RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/3698207-jfks-cuban-missile-crisis-lessons-for-biden/

“I’ve got a guy over there in Moscow who’s in a corner,” President Kennedy mused about Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev during the Cuban Missile Crisis, “and I don’t want to get him in a corner. I want to give him the opinion he can get out.”

Kennedy’s recognition that Khrushchev would need to find a way out of his corner (i.e., a political off-ramp) if he were going to remove the Soviet missiles from Cuba, as the United States was demanding, was but one savvy piece of JFK’s seasoned diplomacy that helped resolve the crisis peacefully.

This month marks the 60th anniversary of that crisis, and Washington now faces a leader in Moscow who is threatening to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine, which could trigger a full-scale nuclear war. If the Cuban Missile Crisis was the most perilous moment of the Cold War, Vladimir Putin’s nuclear threats may mark the most perilous moment to date of the post-Cold War period.

JFK’s leadership during 13 days of high drama provides five lessons to help President Biden navigate today’s crisis.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/10/biden_deflects_to_saudi_arabia.html

Deflection. That’s when someone tries to turn aside responsibility and shift it to someone/something else. Today’s example is the rampage by the White House and Democrats against Saudi Arabia, accusing it of cutting oil production because it is in bed with Russia against American interests in Ukraine.

CNN correspondent Manu Raju tweeted on Wednesday [Rep.] “Ro Khanna and [Sen.] Dan Blumenthal are calling for bill in lame-duck halting arm sales for a year. Calls for NOPEC legislation. And Durbin this AM: ‘I don’t see any reason to arm them now if they believe their future is linked to Vladimir Putin in any way.’”

National Security spokesman John Kirby tried deflection as he announced the White House’s displeasure: “The Saudi Foreign Ministry can try to spin or deflect…  (but) The Saudis conveyed to us… their intention to reduce oil production, which they knew would increase Russian revenues and blunt the effectiveness of sanctions… They could easily wait for the next OPEC meeting… we are reevaluating our relationship with Saudi Arabia… continue to look for signs about where they stand in combatting Russian aggression.”

The reason the White House wanted the cuts to wait until the next OPEC meeting may have something to do with America’s mid-term election. Why the Saudis would care about that is unclear. The fact is that countries make economic and security decisions based on their own interests and their peoples’ interests.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19006/biden-emboldening-iran

“[T]his relationship [between the US and Saudi Arabia] should be based on reciprocity. If Washington is looking for its own interests, as with the Iran nuclear deal or the cancellation of the [Iranian-backed] Houthi group’s designation as a terrorist group, Saudi Arabia also has the right to seek its own interests….” — Rami Al-Khalifa, Syrian author, Elaph, October 12, 2022.

“Biden was the one who decided to pursue a hostile policy towards the [Arab] allies. He and his team were the ones who gave in to America’s enemies and went looking for nuclear agreements that are fraught with flaws and harm to many of America’s friends.” — Abdul Jalil Al-Saeid, Syrian author, Al-Ain, October 11, 2022.

The Arab League, for its part, condemned the Biden administration for waging a “negative campaign” against Saudi Arabia.

These reactions from the Arab countries indicate that the Arabs no longer see the US as a strategic ally or even as a friend. This is excellent news for the mullahs in Iran and their terrorist proxies in the Middle East, including Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Houthis in Yemen.

“In retrospect, I think that was a mistake,” Obama said, referring his total failure to help the Iranian protestors in 2009, when he sided with the regime…. He ended by noting that it was important “to affirm what they do and I hope that it brings about more space for the kind of civic conversation that over time can take the country down a better path.”

“Civic conversation”? With Iran’s savage regime? That’s it?

White House spokesman John Kirby gave the game away. “The president ,” he said, “still believes that a diplomatic way forward is the best way forward….”

It is not a secret, however, that a diplomatic way without a credible military threat to back it up is useless. Even soft-power advocate Joseph Nye, former Dean of the Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, had to concede that, “to be realistic, soft power is never going to replace hard power.”

The Biden administration appears to be waiting until after the November mid-term elections, when Congress will be in recess for its Christmas holiday and therefore unable to block the deal.

So far, 50 “deeply concerned” members of Congress, mostly Democrats from Biden’s own party, have sent Biden a letter effectively opposing the deal.

