ukraine is not confined there: EU officials up to the highest levels are unsure how to cope with the situation, highlighted perhaps by ambassador Nuland’s ‘Fuck the EU’ comment, referring to Brussel’s apparent reluctance to engage Russia through military and economic sanctions.

The EU division over how to react to Russia’s stance over Ukraine stems from the economic impact it will have on the fragile economic recovery in the continent. Even its closest ally, Great Britain is not supporting, “for now, trade sanctions…or close London’s financial center to Russians.”

As the EU’s manufacturing powerhouse, Germany is not sure, at least ‘for now’ also, on how to sanction Russia. Like other members of the EU, Germany obtains about half its natural gas supplies from Russia. Also, Russia is the EU's third biggest trading partner, only behind the United States and China. And the traded goods and services amount to $500 billion in 2012, not to mention major stakes in Russian companies are held my big multinational corporations in the EU. So a trade sanction hurts the EU more than the US.

Regardless of the outcome, there is confidence in Russia’s ability to weather major crises, and this new low in relations with the West will surely be a test not just for Moscow’s patience, but also the persistence of its enemies.

Next Up: Ukraine’s EU Membership: a pretext to NATO Expansion