Category Archives: foreign policy

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.”

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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 – 154

OBAMA’S SCORECARD – PART 2

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.

In Part 1 of this blog I scored Obama on redistribution of wealth and weakening America on a worldwide scale. Read that blog here.

All socialist ideologies require the move of the means of production from the private sector to governmental control. Beginning with Obamacare and moving to micro-managing regulations on manufacturing, coal mining, nuclear power, oil exploration and drilling, and energy use, the president has made an auspicious start but he still has a long way to go. His grade here for advancing progressive programs only rates a “C” minus.

To create a one-party political system run by a progressive elite, Obama needs to destroy the Republican Party and absorb the legislative power of Congress into the executive branch by using executive orders and department regulations. He has made the executive branch more powerful than the office he was elected to fill, but the stubborn resistance from the tea parties and other conservatives has slowed the process and the progressives will probably (hopefully) lose control of the Senate in November 2014. The president gets only another “C” minus here.

To prepare the way to move America into the control of an international organization, he needs to withdraw from foreign bases and weaken the U.S. military forces, which are still the best in the world. The president has announced his intent to cut the manpower of the Armed Forces to pre-WWII levels. The Defense Department, under timid civilian and military leadership, has rolled over and begun implementing manpower cutbacks by informing several hundred captains and majors they will no longer be needed. I’m sure notices to sergeants and others will follow. Majors, captains, and sergeants are the backbone of any military organization. It will take 15 years or more to replace the expertise being wasted. As long as the Pentagon is so gutless, Obama will succeed in diminishing both manpower and weaponry. He gets a “B” plus here.

Unless conservatives, independents, and moderate Democrats wake up, President Obama will eventually get higher grades as a progressive than he ever got during his academic training.

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 150

SHAPE THE BATTLEFIELD

President Obama read the polls and decided he should address the nation on the ISIS threat. But he didn’t say a word Wednesday night about how his past policies have made it necessary for America to go to war again in Iraq.

He claimed to have a small coalition of nine NATO nations and Australia who have not committed ground troops. That’s a bit smaller than the last time we went into Iraq, when we were supported by 29 nations who committed ground troops. President Obama did as well as he could from the foundations of his foreign policy over the last nearly six years. Let’s not poke anymore holes into his speech about ISIS.

As commander-in-chief, he needs to be clear on a few critical points. The first is call the threat what it is. It is radical Islam. Within those circles which include most of the Islamic world, it is a good thing to kill infidels/nonbelievers. Where are the moderate Muslims? The Saudis have funded radical madrases/schools all over the near, middle and far east for at least two decades. Money from Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, Kuwait, and Pakistan have poured resources into the Taliban and other radical Islamic organizations for years. Nearly all the World Trade Center bombers were Saudis. In Egypt the more moderate military is nearly fully occupied dealing with the Muslim Brotherhood that Obama backed against Mubarak. Libya doesn’t seem too moderate, nor does our old ally, Turkey. Pakistan is not a moderate Islamic nation. Good luck, Mr. President, in finding moderate Islamic states to join your coalition with real help and commitment. They may not continue to support ISIS but I doubt they will stand up with a Christian nation against ISIS. Their only interest is keeping ISIS away from their territory.

The second point is that competent boots on the ground are necessary to win any military campaign. Obama’s examples of his strategic success in fighting terrorism in Yemen and Somalia are not even relevant. The relevant bit of recent history is the Bush Administration defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan with approximately 500 American boots on the ground, all military or civilian special forces warriors and, of course, thousands of tribal fighters from the Northern Alliance. Enough fighters to push the Taliban into massing to defend against attack so the U.S. Air Force, flying no holds barred missions, including B-52s, destroyed the defense positions of the Taliban down the length of Afghanistan. The air strikes were guided to the kill zones by American civilian and uniformed Special Forces. That is a proven tactic. The problem is that skilled fighters like those of the Northern Alliance have yet to be identified.

With a clear broad view of the strategic battlefield, victory is possible without large U.S. combat units, but small units on the ground will be needed. First the Kurds will fight and can fight as soon as the Obama Administration recognizes the Kurds will fight for their own homeland. We need to accept and welcome Kurdistan into the alliance. As of last week they reported that had not received any arms shipments from the U.S. Our in the box thinkers had to send all aid to the Kurds through Baghdad which is the same as not sending any. Shiites don’t send weapons to Kurds.

