Biden Tells Munich Conference U.S.Ready to Talk to Iran

Biden’s Munich Speech: Obama Administration Foreign Policy Projects Weakness and Confusion
The Heritage Foundation …for complete article ( snipets below)
In a major speech at the February 7 Munich Security Conference
Vice President Joe Biden outlined the Obama Administration’s foreign policy vision for the first time on the world stage. It was an address designed to reach out to leaders in both Europe and the Middle East, “on behalf of a new Administration determined to set a new tone in Washington, and in America’s relations around the world.”
Biden’s speech should be viewed as one of the weakest projections of U.S. leadership on foreign soil in recent memory. The message was confused, apologetic, over-conciliatory, and remarkably lacking in substance and detail. It was the kind of speech, heavy in platitudes and diplo-speak, that could easily have been given by a continental European bureaucrat nestled in Brussels, Paris, or Berlin. It was not the voice of the most powerful nation on earth.
The Vice President went to great lengths in his speech to avoid offending America’s enemies, such as Iran and Hamas, or her strategic competitors, such as Russia. One could have been forgiven for thinking that the world was largely at peace rather than facing the threat of global terrorism or a dangerous rogue regime aggressively seeking nuclear weapons capability.
Biden’s remarks touched on several key areas, from Iran to NATO reform–all of which gave major cause for concern–and left critical questions unanswered.
Iran
The Vice President confirmed the new Administration’s willingness to enter into direct negotiations with the Islamist regime in Tehran.
In essence, Biden offered a quid pro quo deal with Iran–the kind the European Union has offered for several years with absolutely nothing to show for it except spectacular failure.
Missile Defense
The Vice President stated that the United States “will continue to develop missile defenses to counter a growing Iranian capability, provided the technology is proven to work and cost effective.” However, Biden gave no pledge to press ahead with a third-site missile defense system in Eastern and Central Europe, sowing the seeds of further confusion in Poland and the Czech Republic, two key U.S. allies who have agreed to participate in the defense system by hosting missile interceptors and early warning radar.
Russia
Aside from a refusal to recognize the breakaway Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, there was little evidence in Biden’s speech that the Obama Administration intends to adopt a tough line toward Russian aggression in its “Near Abroad” or attempts to bully and intimidate its neighbors in the Caucasus as well as Eastern Europe. Significantly, Biden made no mention of U.S. support for Georgian and Ukrainian membership in the NATO Membership Action Plan or Russia’s brutal invasion of Georgia last summer.
NATO
While reiterating the importance of the NATO alliance and the need for its renewal in the 21st century, the Vice President supports policies that will undermine the organization and weaken American influence within it. In Munich, Biden backed the full reintegration of France into “NATO structures,” and French officers are reportedly in line to take two senior alliance command positions: Allied Command Transformation and Joint Command Lisbon.
Afghanistan
Biden identified the war in Afghanistan as a top foreign policy priority for the Obama Administration, calling for close cooperation with America’s allies in Europe as well as the government of Pakistan.
War on Terrorism
Significantly absent from the Vice President’s address was any reference to the war on terrorism or the need for the United States and its allies to be prepared for a long hard battle against Islamist terrorism. Biden spoke in soft terms of “a shared struggle against extremism” and of “a small number of violent extremists [who] are beyond the call of reason,” as well as the need to seek with the Muslim world “a new way forward based on mutual interest and mutual respect.” There was no indication given of the sheer scale of the global fight against al-Qaeda and its allies. Al-Qaeda is mentioned just once in Biden’s speech, and only within the context of Afghanistan.
The Vice President also avoided directly mentioning terrorist attacks by Hamas against Israel. There were no words of support for Israel’s recent offensive against Hamas in Gaza, suggesting a significant shift away from open support for Israel by the new U.S. Administration.
A Celebration of Soft Power
Vice President Biden delivered what was in essence a quintessentially European-style speech on German soil. It was an address that tried to be all things to all people, lacking in concrete policy prescriptions and cloaked in vague statements designed to cause minimal offense in foreign capitals, including those of America’s worst enemies. Biden’s address was above all a celebration of “soft power,” cynically re-branded by the Obama Administration as “smart power.”

Wild Thing’s comment……..
The incompetence of the this group will be irresistible to the terrorist types. They have been waiting for idiots like this to be in control. What Biden and Obama don’t seem to understand is that in the Muslim world, their conciliatory attitude will not result in a reciprocal “kinder, gentler” attitude.

….Thank you Mark for sending this to me.
Mark
3rd Mar.Div. 1st Battalion 9th Marine Regiment
1/9 Marines aka The Walking Dead
VN 66-67