Eastern European Missile Shield is Unpopular in Eastern Europe
Something that’s gone missing in neocon hyperventilating about Barack Obama not wanting to build an expensive-but-useless missile shield system in Eastern Europe, is that Eastern Europeans don’t want us to build a missile shield in Eastern Europe. Here’s Andrew Roberts of Northwestern University breaking it down:
More to the point, the public in both countries has been decidedly lukewarm about the treaty to put it mildly. Below is a graph of Czech public opinion showing that over the past three years, a nearly unchanged two-thirds of the public has been opposed to construction of the radar and an even higher percentage has desired a referendum on the issue (presumably in order to vote against it; the data used to construct the graph are available here.) And this despite considerable government propaganda and public antipathy towards Russia.
I don’t have similar data on Poland, but a poll from August 2008 (when the treaty was signed) showed that 56% of the public opposed the missiles and only 27% supported supported them. Support rose somewhat in October 2008 (after the Russia-Georgia crisis), but a majority still opposed the radar (46% to 41%).
It can’t be much of a betrayal of our Czech and Polish allies to decline to build a radar system that neither the Czech population nor the Russian population wants us to build. The right wants us to at great expensive build a missile shield that doesn’t work, in places it’s not wanted, to protect Western Europe from Iranian missiles that don’t exist, in order to antagonize the Russians. The fact that it would make the Russians happy to kill the system somehow makes it a bad idea to kill the system. The Russians would also be mad if we bombed their naval bases—is it appeasement to decline to do so?
59 Responses to “Eastern European Missile Shield is Unpopular in Eastern Europe”
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September 18th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
And here is an example of Cheney’s views of public opinion. He knows what’s necessary, and polls showing public opinion is against what he deems necessary are irrelevant because the people don’t understand the world the way he understands it. Polls, elections, public opinion are all obstacles to the accomplishment of neoconservative foreign and military policy. At least that’s my opinion.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
it’s also worth noting that last march the czech government fell because of its support of the bush missile defense plan. right now the republic just has a caretaker government. even without obama’s action, it was far from clear that the plan had any future after the next election.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
In the early 80s, the people of Europe were protesting against the deployment of american missiles Pershing-2 in Europe (to have means of retaliation after the Soviets broke the balance of powers). Thanks to great leaders like Helmuth Kohl, Lady Thatcher and the socialist François Mitterrand, the Europeans leaders did not listen to their public opinions. François Mitterrand made a great speech before the Bundestag in january 1983 :
I am not sure that Yglesias understand well what is at stake here.
Because, if you reject a NMD program, only to appease Russians (it is astonishing how Yglesias twists the realities !), the sole alternative is the old Mutually Assured Destruction doctrine, and the armament race. The logic of balance of powers, as Mitterand spoke there. Like during the Cold War. It means that our defense is based on dissuasion alone and, in the case of an attack, that we take a “full retaliatory response”. And Yglesias does not seem to have any moral issue to use a “full retaliatory response” (a.k.a. to bomb a civil population), even now in today environment with all those rogue states and individual irrational actors. Personnaly, I prefer a radar and a system of interception. Polls and Yglesias seem to suggest that they prefer to annihilate an other country as a “full retaliatory response”. Who is immoral, stupid and play a dangerous game ?
September 18th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Fleur is one of those people too stupid to realize that the point of MAD is that no one actually uses the weapons.
He’s also one of those people too stupid to notice the problem that the defense doesn’t actually work and so MAD is still in effect.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
WOLVERINES!
Cranky
Sorry, just couldn’t resist.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
“The Russians would also be mad if we bombed their naval bases—is it appeasement to decline to do so?”
Actually, we’ve been meaning to bring that up…
September 18th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
This is why we can’t have nice things.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Basically the wisdom of this move depends on how hard a bargain we drove with Russia, and how we dealt with the Czech and Polish governments.
Does anyone know what the response of the Poles or Czechs has been? If they feel we sandbagged or shortchanged them, this would be extremely unwise. If they agreed to halting the program, then there’s nothing wrong with Obama’s decision.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
#3, if you can assure me that these particular missile-defense batteries would obviate the need for a Mutual Assured Destruction defense, then I’m all for them. However to do that, you’d have to convince me that:
1. They’re designed to counter a real, extant threat
2. They’re sufficient to counter this threat
3. There are no other locations for this defensive battery (that wouldn’t simultaneously piss off our largest potential enemy, thus increasing the probability that billions of human beings die in a full-scale global exchange)
Get me there and we’ll talk. There’s no virtue in pushing a flawed approach to a good idea — it significantly hurts your cause.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:18 pm
Yes, beacuse the Russians could never overwhelm a MND with MIRV’s, dummy war-heads or just plain ol’ numbers.
Never mind the whole point that the navigation and guidance for the NMD have failed tests more often than passed.
No one wants it except defense contracots, it doesn’t work and it just pisses the Russians off.
It’s not a bug, it’s a FEATURE!
September 18th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
> Basically the wisdom of this move depends on how
> hard a bargain we drove with Russia, and how we
> dealt with the Czech and Polish governments.
The United States has just about zero leverage to negotiate anything with Russia. Hell, we need Russia to keep our astronauts on the space station from starving to death (and as of next year to get home). Russia has a huge lever over Europe in the natural gas supply, and doesn’t need the US for much of anything it can’t get in ordinary trade.
Finally, the neocons and their “back Georgia” idiocy burned up any last remaining reservoir of goodwill that Russia, its people, and leaders might have had toward the US.
Cranky
September 18th, 2009 at 2:25 pm
The fact that it would make the Russians happy to kill the system somehow makes it a bad idea to kill the system.
Hey, Neville Yglesias, everybody knows US security is enhanced when Russia feels angry, distrustful and threatened.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
The Russians are ecstatic about this. They are positively overjoyed. This is a country that saw as many as a million people starve to death in the early 90’s. They averted total disaster only because 40% of their potato crop, their number one staple, is grown on family plots smaller than my very small backyard.
The country had before the recent financial crisis 38 billionaires running around a country filled with mass poverty. Russian life expectancy has dropped 20 years in less a decade and a half. Their once proud Navy is a rusting hulk and their once mighty Army is antiquated beyond redemption. They couldn’t invade Slovenia, let alone Europe.
Corruption rules the land. The country is run by mafia bosses and political strongmen. Russians are not happy about this. They hope for a better democratic future but pine for the old days of the communists and the tsars.
Russia has oil, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and pride. That’s about it. The United States threw Russia a little bone and their leaders in the Kremlin and Russians across the land broke out the vodka and burst into patriotic song.
It should always be this easy. The Right Wing thinks we have “given away the farm!” Too fucking funny. Man, all we did was give the Russians an old milk cow that doesn’t produce milk anymore. And everybody, except the American Right, is happy about it.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Agreed Jasper.
Munich! Munich! Munich!
September 18th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
The Czech government and the citizens have very different stances on the missile program. In the interest of democracy, Obama’s move was a good one. http://tinyurl.com/nrretn
September 18th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
“the sole alternative is the old Mutually Assured Destruction doctrine, and the armament race.”
An armament race between the United States and whom—Iran??? It is to laugh.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:45 pm
What has also gone missing is the MSM’s reporting of this overwhelming public opposition. I’m less concerned about “neocon hyperventilating,” and much more concerned that the MSM has adopted the false, neocon premise that the Czech and Polish people actually want this missile system.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
That depends on whether or not he speaks French.
You realize that the missile defense system was being set up to defend against an Iranian, not Russian, launch, right? Iran doesn’t have the missiles or warheads to assure the destruction of anything; and the idea of getting into an armament race with them is laughable.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
Appeases the Russians; saves American money; and prevents a dangerous and stupid boondoggle from getting off the ground.
This is a trifecta. There’s no down side.
I have stopped reading the Washington Post, but – as part of the upside – I’ll certainly read Fred Hiatt’s anguished editorial cry of rage when it comes out. I guess that falls under the category: humor. Adds to funniness in the world – that is something, too.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
The Polish and Czech lack of enthusiasm for Son of Star Wars was the fear that a missile attack on [fill in the blank, e.g. France, U.S., Las Malvinas] would be preceded by disabling attacks on the Czech radar installations and the Polish anti-missile missiles. The MADness of Bush’s plan was only heightened by the unfortunate detail that after nearly 30 years, Star Wars and its offspring couldn’t be made to work even under optimal conditions (known target trajectory, no rain, etc).
Neo-con mantra: Spend money on an unwanted system that doesn’t work and make sure the socialists cut the deficit.
