U.S. In Retreat Loosing Almost Everywhere.

 Russia’s Putin pushes as Obama concedes and retreats. Obama has begun negotiating with Russia on limiting the new U.S. military strategy called prompt global strike that seeks to use conventional missiles and other weapons for strategic effect.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Oct. 21 that “the impact of conventionally armed ICBMs and SLBMs on strategic stability is a provision that is under discussion in the negotiations which are confidential.”

Critics of the Obama rush to conclude a new strategic arms treaty with Russia before the end of the year say that the U.S. military has opposed adding U.S. conventional strike capabilities in the discussions, which would limit operations for attacking terrorists and other threats.

Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. James Cartwright, a proponent of conventional strategic strike, is said to oppose the negotiations of prompt global strike.

The administration is seeking to conclude a new agreement with Russia to replace the 1991 START treaty that expires Dec. 5.

However, the rush to conclude the treaty is leading to concessions to Moscow that are opposed by military, defense officials, Americans on the streets and hitherto U. S. allies.

Russia also sought to add U.S. missile defenses to limitations imposed by the new treaty but so far the administration has not agreed to such limits.

Saudi Arabia has been signaling increasing anxiety at the prospect of an Iran with nuclear weapons eventually dominating the new Shi’ite government of Iraq as the U.S. withdraws its forces over the next two years.

Now the Saudis, in a move that has stunned the West, has decided to make Russia a strategic ally in an effort to counter Iran’s dominance of the Gulf.

Saudi Arabia’s approach to Russia marks a sea change for the Arab kingdom, which long regarded Moscow as the center of the evil communist empire. But today Riyad sees its real threat in neighboring Iran.

King Abdullah has approved the development of a strategic relationship with the Kremlin that would include cooperation in defense and energy. The pro-Russian policy marks a strategy drafted by Deputy Prime Minister Prince Nayef to outspend Iran in the race for weapons and allies.

The Center for New Politics and Policy asserted that Riyad has ordered hundreds of helicopters, main battle tanks, armored personnel carriers and other military platforms from the Kremlin. In a report, the center said the Saudi decision sought to pressure Moscow to stop major weapons and nuclear sales to Iran.

“As a major arms and nuclear materials supplier to Iran, Russian arms sales to Saudi Arabia afford Moscow powerful leverage in the Persian Gulf at a time when American and Western European influence is declining,” the report, titled “Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Policy Gamble and the Iranian Nuclear Problem,” said.

Authored by senior fellow Webster Brooks, the report said Saudi Arabia agreed to a $4 billion weapons deal with the Kremlin in 2007. The deal was said to have included the Russian sale of 150 T-90 main battle tanks, 100 Mi-17 helicopters, hundreds of BMP-3 infantry combat vehicles and 20 BVIC air defense systems.

“Abdullah’s shift to allow the Russians arms sales shocked the United States and Western Europe,” the report said.

Likewise Obama’s decision to abandon plans to build a third long-range missile defense base in Eastern Europe was an enormous mistake that will have long term harmful impacts.

“I consider the abandonment of missile defense in Eastern Europe to be a strategic blunder and a breach of good faith,” Cheney said in a speech Oct. 21 to the Center for Security Policy. The impact of a Middle East under Russia’s influence is frioghtening.

“It is certainly not a model of diplomacy when the leaders of Poland and the Czech Republic are informed of such a decision at the last minute in midnight phone calls.”

By almost any standard USA influence in Asia has all but collapsed as China surges.

Observers call the chaotic Obama foreign policy “preposterous” “incompetent” and maybe even criminal. It seems to be a breakneck effort to reverse the gains of the Cold War era.