Failed Foreign Policies Cause Human Catastrophes

Some 800 people recently died when an overcrowded refugee vessel collided with a merchant ship in the Mediterranean. Among the rescued were a handful of people-smugglers, thus giving testimony to migrant-facilitators' business, thriving in the Middle East as it does in Mexico and Latin-America. As an entry gate into the E.U., Italy can hardly cope with refugees' seemingly never-ending stream from the north-African state belt. Both the Italian Navy and Coast Guard are overwhelmed by the challenge. The European Union is scrambling to find solutions. For now, more funds are supposed to flow into the refugee programs Triton and Poseidon. 

This exodus of people fleeing the conflict zones and war-torn areas of Africa and the Middle East is a direct result of the U.S. and the E.U.'s failed foreign policies. I have criticized the blunder of U.S. foreign policy, supported by the European Union and NATO, in my blog entries of 2011 on Libya (https://www.edwinseditorial.com/2011/03/us-and-european-foreign-policy-blunder.html) and 2013 on Syria (https://www.edwinseditorial.com/2013/05/disastrous-foreign-policy-failures.html), and warned against the policies of supporting violent and extremist insurgent movements while letting down established heads of state and governing political administrations. It began with the Muslim Brotherhood's support in Egypt against President Hosni Mubarak and then the US-led NATO campaign to take down Libya's Gaddafi. The support of a conglomerate of dubious insurgents in Syria was the third cornerstone of a U.S. foreign policy that is unethical and outright in the wrong, as it is ineffective and destructive. 

While the E.U. does everything in its power to help refugees and get a grip on the situation, it abides by its strict immigration policies, thus preventing the internal order from descending into utter chaos. In contrast, the U.S. is propping up its foreign policy blunder by national security foolishness, courtesy of presidential executive immigration orders that pave the way for more or less unlimited immigration, serving nothing but sealing the fate of future political and social disaster.

 

However, most concerning is the fact that these policies seem to find an ever broader acceptance and support on a bipartisan level. Powerful voices of senators, congress members, and presidential candidates for the 2016 race on the Republican side espouse similar, if not identical viewpoints on foreign policy and immigration. 

Given the U.S.'s two-party political system, one has to wonder how the State Department could alter its harmful stance on essential foreign policy and national security issues? If both major political forces align in their position on such topics, how could this ever change and U.S foreign affairs brought back to its senses?

Empirical evidence and the reality of failures don't appear to have any impact. Established authorities and political counterparts are merely doubling down and adding fuel to the fire. In previous commentaries, I have criticized the geopolitical madness vis-a-vis Russia that has been unfolding in Ukraine. Ideological prejudice and a certain arrogance appear to be the dominant forces in a media-driven political business that seemingly doesn't allow concessions to be wrong. What is supposed to be a sign of strength and compelling character is now considered a weakness. 

What can be a solution to this predicament in global affairs, for the most part, instigated by the failed policies of the U.S. and the Transatlantic alliance? Let me reveal a secret here not debated in the political realms, even at the reproach of talking pro domo.

I see the only hope for betterment in the return of philosophers to the ranks of political advisers and proper philosophical instruction to higher education curricula. As far as the former aspect is concerned, the political business, specifically the advisers to political stakeholders and executive decision-makers, has to be enriched and balanced by adding the holistic philosophical thinker to the equation. As far as the latter aspect is concerned, I am talking about conveying the broad history of ideas of philosophy. No lip service to philosophy by providing courses in which so-called philosophy professors and lecturers try to indoctrinate a liberal-progressive political agenda. What is needed is a focus on ontology and social and moral philosophy, thus enabling critical thinking and independent and profound judgment.

No longer must the hubris of jurists and economists, who too quickly get stuck in sterile materialism and superficial rationalism and whose consciousness is lacking profound philosophical reflection, dominate politics and policy-making.

