Category Archives: Barry Kelly

by Barry Kelly | October 1, 2014 · 7:30 am

INSIGHTS 160: FACTS ON THE GROUND

While the president and his administration are pointing fingers of blame at everyone and everything but themselves, let’s look at some ground truths.

The Obama administration could have had a Status of Forces of Agreement in Iraq to protect our troops from being charged, arrested, and tried in Iraqi courts. All that is required is for us to leave a mobile Army Division augmented by its supporting logistical units, air support, selected combat teams, and Special Forces in a U.S.-controlled base strategically located in Iraq. Prime Minister al-Maliki was in no position to follow his Iranian guidance and refuse. We could have replaced him. Sometimes the development of a new democracy needs a little forceful guidance.

When Obama pulled out all our troops, the training of the Iraqi Army with critical American combat support had reached a point where it could have defended Iraqi territory. Without American boots and eyes on the ground to detect and stop al-Maliki from critically weakening the Iraqi Army by replacing most Sunni and Kurdish officers with Shiite replacements, the Iraqi Army was no longer the force America trained. It had no chance against the ISIS invasion. al-Maliki’s leadership destroyed any faint hopes the Sunnis and Kurds had in sharing Iraq’s resources and having a real say in the governing of the country.

The powerful Sunni tribes that fought with U.S. forces to destroy al-Qaeda in Iraq are not going to fight to defend a corrupt Shiite government in Baghdad. Many of these Sunnis joined ISIS as the better choice for them. Some of the Sunnis trained by American forces may well be fighting with ISIS now. They only thing we can offer them to change sides is the promise of their own Sunni nation with no ties to a Shiite government located somewhere south of Baghdad.

The Kurds and their Peshmerga forces are good fighters. They will fight to the death to defend their people and their land. They will not defend the Shiite regime in Baghdad, no matter the name of the prime minister. For many decades, the Kurds have wanted control of their historical homeland. They have fought the Turks, Iranians, and Iraqis as far back as their oral history. American arms and supplies sent to the Kurds through Baghdad will never reach Kurdistan. Out of this chaos the Kurds are betting they have a good chance of winning their freedom. But they will need our help. Without assurances of a free Kurdistan, they will not fight ISIS forces very far from their own borders.

Iran is the biggest danger in the region. Their intent is to development nuclear weapons and missile delivery systems. We don’t know when it will happen, only that it will. Probably during President Obama’s time in office. The mindset of the current Iranian Islamic autocracy is that when they have nuclear weapons, they will use them.

Here again, the president holds views that have no basis in reality. He even has a secretary of state who shares his view of peace through negotiations even when the other side only demands instead of negotiating. It is a one-sided negotiation. Iran doesn’t want ISIS on its doorstep but will not change its focus on the development of nuclear weapons. Iran does not want to be involved in a punishing ground war with ISIS. The Iraqi Shiites will be protected by Iran and become an Iranian puppet pseudo state.

The Obama administration could have prevented the ISIS crisis if it had been more interested in the reality of foreign affairs rather than using inaction to create a make-believe, no-fault-of-Obama’a world. Inaction led to pulling all our troops out of Iraq and turning victory into defeat. Inaction led to the civil war in Syria from spreading into Iraq. Either the Obama Administration did not know or ignored indications al-Maliki was destroying the fabric of the Iraqi nation by cutting the Sunnis and the Kurds out of their share of oil revenue and a voice in the running of the national government, creating a fertile environment for ISIS forces.

The rate of training 5,000 fighters a year in Saudi Arabia to serve as ground troops is not going to work. It creates the illusion of action but is not going to be effective. NATO countries and Sunni coalition members need to field a force of at least 20,000 combat troops, augmented by as many regional fighters as we can recruit, and declare all of Syria and Iraq as a no-fly zone for military aircraft. With the right approach the Sunni tribes we can cut them out of the ISIS recruitment pool and set up a Sunni government to rival ISIS. To do that, President Obama has to recognize the Baghdad government is over and to stop negotiating unimportant legalistic details with a government that will soon be fleeing south. He also needs to get over his anti-colonial hangups about the alleged misuse of America military power in foreign lands. It is not unusual to hear liberal Americans refer to our efforts in Iraq in the Bush years as the “occupation of Iraq.” This is the epitome of “hate America” thinking. We all deserve a better legacy than that espoused by progressives.

Written by the author of “Insights: Transforming America — Is This What We Fought For?” available now as an ebook, in paperback or hardcover on Amazon.com or BN.com. Follow the author on Twitter @factsfictions80. If you think this message is important, please share it.

INSIGHTS 159: FLAWED VISION OR ANTI-U.S. AGENDA?

