I still believe that some of Snowden’s disclosures, and his actions, have forfeited his whistleblower status. But if he’d been a bit more circumspect about what he’d leaked and how he had done it–e.g., not brought US government secrets into the range of Russians and Chinese intelligence agents–that would emphatically not be the case. His disclosures have prompted chilling information about the activities of the NSA and forced a necessary public debate.
Still, comparing Obama to Nixon based on current facts? That’s unhinged. Nixon subverted the law and the Constitution in order to destroy his political opponents and secure political power. Despite tenuous claims by the far right, there’s no indication that the Obama Administration’s drone policy and approach to whistleblowers stems from such Machiavellian considerations.
It isn’t just that The ‘Nixon card’ and its various corollaries in the right-wing bubble are wrong. This line of argument actually distracts us from the nature and the extent of the challenge to liberal democracy in the United States.
In some respects, Obama’s positions are symptomatic of Obama. And they should be approached as such. In other respects, Obama’s positions are symptomatic of the national-security state in the contemporary era. Almost all of the modalities and infrastructure involved date back decades. But the convergence of technological change and the tools implemented in the aftermath of 9/11 have given even greater cause for concern. Indeed, for a variety of bureaucratic, political, and institutional reasons, no US President is likely to significantly curtain these powers without a major push by other branches of government.
Some linkage below the fold.
- Joshua Walker on the future of US diplomacy: “The key for American diplomacy is not doubling down on its great-power past, but harnessing the future on the ground.”
- Piotr Zalewski argues that Turkey’s “Zero Problems” foreign policy has failed.
- Viz. Patrick Porter’s post on Taiwan’s military defense, here’s Michael S. Chase on the opposition DPP’s Defense Blue Paper. And also Keven McCauley’s discussion of the challenges faced by the PRC and ROC as they transition all-volunteer forces.
- The National Interest has run a “pro” and “con” article on admitting Georgia to NATO. Which is kind of like running a “pro” and “con” article on the merits of the GOP nominating John Huntsman for President.
- Lawfare needs your help (via).
Daniel H. Nexon is a Professor at Georgetown University, with a joint appointment in the Department of Government and the School of Foreign Service. His academic work focuses on international-relations theory, power politics, empires and hegemony, and international order. He has also written on the relationship between popular culture and world politics.
He has held fellowships at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation and at the Ohio State University's Mershon Center for International Studies. During 2009-2010 he worked in the U.S. Department of Defense as a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow. He was the lead editor of International Studies Quarterly from 2014-2018.
He is the author of The Struggle for Power in Early Modern Europe: Religious Conflict, Dynastic Empires, and International Change (Princeton University Press, 2009), which won the International Security Studies Section (ISSS) Best Book Award for 2010, and co-author of Exit from Hegemony: The Unraveling of the American Global Order (Oxford University Press, 2020). His articles have appeared in a lot of places. He is the founder of the The Duck of Minerva, and also blogs at Lawyers, Guns and Money.
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
- Dan Nexonhttps://www.duckofminerva.com/author/dhnexon
“But if he’d been a bit more circumspect about what he’d leaked and how he had done it–e.g., not brought US government secrets into the range of Russians and Chinese intelligence agents–that would emphatically not be the case. ”
And go where exactly? Some imaginary fairyland that is pure and good, that is not a US enemy, but willing to be put into the enemy category over harboring him? Or stay in the US and get disappeared after the first day?
I am also conflicted over the whole issue, and I WISH there was some way he could have done it differently. Can I get my pony now?
(And sorry if this sounds snarky – this is still one of my favorite blogs)
No worries. Snowden is one of the more divisive topics around here.
What I had in mind was taking highly classified US documents apparently detailing foreign intel collection to China and Russia. And disclosing some such material.
I am afraid that the Georgia thing is probably far more likely than Huntsman. Alas, the enlargement thing tends to develop its own momentum, even when it means letting in a member that (a) the rest will probably not defend much; and, paradoxically (b) is most likely to use its new membership to be more assertive with Russia. Glenn Snyder’s stuff on alliances is pretty instructive here, as is Patricia Weitsman’s stuff.
There are too many veto points within NATO that really oppose it. Would need major major changes.
The whole idea of NATO expansion was a mistake from the beginning, it seems to me, so why compound a mistake by letting in more and more members? If the ‘West’ wanted to find a mechanism to bind/integrate/etc. C. & E. European countries into the West’s orbit, it shd have found or invented a different mechanism than NATO. Scholars might have argued, and did argue, that NATO had a whole variety of purposes, but to ordinary people — to non-scholars — NATO was a Cold War alliance directed vs the USSR. And b.c that was NATO’s image in the public mind, its effort to re-invent itself after the USSR’s collapse necessarily took on a somewhat devious, for lack of a better word, and strange aspect. When the USSR ceased to exist, NATO shd have ceased to exist. At least it shd have been renamed. Of course all that, esp the more substantive part, wd have required a *lot* of work and wd have run up against entrenched bureaucratic interests etc., so it prob. was never going to happen. I don’t agree w S.Walt on some things and I don’t like some of the tone of his blogging (wh/ is one reason I don’t read him regularly or even that often), but his opposition to NATO expansion, it seems to me, was correct (at least his end position, which is mainly what i remember, was right, ISTM). NATO stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization, iirc. It hasn’t been a ‘North Atlantic’ organization in a long time. Maybe the name was always unfortunate, but when it stopped having a relation to geographical reality the name shd have been changed. To what, I’m not sure. OSCE was already taken.