The next tactic to hurt the heads of our people struggling to put Iraq back together again is to rekindle our Special Forces relationship with the Sunni tribes. They will not go back into a Shiite-dominated government so recognize that, and tell the humpty-dumpty bureaucrats trying to patch together a phony country to cease and desist. The Sunni tribes, if promised their own land and given weapons, will fight and take care of the ISIS forces in Iraq. The next step is easy. Let the Shiites retreat south of Baghdad until they decide they will stop and fight for their own land, Shiiteville. All we have to do then is separate the not so bad guys from the really bad guys in Syria and work with them to get rid of the Assad tyranny. All this can be done in less than a year with very few American WIA or KIA. What was Iraq is now nearly the same as it was before arrogant western diplomats drew unreal lines on a map and created the nightmare of Iraq. None of this can be done unless the president gets out of the way and lets the Pentagon and CIA run the war on terror and radical Islam.

Written by the author of “INSIGHTS: Transforming America — Is This What We Fought For?” available in hardcover, paperback, and ebook formats from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. You are encouraged to share this message and follow the author on Twitter @factsfictions80.

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Filed under Afghanistan, Barry Kelly, Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Kurds, Obama, Shiite, Sunni, Terrorism

Tagged as America, iraq, ISIS, Islam, Middle East, military, Obama, u.s.

by Barry Kelly | September 6, 2014 · 7:32 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 151

POLICY TO DEFEAT ISIS

Outlining a policy to defeat ISIS is not hard. Implementing the policy is much harder, especially when the government is run by a bunch of radical left wing lawyers and ideologues.

To begin, the president needs to recognize the problem. It is not workplace violence as the Obama administration stills labels the murder of soldiers at Fort Hood by a radical Islamist shouting Muslim slogans. With that mindset, this administration will never defeat ISIS with a law and order approach or a “management approach.” Wars are not won by lawyers spouting law and order sound bites: “We’ll bring them to justice.”

What kind of insanity is that? We need to destroy them with our military power. Our warriors need to be in charge of the battle. Keep the lawyers out.

Speaking of lawyers, who do you think has made it mandatory to ship all our weapons to the Kurds through the Shiite government in Baghdad? It has to be the Obama lawyer group. The government in Baghdad is useless. They are and have been a Shiite-dominated government. They are not going to pass weapons on to the Kurds. They don’t want the Kurds to have effective weapons. They have no intentions of helping the Kurds establish a Kurdish nation. And the Kurds will not again put themselves under a Shiite government in Baghdad or anywhere else. The Obama administration has lied again to Congress and the people. The Kurds are not, repeat not, receiving weapons to defend themselves and perform as “boots on the ground” in their area.

Our legalistic Obama administration just can’t grasp the fact that Iraq is no longer a nation. The American troops in Baghdad are primarily there to defend the embassy. For we are still pretending Iraq is a nation that we should continue to recognize and support. Baghdad will fall and the American embassy will be another R&R facility for the victors. Our second policy principle must be recognition that the borders in Iraq, drawn by the Western powers after WWI, are gone. Kurdistan has all the ingredients of nationhood and should be recognized and supported. The enemy does not recognize the border between Syria and Iraq. It is meaningless unless you are an Obama lawyer or diplomat. Our military and political efforts to defeat ISIS must ignore the old border.

The third principle is that we once had a working relationship with the Sunni tribal leaders. That relationship needs to be re-established. We will need to convince the Sunnis that we will keep our word and support them in their own autonomous region, independent of the Shiite government. They will fight for their own land, if supported with U.S. weapons and Special Forces operatives. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Libya, and the Gulf States will support a Sunni homeland in what was part of Iraq. The lawyers will never support this shift. Therefore, it is time for President Obama to surrounded himself with operatives who have a grasp of the real world, instead of the ideologues now occupying the White House.

The fourth policy principle is the president must turn over the management of the war to the Defense Department. If he keeps the White House legal team, the UN, and the State Department out of the war business, we can defeat ISIS. John Kerry always makes everything he touches worse and the Obama lawyers and ideologues have absolutely no real-world experience. The UN has no love for America and is useless in serious peace keeping operations.

I do not expect the Obama administration to leave their progressive ideology to adopt these sensible principles. But they should!

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.