I thought it might be useful to add up what Obama has done with weapons in his foreign policy. Here’s an accounting of how he’s handled weapons:
Fast and Furious
Obama sent 2000 automatic weapons to Mexican drug cartels
Libya
Eager to show he is a tough guy, Obama toppled Moammar Gaddafi without seeking Congress’s approval. He was pompously proud of his refusal to put boots on the ground. Consequently, all sorts of weapons fell into the hands of Al Qaeda-linked groups, including:
20,000 surface to air missiles
Obama was happy to send weapons to the Libyan rebels:
[…] – The Obama administration secretly gave its blessing to arms shipments to Libyan rebels from Qatar last year [2012] , but American officials later grew alarmed as evidence grew that Qatar was turning some of the weapons over to Islamic militants, according to United States officials and foreign diplomats.
… the Obama administration clearly was worried about the consequences of its hidden hand in helping arm Libyan militants, concerns that have not previously been reported. The weapons and money from Qatar strengthened militant groups in Libya, allowing them to become a destabilizing force since the fall of the Qaddafi government.
[…] The United States, which had only small numbers of C.I.A. officers in Libya during the tumult of the rebellion, provided little oversight of the arms shipments. Within weeks of endorsing Qatar’s plan to send weapons there in spring 2011, the White House began receiving reports that they were going to Islamic militant groups. They were “more antidemocratic, more hard-line, closer to an extreme version of Islam” than the main rebel alliance in Libya, said a former Defense Department official.
Also heading into the arms of Al Qaeda in Mali were RPG’s, machine guns, night vision goggles and grenades.
Since the beginning of last year’s insurgency against longtime Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi, weapons have streamed out of Libya, looted from depots and sold on the black market. Difficult to track and impossible to quantify, they move in many directions.
Smugglers from Zintan in the northwest move south with ease into the remote regions straddling Chad and Niger, selling munitions to militants in the Sahel region south of the Sahara desert. Israeli officials say that weapons have flowed into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, pouring out from Egypt through tunnels. The North African-based Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, through long-established links to drug dealers and gunrunners, reportedly acquired Libyan arms as early as March 2011.
The Obama administration had little interest in weapons other than the MANPADS:
Other weapons that went missing in Libya included anti-tank missiles, Grad missiles and mortars, some of which have been seen in Mali. Malian army officers have described being overun by heavily armed rebel forces equipped “just like Libya’s army”, with heavy machine guns on four-wheel drive vehicles, as well as anti-tank and anti-aircraft rockets and light weapons. Tuareg officers serving in the Libyan army brought the weapons with them after the fall of Gaddafi.
And now on September 2 they have 11 jet airliners, courtesy of President Obama. The administration reacts as expected:
A senior State Department counterterrorism official declined to comment on reports of the stolen jetliners.
A second State department official sought to downplay the reports. “We can’t confirm that,” he said.
You might remember that Obama lifted the ban on Libyans taking flight lessons and study in nuclear science.
Currently in Pakistan Sharif is clinging to power, under pressure from protesters. Pakistan sits on a nuclear arsenal.
The second Obama says that it’s time for Sharif to step down, start building that bomb shelter.
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.