RUSSIA SLIPS GORE'S LEASH
Sunday,December 3,2000
New York Post
All year long, Vice President Gore has bragged of his "accomplishments" in dealing with Moscow. He said he was proud that President Clinton had entrusted him with the Russia portfolio. But now comes a measure of just how little progress Gore actually made: Within the past few days, several Russian long-range bombers have been deployed to Siberia - apparently to test U.S. air-defense systems by flying into American airspace off Alaska.
Officials see the move more as a publicity stunt than a security threat; the idea, apparently, is to make Russia look good by thumbing its nose at America - to make its
military shine by embarrassing ours.
So it appears Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon got it right when he said Russia is stuck in "Cold War thinking."
But that's exactly what Gore was supposed to change.
And here's another measure of failure:
In 1995, Gore penned a secret pact with Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin. The deal let Moscow sell sophisticated arms to Iran while escaping U.S. sanctions; Russia was to
end the sales by 1999.
Fearing criticism, Team Clinton-Gore concealed the deal, even from Congress. But Russia never had any intention of ending the sales. Indeed, arms shipments continue to this day.
Last week The Washington Post reported that Russia was ditching the pact altogether - signaling it would soon be selling even bigger, more dangerous weapons to the terrorist theocracy.
Ironically, Gore himself had co-sponsored the law that called for sanctions on Moscow for arming Iran.
Apparently, he later thought reaching a deal - any deal - and touting an "accomplishment" were more important than principles.
No surprise there, of course.
But the consequences are scary: The pact let Moscow sell hundreds of tanks, artillery, a submarine, sophisticated torpedoes and other weapons to Tehran.
And consider this: The Clinton-Gore folks hid news of the pact's collapse until after Election Day.
Yet Moscow informed Washington it was scrapping the deal fully four days before voters went to the polls. But Clinton-Gore kept mum until well after Nov. 7.
The new disclosures fit with the pattern of ineptitude and arrogance on Russian matters ascribed to Gore in a congressional report this year.
The report noted how Gore winked at Russian corruption and incompetence, letting some $20 billion in Russian aid vanish. Indeed, Gore would be hard-pressed to cite a single issue on which his efforts with Moscow did not fail.
But you'd never know that from what he's told you.
Gore's romps helped Russia thumb its nose at our military, bolster a terrorist state and squander billions in aid.
This strikes us as one more good reason to root for George W. Bush. |
