| 29.01.2009 |
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| Recent weeks have brought an influx in reporting about the lobbying efforts of Indians, all of which is worth checking out. The Cable kicked things off with its report on the appointment of Richard Holbrooke to a South Asia envoy post. "But the omission of India from his title, and from [Hillary] Clinton's official remarks introducing the new diplomatic push in the region was no accident -- not to mention a sharp departure from Obama's own previously stated approach of engaging India, as well as Pakistan and Afghanistan, in a regional dialogue. Multiple sources told The Cable that India vigorously -- and successfully -- lobbied the Obama transition team to make sure that neither India nor Kashmir was included in Holbrooke's official brief." They followed up on that later here. Time magazine took a step back and examined the issue as a whole here, and the idea is that India doesn't want the U.S. butting in to Kashmir, and views the limited Holbrooke portfolio as a success in Washington. But the Obama team is saying lobbying had nothing to do with it; they'd always intended to leave India out of his portfolio, but that doesn't mean the administration won't be active on Kashmir. Meanwhile, Indian-American groups have been getting involved, too, according to my CQ colleague Caitlin Webber, with a coalition of groups hitting the Hill this week to "urge lawmakers to make U.S. military aid to Pakistan conditional on cooperation with investigations of November’s terrorist attack in Mumbai." And a group of Pakistani-Americans have been lobbying against such an idea. Why's this all happening all at once? Well, what happened in Mumbai has ramifications for the U.S. -- on its domestic counterterrorism policies, on its agenda hunting terrorists on the Afghanistan border, and so forth. But on a larger level less driven by a single recent news event, one of the people affiliated with the Pakistani-American lobbying effort said: “I think we are all going through a moment of transition. The U.S. is going through its own moment of transition, trying to find its voice, its soul, its destiny, and so is Pakistan and so is India.” |
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| 29.01.2009 |
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| That's what new Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry said Wednesday at a hearing where his remarks did not go entirely unnoticed but were overshadowed by the testimony of Al Gore. But it may have deserved to be the headline (and obviously it's what I went with). I already wrote just yesterday that energy/climate change will be one of the top three foreign policy issues of the year, at least on the congressional agenda. It was a matter of both words and deeds. Wrote Time: "The fact that Kerry chose to make global warming the subject of his first hearing as chairman of the committee signals that in President Barack Obama's Washington at least, Gore's views on the severity of climate change and the need for action are gaining clout — and not just for environmental reasons." The reason is not immediately obvious to anyone who hasn't thought about it much. But Kerry himself explained: "We are here today for the same reason our top military leaders and intelligence officials have been sounding the alarms. They describe climate change as a threat multiplier and they are warning that the cost of ignoring this issue will be more famine, more drought, more widespread pandemics, more natural disasters, more resource scarcity and human displacement on a massive scale." |
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| 28.01.2009 |
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| I gave a speech today, as a CQ reporter, on the security agenda for the new Congress. It was an interesting exercise, to step back and look at it as a whole, and to look forward. What I realized was that there's a lot more there than I expected for a Democratic Congress that will almost surely end up largely supporting a new Democratic president. I don't think there will be the kind of acquiescence to any and all executive branch proposals that marked the immediate post-9/11 environment, nor the kind of outright feuding on fundamental differences over the "how" of battling terrorism that has marked the last couple years. But I do expect there to be border skirmishes over the specifics. Here's the list as I saw it, assembled with the assistance of some of my colleagues. Space will keep me from elaborating much, but these are topics I'll surely return to in this space repeatedly. FOREIGN POLICY --Nuclear proliferation (START treaty, test ban treaty, the UAE) --Energy (climate change, energy demand) --"Smart" power (reviving diplomacy, shifting roles from Pentagon to State) DEFENSE --Budget (debate over cuts at some point, likely for weapons makers, but supplementals until then) --Iraq and Afghanistan (reviewing agreements with the Iraqi government, shifting the focus to Afghanistan) --Veterans (increased care for Iraq ilnesses and lower-priority veterans, DOD/VA health care infrastructure) INTELLIGENCE --Interrogation (Guantanamo closure, whether to codify interrogation tactics, examination of past practices) --Surveillance (court case outcomes, Patriot Act reauthorization) --Authorization bill (cybersecurity, shape of the intelligence community) HOMELAND SECURITY --Chemical plant security (legislation/regulation expiring) --FEMA as part of the Department of Homeland Security (Janet Napolitano non-committal) --Department oversight (Authorization bill, attention to border security, interoperatbility, surface transportation) |
