Foreign Policy

AFP reports: The European Union demanded Wednesday sweeping powers to override national budgets and proposed issuing joint eurozone bonds to help resolve and prevent a repeat of the debt crisis.

"Without stronger governance, it will be difficult if not impossible to sustain the common currency," EU Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso said of his latest legislative proposals.

The head of the executive EU arm, Barroso presented radical plans that would allow him and Economy Commissioner Olli Rehn to decide to intervene in national policymaking, the article reports.

It is time for Greece, Italy and Portugal to think twice about the EU. It was all the fever ten, twenty years ago when the economic cycle was rising to its peak and Bill Clinton – he of the 50 gold watches - was just rising to status of world shaman. It was a giddy time; the Dalai Lama charmed the world and Bono was writing op-eds for the New York Times. Every individual, all people in the global village would be as George Soros saw in the rising karma, a kind of American; an American by degree.

Two hundred and fifty U.S. Marines in Australia doesn’t sound threatening.

But President Obama’s decision to deploy the Marines — rising to 2,500 — on a permanent basis in Darwin from next summer on is a powerful symbol for Beijing, which in the past few days has been told to act like a “grown-up” by the U.S. leader.

I’m all for playing hardball with China, and Obama probably thinks that talking tough will play well at home. “The United States is a Pacific power and we’re here to stay,” he told Australians in remarks that were actually designed for an assertive China.

"I can't stand him. He's a liar," Sarkozy said of Netanyahu, according to CNN.

Obama replied, "You're tired of him; what about me? I have to deal with him every day.”

In an off-mic situation, Obama and Sarkozy are discovered not to trust Netanyahu, and Sarkozy went so far as to call him a liar. Not only did Obama refuse to defend him, but chimed in by saying he has to "deal" with the Israeli prime minister every day.

Now that the Libyan sideshow is out of the way, and Syria has been placed in a holding pattern, Iran’s nuclear program is back at the top of the international agenda.

Tomorrow or Wednesday, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is expected to release a report that, according to media leaks, will say that Iran has been conducting research in areas that could only be used for producing a bomb. The question, as ever, is what to do about it.

Republicans are in imminent danger of losing their ownership of the national security issue ahead of the 2012 elections.

Not many outside of Washington are aware the Obama administration has dispatched close to 100 “military advisers” (read: mostly CIA) to the far reaches of East Africa to combat a menace in the Uganda/Democratic Republic of Congo regions knows as the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).
 
The group has been around for decades, terrorizing that part of the continent and taking no prisoners. They brutally murder, maim and wreak havoc where and when they want.
 
I agree we should probably have our troops over there. Heck, they should’ve gone sooner, if what the White House says about the LRA’s activities has only worsened.

What I’m worried about is what the president chooses to call military campaigns such as this. If I’m not mistaken, the White House exercised its authority and sent military troops not for humanitarian reasons or to protect American interests and people. No, the president said this was clearly in the name of the national interests of the United States. In effect, he was saying this band of mercenaries represented a clear and present danger to the security interests of our nation. That’s a bit of a stretch, even for a military hawk such as myself.

On the heels of the death of Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, and President Obama's announcement late last week that U.S. forces will soon be pulling out of Iraq, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is accusing the president of making military and national-security decisions based on politics. "I would argue Iraq and Afghanistan is being run out of Chicago, not Washington, in terms of decisions," Graham said on Fox News Sunday.

No surprise there — we knew President Obama can't get credit from Republicans for his foreign-policy and defense successes, no matter how many he piles up. But the real news from Graham's comments is his concern that GOP presidential candidates may be giving the president a free pass. "To the Republican Party: National security matters; step up on it," said Graham. "We've got a jobs problem. We've got a national-security problem that is growing by the day."

Another chapter of the Arab Spring concluded with Gadhafi’s death yesterday. The U.S. played a significant financial role in toppling his regime. We lost no troops and avoided political turmoil by putting no boots on the ground. There are important lessons that can be learned, such as the use of counterterrorism exercises and technology, as opposed to flesh and blood, to win wars. We should learn how to enhance our ability to effect regime change without risking the lives of military personnel. Gadhafi is like many other dictators, including Saddam Hussein; he needed to be removed for the sake of the people. Hopefully, our future military exercises will be based on such humanitarian principles, and not on political expediency or the agendas of our foreign allies.

Hillary Clinton has made a surprise trip to “new” Libya to support the National Transitional Council even before the capture of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

The secretary of State met with NTC Chairman Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril and Finance Minister Ali Tarhouni, offering funding and technical support. She said afterward that Libya should be governed by “the rule of law, not the whims of men,” and should have a “transparent and fair judicial system.”

It’s a scary world out there, if you read Mitt Romney’s white paper on national security. If he is elected, it’s going to get even scarier.

Romney as president would boost U.S. military spending and naval shipbuilding. He would dispatch aircraft carrier task forces to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf as a warning to Iran. He would expand the naval presence in the Western Pacific as a warning to China. The U.S. should be coordinating with Taiwan to determine its military needs and supplying them with adequate aircraft and other military platforms, he says.