Obama’s Toothless Foreign Policy Eight years of almost no sticks and very few carrots has made the U.S. into a bystander. By William A. Galston
http://www.wsj.com/articles/obamas-toothless-foreign-policy-1473204167
As our dispiriting presidential campaign grinds on, the rest of the world is not standing still. And the news is not good.
At the G-20 meeting last weekend, Chinese officials treated the president of the United States and his senior aides with blatant disrespect. As Chinese nationalism surges, President Xi Jinping is asserting his country’s claims throughout the South China Sea, a move that episodic demonstrations of American naval power have failed to halt. Meanwhile, the linchpin of President Obama’s “pivot” to Asia—the Trans-Pacific Partnership—faces opposition from both presidential candidates and hangs by a thread in Congress. Its defeat would deal a heavy blow to American credibility.
In the Middle East, the Syrian civil war continues its bloody course, and the latest effort to negotiate a humanitarian cease-fire with the Russians has foundered over what the administration describes as “trust” issues. Mr. Obama’s prediction that Vladimir Putin’s use of military force would land him in a quagmire described his own state of mind rather than reality. Instead, at modest cost, Mr. Putin has restored Russia’s standing as a key player in the region, while our friends and allies see America in retreat.
In northern Syria, U.S.-backed Kurds have been the only effective fighters against Islamic State. But when Turkey sent its forces across the border, Mr. Obama sent Vice President Joe Biden to Turkey, where he demanded that the Kurds withdraw from ISIS-held territory they had recently seized. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sees every manifestation of Kurdish nationalism, wherever it may occur, as a threat to Turkey’s domestic security.
The U.S. is under no obligation to agree with him, especially at the expense of one of the few reliably pro-Western forces in the region. Mr. Obama’s meeting in China with Mr. Erdogan did not yield an agreement. The administration’s brand of “realism” in Syria has ended in a damaging muddle.
The group photo at the G-20 meeting spoke volumes. At one end, President Putin was speaking to President Erdogan, who listened attentively. At the other end, President Obama peered curiously at the colloquy. In the middle, President Xi smiled confidently. As the authoritarian entente cordiale flowers, the U.S. is reduced to a bystander’s role.
Mr. Obama seems to have assumed that events in Syria, however awful to behold, would have no effect on core American interests. If so, he was badly mistaken. The flood of Syrian refugees has destabilized its neighbors in the Middle East and Europe. CONTINUE AT SITE
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