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| 27.01.2009 |
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| The European Union tiptoe toward being willing to accept some Guantanamo detainees points to one major difference between the Bush administration and the Obama administration: Bush evoked hostility from many traditional U.S. allies, while Obama has something of a clean slate, thanks to not having offended anyone yet and his generally more welcoming attitude toward international cooperation. Now, some of the groundwork toward countries being willing to accept Gitmo detainees may have indeed been put in place by Bush's team. But even then, the sense was that buddying up to the new administration was the major goal, not doing favors for the outgoing team. There is no huge cry for Gitmo detainees to be returned to the United States. The stray Democratic congressman says he'd be fine with them being in his district, but several lawmakers, albeit Republicans, have made a big fuss about the idea. Karl Rove predicts that Gitmo will not be closed in a year. There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical of whether Obama can deliver on his plan. But if the international community gets on board, it will absolutely be significantly easier. |
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| 26.01.2009 |
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| I had the chance to interview Malcolm Gladwell about his new book "Outliers" today. But obviously I had to ask him about the effect President Barack Obama would have on America's standing abroad. "It can only go up," Gladwell who described himself as a centrist Democrat, answered, pointing out that while it is very early to make a call on that, the decision to close Guantanamo was an important step in the right direction. After the full interview goes online at DW-WORLD.DE, I'll link to it from here. |
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| 25.01.2009 |
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| This AP analysis article has some interesting insights about the new Obama/Clinton foreign policy, but I was most taken by one section. "[Clinton} intends to make more use of special diplomatic envoys, in part to move the U.S. away from its recent practice of increasing the power of military commanders to interact with foreign leaders. 'I believe that special envoys, particularly (as compared to) military commands, have a lot to recommend in order to make sure that we've got the civilian presence well represented,' she told senators." It's not just that Obama and Clinton prefer diplomacy. The Pentagon under Bush increasingly took on roles that were once the exclusive province of the military. And in many ways, they still are doing those things. One wonders what Robert Gates thinks of Clinton's plans, not that conflict between Defense and State would be anything new. |
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| 22.01.2009 |
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| German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier had a busy day today and was involved in at least two major international news stories. First, he talked to his new American counterpart Hillary Clinton to offer his congratulations. Clinton and Steinmeier agreed to meet soon. And second, according to German tabloid bild.de, Steinmeier and German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble agreed to meet in the next few days to iron out their publicly voiced dispute about whether Germany should consider taking inmates from Guantanamo. While Steinmeier said Germany should consider such a move, Interior Minister Schaeuble said he could not see why EU countries should grant sanctuary to people who are too dangerous for the U.S. |
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| 22.01.2009 |
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| Sticking with reaction to Tuesday's inaugural speech, some interesting ideological types have dissected the foreign policy remarks of President Obama and their relative liberal or conservative qualities. For the most part, both this Heritage piece and this U.S. News piece get it right. For instance, the Heritage author said that by referring to a "war" on a terror network, Obama seconded Bush (although Obama used "network" as opposed to "terrorism" itself, a slight but important distinction that nonetheless leaves the assessment basically accurate); by addressing foreign leaders to whom the United States will "extend a hand" to those who "unclench your fist," Obama was putting forward an opposite course. At the same time, there was some hopefulness in the Heritage piece that Obama wouldn't turn too far away from Bush: "...how far world events will allow the Obama foreign policy to diverge from that of the Bush years remains to be seen." The U.S. News author was correct to take issue with conservatives who somehow saw something new in Obama's desire to "defeat" terrorists, as though Democrats hadn't wanted to do so before: "The national Democrats who don't want to defeat our terrorist enemies only exist in the fevered mirror universe of GOP talking points." |
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| 21.01.2009 |
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| David Nather tackles President Obama's message to the world. Caitlin Webber tackles how world leaders reacted to the inauguration. BBC Monitoring tackles world media reaction. |
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| 20.01.2009 |
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| Recently I wrote about the new president's travel plans and the race between European leaders to be the first to visit Barack Obama in the White House. While there is still no news on the latter, German magazine Focus reports that President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit Berlin in April. According to the report, Obama's staff is preparing a trip to the German capital after participating in a NATO summit on April 3-4 in Baden-Baden and Strasbourg. With his trip to Berlin, Barack Obama intends to thank Berliners for their support during his big speech there last year. No word whether President Obama will be allowed to do what candidate Obama was not: Give a speech at Brandenburg Gate. | ||||||||
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| 20.01.2009 |
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| Multiple news reports make abundantly clear that as soon as President-elect Obama officially becomes president, he will hit foreign policy hard, tackling issues such as the Iraq War and Guantanamo. Where the reports differ is on what Obama will do on the conflict in Gaza, short of naming a Middle East envoy, which has been reported most everywhere. The Post: "Incoming officials were still debating yesterday how involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian crisis should proceed during the first week. With a fragile Gaza cease-fire in place, the new administration plans to tread gingerly, working behind the scenes while allowing Egyptian and European initiatives to play out before taking a highly visible role." The Hill: "After weeks of delivering speeches on the nation’s economic crisis, Obama is scheduled to meet with the Joints Chiefs of Staff and other high-ranking military officers on Wednesday and has promised to 'have plenty to say' about the conflict in Gaza after he is sworn in." I suspect CNN's account reflects the differing sources some of the publications might have: "The Obama aides also revealed the Mideast crisis has shot to the top of the immediate agenda. The aides said Obama has been pushing behind the scenes for quick, decisive action, overriding the advice of some aides who believe getting active instantly may raise unrealistic expectations for Mideast peace." |
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| 19.01.2009 |
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| Finally, transition time will officially come to end on Tuesday with Barack Obama's inauguration. It's about time. Putting the -elect every time after President for almost three months is really long enough. I think many journalists share this feeling. So before all the hard work begins for soon-to-be President Obama, it's time to party. If you are in Washington, DC on Inauguration Day, you probably cannot escape some sort of party or another. Still not sure where to go to though? Then just click here for a whole slew of party offerings in the U.S. capital. In Germany, probably one of largest inauguration party's outside the U.S. will kick off at Club Goya in Berlin at 4 p.m. The event is hosted by Democrats Abroad and Republicans Abroad. Around 1500 guests are expected, including staff from the U.S. Embassy in Berlin. While there are lots of other partys in most major German cities, Munich will be the first German city to stage an Inaugural Ball hosted jointly by Democrats and Republicans abroad. It happens at the Arabella Sheraton starting at 4 p.m. For tickets (75 Euro), send a mail to munichinauguralball2009@gmail.com. Elsewhere in Europe, Austrians are celebrating Obama's inauguration at the Vienna Marriott, while Luxembourg's inauguration fest will take place at the hotel Sofitel. For parties in other cities in Europe and around the globe, check out the homepage of Democrats Abroad and select a country. Have fun! |
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| 18.01.2009 |
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| It's probably too early to call it a trend, but when one blogger on the left notices it and a magazine on the right notices it, it's at least interesting. DanK at TPM notes a reported Obama hire on Russia who has an intervention-oriented mindset. The American Conservative notes the same hire, plus another potential pick at the State Department, as being part of the same intervention-oriented strain. Something to consider. |
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| 16.01.2009 |
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| Not only in the U.S. are President-elect Barack Obama's books bestsellers. As German daily Die Welt reports, Chinese readers apparently just can't get enough of Obama and his writings. A collection of Obama aphorisms is a huge success in Beijing's bookstore Sanlian, only to be topped by John Talbott's "Obamanomics". According to Die Welt, the President-elect's "The Audacity of Hope" sold more than 100,000 copies. There are more than 20 Obama biographies – most of them unauthorized – on the market as well. For a comparison: Five biographies deal with French President Nicholas Sarkozy, three with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. | ||||||||
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| 16.01.2009 |
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| A surprising fact: In a 2008 presidential campaign where foreign policy by all appearances took a backseat to the economy, President-elect Obama made more campaign promises on foreign policy than any other subject. That's according to Politifact, which compiled all of his promises (510 in all) and segregated them by category (87 on foreign policy). The plan is to follow all of his promises and see which one he fulfills. You can check out all the foreign policy pledges here, and go ahead and expect "no action" on some of them from now until 2012 or even 2016 -- Vice President-elect Biden said during the campaign that the economic crisis meant that some of the pledges to vastly increase foreign aid probably would go down the drain. |
