The United States has been consistently trying to deter
Iran’s progression towards nuclear weapons, by imposing severe economic sanctions on Iran’s trade with the outside world. The ongoing
negotiations between Iran’s now moderate president and U.S. Secretary of State
John Kerry appear to be close to an agreement that would lift the economic
sanctions while enabling Iran to continue peaceful nuclear energy development,
with verifiable limits on fuel enrichment towards weapon quality.
While the wording of the forthcoming agreement has not yet
been revealed, credible suspicions are abundant to the effect that it would
make it very close for Iran to be able to build a nuclear weapon in a very
short time. It was declared totally unacceptable by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
And not only by Israel’s prime minister. Opposition to such
an agreement is overwhelming in the U.S. Congress, with clear signs that it would
not be ratified. And so it has become a major challenge to U.S. President Barack
Obama, who is firmly behind reaching an agreement with Iran as his own
signature legacy.
Where do we go from here? Kerry will try to persuade Iran to yield on some detail, while
asking Russia’s President Vladimir Putin to nudge Iran towards some compromise. Actually
this is the same old game going on for years, except that now it has become a
matter of extreme importance for Obama, whose popularity in America
is declining.
And what does Putin get in return? No weapons for Ukraine from America and from Europe! No other explanation holds water why arming
Ukraine – in the presence of threat from Russia to the entire central Europe
— has become a no-no for the
West. The Ukrainian army, weak as it may
be, is the only force now standing between Russia and Berlin, while NATO force
is a joke.
Obama’s assertion that arming Ukraine would only
escalate the war is so absurd that it would be dismissed out of hand if
Europe’s leaders had any spine. Evidence shows that the recent lntensity of war
in Ukraine has imposed a major strain on Russia. More escalation is not exactly
what Putin wants. (“The Guardian:
Scale of Russian military intervention in Ukraine revealed” Kyiv Post, March
11). A more likely result would be
willingness in the Kremlin to settle without trying to impose on Kyiv the
onerous bindings the despicable Merkel/Hollande team agreed to in Minsk in February 2015.
Overall, not only Ukraine is a spendable chip for Obama, but
so is Europe. Rightly or wrongly, his attention, besides Iran, is focused on
what he sees as shortcomings in American society that needs to be reformed, as
articulated in his recent speeches concerning the public order, the need to
reorganize and educate the police departments throughout the country (how to
handle criminal behavior and race rioting in an enlightened way), and to
continue the civil rights struggle.
Obama’s emphasis on such matters has been reflected
in his high-level appointments in the U.S. attorney general’s office as well as
in his own inner circle of advisers.
A recent article raised this question: “Who runs American
foreign policy? Over the past year….. the answer has been a mystery. But with
the ouster of Chuck Hagel — the third defense secretary in six years — the answers now point to Rice. She
is the president’s national security adviser. But some question whether she has
strategic chops for the job” (“Susan Rice: Obama’s right-hand woman,” Newsweek,
Dec. 16).
In any case, Rice shows the same mind as Obama, which is to say that the president’s decisions and her approval is one
and the same. It may also explain why President Obama is intransigent on some
issues, despite recommendations from competent sources and the prevailing
opinion.
These matters are of huge importance worldwide and
principally for the United States. Success or damage can come from a very small
inner circle that ignores competent advice.
As for Ukraine, it has now the right leadership to decide what
to do in the light of western obtuseness. Ukraine now stands far ahead of where
it was in the last 300 years. It must carry on with war and hardships. It has
an army that needs to be made larger.
There is no retreating into defeat or fictional “guerilla
warfare” as some losers have speculated. The only part of the country that
needs to abandoned is the Donbas, as the source of pro-Russian subversion,
Soviet-style criminal legacy, and as the tool of Moscow.
Boris Danik is a retired Ukrainian-American living in North Caldwell, New Jersey.