September 18th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
It’s more like this: the government has spent years promising these systems, and the governments of eastern Europe have expended a fair amount of political capital in order to say yes to them.
Obama went ahead and said “ahh, never mind” – leaving those governments hanging out to dry, and getting nothing from Russia in return.
Not to mention the tone deafness of making the announcement on the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland.
Personally, I never much cared for offering security guarantees deep into the traditional Russian sphere of influence – but having spent years saying we were going to, we set a whole bunch of expectations. At the very least, Russia should have been asked for some kind of quid pro quo.
September 18th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Matt, influential people like you need to stop using the word “shield” to describe this non-functioning missile defense program. Well, maybe if you put “shield” in scare quotes. Even as you criticize the program you call it a shield, implying to the ill-informed that it’s some kind of mighty force field or something. I mean, who would be against a missile defense shield?
September 18th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
It’s been a few years, but last time I was in the Czech Republic, they hated Americans almost as much as they hate the Russians. And I can assure you, they hate the Russians a lot. They really seem like a culture that really wants to be left alone. And one thing is certain: they really will do fine on their own.
September 18th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Why should Russia offer us something in return for not deploying the missile shield? We broke the ABM treaty. I believe that making a move that can be interpreted as hostile, then demanding a reward for retracting that move is called “extortion”.
September 18th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Hasn’t the “official” line consistently been that the US missles in Eastern Europe were there to defend everyone against Iran? The Russians said from the start that they were actually being placed there to deter them. I believe our government has always denied it.
Since the opposition to changing the program is all about Russia, I guess they were right.
September 18th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Good anti-missile defense changes the equation from “mutually assured destruction”, where neither side has an incentive to use nukes to “whoever attacks first wins because opponent’s missiles that survive the attack are likely to be blocked by the NMD” – where both sides have the clear incentive to strike first.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
MIRVs are vastly over-rated, and in any case only happen in the third-stage – most ABM aims to shoot down the missile in the second-stage, while it’s still ascending and in one piece.
Dummy warheads are also the same thing – in order to fool the current system, you’d basically have to make a dummy warhead that looks and behaves almost exactly like an actual warhead. Why not just use another warhead?
That’s part of the reason (the other was that Russia would target them with nuclear missiles), which is why they asked for various forms of compensation, like Patriot missiles. The US didn’t give them to them.
No, it changes the system from “nuclear war at the drop of a pin due to a fuck-up in communications” (only someone who is unfamiliar with the history of near-disastrous exchanges – eight of which are on public record – would say MAD is some type of stable situation – we got lucky), to “ICBMs are now obsolete, forcing people to use delivery mechanisms like bombers that can be called back at the last minute, and that we have more control over”.
Moreover, even a limited ABM helps prevent an accidental or minor exchange from turning into a full-out exchange that leaves hundreds of millions dead. It also means that millions of people may not have to die when/if that happens, since the lone nuke would never make it.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
“Why should Russia offer us something in return for not deploying the missile shield? We broke the ABM treaty.”
Wiley, good point. It’s similar to what people say about an Israeli settlement freeze: “Why should Israel stop building settlements for nothing in return?” The answer is that they’re illegal and hostile. You don’t get a cookie for giving up something like that.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Of course Brett fails to demonstrate that there is any such thing as working ABM. Which rather negates the rest of his screed. When combined with the fact that this isn’t supposed to be about an actual nuclear power, but about a nation that does not yet have so much as a single completed nuclear power plant.
So, a non-working defense against a non-existent threat. Ooh, let’s throw more money at it.
As for James Robertson’s moronic contribution, you can’t really expect much from someone so fucking stupid as to blame Woodrow Wilson for Bush’s unprovoked assault on the Iraqi people.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
Brett, it’s exactly the opposite. 10 thousand missiles will overwhelm any NMD, but 2-3 hundred may not. Thus, if I know that you have an NMD and I see something even remotely suspicious in the air, I’m bound to launch all my missiles immediately; otherwise I risk to end up with too few for a successful counter-strike.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
When combined with the fact that this isn’t supposed to be about an actual nuclear power, but about a nation that does not yet have so much as a single completed nuclear power plant.
Edit Fail:
When combined with the fact that this isn’t supposed to be about an actual nuclear power, but about a nation that does not yet have so much as a single completed nuclear power plant, it shows a stunning lack of attention to detail and a typical ‘conservative’ love for waste fraud and abuse – so long as it feeds the war machine.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
We are here by the skin of our teeth. I see that as an argument to go to LUA status while working toward disarmament. The U.S. and Russia could, meanwhile, work on finding ways to disable missiles in the case of accidental launch. Surely there are more feasible methods than shooting them down with another missile.