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| 15.01.2009 |
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| A new global poll compiled by Austrian research company Triconsult right before the U.S. election (October/November 2008) provides some interesting data. It is essentially another confirmation of America's declined global image and the high hopes for President-elect Barack Obama. Here's a quick snapshot: -Western Europeans (Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Austria, Finland) think that the U.S. will pay more attention to human rights under President Barack Obama and that America's image abroad will improve. -Western Europeans believe Americans are more conservative and traditional than Europeans. -In every country polled, a majority of people think poverty in the U.S. will tend to decline under Obama rather than increase. Americans also are of that opinion, but to a lesser extent than all the other countries. -In every country but Russia people are convinced that environmental issues in the U.S. will improve under President Obama. -Every country has higher hopes than the U.S. that the chances for world peace will improve under Obama. However, even in the U.S., more people agree rather than disagree with that view. -A large majority (90 percent) of Western Europeans (75 percent of Americans) think that tensions between Muslims and Christians will remain the same or decrease. -Three out of ten Americans think that the threat of terrorism will increase. Only one out of ten Western Europeans is of that opinion. -Only in Turkey and Georgia do more people believe that America's influence in the world has increased. All other countries see the opposite. You can get all the details and figures, as well as a lot more fascinating polling factoids here (in German). |
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| 15.01.2009 |
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| There's a very deep pool of reporting right now that is looking back at the Bush administration's foreign policy and national security legacy, but I want to drill a little deeper on one specific issue: interrogation and detention policy. Journalist and author Bob Woodward said the following in a recent roundtable: "If there had been other attacks, large attacks, many attacks, quite frankly -- and this doesn't speak well to the country -- probably these things wouldn't have been an issue, people would have accepted it and the dark side would have been okay." Woodward's statements came on the same day he reported that a top Bush administration official said a terror case had to be thrown out because a suspect was tortured. And I think that just hints at why Woodward's prediction is somewhat false. There are a great many reasons that "the dark side" may have ran afoul of the general populace even if there were additional terror attacks. --It obviously can complicate terror prosecutions, making it harder to jail people who are guilty, and surely a segment of the electorate might have come to question it on those grounds. --There is a considerable body of study questioning whether some of the tactics the Bush administration has acknowledged using produce good intelligence, since people enduring harsh treatment have been known to lie simply to escape said harsh treatment. Trained interrogators, psychologists and anyone with a pragmatic streak would have eventually spoken out about this no matter the number of attacks, I imagine. --There would always have been a segment of the population that would have moral objections to the U.S. government embracing "the dark side." --And, as a foreign policy "realist" argued Tuesday, waterboarding/torture has had, and would continually have had even had their been additional attacks, ramifications for the United States internationally; there is a plausible argument that the revelations of the United States' harsh treatment pushed more people toward becoming terrorists. If the tactics used to fight terrorists create new terrorists, surely at least a segment of the population would have wondered whether the tactics were effective. And that doesn't even factor in to the discussion any of the fallout all of this has led to for the United States' allies, whose help would still hypothetically be handy for fighting terrorists. I'm not personally arguing for or against any specific interrogation/detention regime. I'm only arguing with the premise of Woodward's statement. I'm guessing that if there had been more terror attacks, it might have taken longer for the Bush administration's methods in the "war on terror" to have come under the kind of scrutiny they're under now. But they would have eventually. |
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| 13.01.2009 |
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| In a good post over at the New Atlanticist, James Joyner outlines and analyses President-elect Barack Obama's decision to close the Guantanamo prison and the difficulties it presents. One of them is, as the AP reports, judging the mixed group of more than 200 inmates currently detained at Guantanamo. Another difficult step is to find countries willing to take the prisoners. Britain, who has been asked by the U.S. to take prisoners, said it was only inclined to do so if joined by other European nations. The UN has also called upon countries to accept prisoners. Not surprisingly, takers are not exactly lining up. But in an interesting twist, Finland, which has no nationals detained in Guantanamo, has offered to take up to sixty inmates. For a list (published in 2006) of prisoners at Guantanamo and their countries of origin click here. |
