Why Obama reassures allies

Crises from Syria to Crimea to Japan force President Obama and top US securitys official to fly around the world reassuring allies of US security commitments. One good reason: so that nonnuclear countries don't go nuclear.

|
AP Photo
President Obama and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe leave a Tokyo sushi restaurant April 23, part of a four-country swing through Asia for Obama to shore up US allies.

In recent weeks, Washington’s top security officials – from President Obama on down – have begun a sort of “reassurance tour,” telling allies and others that the United States still has their backs. Mr. Obama is in Japan, the vice president was in Ukraine, the Defense secretary went to Europe, and the secretary of State has been traveling almost everywhere. 

Why this sudden rush to renew old defense vows?

In three words: Syria, Senkaku, and Crimea.

Many of America’s friends have begun to worry about US stamina for defense and its commitments to others. Their concern was first sparked by Obama not living up to his “red line” threat last year against Syria for its use of chemical weapons. But it was reinforced by his ambiguous support for Japan in its struggle with China over the Senkaku Islands, and now a tepid response to Russia’s taking of Crimea in Ukraine.

Combined with budget cutting at the Pentagon, the US defense umbrella looks a bit tattered and torn.

“The era when the US possessed overwhelming military power, including nuclear power, is over,” stated Japan’s Sankei newspaper this month. “With Chinese nuclear missiles able to strike Washington and New York, would America really retaliate with nuclear weapons on behalf of Japan?”

The administration is now offering both words and actions to renew US support to other nations. It is stationing fighter jets in NATO countries close to Russia’s borders. It keeps looking for ways to back non-jihadist rebels in Syria. And for his trip to Japan, Obama became the first president to state that a bilateral security treaty requires the US to militarily defend the Japanese islands claimed by China.

But Obama’s motives go beyond simply restoring US credibility. The US is also worried that some countries may now be tempted to pursue nuclear weapons.

Many world leaders note that the US and Russia both signed a pact with Ukraine in 1994 to honor its sovereignty and territorial integrity if it gave up its Soviet-era nuclear stockpile. Russia broke the agreement in March with its grab of Crimea, triggering some US sanctions. But top Ukrainian leaders say the US did not do enough to honor the pact’s moral commitment. A few even want to restore Ukraine’s nuclear capability and back out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a pact designed with incentives for nonnuclear nations to avoid joining the nuclear club.

During a March trip to Japan and South Korea, Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged that the US needs to make sure those Asian allies “don’t feel so threatened that they move towards nuclearization in self-help.”

In other words, Obama’s foreign-policy goal of a world without weapons could now be further out of reach unless he continues to beef up America’s security commitments.

The moral leadership that the US took on after World War II – in defense of many democracies or against gross human rights violations – still comes at a price. Despite the president’s attempts to roll back defense spending or push allies to boost their militaries, he still refers to the US as an “exceptional” nation. These latest crises are showing just how exceptional the US is. And how much it still needs to prove it.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Why Obama reassures allies
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2014/0423/Why-Obama-reassures-allies
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe