In an interview with the Daily Beast’s Gerald Posner, Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national security adviser to U.S. President Jimmy Carter, said on Sunday that President Obama’s scrapping missile defense was the right thing to do. The George W. Bush Administration’s defense missile shield project had been based on “a nonexistent defense technology, designed against a nonexistent threat”.
This, however, become an irrelevance next to Brzezinski’s more provocative assertion: Washington has to shoot down Israeli jets over Iraqi airspace if they are en route to attack Iran. This would be an example of US assertiveness to ensure the success of engagement with Tehran and Middle Eastern states. It would be a marker of a “strong strategy” backed-up with decisiveness, lacking in US foreign policy.
Transcript:
Is the Obama administration decision to end the missile-defense program the right one?
Well, let me first of all say that my view on this subject for the last two years has been that the Bush missile-shield proposal was based on a nonexistent defense technology, designed against a nonexistent threat, and designed to protect West Europeans, who weren’t asking for the protection.
Speaking on MSNBC’s Morning Joe this week, Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s National Security Advisor, reviewed the Middle East peace process. He declared that President Obama found himself between two options/schools of thought: Israel’s official perspective of delaying the peace with Palestinians, by presenting the Iranian danger as the priority of “existential threat”, and the demand for a two-state solution.
For Brzezinski, the outcome of Obama’s speech in Cairo on July 4 will be the turning point in US policy. It will ether foster a solution or, in its failure, ensure the peace process will be stuck for a long time. Thus, the US must make it clear to Israelis and Palestinians that this is the last chance for peace in the region, particular as the tension with Iran is worsening.
Brzezinski believes Israel must withdraw from occupied Palestine and must be pushed to share Jerusalem and stop the expansion settlements. In return, Israel must be assured that it does not have to accept any Palestinian refugees via a “right to return”. Otherwise, a polarization would continue, with Palestinians seeing no alternative outside Hamas.
Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor to President Jimmy Carter, spoke on MSNBC’s Morning Joe
about North Korea’s recent nuclear test. He underlined the importance of a multilateral approach, given that the US is still involved in conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Brzezinski warned that a military strike against North Korea would get the US stuck in the Far East. Instead, he put hope in Chinese involvement in a diplomatic initiative, since a prudent China does not want a war next to its borders and North Korea’s foreign trade is primarily with and through China.
Gareth Porter, who is emerging as the best observer of the US military manoeuvres on Iraq and Afghanistan, looks behind President Obama’s eventual decision to approve only part of the 30,000 extra troops request by US commanders for the Afghan War (Porter says 17,000 sent; we put the figure at just over 20,000). While the President has apparently drawn the line with the military, Porter warns, “Obama now faces the prospect that the Joint Chiefs will renew their support for McKiernan’s request for the remaining 13,000 troops next month.” And he has an analogy which is just short of terrifying:
Both Obama’s decision to agree to just over half of his field commander’s request for additional troops and the broader strategic situation offer striking parallels with the decision by President Lyndon B. Johnson in April 1965 to approve 36,000 out of a 49,000 troop request for Vietnam.
‘What is the End Game?’: Why Obama Rejected a Bigger Surge in Afghanistan
Gareth Porter
President Barack Obama decided to approve only 17,000 of the 30,000 troops requested by Gen. David McKiernan, the top commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, and Gen. David Petraeus, the CENTCOM commander, after McKiernan was unable to tell him how they would be used, according to a White House source. Read the rest of this entry »
In an interview with the Daily Beast’s Gerald Posner, Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national security adviser to U.S. President Jimmy Carter, said on Sunday that President Obama’s scrapping missile defense was the right thing to do. The George W. Bush Administration’s defense missile shield project had been based on “a nonexistent defense technology, designed against a nonexistent threat”.
Gareth Porter, who is emerging as the best observer of the US military manoeuvres on Iraq and Afghanistan, looks 
Entries (RSS)