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| 13.01.2009 |
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| President-elect Obama and congressional Democrats have been a bit out of sync on intelligence issues. First he angered some congressional liberals who opposed a candidate for the CIA director's job, John Brennan, because they feared his views on interrogation and surveillance policies were too closely in line with the Bush administration's. Then, the candidate he did pick, Leon Panetta, drew some fire from a couple senior Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee who were angry they hadn't been informed and had concerns about his thin intelligence resume. Those concerns now appear to have died down. The next intelligence-related issue on which Congress and Obama may be out of sync is whether to merge the White House Homeland Security Council into the National Security Council. On the surface, it sounds like an easy decision -- why would you need a separate homeland security council when it's as much of a component of national security as anything else that falls under the NSC's purview? But the leaders of the House and Senate committees with oversight of homeland security are skeptical about the idea, because they fear it could lead to homeland security getting thrown onto the backburner. One's a Democrat and the other's an independent, and both say they're "open" to the merger, with some caveats. The top Republican on the Senate panel has similar concerns. Read more in my CQ story here (although you won't find the House chairman's point of view in that story, expressed to me but not published in the piece). |
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| 12.01.2009 |
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| As Tim wrote, Barack Obama, in keeping with tradition, chose neighboring Canada as his first country to visit. On that note, it will be interesting to see who will be the first European leader to visit the new President in the White House, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Nicholas Sarkozy and Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown being the obvious favorites. After Obama's big fanfare trip to Berlin last year didn't go down well with the French and the British, let's see which European country is picked to receive the first presidential visit. According to media reports, Poland is not faring too badly, having already secured a visit by President Obama in June. For an interesting perspective on how President George W. Bush prioritized his foreign trips click here. |
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| 11.01.2009 |
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| President-elect Barack Obama is going the opposite route of President Bush right away on one early foreign policy decision: A visit to Canada. Bush, you see, went to Mexico as his first foreign policy trip, breaking a rather long tradition of new presidents visiting Canada first, one that Obama plans to restore, according to both the Obama team and Canadian officials. As you might expect, they're happy about this in Canada, where it's something of a symbolic victory about the importance of their country. But that doesn't mean Obama won't have some contentious business to attend to once there. Per the Vancouver Sun: "The meeting between [Prime Minister Stephen] Harper and Obama is certain to focus heavily on several key topics — the war in Afghanistan, climate change and the impact the global recession is having on the North American auto industry and Canada-U.S. bilateral trade." |
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| 09.01.2009 |
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| How will China-U.S. relations fare under President Barack Obama is a topic many commentators have been tackling recently, going beyond the latest news that U.S. debt is becoming less appealing to China. Howard LaFranchi deems it likely that Obama may pursue a tougher stance on China than the Bush administration because of an increased focus on human rights and statements criticizing Beijing's monetary policy. That puts Chinese officials in a tight spot. While they felt comfortable with the outgoing Republican administration, the Chinese people are rather fond of Barack Obama. China expert David Shambough, in an article in the International Herald Tribune, presents a brief history of Sino-American relations calling them a marriage of convenience. In his opinion, relations between both countries are currently the best since the Tiananmen crackdown of 1989. Focusing on the most critical issue between the U.S. and China - Taiwan -, Bonnie Glaser offers eight policy objectives that she thinks are likely to be pursued by the Obama administration. Among the points mentioned are a possible change of rhetoric, not substance of Washington's "one China" policy and firm support for a larger Taiwanese role in international organizations. In an editorial for Forbes, Gordon Chang presents his rather gloomy outlook on China for 2009. He argues that the ability of China's leadership to govern the country effectively is starting to erode, which leaves Chinese officials little margin of error. According to Chang, with three historic anniversaries coming up, 2009 will be a crucial year for China. |
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| 08.01.2009 |
