Hillary will use nukes to defend Saudi, UAE, Kuwait???

[Little-Acorn]

This was a rather stunning announcement during the recent Democrat debate. I have to wonder if it's just an unprepared, off-the-cuff remark, as Obama's promise to invade Pakistan last year was. But the use of nuclear weapons (the classic U.S. definition of "massive retaliation") is not something to be bandied about lightly.

If John McCain (or George Bush or Ronald Reagan) had made this statement, would the media have ignored it for them as they are doing for Hillary?

------------------------------------------------

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=62154

Dick Morris: Has Hillary gone ballistic?
Senator offers to protect Saudis, others with nuclear weapons

Posted: April 21, 2008
12:01 am Eastern

WASHINGTON – Overlooked in ABC's Democratic presidential debate in Philadelphia was a new defense doctrine offered by Hillary Clinton that would have the U.S. defend Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates with nuclear weapons, political consultant and pundit Dick Morris points out today.

"Hillary's commitment to use nuclear weapons to defend Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Kuwait, which she made in the ABC Philadelphia debate went largely unnoticed," Morris told WND. "(George) Stephanopoulos, who asked the question, was too focused on Obama's wearing or not wearing a flag pin in his lapel."

Here's what Clinton said: "We should be looking to create an umbrella of deterrence that goes much further than just Israel. Of course I would make it clear to the Iranians that an attack on Israel would incur massive retaliation from the United States. But I would do the same with other countries in the region ... . You can't go to the Saudis or the Kuwaities or UAE and others who have a legitimate concern about Iran and say, well, don't acquire these weapons to defend yourself unless you're also willing to say we will provide a deterrent backup."

Morris, who worked as a political consultant for Bill Clinton, suggests the sweeping new defense doctrine offered up by Hillary Clinton is "perhaps influenced by her husband's $15 million paycheck from Dubai or the $10 million the Saudi monarchy gave to his library."

In a column today in the New York Post, Morris asks: "Has Hillary gone ballistic? This bizarre new foreign policy stance went right over the pro-Clinton head of ABC's debate moderator, George Stephanopolous, who was too busy checking his list of pro-Hillary questions to recognize the import of Clinton's answer. But the fact is that no American president has ever made so sweeping a commitment in the region. Hillary certainly appears willing to break new ground."

He concludes by saying: "If there is one real warmonger in this race, it is Hillary Clinton, who is now willing to risk our cities to save some of the most repressive regimes in the Middle East."

[manu1959]

"perhaps influenced by her husband's $15 million paycheck from Dubai or the $10 million the Saudi monarchy gave to his library."


gee ya think........

[Little-Acorn]

Rabidly anti-military people like Hillary have spent very little conscious thought on the actual problems of National Defense, the proper use of military power, and above all on the huge problems of how and why we should restrain the use of American nuclear capability while still preserving it a a viable deterrent.

On the rare occasionas when she does think about such things, she comes out with wild statements like this one.

Didn't some Democrat Presidential candidate say recently, that the Oval Office is not a suitable place to get OJT (On-the-Job Training)? Who was that, again?

And her lack of training on THIS subject, has to be the most dangerous lack of all.

[glockmail]

I'm on record here months ago suggesting that Hillary would probably be the first of any of the then dozen or so candidates on both sides of the isle to use nukes. This is clearly the type of person who completely annihilates her enemies regardless of the fallout and will use whatever means necessary to do that.

[typomaniac]

This was a rather stunning announcement during the recent Democrat debate. I have to wonder if it's just an unprepared, off-the-cuff remark, as Obama's promise to invade Pakistan last year was. But the use of nuclear weapons (the classic U.S. definition of "massive retaliation") is not something to be bandied about lightly.

If John McCain (or George Bush or Ronald Reagan) had made this statement, would the media have ignored it for them as they are doing for Hillary?

Why not? It would hardly be news. Any one of those three would be (or have been) delighted to have an excuse to nuke the raghead terrorists.

[Little-Acorn]

Why not? It would hardly be news.

What a blithe statement, totally at odds with reality. Just as Hillary's statement was.

Any one of those three would be (or have been) delighted to have an excuse to nuke the raghead terrorists.

All three had PLENTY of excuses, and plenty of actual provocations while they were President. Yet they never made such a statement, and they certainly never used the nukes they had.

Your constant "Republicans do it too" fib is getting VERY threadbare. You really need some new material.

[typomaniac]

The truth never gets threadbare; posting articles that are good only for lining the bird cage does.