The Crisis of Morality

If society turns immanent - I use the term immanence in the Kantian epistemological tradition of everything that remains within the boundaries of possible experience - and loses its transcendent basis, its particular religious-metaphysical reference, it will perish. Western civilization has profoundly gone down this path in recent decades, and restorative measures have been mostly ineffective. Yet, every culture arises from its religious foundation, derives its cohesive strength from it, and perennially regenerates itself through it. The common denominator for any civilization has got to be transcendent. Everything immanent, above all also science, is prone to opposing and conflicting interpretation, which is why anything immanent cannot serve as a constant unifier. The paradox of this truth lies in the fact that precisely the faculty unable to fathom the transcendent, namely human reason, comes to acknowledge the necessity of the transcendent.

In sacred terms, the transcendent manifests itself in religion; in secular terms, the transcendent manifests itself in morality. As religion serves as the horizon of meaning and represents common and uniting values, morality – and by no means economy – is the underpinning category of immanent life routine.

As civilization as a whole disintegrates when it loses its religious foundation, so do social and political life fail if morality subsides. We can ultimately lead every crisis of politics back to a moral crisis or, more precisely, to the fact that the fading of morality has not been detected or reacted to in time.

Morality constitutes the crisis of responsibility, as only the moral human being binds itself to act responsibly because of an inner and voluntary disposition to do so. Whether one excels in the economy, is an educator, contributes to the safety of the society by way of constabulary or military service, or works as a politician on bettering the social conditions of his constituency – the quality of their achievements depends on their morality, which is their commitment to act responsibly.
 
The notion of freedom inextricably links the categories of morality and responsibility. Only if the human being is free to decide between alternatives to act can he take on responsibility for his actions and be held accountable for his doing (or not doing). Not being able to withdraw from this responsibility constitutes the intrinsic moral quality of being human.

Human freedom is about responsible freedom. Irresponsible freedom, epitomizing in unconstrained egocentrism, is mere arbitrariness and no freedom at all. True human freedom is finite freedom, limited by the conditions of social coexistence and all other individuals' legitimate aspirations. Liberty must not be mistaken as independence from everything, but instead has to be considered as a choice to something.

Inappropriate use of freedom equals irresponsibility, which equals immorality. The absence of a personal and inner disposition to act righteously necessitates the enforcement of correct behavior from the outside. While morality cannot be imposed from the outside but rather springs from an intimate and inner urge to "ought" righteously, legality comes with law enforcement. Indeed, we cannot even imagine human statutory law without its intricate linkage to the ability to be carried through by force.

Suppose we put these considerations into a political context. In that case, we find throughout history and the modern world governmental systems that allow for freedom and individual responsibility, and those collectivist forms of government that don't. Thus the futility of the debate about capitalism versus socialism as socialism is a collectivist form of government, whereas capitalism is a form of economy. While the relatively closed and collectivistic socialist societies typically embrace the economic concept of a planned market economy, free and open democratic societies usually feature free-market economies as the typical characteristic of capitalism.

Capitalism can only exist in a political environment that allows for responsibility – for there are freedom and morality – and can only survive if the proponents of this system are generally prone and willing to use that freedom by acting morally. Thus, capitalism's problem is not the lack of legal regulations, but rather the irresponsibility – in other words: the immorality and human immaturity – of its proponents. The one who cannot impose boundaries upon himself in a self-legislating manner needs to get the proper behavior forced upon from the outside. Inappropriate, dishonest, and illegal behavior is even possible under existing laws and regulations. The political system of open and democratic societies, and the economic system of capitalism can function in the end only if the inner moral disposition, the outlined sense of responsibility, can be instilled and realized. This ideational concept is empirically sound in general terms.  On Wall Street, the one who derives his incentives to act mostly from greed and the idea of personal enrichment proves his moral immaturity to the same extent as the guy from Main Street, who buys himself a home on a loan that he can't afford. Both have not understood the meaning and import of free society and its ensuing stakes for the individual.

The price of freedom is the responsibility, and those who are unwilling to pay this price, do not deserve freedom. They must not wonder why they are subjugated continuously to regulations, legal impositions, and governmental encroachment.

