Dissed by Putin — again: President Obama gets denied whenever he asks for help, with Russian asylum for Edward Snowden the latest slap. (AFP/Getty Images)
Welcome to America’s “no-cards” foreign policy, in which the most powerful man in the world, President Obama, always faces few choices — all of them bad.
Yesterday, Russian President Vladimir Putin slapped Obama in the face by granting asylum to Edward Snowden, the man Washington wants to put on trial for stealing state secrets while working as an intelligence contractor.
But Obama’s advisers insist America has very few strong cards to play here. So don’t expect much of a response to Putin’s slap.
After all, the Obama crew note, we really need Russia’s help in resolving various world crises. Besides, what are we going to do, go to war over this?
The president signaled exactly this view to Putin earlier this summer when Snowden’s stay at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport started to turn into farce. “I’m not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker,” Obama said back in June.
Translation: Don’t worry, Vlad. I’m not going to do anything drastic; you and I have bigger fish to fry together.
Or as “very disappointed” White House spokesman Jay Carney said yesterday, we have “broad and important” issues with Russia, so let’s not let Snowden “become a problem.”
Here’s the logic: War is raging in Syria, with 100,000 dead and counting. Putin, more than anyone, can tame President Bashar al-Assad. Putin also has a lot of influence in Tehran, where the mullahs are about to go nuclear (with Russia’s help).
Putin, perhaps more than anyone else, holds the key to turning these situations around, andthe Snowden crisis pales in comparison.
Put aside for a moment the very doubtful proposition that Putin really intends to help America resolve any of these crises. The larger problem is that Obama seems to genuinely believe that he really has no cards to play at Putin’s poker table — short of, that is, going all-in by “scrambling jets.”
Even the most eager-to-accommodate US president in recent history, Jimmy Carter, managed to get angry enough with the Russians back in 1980, when he pulled out of the Moscow Olympics to protest the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan earlier that year.
Today, Obama could tell Putin that, unless he hands Snowden over, we’ll pull out of next year’s winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Less dramatically, he could ask the world-leading track stars of Team USA to boycott the Aug. 10 world athletic championship in Moscow.
Or Obama himself could boycott the annual gathering of the world’s 20 leading nations in early September unless it’s moved from St. Petersburg to a non-Russian venue.
Or hit even closer to home by canceling a one-on-one Moscow summit with Putin, tentatively set to take place shortly before or after that G-20 summit. (We’re “re-evaluating [its] utility” was all Carney could manage yesterday.)
Sure, slapping back may anger the Russian Bear. They’re very sensitive about such symbolic moves over there at the Kremlin. But so what?
It’s not as if Putin is helpful even in the best of times. As of now, in fact, and despite Obama’s early policy of bearing gifts to Moscow in an attempt to “reset” relations, Putin can’t be muchmorehostile on the world stage.
Forget the warm phone calls between the two leaders; never mind Obama’s disarmament deals with Moscow. Russia’s foreign policy seems to be the same as during the Cold War: Watch what America’s doing, and do the exact opposite.
So, as Obama keeps courting Putin (because America, again, supposedly has no other cards to play), the Syrian carnage continues unchecked and Iran keeps marching toward The Bomb.
And beyond Russia’s sphere of influence Egypt’s chaos is about to blow up, China bullies its neighbors, North Korea imports arms from Cuba and — well, you get the picture.
In lieu of finding (or making) good options on any of these crises, Obama gives a resounding “this is unacceptable” speech, thenturns the matter over to NATO or the United Nations.
There are always excuses: America is broke; voters no longer want us to be the world’s cop. And even if we did want it, what can we do?
And so the onetime leader of the free world, the globe’s only superpower, has no cards left to play — not even to bring a wayward fugitive for trial.
Twitter: @bennyavni