Michael Cohen: Amateur hour for the pundit class demanding that Obama do 'something' in Ukraine.

[pampango]

Don't listen to Obama's Ukraine critics: he's not 'losing' – and it's not his fight

...it has been amateur hour back in Washington. I’m talking about the people who won’t stop weighing in on Obama’s lack of “action” in the Ukraine. Indeed, the sea of foreign policy punditry – already shark-infested – has reached new lows in fear-mongering, exaggerated doom-saying and a stunning inability to place global events in any rational historical context.

So while Obama may utilize political capital to ratify the Start treaty with Russia, he’s not going to extend it so save the Crimea. The territorial integrity of Ukraine is not nothing, but it’s hardly in the top tier of US policy concerns.

But this crisis is Putin’s Waterloo, not ours.

Which brings us to perhaps the most bizarre element of watching the Crimean situation unfold through a US-centric lens: the iron-clad certainty of the pundit class that Putin is winning and Obama is losing. The exact opposite is true.

Putin has initiated a conflict that will, quite obviously, result in greater diplomatic and political isolation as well as the potential for economic sanction. He’s compounded his loss of a key ally in Kiev by further enflaming Ukrainian nationalism, and his provocations could have a cascading effect in Europe by pushing countries that rely on Russia’s natural gas exports to look elsewhere for their energy needs. Putin is the leader of a country with a weak military, an under-performing economy and a host of social, environmental and health-related challenges. Seizing the Crimea will only make the problems facing Russia that much greater.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/03/obama-ukraine-russia-critics-credibility

For strong military powers versus weak ones, military conquests are often quite easy in the short run. The problems, expense and complications come in the long run. Russia has 'won' a naval base that it already had a 30-year lease on and control of a province that many Ukrainians may resent losing but brings Russia no particular benefit or than perhaps expanding its territorial boundaries. These marginal "wins" may come at a high price in the long run.

One would assume that Obama will continue to play this smartly and nonviolently which may inflame the "you have to do something" punditry class but is the best strategy in the long run. Let the republicans howl at the moon as much as they want.

[bemildred]

1. Yes. I concur. It's razzies all around, not somebody is winning. nt

[Laelth]

2. Hear, hear! k&r n/t

-Laelth

[TwilightGardener]

3. Obama's got some decent strategists on his team--they tune a lot of criticism

and distraction out, rather than react to it and get off track. I doubt they're listening to much of the noise.

[Cha]

4. Excellent. thank you, pampango

[kiranon]

5. Putin also reinforced the right of non Russians in other parts of Russia

to go their own way. Putin has created a host of future problems that will haunt Russia for a very long time. What's to stop China from annexing parts of Russia using the same pretext? And, China is in a very expansionist mood and always has been. China not the U.S. is Russia's nemesis.

[namaste2]

6. Do the pundits ever actually listen to themselves?

It cracks me up to hear on one hand, that President Obama is a dictator and is ruining democracy in this country. Today I heard Rudy Guilliani remark his admiration for Putin (pretty much a dictator for real) because he decides to do something and it just takes 1/2 day to accomplish. Our President on the other hand, has to talk and consult with other people and diddles and daddles and just can't take action fast enough!
Can they not even delve into the depths of their own hatred? Wow!

[Quantess]

7. Thanks for posting.

K & R

[RobertEarl]

8. Thanks and here's another kick for peace!