Although the subject of further consideration, it becomes quite clear that only through appropriate socialization and education processes can the desired attitude on life be achieved. All those national and international comparisons on high school and college levels of knowledge and education regarding mathematical, technological, and language skills are vain, as long as the instruction does not result in independent judgmental abilities. And the quality to acknowledge the significance and indispensability of responsibility as the existential manifestation of freedom in any social context.

Loretta Lynch Confirmation

It has been a perennial dream of liberal politicians to get rid of borders and the nation-state's confinements, thus eradicating any differences between citizens and foreigners, be they illegal or legal immigrants. However, any society attempting to obliterate these differences is bound to perish in the long run. I have given a comprehensive account of what I termed the neo-cosmopolitan idea in my blog-essay of August 9, 2010, in the wake of the Arizona Immigration Law's rejection by a federal judge.

I have warned about this particular utopian phantasm that claims the individual human being, and not the (nation-) state, to be the protagonist in interstate and international relations. As I made clear, while the traditional position sees the (nation-) state as the moral actor in political affairs through which individual rights can be brought to bear alone, the neo-cosmopolitan position stipulates a radical reduction of state-sovereignty. It promotes the idea of a global social contract. Hence, the attempt to put any immigrant on level par with a citizen, a person holding legal citizenship, granting them equal rights in employment, voting, social support, etc.

So, yes, Mr. Obama's (most likely unconstitutional) executive orders are highly unreasonable and will severely damage this nation's social fabric. It would be preposterous to confirm a person into the highest office of law enforcement of the land after claiming in a congressional hearing that illegal immigrants have the same right to employment as US citizens. It doesn't play any role whether the job aspirant is a man or a woman, black or white, Republican or Democrat. By whatever bizarre ideological confusion, a person negates one of the most profound statecraft criteria, she deserves exclusion from holding such office.

While the federal prosecutor from Brooklyn, N.Y., Loretta Lynch might be, as Mr. Obama claimed, a "tough, fair, and independent attorney," she seems to be unfit for the office of Attorney General due to her unsound political philosophy.

Ukraine - Another Failure of Western Interventionism

As I've made clear in my previous blog of March 2014 below, by overthrowing a democratically elected government in Ukraine, Washington, with support from the European Union's leading powers, has brought the United States and the West into a confrontation with Russia.

In about a year, the West has managed to topple the democratically-elected Ukraine government, install the Washington and Berlin-backed Poroshenko administration in Kyiv, and drive the nation into a fratricidal civil war. It turned the country into a failed state, virtually destroyed its economy, and severely damaged Russia's.

In its usual reversal of cause-effect realities, the mainstream media, in its typical reversal of cause-effect facts, blamed Russia and Putin's aggression and expansionism for protecting incumbent administrations and concealing their sad and ill-defined policies. Had the U.S. and Europe conducted just and wise policy procedures, they could have foreseen the support of Ukrainian separatists and annexation of Crimea by Russia as inevitable for its national interest.

Think about this: A year before scheduled presidential elections through which the Ukrainian people could have gotten rid of president Yanukovich's allegedly corrupt administration and chosen an administration espousing a more EU-oriented course, the U.S. and E.U. instigated an unnecessary coup. Why, for what reasons? To install a Western puppet administration that the people of Ukraine might have never elected themselves? To prevent a Russian-prone government (that was simultaneously establishing good relations with the West) from being democratically confirmed in OSCE-monitored elections? To put Ukraine into NATO and E.U. and drive Russia out of its Black Sea ports in Crimea?
 
Whatever the reason or ensemble of reasons, the applied policies provide evidence of a colossal misunderstanding of foreign affairs in a post-Cold War global setting and an astounding lack of any practical political philosophy of international relations in Washington. However, the incompetence and dilettantism that is hiding behind the democratic principle is widespread and not limited to the White House. Senators and politicians of both parties in Washington are pushing the notion of arming Ukraine and an increased show of force in Eastern Europe by the U.S. and NATO. GOP Senator James Inhoffe just introduced a bill in the U.S. Senate to arm Ukraine with "Lethal Military Aid" against pro-Russian separatists, which means the hawks are doubling down on the political foolishness. They perpetuate the damage to global affairs and continue to push Ukraine into a proxy war with Russia.