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| Yesterday I wrote about how Rotterdam's new mayor has sparked comparisons with President-elect Barack Obama. Today, in another sign how the former Democratic Senator from Illinois and his campaign resonate with Europeans, the German Social Democrats (SPD), the country's oldest major party, officially launched their new and improved homepage in preparation for Germany's general election this fall. And who do you think inspired the SPD in their efforts? Yep, that's right, Barack Obama. "The online campaign will become the heart of our general election campaign," Kajo Wasserhövel, in charge of the Social Democratic election campaign said. Taking a page out of Obama's hugely successful online campaign, the SPD has decluttered its old internet site, which looked like old newspaper articles that were cut and pasted online, as Germany's tageszeitung mocked. No more. The new site comes with lots of large pictures, buttons for online donations and links to social networking sites. And it's not just the new internet site that smacks of Obamamania. Want to know how the party's Germanized stab at "Yes we can" sounds? "Anpacken. Für unser Land" (Let's tackle things. For our country). According to campaign manager Wasserhövel, the Social Democratic homepage is only the start. The next relaunch is just a matter of time. German Foreign Minister and Social Democratic candidate for Chancellor Frank-Walter Steinmeier's personal internet site is scheduled to get a makeover soon too. To compare, check out the SPD's new homepage here and an old version from last January here. You can find Frank-Walter Steinmeier's personal internet site here. And here's the original: You can find Barack Obama's internet site here and the Democratic Party's homepage here. |
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| 08.01.2009 |
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| On Gaza and other foreign matters, President-elect Barack Obama's team has repeatedly refused to weigh in on the principle that there is only "one president at a time." But on the economic front, Obama has stepped over that line. It's hard to reconcile the two, just using one's brain. The closest Obama has come to explaining the difference is to say on Monday, per Politico, “I will continue to insist that, when it comes to foreign affairs, it is particularly important to emphasize that there is one president at a time... There are delicate negotiations taking place right now and we can't have two voices coming out of the United States when you have so much at stake.” I suppose it's defensible, then, if President Bush isn't proposing his own economic plan, therefore meaning there isn't any interference in negotiations. Because is there really any reason there should be just one face representing the executive branch abroad as opposed to with Congress? |
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| 08.01.2009 |
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| Were you aware that Barack Obama had made his "first big foreign policy mistake?" And that it was a statement about Kashmir? The press in India and Pakistan is going bonkers about it, but it's not getting much ink in the United States. Perhaps that's because the statement was made months ago, on the campaign trail -- which would make it difficult to qualify as Obama's "first big foreign policy mistake," since it was made before he was even elected, let alone inaugurated. Obviously, Obama's stance on Kashmir has its detractors, as you might have read back in November, when the remarks were first published. But if this warrants big headlines, now, in India and Pakistan, clearly there's a great hunger for any shred of U.S.-related news in that region of the world, because this one's a big reach. Nonetheless, if you want to get caught up on this tempest in a teapot, you can read the Washington Times piece that started it all here. (And by the way, if the author of the piece was somehow alleging this was the "first big foreign policy mistake" Obama has ever made, in his whole life, or as a candidate for president, I'm sure Obama's critics and even his allies could find bigger so-called "mistake[s].") |
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| 07.01.2009 |
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| Amid all the major doom and gloom stories about the global economic crisis, the war in Gaza and Russia's power play with its gas exports, an important piece of good news was barely noticed by the international press. For the first time a major European city is being governed by a muslim immigrant. Ahmed Aboutaleb, Morrocan-born, was sworn in on Monday as mayor of the Netherland's second largest city Rotterdam. Aboutaleb, who has been dubbed "Obama from the Maas" by Dutch media, is a Social Democrat who previously served as Secretary of State for Social Affairs in the Dutch government. The new mayor of Rotterdam was 14 years old when he immigrated to the Netherlands from Morroco. His job won't be easy: Rotterdam has the largest immigrant population among all Dutch cities and was the base of Pim Fortuyn, the right wing politician who was killed in 2002. |
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| 06.01.2009 |