The Saudis and their allies in the Gulf appear to be wondering why Biden is threatening them with “consequences” simply for trying to protect themselves from soon being annihilated by Iran, especially as it was the US that introduced the mortal threat against the Saudis — by granting Iran nuclear weapons with the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal — in the first place.

In [2015]… Obama revealingly let slip: “Even before taking office, I made clear that Iran would not be allowed to acquire a nuclear weapon on my watch…” [Emphasis added.]

The new Iran deal, according to reports, also does not prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons capability, and would merely postpone the same disaster until after the Biden administration’s “watch.”

“[H]ow can we in good conscience,” Obama said in his July 2015 statement, “justify war before we’ve tested a diplomatic agreement that achieves our objectives; that has been agreed to by Iran.”

This diplomatic agreement has now been tested. It failed. That is why this or any agreement with Iran should be allowed to die a dignified death, especially during Congress’s Christmas recess.

The Saudis and other Arabs who were once considered America’s major allies in the Middle East have resumed their criticism of the Biden administration, accusing it of harming US interests and alienating Washington’s friends.

The criticism came after US President Joe Biden threatened that “there will be consequences” for US relations with Saudi Arabia after OPEC+ announced that it would cut its oil production target. It also came after White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said a policy review of US-Saudi relations would be conducted in response to the OOEC+ announcement.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18998/leadership-cost-ukraine-support

The difficult reality is that we may never know what would push Putin to make the decision to go nuclear…. The U.S. objective should be to deter him: make the potential cost to him so high that it would be suicidal for him even to try.

The clearest and most welcome statement was made by Biden himself in March: he stated, “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power.”

Biden is old enough to remember that “what happens in Sudetenland does not stay in Sudetenland.” If Putin is allowed to occupy Ukraine, Russia — and undoubtedly all the other aggressor nations waiting in the wings — China, Iran, Turkey, North Korea — will be emboldened to begin a free-for-all of invading their countries of choice. Putin could further move to take over Moldova, Poland and the Baltic states, for a start; Turkey could move on Greece and southern Cyprus, and China would most certainly move on the world’s computer-chip center, Taiwan.

Biden…. on day one, effectively closed down America’s ability to produce and export oil, thereby instantly creating an acute shortage of energy worldwide. Putin could not have dreamed of a bigger gift. Immediately, the price of oil tripled, from roughly $40 to $112. Russia was making a billion dollars a day, or $360 billion a year. Biden, with a stroke of his pen, had just financed Russia’s entire war on Ukraine even before granting Putin the use of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Europe, thereby guaranteeing Russia the ability to hold Europe hostage come winter.

The problem with this response [wishing to isolate America to avoid restoring Ukraine’s integrity] is that it is exactly the same view that, in 1938, led British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain to wave around a piece of paper and inaccurately claim “peace for our time” with Hitler. Chamberlain evidently saw that his British voters did not want war, so he tried to give them what they wanted. That is not great leadership; that is great followership.

People in thriving democracies usually do not want war — ever. They can see that they are enjoying magical, free lives — and wish to keep them. We all would like peace handed to us on a platter. Unfortunately, that is not always the available choice, particularly looking a few moves ahead. How much less costly it would have been in blood and treasure to have stopped Hitler before he crossed the Rhine. Surrender always remains an option — but usually not a happy one.

The U.S. and EU must put in place compelling plans to address the threat of slowing economies (growth); high inflation (stop government spending); rising energy prices (re-open the oil spigots), and potential shortages… at the same time as educating the public about the even worse consequences of not supporting Ukraine.

The idea is to make Putin afraid, not Americans.

Leaders of both U.S. political parties need clearly to articulate the American strategic interest in Ukraine, where a Western defeat could mean the beginning of the end of Europe, and let Putin know in no uncertain terms what the U.S. responses to any unpleasant escalation might be. The same can be done in European capitals and NATO countries, as well.

Leaders of both parties also need to lay out how they will address the current internal economic crises, their continuing support for Ukraine, defeating Putin and deterring further aggression by Russia, China, Turkey, North Korea and Iran. Short of delivering on these questions, they are doing no less than seriously jeopardizing the long-term national security of the U.S. and the West.

U.S. President Joe Biden is known for making confusing and sometimes wild pronouncements that his administration is known for frequently walking back. This might have been the case when he randomly decided to tell an audience of well-heeled Democrats at a fundraiser that Russian President Vladimir Putin is “not joking” about using nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. “We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon,” he added, “since Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis.”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18964/aggression-russia-ukraine

The West is not threatening Russia. Putin is threatening the West.

