The View from Right Field

Arsenal of Democracy Then. Vaccine Maker of the World Now.

Demand for vaccines is dropping around the United States.  States are telling the federal government they don’t need their full share.  If we don’t have more vaccines than we need now, we will soon.  So here is an idea of what to do with the extra doses we will have: Send them around the world to the people and countries that need them.

Instead of making a show of supporting a waiver of patent rights in vaccines, something that will take months to negotiate with other countries and months more before companies can start manufacturing vaccines they have never made before, why don’t we make them for the world ourselves?  We can allow American companies to export vaccines.  And for poor countries, we can buy them from American manufacturers and give them to those who can’t afford them.

“How Do You Solve a Problem Like Korea” (to tune of “Maria” from “The Sound of Music”)

Except, of course, I am referring just to North Korea, not all of Korea; and except that, while North Korea is a problem, it is not Maria.  There was a solution for Maria: sending her to be governess at Captain von Trapp’s house.  As for North Korea, consider the situation.

1.  North Korea is an economic disaster. Earlier this month, Kim Jong Un compared the country’s worsening economic situation to the 1990s famine that resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths. Floods last summer and US sanctions contributed to the problems, as has North Korea’s closing of its borders with the world, including even China, because of Covid-19.  But mostly, it’s the system, both economic and dictatorial.  Several weeks ago, there was a picture of people from the Russian embassy using a handcar to leave the country.

Why Shouldn’t We Take Care of Ourselves Instead of the World?

[See Note below]

With Russia massing tens of thousands of troops on Ukraine’s border and China increasing its aggressive behavior against Taiwan, maybe now is a good time to consider what the purpose of U.S. foreign policy should be and what our national interests are in connection with either or both of those situations.  Actually, the real question is what our national interests are in general. 

We hear talk about supporting a rules-based international order.  But is that really what we should be doing?  Is it our goal to support other countries or do we need to worry about ourselves?  Some would say that we have lots of problems in the United States; there are lots of things we need to do for our people.  The Biden administration is proposing spending trillions of dollars on important domestic priorities.  Given all of this, do we really have the money – or the time or energy – to deal with Ukraine or Taiwan – or the Uighurs or Alexei Navalny?     

Leaving Afghanistan

I have predicted several times that we would be leaving Afghanistan.  It now looks like this will happen and we will be gone by September 11, 2021.  Five comments:

First, I’m not surprised.  Joe Biden was always going to leave.  And he will get it done because his people want to leave, too,¹ and because we are putting no conditions on what the Taliban, etc., have to done before we leave.

H.R. McMaster on Strategy Against the Soviet Union and Strategy Against China

Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster (Ret.) and Jonathan D.T. Ward wrote in Thursday’s Chicago Tribune that the United States’ strategy vis-à-vis China should include the kind of policies used by President Reagan in the Cold War against the Soviet Union.  Messrs. McMaster and Ward explain:

“Reagan’s approach – applying intensive economic and military pressure to a superpower adversary – became foundational to American strategic thinking. It hastened the end of Soviet power and promoted a peaceful conclusion to the multi-decade Cold War.”

Afghanistan: Biden May Accomplish What Trump and Obama Couldn’t

In a leaked letter,¹ Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has basically told the Afghanistan government to get with the plan, i.e., the United States’s power-sharing plan for Afghanistan, under which the elected Afghan government is to share power with the Taliban until new elections are held.²  The implication is, if they don’t, we’re gone.  Of course, under the plan, the United States would probably go anyway, so I’m not sure there’s really much of a difference between agreeing or not agreeing.  Other than the fact that agreeing, as I said above, means letting the Taliban into the government.³  

Given that the Afghan government and the Taliban haven’t gotten anywhere in their talks under the US-Taliban agreement of last year, it’s hard to see how they are going to work together in some new government.  But that’s not the concern of the Biden administration.  They just want out.  We have to get out, we are told, in order to end the longest war in American history.  I find this “longest war in American history” argument a little annoying.  What does it mean and why is it important?  The Cold War was twice as long.  The deaths in one day at Antietam were more than double the number of deaths in almost 20 years in Afghanistan.  So what is the urgency?  Other than we don’t care anymore.

While Trump Stews, Mike Pompeo Has Been Busy

It’s unclear what Donald Trump has been doing with his time now that he is off Twitter, Facebook, etc., but Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been working hard.  Karen DeYoung has a list of what he has been doing.  It’s a lot – and it’s wrong.  Instead of working on a transition, Secretary Pompeo has been throwing up roadblocks for the Biden administration.

As Ms. DeYoung notes, what Secretary Pompeo can be reversed, but in most cases, it will take time.  Also, the process of reversing those decisions could hurt the very people and policies Secretary Pompeo is trying to protect. 

President Trump Is “Bringing the Troops Home” from Somalia

Well, he’s not actually bringing the troops home from Somalia.  What he’s doing is moving almost all of the 700 troops currently in Somalia to Kenya and Djibouti, where they will do pretty much the same thing they are doing now, i.e., counterterrorism missions against al-Shabaah and Islamic State militants in Somalia.  Except they won’t be able to do them as well from Kenya and Djibouti.  But President Trump will be able to claim he got our troops out of Somalia.

While the Trump administration will claim we can still do the same counterterrorism missions, even if we aren’t in Somalia, it’s not true.  First, how is the Somalian government going to feel about us pulling out and then coming back, whenever we want to, to conduct counterterrorism raids in their country?  We need their consent and cooperation to do this.  Will they agree?  Will they cooperate with us as much?

@realDonaldTrump’s Legacy - Afghanistan and Iraq

For those who thought Donald Trump’s legacy, at least since November 3, would be most tarnished by his refusal to concede to President-Elect Joe Biden, I give you this:

“BREAKING: US Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller announces that the number of US troops in Afghanistan and Iraq will be reduced to 2,500 by January 15th, 2021.”

Acting Secretary Miller apparently refused to take questions after announcing the decision.  I have talked about this before (here and here, among others); there is no need to talk about it again.  It is a terrible decision, as so many of President Trump’s decisions have been.  The United States, Afghanistan, and the world will regret it.

Do Uighur Lives Matter? – Part Two: Do We Care?

In an earlier post I talked about why I thought saying “Uighur Lives Matter” could be problematic.  But beyond that, I don’t think “Uighurs Lives Matter” would carry the day in the United States, even if saying it wasn’t problematic.  Let me mention a couple of reasons.  First, a number of Americans just don’t care about what is going on elsewhere in the world.  It is part of their America First approach.  They feel we need to make economic deals with China.  We have to take care of ourselves; we can’t worry about the Uighurs.  This is certainly what former National Security Adviser John Bolton says that President Trump told President Xi Jinping. 

Second, lots of individual Americans and American companies are intimidated by China.  They see over a billion Chinese and decide sales and profits are more important than principles and doing what is right.