[Little-Acorn]

The truth never gets threadbare; posting articles that are good only for lining the bird cage does.

In other words, you can find nothing in the article you can refute, so you simply announce "none of it's true"?

[theHawk]

Why not? It would hardly be news. Any one of those three would be (or have been) delighted to have an excuse to nuke the raghead terrorists.

Then why didn't they when we were attacked on 9/11? Or when we invaded Iraq?

To this day, only Democrats have dropped nukes on people, not any Republicans.

[typomaniac]

In other words, you can find nothing in the article you can refute, so you simply announce "none of it's true"?

The only reason I'm not bothering to refute it is that I have absolutely no interest in defending Hillary.

(By the way, if President Cheney in 2003 thought the Iraq mess would last as long as it has, he probably WOULD have told his sock puppet to nuke Saddam.)

[Little-Acorn]

The only reason I'm not bothering to refute it is that I have absolutely no interest in defending Hillary.

Uh-huh. The fact that you couldn't refute it, had nothing to do with it. Got it.

(the usual attempt to smear the Bush admin with an accusation of something they had the wisdom not to do, deleted)

[typomaniac]

Uh-huh. The fact that you couldn't refute it, had nothing to do with it. Got it.

Well, now at least you're responding to people, which is a big step up from when you did nothing BUT post articles.

There may be hope for you yet.

[gabosaurus]

Bandar Bush would approve. When he leaves office, no doubt Dubya will take a lucrative job with a oil company that has ties to that region.

[Little-Acorn]

Well, now at least you're responding to people, which is a big step up from when you did nothing BUT post articles.

Of coure, I've always done far more than that. typo seems to be using a second fib to try to divert attention from his first series of blunders.

Do these people EVER reply honestly to any debate where their "facts" are questioned?

[The Bare Knuckled Pundit]

Hillary's doing a couple things here.

First, she's fleshing out and building on what has been implied since the late 1970's and the classification of the Persian Gulf and its attendant oil reserves as a strategic national interest of the United States in the Carter Doctrine. Furthermore, the Carter Doctrine is built on the pre-existing strategic security/economic relationship that dates back to President Roosevelt's meeting with the founder of Saudi Arabia in the waning days of World War II.

In response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the destabilizing ripples that washed across the region in the wake of the Iranian Islamic revolution that swept the Shah from power, Carter declared that the US would defend its interests in the Gulf and prevent them from falling under the influence of any outside power with any means necessary. The clear implication was should the Soviets use Afghanistan as a launching point for an invasion of Iran and an attempt to seize its oil fields, the US reserved the right to respond militarily up to and including the possible use of nuclear weapons. The thought was that Gulf oil was the life blood of the Western economies and could not be allowed to fall under the control of malign anti-Western powers lest they hold it and the West hostage. Much the same reasoning that was invoked as the basis for Gulf War I in 1991.

Fast forward to the current Bush administration and Vice President Cheney's assurances to the Saudis and the various emirates and principalities that the US would consider an attack on them to be an attack on American interests that would be responded to with the full force of the American military. In doing so, the Bush administration has expanded the Carter Doctrine to include any intra-Gulf would-be-hegemons like Iran. Now do we not only keep people out of our sandbox, but we guarantee that those in it must play well together or else.

In addition to stating the obvious, Hillary is trying to send a signal to the Saudis and the rest of Gulf petrostates that the US will remain the guarantor of their security and need not look to Russia or China for military and political protection. She is sending a significant geopolitical message in an attempt to keep the locals from courting other suitors and replacing the US in its role as regional hegemon in the Gulf.

All of this in spite of the fact the Saudis have maintained Chinese manufactured and serviced CSS-2 long range missiles as a reserve strategic deterrent. Though the Saudis have been loath to discuss them and have denied maintaining a chemical or nuclear arsenal, there have been rumors in the intelligence community for years that they have an "agreement in principal" with either China or Pakistan that would provide them with nuclear warheads for the missiles should the need arise.

Finally, there is the thought that Hillary is trying to prevent the sparking of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. By extending the nuclear umbrella to the Saudis and their neighbors, the thought is the US would prevent the need for them to develop independent nuclear arsenals, much like what happened when the US extended it to Japan and West Germany during the Cold War. Sadly, the end result may well be another series of opportunities for the Saudi and petrostates tail to wag the American dog. An increasingly common and unfortunate state of affairs in today's world, I would point out.