Normally when a president gives a speech to an international audience, the president and his staff carefully craft the message he is to deliver. The Obama White House is no different. They never miss a chance to get their message out. They are very good about keeping all their key members on the message.

What message was the president reading off his teleprompter this past week in front of his international audience? Was it that ISIS is a bad group that needs to be checked and all concerned nations should join him in the fight against ISIS? Sounds right. And he did ask for support.

The second message seemed to be that while these people are bad, they are not radical or extremist Islamists. In fact, he never used the words “radical Islamists.” He said America will never wage a war against Islam, going on to say there is no “them or us.” We have millions of Islamic members in America, he said, as if to say a war against Islam would be a war against our own people.

The president has a hard time with using words to describe terrorism inflicted on others by followers of Islam. Remember he and his attorney general still refer to the murdering of service members at Fort Hood by a self-avowed Islamist shouting “Allah Akbar” while firing into an unarmed group of service men and women as “work place violence.” The president and his attorney general have never used the Islamic label in any situation involving terrorism. (Hope the next attorney general can break this mold.) It is clear all Islamists are not terrorists but nearly all recent terrorism attacks have been done in the name of Islam by the terrorists. What is the problem with recognizing reality?

This president acts as if he doesn’t like America or its historical past. Does he really think the shooting of a black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, is equal to the beheadings and murders of thousands of people judged to be unbelievers by ISIS? If not, why even raise the issue? The case in Ferguson is still under investigation and until the grand jury makes the evidence public, everyone, including our president and Eric Holder, should be quiet about the issue. It may not be exactly the way they would like it to be.

I suspect the president is so mired in the anti-colonial socialist past of his historical view that he has trouble seeing reality in some cases. Unfortunately, those cases sometimes involve national security. A lot of American blood and treasure have been spent by brave men and women to defend us from radical jihadists. How can we win the struggle against radical Islam if our leaders cannot even recognize the issue and call it by name? Your call: flawed vision or an anti-U.S. agenda?

1 Comment

Filed under Barry Kelly, Conservative views, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Politics, Progressives, Terrorism

Tagged as Attorney General, eric holder, ISIS, Islam, Middle East, Obama, socialism

by Barry Kelly | September 25, 2014 · 7:35 am

INSIGHTS 157 — WHO’S TO BLAME FOR OUR MESS? PART 1

beforeitsnews.com

Most Americans seem to realize the country is in a mess, both domestically and internationally. The evidence is clear to all but the fringe true believers who have totally closed their minds to new or conflicting information.

You don’t have to look far. We have fewer people in the workforce than anytime in the last eight years. Wages have not keep pace with inflation. More people are on food stamps and their numbers are growing faster than ever before. The dollar is losing strength. Only those who can afford to make investments in the stock market are doing better than okay. The president’s Qualitative Easing program has pumped varying amounts as high as 86 billion dollars a month into the economy for the last several years, creating an artificial stock market for the well-to-do, but widened the gap between the haves and have-nots. The progressives have created an ideal economy for their class warfare rhetoric.

Tax reform has been ignored. Social programs and debt servicing are eating deeply into the gross national product and getting worse each year. Obamacare has yet to find a niche where it is actually helping people. Regulations are killing business and driving American corporations overseas in search of friendly business locations. Government is growing at a rate far beyond what is necessary. Power is accruing to the executive branch. The separation of powers contained in the Constitution is being rapidly eroded. Congress, largely due to its timidness, is becoming irrelevant. At least the progressives in charge know where they are driving the country. The Republicans do not.

If anything good is happening domestically, it is hard to find. The president, the attorney general and profession racists raise the race flag at every opportunity. The once-prestigious New York Times and Washington Post have become ideological supporters of the progressive agenda. Selective omission and slanting of the news is an everyday affair.

Our universities are no longer bastions of free thinking and speech. They too are turning out left-wing ideologues, rather than graduates who have learned to question orthodoxy and think outside the box. Pride in America is hard to find in progressive ranks and the history of our country is, according to Obama’s progressives, something we must apologize for. The progressive party refers to our armed forces in Iraq as an occupying force. At a time of real dangers in the world, President Obama is cutting the armed forces back to pre-WWII levels.

Internationally, nothing done by the president’s direction has gone right. First, the do-nothing but travel everywhere secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and the “never saw a situation he couldn’t make worse” John Kerry, have made a shambles out negations with Iran, Iraq, Israel, the Palestinians, Russia, China, Europe, and the Middle East. If there ever was gang in the White House that couldn’t shoot straight, this is it. Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Israel, and Benghazi come to mind. The foreign policy list of unbelievable gaffs could go on much longer.

Read my next blog to find out who is to blame for all this mess. Coming later this week.