However, the overbearing arrogance and hubris of Washington appear to drive a wedge into transatlantic relations, as ever more European nations distance themselves from the idea of arming Ukraine and potentially dragging NATO into war with Russia. Western Europe's economic ties with Putin's country are too close, and a significant portion of Russia's natural gas delivery to Europe runs through Ukraine. Aside from that, European nations, even when NATO-members, know that their populations are not ready to subscribe to go to outright war with Russia over Ukraine.

What are the options for future development? From Ukraine breaking apart with the eastern and separatist parts integrating into Russia to outright war between the West and Russia over Ukraine, almost anything appears possible. Given the strength and commitment of the Russian-backed separatists, it seems unlikely that the Ukrainian Armed Forces, lacking in coherence and dedication to the cause, would reconquer the eastern and southeastern parts of the country. A diplomatic solution along the lines of the Minsk negotiations results will depend on the ending of military and armament support from the U.S. and other western nations. I am convinced, though, that the arms support will seize soon or never get up to speed as it has become quite clear by now that Kyiv has lost and is unable to wage a full-scale war with or without weapons from the West. While the U.S. and individual European nations might be willing to prolong the agony, Kyiv can't fight a war without the will of its people behind. And in the long run, even the most hawkish politicians in Washington couldn't possibly want to throw NATO in and fight World War III against Russia over some folly and utter political blunder they have instigated and committed in Ukraine by themselves in the first place?

It is mind-boggling to note that, like in the Middle East, western political authorities could have easily prevented the meaningless bloodshed in Ukraine and the state's unnecessary disintegration. The hubris of liberal interventionism and U.S. activism worldwide - resulting from distorted interpretations of history, misguided doctrines of international relations, and an unjustifiable sense of moral superiority - appears unconquerable.

No matter how many times history proves them wrong and presents the horrendous damage, these policies are causing worldwide, self-righteous pride and defiant inertia prevail over any judiciousness or informed judgment.

Failed US Foreign Policies Result in New Form of Radicalized Warfare

When talking to friends before the presidential election in 2012, I repeatedly stated that if Barack Obama had character and proper self-awareness, he would resign. He would declare to his people that he found out that he was totally in over his head during his first tenure and realized his utter incapability to carry out the most powerful job in the world. While the option for him to resign is still on the table, albeit with minuscule probability, I ascribed his reelection to colossal political illiteracy on the part of the majority of American people. 

It demonstrated that irrational ideological prejudice and preconceived notions of politics control Americans' minds. The seed of liberal socialization and the lunacy of political correctness yield their fruits and cloud, if not incapacitate, sound political judgment. 

Yet, not even I, in my deep cultural pessimism about the decline of the Western world, was able to anticipate the utter disaster the Obama presidency, quite often not only supported by his party but rather by equally misguided politicians from the other side of the aisle, was going to bring about. I've been commenting on the blunder of Obama policies in domestic affairs (e.g., immigration, healthcare, same-sex marriage) and foreign affairs (e.g., Egypt, Libya, Syria, Ukraine) in previous blogs. While I am not happy that the catastrophes that unfolded inside and outside the U.S. proved me right, I shall not repeat myself. But the hope lives on that readers will scroll down and read expositions that can usually neither find in mainstream media nor high school and college education, for that matter. 

Here I focus on international relations and elaborate on another most destructive effect yielded by the Obama regime's failed policies. An outcome that moves into the limelight of international politics, especially after the Caucasus and the Middle East have become engulfed by raging conflagrations far beyond warfare's usual stakes. 

