Us politics

The implosion of General McChrsytal’s career has refocused attention on Afghanistan. Reading Peggy Noonan’s column on the subject I was struck by this paragraph reflecting on Jonathan Alter’s reporting of Obama’s decision making process when he ordered the surge: More crucially, the president asked policy makers, in Mr. Alter’s words, “If the Taliban took Kabul and controlled Afghanistan, could it link up with Pakistan’s Taliban and threaten command and control of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons?” The answer: Quite possibly yes. Mr. Alter: “Early on, the President eliminated withdrawal (from Afghanistan) as an option, in part because of a new classified study on what would happen to Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal if the

G20 summits are usually turgid affairs, but this one has some (limited) potential. Relations between the White House and Britain and the White House and Europe have been frosty of late. Afghanistan, BP, the Falklands, Merkel and Sarkozy’s irritation at Obama’s personal and political aloofness, all of these have been contentious. Diplomatic tension has now developed an economic arm. The broadly centre right governments of Britain, France and Germany are committed to cutting public spending now. Each has introduced an austerity programme, and Cameron has made retrenchment is his international cause. Obama still stands for stimulus. The President said: ‘This weekend in Toronto, I hope we can build on this

How wrong I was. President Obama, lambasted by his critics for being ponderous, has acted with lightening speed: less than 24 hours after that Rolling Stone article, General Stanley McChrystal was forced out of his job in place of the only person that could pick up where he left off, namely General David Petraeus. In acting swiftly, the US president has moved to restore the authority and respect his position as Commander-in-Chief deserves; and he has begun to re-establish the kind of civil-military relations that need to exist in militarily-capable liberal democracies like the United States.   What effect the change of commander will have in Kabul remains unclear. But

The Taliban are expanding their area of influence, NATO allies are eager to leave Afghanistan, the forthcoming parliamentary elections are likely to be even more fraudulent than last year’s presidential election – in other words, how can it get any worse for President Obama’s AfPak strategy? Oh yeah, the man the US president has trusted to execute the strategy, the man whose name is now synonymous with the international community’s’ plan, General Stanley McChrystal gives an interview to Rolling Stone magazine (in itself a dubious choice), which paints a picture of the commander as insubordinate, unwise or simply not in control of his headquarters. The fact that everyone has rushed

To all bar Tony Hayward, it is clear that BP is finished in America. A Macarthyite degree of opprobrium has been cast against the interloper. As Matthew Lynn notes, BP’s PR flunkies are grovelling across the networks, apologising in that singularly lachrymose British fashion. They should stop demeaning themselves and fight back. BP is to blame for the leak, but it is being demonised by an American President whose desperate populism and prejudice is masquerading as principled leadership; it is the latest British institution to be victimised by Barack Obama. Owing largely to the demands of the insatiable US market – which Obama has done nothing to abate, despite his

Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. diplomat in charge of Afghanistan and Pakistan affairs said Washington has now publicly made clear the US government is serious about negotiating with the Taliban. Speaking at a conference in Madrid, the US envoy said: ‘Let me be clear on one thing, everybody understands that this war will not end in a clear-cut military victory. It’s not going to end on the deck of a battleship like World War Two, or Dayton, Ohio, like the Bosnian war It’s going to have some different ending from that, some form of political settlements are necessary … you can’t have a settlement with al Qaeda, you can’t talk to

In opposition, the Conservatives pursued an AfPak policy that can best be described as loyal criticism – while they supported the mission they criticised the means and methods employed to achieve it. It was an effective line of attack. But now that they have the internal documents and can call for further intelligence assessments, they should instead undertake a zero-based review of the current strategy focusing on: 1) the viability of the current US approach; 2) the likely timing and manner of a US shift; and 3) the best role for the UK in the next six months, in the next 2 years and in the next five years. In

One of Labour’s talking points during the election has been that even the US administration is worried about Conservative Europe policy and how a government led by David Cameron may marginalise Britain in Europe and hobble Europe in the world. Until now, there has been very little to prove the concern. US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton has said nothing, nor has anyone in the White House. But two days ago came the clearest sign that the US administration may indeed be worried. In a blogpost, John Podesta, Bill Clinton’s former chief of staff, head of Barack Obama’s Transition team and founder of the Center for American Progress, the most