Putin might desperately try to reverse the situation, whatever the cost… Ukraine and its heroism have shocked the world. Ukraine’s army can win, but it will require the unwavering support of the West.

The men Putin recently began sending to the front may be reservists, but most have not held a weapon for a very long time and have no will to fight. Some who managed to send messages on Telegram channels say they know they are destined to be cannon fodder.

Putin has almost no allies and could lose what limited support he has. Chinese President Xi Jinping has in common with Putin a clear hostility to the West, but has reportedly not supplied Russia with weapons.

During a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Samarkand, Uzbekistan last month, Xi reportedly told Putin that it was necessary to “instill stability and positive energy into a world in turmoil”. Whatever that meant, it was not a message of support for the war.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on September 20 that “Russia should return the occupied lands to Ukraine” — not exactly the direction in which Putin would like to be going.

The Chinese Communist Party, which openly says it wants to dominate the world, apparently does not want a larger war just now. On September 24, Wang Yi, China’s foreign minister, was even more explicit…

The United States has, once again, like it or not, emerged as the only power capable of defeating an aggressive enemy of democracy; when it does, the status of the US and NATO are strengthened. It is, however, impossible to forget that America’s debacle in Afghanistan, the Biden administration’s frenzy to sign a lethal nuclear deal with Iran under almost any conditions, and the extreme weakness of Biden’s White House before Putin invaded Ukraine. These failures no doubt played into Putin’s decision to invade.

The Biden administration’s failure to arm Ukraine before the invasion and his comments that a “minor incursion” might be acceptable were catastrophic. The same failure to provide sufficient deterrence to Taiwan is unquestionably inviting Communist Chinese aggression.

The weakness of the Biden administration has created aggression everywhere — Russia, China, Iran, Turkey, North Korea; assaults on the dollar as the World’s reserve currency — even domestically.

Will the Biden administration ever learn from its mistakes? Or is its ultimate, unspoken goal actually to hand over the United States quietly to Russia, China and Iran?

September 21. Russian President Vladimir Putin, in a pre-recorded speech on Russian television, announces that Russia is being attacked by the Ukrainian government and the West. He defines Ukrainian territories occupied by the Russian army as “liberated zones”. He speaks of the referendums he staged in the regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhya and Kherson to try illegally to attach them to Russia. He says that he has decided on a “partial mobilization” to defend the Russian fatherland; adds that the West threatens Russia, and that any aggression against Russian territory will lead to a response by “all weapon systems available to us”.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18995/iran-protest-support

While the majority of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Parliament chants ‘Death to America’ & supports the Khamenei loyal police for their barbaric actions the leader of the free world (Joe Biden) is silent. Why?” — Iranian Americans for Liberty, Twitter, October 2, 2022.

Nika Shakarami, a 17-year-old girl, was one of the many women who was arrested for burning her hijab. According to the forensic doctor, she was repeatedly raped, beaten and her dead body was delivered to her family with smashed nose and broken skull.

In August 2015, Obama delivered another speech justifying his [Iran] deal, also immediately exposed as a lie: “After two years of negotiations, we have achieved a detailed arrangement that permanently prohibits Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. It cuts off all of Iran’s pathways to a bomb. It contains the most comprehensive inspection and verification regime ever negotiated to monitor a nuclear program.”

However, as the “sunset clauses” quickly revealed, there was nothing “permanent” about it. Iran was to have all the nuclear weapons it wanted in a few short years, along with ballistic missiles to deliver them.

Obama’s billions which were reported as part of a plan to turn Iran in to a “friend,” did the opposite. Iran took the billions, enriched even more uranium, hid what it was doing even further from inspectors, took over Lebanon, and began a war in Yemen.

So far, sadly, instead of standing with the people of Iran heroically confronting a regime that chants “Death to America”, Biden tsk-tsks, says he is “gravely concerned,” but effectively says nothing. He still wants a deal with the mullahs that will quickly bring Iran to nuclear weapons capability, reward Iran’s aggression with a trillion dollars, enable it to oppress women and kill more of its innocent citizens, and empower it to help Russia with even more military equipment to crush Ukraine.

