Let’s Not Forget, Obama Is A Nobel Peace Prize Winner!

In October of 2009, with less than eight months serving as the President of the United States, Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

In a selection that did not have the early support from 3 of the 5 on the Nobel Selection Committee, it was Committee Chairman Thorbjor Jagland that argued the case in favor of Barack Obama over the other 204 selectees.  After awarding the Nobel Prize, there was considerable back lash for having presented the award for action that had not yet been taken.  In defense of the decision, Jagland remarked, "We have not given the prize for what may happen in the future. We are awarding Obama for what he has done in the past year.  And we are hoping this may contribute a little bit for what he is trying to do."   

Jagland’s remark “what he has done in the past year” was in clear reference to Obama’s “Apology Tour” that he set out on almost immediately after taking the oath of office.  Over the course of about 100 days Obama confessed what he believed to be the “Sins of our Nation” while at the same time making it clear to the world that the United States is no more exceptional than the least productive and troubled nation.  Jagland also commented that the committee was influence by Obama’s position on climate change as well as his efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation, neither issue the president had been in office long enough to do much more than write a memo about.

With six years under his belt now, let’s take a look what strides Obama has made towards nuclear proliferation.

Start with Russia, the undisputed second greatest nuclear power.  Because of the actions of reformer Mikhail Gorbachev, a failing economy and political pressure from President Reagan, the threat of nuclear holocaust came to an end in the 80’s.  But with the growing tensions between the US and certain factions in the Middle East, then President Bush took advantage of the dissolution of the Soviet Union and made deals with some of Russia neighbors, such as Poland and the Czech Republic to establish missile defense systems in their countries.

Politically, Russian leaders had no choice but to counter the US and the political rhetoric between the two super powers commenced.  This most certainly was anticipated by the Bush administration and likely discussed in great detail with Russia outside of the public eye however, the US media and Bush’s political opposition spun these actions into a make believe crisis and labeled it the start of a new Cold War between Russia and the US.  Throughout this ordeal and the crisis between Russia and Georgia, while Bush and Putin (whom he chiefly negotiated with) had many disagreements, they did share a good relationship.

Not one to let a crisis go to waste, fabricated or otherwise, President Obama seized the opportunity to portray himself as the Great Peacemaker.  This started with one of the grandest public relations blunders of all time, the embarrassing “reset” button incident between then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her counterpart Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.  Not many months later the missile defense system deal, which was to be stationed in Poland, was canceled, a move that came as a crushing blow to that country.  The move was praised by Russia’s then President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin; called and act of cowardice by his political opponents;, an act of “brilliance” by Nancy Pelosi and called an appeasement to Moscow by Poland.  What Americans saw by this action was a foreign policy decision made where Obama placed his ideology in front of the better good and security of the nation, an action that would repeat itself time and again in the years to come.

As for a reduction in nuclear arms, the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty ( New START), negotiated and signed between the two super powers back in early 2010 did absolutely nothing in the way of reducing Russia’s nuclear arsenal while the United States had to reduce in large numbers to comply.  Of course we started with a larger number, but that is not the point, the New START deal was more of a PR stunt orchestrated by the Great Peacemaker.  In no other nuclear arms deal in history has the US agreed to reduce any aspect of its nuclear arsenal without reciprocation from Russia.  But the goal of the Great Peacemaker was not to maintain dominance and superiority but instead to make American a world’s equal.  

In a move the stunned the world, Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi announced one morning that he was going to give up his weapons of mass destruction (WMD).  This event took place in 2003 and true to his word Gaddafi and his regime work with the governing bodies to safely and verifiably catalog, dismantle and remove his WMDs and his ability to develop them.  During this time a peculiar relationship developed between Gaddafi and the US, specifically Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.  

By the end of 2008 most of the work was complete and it looked as though Gaddafi was holding to his word to ride his state of all WMDs.  But in 2009 everything change and Libya unexpectedly stopped the removal of the final small amount nuclear grade fuel.  While there has never been an explanation for these actions, the one factor that had changed was US/Libyan relations.  Gaddafi had for some time tried to reach out to President Elect Obama in an effort to personally express his desire to maintain the relationship that had developed between himself and the US however his attempts to solidify that relationship fell on deaf ears.  The relationship between the US and Gaddafi deteriorated rapidly and was almost as if it did not exist at all.

The final shipment of nuclear grade fuel was eventually transferred out of Libya and handed over to Russia for disposal near the end of 2009 putting an end to Libya’s nuclear weapons program.  But there was still more work to do as not all of Gaddafi’s stockpiles of other WMDs had been completely removed.

The relative peace in Libya, which seemed to be held together at least in part by the relationship between Gaddafi and the Bush administration, began to deteriorate in 2010 which eventually lead to what was essentially the assassination of Gaddafi by National Transitional Council forces with the aid of a NATO coalition in October of 2011. 

So it was not the actions of the Great Peacemaker that removed nuclear weapons from a tyrant and as odd as it may seem Gaddafi’s Libya was an ally to America, yet news of his death was met with a rousing cheer from Secretary of State Clinton and we all know how the rest of the story in Libya goes.

What about North Korea, has the Great Peacemaker convinced the rogue nation to lay down its nuclear arms?  In then candidate Obama’s campaign manifesto, Change We Can Believe In, he described North Korea as an example of a country where direct and tough diplomacy that lays out clear choices as being the only way to handle such a regime.

The first opportunity presented to Obama to try out is “tough diplomacy” on North Korea came just a few months after taking office.  The ailing leader Kim Jong-il conducted the countries second nuclear test in May of that year, in an act of defiance to the west.  His actions came with little consequence as did the third nuclear test which was orchestrated by Kim Jong-il’s 26 year old son and the new Supreme leader of North Korea.  The third nuclear test took place just one month after President Obama re-election and was clearly intended to send a message to the president from the new kid in town.  In response to the test, the US as well as the international community responded as most would have expected, with firm media rhetoric and more sanctions on an already isolated state!

And last there is Iran and it appears more now than ever that the Obama Administration is ready and willing to allow what most consider the most dangerous state in the world, the ability to produce a limited amount of fuel needed to create a nuclear weapon with the promise that they will not build one.

Now, the Great Peacemaker has us engaged in another war, a war that could have easily been avoided and a war being fought against an enemy he pretended not to exist despite all is intelligence advisors telling him otherwise.

The Great Peacemaker’s attempt to appease the Muslim nations and our advisories by portraying the United States as an equal through the confessions of American sins and the denouncement of our nation’s greatness has failed beyond compare.