by Chuck MacNab
Within the past few weeks, since the Obama Administration has started to settle in, it has become more and more obvious that the new Administration is being tested around the world.
While we are occupied and distracted by the crisis in the world economy, funding the "pork" of global warming, funding the "political correctness police" and stripping support for needed weapons systems and replacements, aggressive moves by our enemies are becoming more evident.
Russia has pressured a former Soviet satellite nation, Kyrgyzstan, to cancel our right to use a critically important air base there. This base is the sole supply base from which air cargo and other operations supply Afghanistan. At the same time, "conveniently" (for our enemies), a critical bridge has been knocked out on the main road supplying our troops and now that route is closed. This forces us into a much more expensive and less reliable supply route into a country where we are facing escalating enemy operations.
While we are on the subject of Afghanistan, the Obama Administration has decided to add 17,000 more troops to forces there. While this may seem to be a significant "surge" it is only half the number of reinforcements that the General in charge of the area requested. "General" Obama, our Commander in Chief, must be watching too many old John Wayne movies. (He is, after all, a big fan of Hollywood!) He would be wise to listen to his commanders in the field and accept their professional military judgment about how many troops are needed. The enemy sees these moves, is not stupid, knows that he has a "problem" with anything military, guesses that he will over-rule General Patraeus (There are indications he is doing just that now), and knows that he would have lost the war in Iraq had he been given the chance to set policy. He may still cause a defeat in Iraq and he most certainly will in Afghanistan if he continues to impose political decisions on the professional military leadership! In addition, he has recently been dissing the country's President, Hamid Karzai and that can't be very productive at this stage.
The Taliban are being supplied with satellite and other intelligence from outside sources and have learned how to be more effective from the tactics we showed in Iraq. The U.S. supplied the opposition forces with weapons and intelligence that defeated the Soviet Union and now it may be that Putin is secretly engaging in the same strategy. The publicity seeking "super diplomat" that Obama has sent to the area with, we're sure, orders to "push his weight around" is likely to get in the way of just about everything while his "needs" are being met! We are sure that his most important objective is to let everyone know that he is "in charge."
Kim Jong II, North Korean dictator has once again taken advantage of U. S. incompetence and built nuclear weapons. Now he is close to having a delivery system that can realistically threaten the North American continent. Thanks to the foresight of the Bush Administration, we may have a deterrent that could knock down an incoming missile. Had the Democrats been able to remove the appropriation for this defensive weapon, as they tried to do, we would not even have that with which to defend ourselves! Now that they are in power in all branches of government, we can look forward to cancellation of most of our more advanced weaponry, such as the F-22 Raptor.
The Iranians have shown they are more than a match for the West when it comes to delaying, diverting and disrupting any attempt to get them to agree to stop production of nuclear weapons capability. They have starved their citizens so they could use their oil revenue to build a proliferation of hidden underground nuclear manufacturing facilities. The Israelis are probably the only ones with any degree of knowledge about these facilities and yet we refused a request by Israel to buy some "bunker buster" explosive devices. The current Administration is still playing "footsie" with a "let's talk" philosophy that will undoubtedly continue right up until Iran tests an intercontinental rocket that can reach N. America with a nuclear device and/or delivers a completed "suitcase bomb" to Hamas. At that point there will be no strategy left but to talk! No doubt Obama is telling the Israelis that he will side with the Arabs should they try to solve the Iranian problem militarily! The Israelis have already been denied transit for Israeli military aircraft to cross Iraq!
To be fair, not all of the problems we face are the result of Obama moving into the White House! We need to give the Bush Administration credit when it comes to war in Iraq, defense expenditures and a few other things. However, we wonder how many Islamic terrorists have crossed the Mexican border since 9-11 and the last few moves with the economy were anything but "stellar" in our opinion. G.W. somehow ushered in a total conservative defeat and, as a consequence, the worst attack of socialism the country has ever seen. We'll see how this all plays out. -- End
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