A Look At President Obama From Moscow: Is He Already Using Smokescreens?

April 29, 2009

Anton Goryunov writes from Moscow: Does anyone seriously believe that US President Barack Obama did not expect the scandal surrounding the ‘torture memos’ to get out of control? And does anyone really think that the whole idea of making these memos public was not intended to target senior officials in former President George Bush’s Administration? If so, then all those who think like that should stick to reading celebrity magazines and trashy tabloids.President Obama needs as many smokescreens as he can master to cover up his inability to come up with worthwhile solutions to the current economic crisis in the United States. By now most people have already realised that he has yet to produce specific measures that would help tackle the recession. The economic bail-out package he has pushed through congress is not really the answer to America’s woes as it envisages spending a lot of money on programmes and projects that do not really matter. Obama’s popularity has already dipped below the 50 per cent mark after only a hundred days in office. It is not yet a disaster by any standards but it is not a good sign. All those photos on the front covers of glossy magazines would not be enough to save him from the public’s anger once the recession hits many more millions of Americans hard. The problem with Obama and his people is that they cannot seem to understand one simple truth: the crisis has not reached its lowest point. The banks have not yet even revealed all their losses and proper lending will not resume in the near future.

The thinking in Russia amongst political analysts is that Obama will be weakened so seriously by the middle of his first term that Moscow would be able to demand concessions from him in return for foreign policy ‘triumphs’ that he would be seen as achieving on the international stage. Arms control would one of these ‘triumphs’ areas. Although it is mostly meaningless in the concept of the end of the Cold War it will allow Obama to score political points at home by claiming that he has been able to make the world a safer place. With the liberal media supporting him the likes of CNN would make a big song and dance about it and present Obama in a favourable light.

Another area where Obama needs Moscow’s help desperately is in Afghanistan. He might be seen as acting tough with the Taliban and sending additional US troops there but the situation on the ground remains tense and a civil war threatens to erupt in the neighbouring Pakistan making the whole crisis even more dangerous. Russia can provide supply lines to the troops in Afghanistan and act as a behind the scenes mediator with the warlords based in the north of Afghanistan. Whatever people may think about Russia’s role in Afghanistan it still has considerable influence on the ground there, not to mention a network of agents and informers.

Iran is another area where Moscow’s cooperation would be crucial for Obama. To say that Russia has a serious influence in Tehran is an understatement. The Iranian nuclear issue carries such significance, having been presented by the media and Israel as a major stumbling block to peace in the Middle East and the whole world, that any progress in that area would allow Obama to claim serious success. Again, it has no direct relevance to the domestic audience in America in practical terms but leave it for the pro-Obama American press, which would be most of the press, to make a huge thing out of it. Any progress in Iran could be used as a smoke screen for the bad news coming from the US economic front for a while.

President Obama’s attempts to befriend authoritarian regimes in Cuba and Venezuela could also be helped by Moscow where his concessionary noises are treated as signs of weakness rather than pragmatic foreign policy initiatives. The question that is posed in the Kremlin is this: would a strong America really start getting friendly with its old ideological foes? The answer is ‘no’. Cuba should have been last on President Obama’s list of priorities and yet he decided to turn relations with Havana into a major foreign policy issue. Just like he did with the hijacking of an American cargo ship in the Indian Ocean by the Somali pirates. It was ridiculous to see the release of the captain of the ship presented by the White House as some major foreign policy victory. As one Russian analyst said, ‘things are definitely not going Obama’s way on the domestic front if he has to depend on being seen as coming on top in some brawl in the middle of nowhere.’

But let’s turn back to the ‘torture scandal’. I for one really have no problems with Bush’s people held responsible for the Iraqi war. The only problem is that at a time of a severe economic crisis in the country is it a good idea to have Washington split along party lines? The Republicans are already vowing to make life as difficult as possible for Obama in the light of the unravelling crisis around the memos. And I would not be at all surprised that the CIA would want to shield itself from the scandal by revealing some unsavoury information about the presidential inner circle. Do not forget: it was the CIA that had organised the leak about Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinski. Clinton was despised by the American intelligence community and he paid the price for that. It would be sensible for President Obama not to antagonise the spooks too much. Honeymoon or no honeymoon.

– End –

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