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| With his decision to nominate Leon Panetta to head the CIA, President-elect Barack Obama has scored a huge surprise. While some politicians working on intelligence matters scratch their heads over the choice, other voices argue that intelligence experience may not necessarily be the most important credential for the job these days. And as former CIA director John Deutch told The Caucus, some of the most successful heads (George Bush senior being one of them) of the CIA possessed little or no intelligence experience. By putting Leon Panetta in charge of the CIA, I think Barack Obama wants to achieve three things: He wants someone at the helm he can trust absolutely; he wants that person to put an end to interrogation/torture practices established unter the Bush administration; and he wants to symbolize a break from the past publicly. With Leon Panetta, there is a good chance he can fulfill all three tasks. While the CIA, with its focus on human intelligence, is certainly the most widely known spy agency, the NSA with its focus on signals intelligence is arguably the more important one. Considering the recent warrantless surveillance scandal, it might be even more interesting to find out who Barack Obama picks to head the NSA. |
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| 06.01.2009 |
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| From the Department of Stupidly Promoting Others comes this recommendation that you check out all the major, major new features over at Foreign Policy magazine's website, which has added like a gazillion foreign policy blogs, all of which show promise. But if you're anything like me, you won't stop reading the (hopefully) good work we do here at Across the Pond, because this is an opportunity to supplement, not replace, with yet more good foreign policy analysis. They hit foreign policy from every angle at each of the new blogs, and I won't link to every single one of them today; there are nine in all, and I recommend exploring. But I can tell you I'm personally looking forward to regularly visiting The Cable, written by the excellent foreign policy/national security writer Laura Rozen; The Best Defense, penned by Tom Ricks, the Washington Post defense writer who does great work; and Madam Secretary, which promises to "obsessive" about Hillary Clinton. There are some other heavyweights that just got hired -- go check it out. And if this doesn't sound enough like a press release, here's the actual press release. |
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| 05.01.2009 |
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| On Sunday, Bill Richardson withdrew as President-elect Obama's choice to head up the Commerce Department, removing a voice from his cabinet who represents a more pro-free trade position. Considering that Obama's pick for U.S. trade representative, Rep. Xavier Becerra, is seen as more skeptical of free trade (or, rather, more in favor of fair trade -- the dispute over wording here makes writing about this difficult), Richardson's departure leaves Rahm Emmanuel, Obama's pick for White House chief of staff, as the biggest counterbalance representing that stance. One wonders if Obama's team will replace Richardson with someone who reflects Richardson's point of view on trade. |
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| 02.01.2009 |
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| Instead of looking back and writing a year-in-review kind of post as many others have done, I prefer to offer readers a few foreign policy-related predictions for 2009 from across the web. Kathleen McFarland at The Fox Forum predicts: - A resurgent Russia will lead Ukraine to cancel its plans for membership in the European Union and fall back under the Russian sphere of influence. Europe will do nothing about it. - China will see social unrest by the end of the year. The Chinese government will quell the unrest and restore order. Charlie Edwards at Global Dashboard predicts: - Britain will increase its troops in Afghanistan by spring. Germany, France and Italy will do so as well in October after a deal with the Obama administration. - The U.S. or France will fight a brief, but intense, war in Somalia. - Benjamin Netanyahu will win elections in Israel in February. - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be voted out in elections in Iran in June. - Prime Minister Recip Tayyin Erdogan will end Turkey's bid to join the EU and turn east instead. - Mexico, the world's leading narco state, will descend into total chaos and destabilize the region. Janet Daley at the Daily Telegraph predicts: - No dramatic foreign policy shift vis-a-vis Russia, the Middle East and Islamist terrorism under President Barack Obama. - No significant international agreement for global financial regulation will be reached. Michael Goodwin at the New York Daily News predicts: - Stories about friction between President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will surface within six months. - Pakistan or Iran, not Gaza, will be involved in a serious international crisis. Agree or disagree? What are your predictions for 2009? |
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| 02.01.2009 |
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| If you're interested in following the Senate's march of nominees for hearings and confirmations, two locations of note: 1. This New York Times piece that lays out the current schedule. 2. This CQPolitics.com blog that posts new hearing dates as they happen. Few of the nominees of interest to this blog -- i.e., those with foreign relations roles -- or much of any of the nominees, in fact, are expected to encounter any real resistance from Democrats who control Congress. But it's an opportunity to stop relying on speculation and get from the horse's mouth the incoming administration's views on Afghanistan and the like. Per the times: "The confirmation calendar, at this juncture, promises to be manna for policy wonks as everyone gets a glimpse of the incoming administration’s plans and its collective (or not so) thinking." |
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