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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

President Hamid Karzai is doomed. During his strategic shopping trip to Washington this week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pronounced his epitaph: “We will not abandon the Afghan people.”

In DC doublespeak, that means we’re searching desperately for the exit ramp.

Then we got the mandatory presidential press conference. If platitudes killed terrorists, “The Bam and Ham Show” would’ve exterminated the Taliban. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Appeasement doesn’t work. It doesn’t work with dictators, and it doesn’t work with terrorists. The attempted Times Square bombing was yet more proof.

We’ve allowed Islamist extremists to dictate what we can say, print or portray. We don’t want to offend them. The First Amendment bows before Islam.

The Obama administration has ducked all unwelcome evidence that such appeasement doesn’t work. Instead, it goes to absurd lengths to convince Muslim radicals that we respect their views. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Something big is happening. Big enough to alarm the White House. So big that the administration did an abrupt about-face regarding terrorism.

Terrorism’s serious now — driving major policy reversals. The administration just won’t tell us why.

A week ago, failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad wasn’t even a Muslim, but a 40-something white male and, as Mayor Bloomberg insisted, probably an opponent of ObamaCare. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

American and European leftists share the conviction that the immigrant, legal or illegal, is always right — and the native-born citizen’s always wrong.

This bigotry toward the law-abiding American, Brit, Frenchman or Italian doesn’t help the immigrant in the end. Instead, it’s a powerful engine driving divisiveness.

There are deep differences between Europe’s experience with legal immigrants intent on importing intolerant lifestyles and our problem with illegals responsible for social friction and violent criminality. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

South of the border, down Mexico way, a new and savage revolution rages just beyond our inspection lanes. After less than five years of fighting, estimates of the dead have reached 22,000.

The rate of killing accelerates each month. And Washington covers its eyes like a kid at a scary movie. Well, the Mexican narco-insurgency, in which well-armed guerrilla forces confront the authority and presence of the state, is our No. 1 security challenge. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

At some point during the American Revolution, a frustrated British general, deep into his evening port, must have asked, “Can’t these primitives understand the advantages we offer them?”

In Afghanistan today, exasperated American generals ask, “Can’t these Afghans understand the advantages we offer them?”

The more things change . . . (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Robert Gates isn’t just our secretary of defense — he’s our national damage-control officer.

The closest thing this love-your-enemies administration has to an indispensable man, Gates is fighting the good fight in the worst of times.

Ever since signing on as President George W. Bush’s SecDef in early 2005, Gates has fought to reform the Air Force, improve the Pentagon’s dysfunctional acquisition system, give our troops in the field what they really need and cut through the red tape that’s paid for in red blood. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Jeez, this guy is good.

A few years back, I wrote that Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was the most impressive major leader on today’s world stage. Since then, he’s gotten better.

Back then, he was eating President George W. Bush for breakfast. Now he’s snacking on President Obama as sushi — eating him raw, in happy little bites.

Putin’s ruthless, unforgiving and murderous. He also has a clear vision of what he wants, the strength of will to get it — and a stunning ability to spot the weaknesses in his foreign counterparts. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Our foreign policy suffers from a chronic learning disability: Neither Democrats nor Republicans can get it through their heads that supporting unpopular, corrupt foreign bosses always ends badly.

Decade after decade, we’ve backed illegitimate rulers as a a strategic short-cut. We did what was expedient, not what was wise. And we paid.

Our latest debacle occurred in Kyrgyztan — a backwater that wouldn’t matter a hoot, if not for other dumber-than-dumb US policies. (more…)

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by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]

Our government continues to insist that imminent magic will make President Hamid Karzai reform and make his Afghan government perform.

Ain’t gonna happen. The better diplomats and generals know it. But they continue to play along — because we don’t have Plan B and never did.

We’re married to an abusive spouse and keep going back for more. We give Karzai lavish presents (an entire country), but he just keeps demanding more — while cheating on us. (more…)