 

The encouragement and even unconditional military support and armament of the opposition forces at first in Libya, then in Syria, the childish announcement of "Assad must go" by Obama and his silly drawing of a red line regarding chemical weapons has caused irreversible damage. It brought the war back to Iraq and more or less nullified the progress achieved there in the past decade. But it also generated a new kind of asymmetrical threat, one that is far worse than the asymmetrical warfare against global terrorism we have become used to ever since September 11, 2001. The Obama administration has radicalized smoldering conflicts by taking out established regimes or politically emboldening and militarily strengthening dubious insurgent forces. They removed or significantly weakened regionally pacifying governments and political administrations that usually contain armed conflict or at least keep it within certain bounds and on a politically controllable level. 

The emergence of the I.S. - the Islamic State, a terrorist group that initially appeared on the scene as ISIS/Islamic State in Iraq and Syria) - would not have been possible without the incoherent and misguided foreign policy of the Obama administration. It ushered the Middle East into a new era of asymmetrical warfare that has a direct global impact and should concern the U.S. as well as the entire occidental world. 

The I.S. replaced the pinpointed and mostly arbitrary violence of terrorism with the horror of planned persecution of religious, foremost Christian minorities and magnitude and barbarity of killings that include crucifixions and the beheading of children. (For my article on the history of ideas of terrorism, go to the Homeland Security Digital Library at https://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=455848). The brutality and destructiveness of I.S.'s operations have even scared away the Iraqi army, who did not put up a decent fight despite superiority in numbers and trained by American instructors. 

A self-appointed conglomerate of radical Islamist thugs, using to significant degree weapons sent to Syrian opposition forces by the U.S., made the established and decently trained, organized, and equipped regular Iraq army run. Human atrocities committed by the I.S. are accompanied by targeted vandalism, destruction of churches and other cultural treasures, causing irreversible damage to humankind's cultural heritage. I counted the armament of Syrian rebels as one of the disastrous foreign policy failures in my post of May 10, 2013 (https://www.edwinseditorial.com/2013/05/disastrous-foreign-policy-failures.html). 

It is mind-boggling to be aware that almost all of this could have been prevented. Alas, the ignorance of the incumbent political administration is stunning. A strategically overwhelmed president at the helm who has no sound concept of international affairs and cultural interrelations in his mind caused damage whose magnitude is mind-boggling, given the brevity of the few years he has been in office. If ever, it might take generations to correct the committed errors.

However, the fact is that fundamental misconceptions about political (and thus profoundly human) affairs magnify themselves in implementing political ideas. For preventing further damage to global issues, a swift turnaround must bring American (and Transatlantic, for that matter) foreign policy to its senses. 

Given Mr. Obama's stubbornness and hubris and conceitedness, there is little hope things will get better in the two years he has left in office. Unless, of course, his ignorance and ideological prejudice will be reined in by the Senate, by Congress, and by a significant majority of the American public.

UKRAINE AND THE WRONG SIDE OF HISTORY

After the follies in the Middle East – letting down the established political leaders in Egypt, Libya, and Syria and supporting dubious insurgent movements – the U.S. and the European Union's irreparable foreign policy screw-ups continue in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.

The Ukraine debacle, instigated by the U.S. and the European Union, is being exacerbated by the U.S. The respective governments have maneuvered themselves into seemingly irreversible positions. In the U.S., the disregard for geopolitical factors and geostrategic interests appears to be ubiquitous. In addition to the always clueless U.S. president and his administration – this author has long stopped wondering what type of "experts" advise this government – a host of senators and congressmen from both parties joined the inane chorus of foreign policy ignorance. Many pundits and op-ed writers set the stage for yet another policy failure when they pushed Russia's pathetic hostility and the Russian president.

How about some perspective on the whole affair? Besides the historical fact that the Crimean peninsula has been Russian and under Russian influence ever since Catherine the Great?
 
Mr. Yanukovych, the legitimate president of Ukraine, was elected in 2010 in free and fair elections as attested to by the OSCE.  However, he sealed his fate when he chose a custom union offered by Putin over a deal presented by the E.U. - $15 billion in loans and favorable rates on natural gas and oil versus loans and credits tied to economic reforms monitored by the IMF but no certainty of full E.U. membership.