False alarms can be rectified with communications. The false alarm during the Cuban Missile Crisis was a result of an oversight on our part couple with high tensions. The false alarm of 79 was a result of sheer idiocy on our part, coupled with high tensions. The false alarm of 80′ was caused by a failed computer chip, and was clearly a glitch.
Seems to me the best thing to do is to alleviate the tension and do nothing that shortens the required response time.
September 18th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
I agree. The NMD programs have yet to reach the point of efficiency. But that is not an argument per se to cut the programs. This is precisely because it is not optimum yet that investments have to be made. Before Reagan, I think Nixon and Kissinger have been searching alternatives to MAD and were blocked by a greedy Congress.
What is strange in this debate is the implicit praise of the doctrines of McNamara etc. People seem not to understand the implications of the absence of a defense system. And what is even stranger : in the 80’s when the Nato allies, in the logic of MAD, deployed missiles “to protect Europe against soviet SS-2″ (= to be “protected” by launching other missiles on USSR populations), there were a lot of anger and protestations. Mitterrand called the deployment of Pershing-2 a “parade” (parry). And the radical left was against it. For moral reasons. But now when we are working on an alternative, a system of radars, satellites and interception missiles, the radical left is still against it. We may begin to wonder if the left is serious about defense commitments to allies and if they really care about our protection.
Officially, because there is a good rational argument there (= if rogue states driven by eschatologic islam or isolate terrorist groups have access to it, good old dissuasion would be obsolete). But only naive people would consider that the extension of the shield the USA have already for themselves to their allies in Asia or Europe will have no implication in the balance of powers with China and Russia. This shield is, also, a mean of world preponderance for the USA (including influence towards its dependant allies like Israel, and European and Asian democracies).
September 18th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
False alarms can be rectified with communications.
According to this article, once computers detect a missile strike, the Russian leader has about 10 minutes to communicate. What is he going to do: call the US president and ask “are you attacking us?”, hear him say “no” and go back to sleep? I don’t think it’s that simple.
September 18th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
> This is precisely because it is not
> optimum yet that investments have to be made.
LOL. Really LOL. That is the argument that the missile defense advocates have been using since 1950. Always the need for “more funding”. More, more, give me more gruel…
Cranky
September 18th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Actually, your example, abbi, is one in which communications would have been especially helpful, since Norwegian rocket tests and a communications failure were responsible for the misunderstanding. Merely requiring that all relevant Russian officials verify receipt of such a notice with a statement that demonstrates that they get the implication of it before testing would be an adequate safeguard. The U.S. and the Soviets managed to notify each other of all nuclear missile tests without mishaps.
Our false alarms were caused by our own communication failures or glitches combined with tensions and LAW status. Our decision window is 12 minutes. Unless we have a missile shield that is proven to work and includes enough missiles to shoot down every Russian missile (maybe three times the amount, including redundant systems) it is silly to think that being convinced that verification of nuclear missiles being launched at us from Russia would result in anything other than massive retaliation.
Since satellite technology is advanced enough to film any place on earth, I don’t understand why there isn’t more talk of using them as verification tools.
What makes the Russians nervous is their failing satellite system and the loss of their back up radar when they lost territory. Dealing with that in a mutually beneficial way, makes much more sense than continuing Cold War paranoia and is much cheaper and feasible than missile shields.
LUA status would slow everything down considerably.
September 18th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
LOW status
September 18th, 2009 at 7:37 pm
@James Robertson 21
Interesting point. I trust the Czech and Polish governments will be compensated for what they did for us. It’s of course not a sufficient reason to keep the missile “shield” there, but that’s the first plausible prima facie claim for leaving the weapons there I’ve seen.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:30 pm
What a funny idea Fleur has, that the right has ever been serious about national defense…hahahahahaha…
Do we really need to go through the litany of mindless violence perpetrated by the right and their fellow travelers?
September 18th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
The weapons were never in place and aren’t currently operational, so there is little to remove. It was always a joke that Iran would some how attempt to hold all of Europe hostage to some sort of ballistic missile terrorism. Another GWB wet dream bites the dust.