Is Biden — whose family received $3.5 million from the widow of the mayor of Moscow; who, on day one, effectively crippled US oil and gas exploration and exports, thereby, as the price of oil and natural gas suddenly shot up, funding Putin’s war on Ukraine, and who gave Putin the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to blackmail Europe in winter — once again just being a “Russian stooge”?

While the Iranian regime is arresting, wounding, torturing and killing protesters, all the Biden administration appears to be concerned with is trying to revive a nuclear deal that will soon give Iran unlimited nuclear weapons capability; lift sanctions against the expansionist regime of Iran thereby pumping billions of dollars into its treasury for further adventurism; build nuclear weapons; provide Russia with still more deadly military equipment; and empower the mullahs even further to oppress and murder their innocent, fed-up civilian population for the “crime” of women showing too much hair. Their mothers must be very proud of them.

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/how-to-lose-friends-and-influence-over-people-saudi-arabia-obama-biden

Americans have a reputation, with others and in their own national literature, for being careless and breaking things. Often this is because they are so admirably creative, dynamic, and unattached to the past. But for the last two decades, the epicenter of American carelessness has been the Middle East, an area of the world that seems to encourage fantasies among all Westerners, yet where real-world margins for error are small. The result has been a series of disasters for the peoples of the region and for American prestige. This week brought what looks like another unforced error in policymaking, fed by hubris, fantasy, airy talk, and a refusal to acknowledge reality.

On Tuesday, White House national security spokesman John Kirby announced that President Joe Biden will be reevaluating America’s relationship with Saudi Arabia after OPEC+ announced the previous week that it would cut oil production. Kirby’s announcement followed a statement by Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., claiming that Saudi Arabia is helping to “underwrite Putin’s war” through OPEC+. “As Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,” Menendez said, “I will not green-light any cooperation with Riyadh until the Kingdom reassesses its position with respect to the war in Ukraine.”

As a Saudi who loves the United States, and believes deeply that our two countries need each other, the only word that comes to mind regarding the contemporary “reevaluation” of our relations is: obscene.

It was the Obama administration that decided to give Vladimir Putin a foothold in the eastern Mediterranean, which it sold to the American people as a way to “deescalate” the civil war in Syria. As the United States romanced Putin, offering him Crimea and warm water ports in Syria in exchange for pulling Iran’s irons out of the fire over the past decade, U.S. allies like Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, and Israel have had no choice but to cope. Last month, while Russian-operated Iranian drones and missiles were pounding Kyiv, Riyadh used its diplomatic leverage to obtain the release of American and British POWs from Putin.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/10/biden_deflects_to_saudi_arabia.html

Deflection. That’s when someone tries to turn aside responsibility and shift it to someone/something else. Today’s example is the rampage by the White House and Democrats against Saudi Arabia, accusing it of cutting oil production because it is in bed with Russia against American interests in Ukraine.

CNN correspondent Manu Raju tweeted on Wednesday [Rep.] “Ro Khanna and [Sen.] Dan Blumenthal are calling for bill in lame-duck halting arm sales for a year. Calls for NOPEC legislation. And Durbin this AM: ‘I don’t see any reason to arm them now if they believe their future is linked to Vladimir Putin in any way.’”

National Security spokesman John Kirby tried deflection as he announced the White House’s displeasure: “The Saudi Foreign Ministry can try to spin or deflect…  (but) The Saudis conveyed to us… their intention to reduce oil production, which they knew would increase Russian revenues and blunt the effectiveness of sanctions… They could easily wait for the next OPEC meeting… we are reevaluating our relationship with Saudi Arabia… continue to look for signs about where they stand in combatting Russian aggression.”

The reason the White House wanted the cuts to wait until the next OPEC meeting may have something to do with America’s mid-term election. Why the Saudis would care about that is unclear. The fact is that countries make economic and security decisions based on their own interests and their peoples’ interests.

America’s European allies certainly do — just last week, Reuters reported that the EU remains the  biggest market for Russian oil, according to the IAEA. India and China are increasing their purchases from Russia, according to the CEO of Gazprom Neft. And, while demanding that Saudi Arabia produce more, the Biden administration is considering reinstating a ban on exports of crude oil as gasoline prices rise in the U.S. Reducing oil exports to our allies would only make others look elsewhere, including to Russia, as winter approaches and their stocks remain low.

The actual cause of the Saudi decision to cut production in the face of Biden administration begging for an increase is Biden administration policy.