Here’s how President Obama raised more than a few eyebrows during a press conference in The Hague yesterday:
Asked whether in hindsight he agrees with Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney’s assessment that Russia is the United States’ top geopolitical foe, Obama said he is more concerned about a nuclear bomb in Manhattan than in Russia.
‘America’s got a whole lot of challenges,’ Obama said. ‘Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate neighbors, not out of strength but out of weakness.’
(“Associated Press,” March 26, 2014)
He’s right, of course; not least because Cold War (MAD) history, as well as the disintegration of the Soviet Union, has transformed Russia from geopolitical foe to frenemy. Specifically, the United States has far more to fear from Islamic terrorists detonating a “loose nuke” in Manhattan than from Russia launching an intercontinental ballistic missile to hit NYC. And, on the economic front, China is clearly a more formidable geopolitical foe.
But he’s wrong to dismiss Russia as just a regional power; not least because, if this were so, Obama would not be trying so hard to calibrate his response to its annexation of Crimea. He’s only doing so to avoid jeopardizing Putin’s indispensable cooperation on resolving the Syrian conflict and keeping Iran’s nuclear ambitions in check.
And, apropos of nuclear weapons, Obama’s diss is patently belied by the fact that Russia’s nuclear arsenal alone makes it a world power. After all, Russia’s stockpiles rivals America’s, giving it the ability to destroy any and every country on earth in an instant too.
Not to mention U.S. generals expressing concerns about Russia rekindling Cold War ties with countries like Venezuela and Cuba, complete with Russian warships patrolling the Caribbean Sea the way they’re patrolling the Mediterranean Sea.
There’s no gainsaying that the United States is the most powerful nation on the planet. But this is precisely why dissing Russia in this fashion made Obama look like the bully he was accusing Putin of being.
What’s more, his comments make a mockery of his highly touted serene leadership style and might only serve to get under Putin’s very thin skin. Indeed, nobody should be surprised if he does something rash just to show how much of a world power Russia really is….
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