Sarkozy: Obama’s Foreign Policy ‘Utterly Immature’ – Obama No Uniter
October 29, 2008
Michael van der Galien
familysecuritymatters.org
For months, years even, Democrats have argued that President George W. Bush did horrendous damage to America’s image and reputation and alienated important allies in especially Europe by pursuing a hawkish foreign policy.
Bush, Democrats to a degree rightfully said, was too willing to act unilateral. A Democratic president would change all that, they said, and act in unison with western European countries in order to remove the threat posed by enemy regimes.
Barack Obama was supposed to be the candidate who could bring the above about. He would, he and his supporters said, be able to restore America’s reputation almost single handed, and his multilateral approach to foreign policy would cause the transatlantic relationship to improve, and the West to unite as never before since the end of the Cold War.
Sadly, however, Obama will not be any such man. Instead, he seems the liberal mirror image of George Bush. He too is willing to act unilateral when a multilateral approach will prove more effective, for instance on the subject of free trade. Unlike what many Obama supporters would like one to believe, Canada and Mexico are not exactly thrilled with Obama’s promise to unilaterally decide that NAFTA should be renegotiated.
Not only did Canada and Mexico respond angrily to Obama’s pledges during the Democratic primaries to renegotiate NAFTA and other free trade agreements, European politicians also warned the Democratic leadership that America would be wise to support the principles of free trade it advocated during the Clinton and Bush years. Although Obama has stopped talking frequently about limiting free trade in order to ‘protect’ American businesses, Europe and other allies of the U.S. remain worried that he will implement anti-free trade policies nonetheless once in office.
And then there is the issue of Iran. In May of this year, Britain’s Foreign Minister David Miliband said back in May of this year that Obama’s views on Iran worry him and his European colleagues. They fear, he said back then, that Obama’s plans will jeopardize their efforts to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, thereby altering the balance of power in the region significantly.
Today, another foreign newspaper, the Haaretz, reported on the views of yet another leading European polician: Nicolas Sarkozy, president of France. Sarkozy too “is very critical of U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama’s positions on Iran,” the report says, fearing that America’s attitude towards Iran in 2009 may cause the Mullahs to continue pursuing nuclear weapons, with no one willing or able to stop them.
According to reliable sources, Sarkozy considers Obama’s views on Iran to be “utterly immature,” and comprised of “formulations empty of all content.” These are words no European leader would use lightly to describe the views of a (future) American president. Nonetheless, Sarkozy used them to describe Obama in closed forums in France.
He also argues, according to sources, that Obama’s views on Iran are not “crystallized, and therefore many issues remain open,” which worries Sarkozy tremendously.
Sarkozy believes that an Obama administration would undo all the efforts of Europe, allied with the United States, to force Iran into giving up its nuclear program. Obama, Sarkozy believes, will be likely to destroy the multilateral alliance against Iran and, instead, agree to directly negotiate with Iran without any preconditions.
Europe considers negotiating without preconditions with Iran to be silly, possibly counterproductive and dangerous.
France’s intelligence agency believes that Iran has already produced 40% of the enriched uranium it needs to build a nuclear bomb. Tehran will have enough to do so in the Spring or Summer of 2009, the French believe.
As such, Sarkozy’s concerns about Barack Obama are both logical and prudent. He is determined to negotiate with Obama if he does indeed win the election November 4, but he fears that Obama will prove too much of an ideological dove to deter Iran.
Interestingly, where Europe accused the United States of being too hawkish under George W. Bush, it now fears that an Obama administration will act just as unilateral as Bush’s, and will be too dovish. European leaders are sending out very clear warning signals about what they think of Obama and his foreign policy views, which is being ignored by most American media.
Obama often presents himself as a man who will restore America’s alliance with Europe. When one takes a closer look at his foreign policy plans, however, it becomes clear that Obama will do no such thing. Instead, he seems determined to pursue a highly ideological foreign policy which will put him on collision course with Europe. European politicians and columnists understand this, perhaps it is time for Americans who favor improving the Europe-U.S. relationship to pay attention to them.
Michael van der Galien is Editor-in-Chief of PoliGazette. |
