Nuclear Cooperation Agreement

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Barack Obama, Biden Administration, Department of State, Dictatorship, Donald Trump, elections, internal supporters of human rights, Iran, Joe Biden, Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, Nuclear Proliferation, Taliban, U.S. Military, use of force March 27, 2021

Afghanistan: Biden’s Achilles Heel

More fundamentally, his failure to replace Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad as head of the peace negotiations reveals he is inclined to continue Donald Trump’s “cut and run” policy, embodied in the February 29, 2020 surrender and withdrawal agreement in Doha, Qatar with the Taliban.

The Agreement does not provide even the slightest fig leaf to conceal the abject nature of the surrender to the Taliban.

By proceeding with the May 1, 2021 withdrawal date established in the Doha Agreement, or even postponing it by months, Biden would fail to recognize that the Taliban have not seriously engaged in “intra-Afghan” negotiations aimed at a peace settlement, and establishing a viable cease-fire, as called for in the Doha Agreement.
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Biden is the prisoner of his 2009 thinking. He doesn’t recognize that conditions have changed. He doesn’t recognize that the current U.S. force posture and mission is essentially what he was arguing for in Barack Obama’s 2009 Afghanistan policy review.

If Biden continues on Trump’s “cut and run” course, he will be responsible for Afghanistan becoming another Iran, with the people–including those we have nurtured as advocates of democracy and the rule of law for the last 20 years–living under the harsh dictatorial rule of Islamic religious extremists, as in Iran.

Moreover, surrender in Afghanistan is not likely to enhance his negotiating position with Iran.

Biden must replace Khalilzad immediately, and conduct a fresh and new review of U.S. military and policy options in the region. He should listen to his democratic allies and, above all, to the people of Afghanistan as represented by their elected leaders.

He needs to develop a policy based on the facts on the ground today, and set aside the idea that the U.S. goal should be just to get out of Afghanistan.

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Barack Obama, Crimea, Crimes Against Humanity, Dictatorship, Donald Trump, European Union, History, human rights, Intelligence, internal supporters of human rights, International Law, NATO, Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, Russia, sanctions, self-defense, Soviet Union, State Department, syria, Torture, U.N. Charter, U.N. Torture Convention, Ukraine, United States, use of force, vision of peace, Vladimir Putin, war crimes

President-elect Trump, foreign policy, and the defense of core American values

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Argentina, Barack Obama, Brazil, China, Crimea, Deutschland, European Union, France, freedom of speech, Germany, History, human rights, International Law, NATO, Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, Nuclear Proliferation, Russia, sanctions, self-defense, South Africa, State Department, State Department Legal Adviser, U.N. Charter, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, use of force July 16, 2014

Putin’s de facto partners: EU members—-and their further responses to ongoing Russian aggression in Ukraine

Looking at this broad picture as a whole, one can see clearly that the EU and the U.S. have in effect acted as silent partners with Putin and Russia in the latter’s aggression against the Ukraine. Succumbing to the temptations of appeasement in the face of Russian aggression and threats of further aggression, they have in fact emboldened Putin. Nowhere was this more clearly demonstrated than after the invasion of the Crimea, when they responded with a slap on the wrist, in the form of the mildest of “targeted sanctions” aimed at only a few individuals. Shortly thereafter, undeterred, Russia annexed the Crimea.

By not responding effectively, the West has become the co-dependent enabler of Vladimir Putin and Russia in their ongoing aggression against the Ukraine. In Europe and the United States, appeasement and pacifism have triumphed when faced with the mighty Russian Bear.

Europe and the United States have become Putin’s silent partners, his co-dependent enablers, as he proceeds to tear down the fundamental principles of international law and the U.N. Charter which prohibit the threat or use of force across international frontiers. “Co-dependent” on the bully who abuses them, they also remain silent on Putin’s violations of fundamental human rights in Russia itself.
…It is time for Putin’s silent partners in aggression to end their co-dependent relationship with him and Russia.

It is time for them to understand the broader consequences of continuing Russian aggression.

It is time for them to act to bolster the deterrent effect of the U.N. Charter’s prohibition of the threat or use of force by imposing real, “third-stage” sanctions aimed at restoring the status quo ante existing prior to Russia’s invasion of the Crimea.