September 19th, 2009 at 1:03 am
That could be an option for defense against some small countries, if we park sea-based ABM systems at their international waters border, but not Russia. Shooting down Russian ICBMs in boost phase isn’t an option. You’d need detection of launches, discrimination of real launches from simulating flares, aquisition of target, calculation of firing solution and flight of interceptor all in the 3 minutes of an SS-25’s boost phase. Not gonna happen.
Dummy warheads are paper-thin, lightweight, metal cones. In space and the upper atmosphere, where they are released they act exactly like warheads. An attacker can replace a single warhead on a mirved ICBM with thousands of these dummies, stacked like stored traffic cones. Instead of having 14 warheads on each missile, the attacker sends 13 warheads and 5000 decoys. The defender can try to calculate intercept solutions for all of the warheads and dummies. If they are successful, they must still wait for the attack wave to enter the atmosphere before assigning interceptors to targets.
September 19th, 2009 at 1:31 am
[...] the Czech Republic and Poland to (supposedly) counter Iranian ICBM’s that don’t exist. Eastern Europeans didn’t want it. Our Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff don’t want it. It pissed off the [...]
September 19th, 2009 at 1:40 am
I love the disconnect on this: ABM systems can’t work, but it makes the Russians happy (and the governments of Eastern Europe unhappy) to have us not deploy one.
Maybe the Russians and Eastern Europeans know something the left doesn’t.
September 19th, 2009 at 2:02 am
You’d be surprised – the Alaskan radar is actually pretty solid at this type of thing.
No they don’t – they move differently, and put off different temperature reading.
Or just have their radar identify the one object that’s actually moving like a warhead (and mind you, this is all third-stage stuff, so hopefully the missile is shot down earlier), and shoot it down.
Or the Turks, who just increased the funding to their ABM system by $1 billion. Or the Israelis, who have been working on their own system for years. The Russians have had a ground-based system around Moscow for decades, although they’ve let it slide in the past couple years (and the interceptors are no longer nuclear-tipped).
September 19th, 2009 at 2:32 am
@36 wiley: “What makes the Russians nervous is their failing satellite system and the loss of their back up radar when they lost territory.”
Super important point. The Russkies are going blind. That leads to paranoia. This is not the time for the US to exacerbate the situation.
If anything, we should make sure the Russians retain the capability to see clearly. No one needs a big, blind, crazy bear lashing out at an incorrectly perceived threat. Especially when the bear has 6,000 nuclear warheads, or enough firepower to blow up both Chuck Grassley AND Mighty Max Baucus -and several times over, at that.
September 19th, 2009 at 4:20 am
[...] Eastern European Missile Shield is Unpopular in Eastern Europe - Matthew Yglesias [...]
September 19th, 2009 at 5:34 am
Wiley 36, you’re right: in the Norwegian rocket incident communication was the issue. But it could be a flock of geese, or a meteorite or something. I guess the bottom line is: it’s either disarmament or a risk of annihilation, and the NMD systems increase the risk of annihilation.
September 19th, 2009 at 7:48 am
BULLSHIT-the Polish and Czech governments are appalled at America’s withdrawal of the systems. Russia is at there door and testing NATO’s commitment to the former colonies of the USSR. We betrayed them on the 60th anniversary of Stalin’s invasion of Poland. This is a deleiberate slap at allies. We should hang our heads in shame.
September 19th, 2009 at 7:59 am
@48, the former colonies of the USSR are so eager to become colonies of the US?
September 19th, 2009 at 11:38 am
Wow, the idiot brigade (morning Mike, Brett, James) is up early and full of piss and vinegar. Also stupidity, but that’s their stock and trade.
Only someone as fucking stupid as James “Murdering people for 80 year old causes is a great idea” Robertson could suggest that the Russian opposition to this massive boondoggle is because they know that it secretly works. Good show dipshit. Here’s a better idea – they oppose it because it is a needlessly aggressive act. But then as a supporter of mass murder in all its glory James is actually a fan of “needlessly aggressive.”
Mike, you are an idiot on Washington Monthly, your stupidity doesn’t wear any better over here.
Brett, your argument is just the standard one for AI – or fusion – “you just wait, we’ll show you one day!” Meanwhile in the real world you waste huge amounts of money and we still aren’t talking about anything effective. Nor are we talking about a system to protect us against realistic threats.