The protesters subsequently forming in Kyiv – not all of them, but many of them – struck up tents and quarters, set up barricades, engaged the police in violent struggles by using Molotov cocktails, seized and burned down the headquarters of the ruling political party, and demanded the overthrow of the regime. It didn't help President Yanukovych much that he approved a full amnesty to all those arrested during the uprisings and offered to form a coalition government with the opposing party until the new presidential elections scheduled for 2015. The radical left overthrew Viktor Yanukovych, impeached him after seizing the parliament, and chased him out of the country. Does this look like democracy in action or rather like a coup d'etat no sovereign nation could accept? Is this the kind of political demonstration to which US-senator McCain should lend his support by flying into Kyiv and help taking sides against a legitimate government?

It is not the alleged old-Soviet type of imperialism of the ex-KGB officer Vladimir Putin that has maneuvered him into this precarious situation of possibly losing Ukraine and forcefully annexing the Crimea and perhaps the eastern parts of Ukraine, alienating himself and setting the stage for a new Cold War. The transatlantic realm's failed policies generated this quagmire and pushed it to the point of no return. If anybody finds themselves on the wrong side of history in all this, it is Mr. Obama in conjunction with Democratic ideologues and Republican neocons.

This author participated in the educational civil-military efforts within the framework of NATO's Partnership for Peace initiative in the 1990ies in eastern and southeastern Europe. He knows all too well what would have to happen now had the proponents of ignorant foreign policies gotten their way and brought Ukraine (and Georgia for that matter) to full NATO membership.

The military outreach of Russia to Crimea and probably other parts of Ukraine would invoke Article 5 of the NATO Treaty, meaning an attack on one is considered an attack on all. Armed intervention and an outright war would now be inevitable.

THE END-JUSTIFIES-THE-MEANS – BUT ONE PROBLEMATIC PRINCIPLE IN POLITICS

A quite enticing and seemingly reasonable, yet damaging and destructive principle usually dominates human action. It is the most unethical maxim of the-end-justifies-the-means. In the political world, representatives of all ideological provenance and political parties follow this enticing yet so destructive principle. They follow a merely consequentialist approach. 

 

While it is necessary and intelligible that we strive for desired outcomes and intend our actions' consequences, we should always weigh the means to attain the desired result. Whatever means we use should always weigh against an unshakable background built by idealistic notions such as fairness, justice, impartiality, honesty, integrity. While we can err in applying these dimensions, we demonstrate the willingness to take others' rights into account and thus moderate the use of means applied to one's cause. 

In the political realms of domestic and foreign politics, the following factors and insights can serve to moderate the often pernicious effects of mere consequentialism, to name a few:

 

• The dignity of the office and political function.
• The humanity of political opponents and the legitimacy of political opposition.
• The good of the nation.
• Capacity for self-criticism, including the acknowledgment of own mistakes and failed policies.
• The admission of guilt and the acceptance of personal accountability.
• Understanding of the nature of a democratic and open society that can only prosper on the grounds of a minimal amount of bipartisanship and mutual respect among political opponents, and so forth. 

 

For epistemological reasons, it is quite clear that we find the application of the-end-justifies-the-means maxim mostly where a habitually unbalanced and unilateral worldview predominates and a transcendent dimension of reflection and temperance is lacking. The linear perception of historical development and a one-dimensional grasp of social reality does not pose many hindrances to applying this merely consequentialist approach in decision-making. 

Whenever the consequentialist attitude prevails, everything it takes short of physical violence, and quite often even including violent means, appears to be justified in achieving one's goals – lying, cheating, denunciation, distortion, defamation, slander, slur! 

The current political landscape – domestically (i.e., Affordable Care Act implementation; immigration debate; government shutdown and budget) as well as internationally (i.e., Libya/Benghazi; Iran) – provides ample opportunities to study the damage caused by mere consequentialism and its detrimental impact on all levels of social and political coexistence.

Irrespective of individual political belief systems and ideologies, the fact remains that we confront inferior human and political morals whenever we face the intemperate application of consequentialism.