Do you like and understand what you’re reading? Share it with your friends and leave me comments here or on Amazon. I read them! You can also visit my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter. This content and more is available in my latest book, “INSIGHTS: Transforming America.”

4 Comments

Filed under Barry Kelly, class warfare, Conservative views, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Obama, Obamacare, political solutions, Politics

Tagged as Benghazi, Bush, class warfare, Congress, Iran, iraq, Middle East, transformation, White House

by Barry Kelly | September 24, 2014 · 7:25 am

INSIGHTS 156 — BOOTS IN THE SKY OVER SYRIA

The thunder over Syria is a victory for President Obama’s diplomacy. Maybe he has more insights into Muslim politics than other foreign policy areas.

infoplease.com

No matter what or how, this is one of those rare win-win events. America gets very welcome cover for air attacks against Muslim targets. Muslim nations flying combat missions with our planes also will give Putin pause before he does something rash to protect President Assad in Syria. Putin may be happy to maintain and defend his naval base in Syria and leave the air war uncontested by Russian threats. Iran also may not be willing to militarily confront a powerful Sunni military and political coalition. I’m sure one of the prices we paid for Saudi, U.A.E., Jordanian, Qatar and Bahrain’s support is our agreement to defend them against external attacks.

In any agreement, it’s always instructive to understand the strategic and tactical goals of your allies. Our allies in the air war against ISIS have clear goals. They do not want a powerful Sunni radical nation on their borders. Many of the Muslims butchered by ISIS were Sunnis. Some of the ISIS military units were once funded by members of our new Muslim air war allies. King Saud and the U.A.E. have been funding and equipping a proxy war against President Assad’s Syrian Shiite regime for a few years. They have fighters on the ground. Now they have the freedom to provide air support for their fighters. The same Muslim air sorties can also punish any units that have double-crossed them and joined ISIS. It seems the U.A.E. has command and control to direct the Muslim air war. They have better intelligence on the ground where their fighting units are engaged with Assad then we do. It is still a win-win but getting rid of Assad’s Alawite (Shiite) Regime may rank higher with our Muslim air coalition than defeating ISIS in Iraq.

Bringing Saudi Arabia into the air war against ISIS is a very big deal. President Obama must have upgraded his foreign policy team. Openly talking about bringing Iran into the war against ISIS was a brilliant move. Nothing would make the Saudis move faster than the possibility of an American/Iran alliance in their front yard. We don’t have boots-on-the-ground but the military and diplomatic war against ISIS has moved several squares forward.

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 153

OBAMA’S SCORECARD – PART 1

washingtontimes.com

It will soon be six years since Barack Obama was elected president of the United States. The traditional way of evaluating a president is to judge how he has done as a leader to solve problems concerning the economy, national security, and foreign policy. We could do that here, but that wouldn’t be addressing what President Obama has been doing. To be fair, he should be scored on what he has been working to accomplish. To do that, we have to use the tasks relevant to progressive goals, for those are what is important to President Obama and his legacy.

President Obama’s overall goal is the transformation of America. That term means very little unless you examine the steps that are required in the process of transformation. The first step is to marginalize his opposition, the Republican Party, by a skillful manipulation of issues. Remember, the progressive mantra is “the issue is never the issue.” In short, that means you don’t try to solve problems or issues, you simply use every issue to instead attack the opposition. Changing sides on issues or lying about what you said previously about the issue doesn’t matter and happens often. To progressives, the end justifies the means as long as your intent is to seize power and wealth from those who have it and give to the have-nots. This goes for both individuals and nations.

Domestically, Obama has done this by:

increasing taxes on the top earners
instituting death taxes so families cannot pass on wealth to heirs
put forth regulations to hamper business expansion
raised minimum wages
increased unemployment benefits
expanded food stamp recipients
Obamacare
internationally signing treaties in the area of climate change
taxes on burning carbon
providing payments to the United Nations and other groups and nations that do not share our goals.

Obama, so far, only gets a “C” for his redistribution of wealth goals, but he is making progress.

Another progressive goal is to weaken America in the international arena among its allies and adversaries. A major task in this goal is to destroy America’s ability to project power outside our borders. The value of our word in foreign affairs is at a very low point. No one, enemies nor allies, believes us. They see our will and resolve as non-existent. Our unwise withdrawal from Iraq, Obama’s haste to get us into Afghanistan and then withdraw on a meaningless time table, redlines that disappear and negotiations that have no substance have been effective in reducing our world power. In the president’s drive to diminish American power and prestige internationally, he deserves an “A.”

Stay tuned for part 2 of this blog, coming later this week, which will score Obama on increasing government control; expanding the executive branch; and weaken the U.S. military.