You guys are the same clueless clowns who were so afraid of a tinpot dictator in the Middle East that you killed hundreds of thousands of innocents just to assassinate him. You are fucking nuts and paranoid to boot. Taking advice from the lot of you is like taking investment advice from Bernie Madoff – someone is going to benefit, but it sure as hell won’t be the people listening to you assholes.
September 19th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
For an enormous amount of money we can develop a sensor system capable of distinguishing the temperature differences and small-movement profiles of warheads and decoys in space. For less than 1/10000 of that cost, the Russians can make warheads that mimic the small-movement and temperature profiles of the dummies.
September 19th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
You are as stupid as James Robertson says, nay, STUPIDER! The Russians, I was just there in Moscow, are gloating about how they have humbled the paper tiger Americans. BTW, I am not on Washington Monthly, SHIT for Brains.
September 19th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
Wow, dumbass Mike K is very sensitive about his idiocy. Sorry, I didn’t realize you were as thin skinned as you are stupid. Also, there’s someone exactly as moronic and belligerent as you on Washington Monthly going by the name Mike K, how was I to know there were two such dimwitted tools?
The questions one has to ask:
1) Does this protect us from Iran?
2) Does this protect us from Russia?
3) If it does neither, what is its purpose?
The answers:
1) A butterfly net, sans netting, would protect us from the Iranian threat. They can’t reach us.
2) It is far too small to be of any real use against an actual Russian attack.
3) None of the dumbasses telling us that this is a vital component of national security (yeah, same dumbasses who were so concerned with national security that they let 19 guys with box cutters frighten us into two wars) can answer this question. That’s because there is no good answer.
September 19th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
You must be either an idiot or functionally illiterate (or both) to have not noticed why we’ve pointed out that the Russians know the system works. Here’s a hint – They have one of their own around Moscow, and have had one for decades (one that used to have nuclear-tipped interceptors).
As for the other reason, back in the 1990s, when funding was extremely tight, the Russians made the decision to re-vamp their ICBMs and fund the next generation of them, as opposed to trying to salvage their disintegrating SSBN fleet. Suddenly ABM comes along (technically, it had been there forever, but now it starts spreading worldwide), and they find out they’ve wasted significant amounts of money.
September 19th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Right Brett, the tests fail and fail and fail, but it secretly works. And you think other people are stupid. Gotcha.
September 19th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
source
September 19th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Not thin-skinned, just fitting in this leftist milieu where tired obscenities passes for reasoned debate. Still the Russians are not impressed by our appeasement, Putin now wants more from Obama in WTO concessions.
In the chest of every leftist like the denizens of this blog beats the heart of a dictator that CANNOT stand free people living under a constitutionally limited government. You want to dictate everyone’s lives, treat them as idiots who can only exist as subjects of government orders and hand out food and shelter to them. That is why Obama has been kneeling down before Saudi princes, Banana Republic thugs like Chavez, refusing to meet with moral leaders like the Dalai Lama, and appeasing illegitimate characters like Putin–simple surrender monkeys, you are.
And you are still stupider than Robertson thinks. And a coward in the face of the thugs.
September 20th, 2009 at 3:00 am
[...] Yglesias comments (and the italics are [...]
September 20th, 2009 at 11:33 pm
[...] One of the greatest intellectual mistakes of neoconservative foreign policy is its unwillingness to let go of the notion of a polarized world in which foreign policy is zero sum, at least with respect to any nation that the neocons happen not to like (Russia, China, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, North Korea). This sort of thinking causes them to say silly things. Consider Michael Goldfarb’s assertion that the decision is a “complete capitulation to Russia’s Vladimir Putin” which “will be disastrous” and from which “we will get absolute nothing. . . .” Or Lindsay Graham’s (who can’t seem to decide whether he is a neocon or not) claim that the move is “a capitulation to the Russians” which would “make Iran happy” and “undercut two good allies [in the Czech Republic and Poland].” Indeed, Graham’s assessment that we have “abandoned” our allies hints at the same crazy claim that the Weekly Standard immediately made: that the President’s decision is on par with Chamberlin’s decision to allow Germany to annex Austria and the German-speaking part of Czechoslovakia (also known as “appeasement”). It is difficult to assert that we are “abandoning” the Czechs and Polish when roughly 2/3 of people in Poland and 56% of Czechsdisapprove of the missile shield. (h/t Matt Yglesias) [...]