Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Garry Kasparov: Obama Should Stand Up to Russia's Regime
...the Illinois senator rejected John McCain's proposal to eject Russia and exclude China from the Group of Eight (G-8). Mr. Obama's response during a July 13 interview on CNN -- "We have to engage and get them involved" -- suggests that it is impossible to work with Russia and China on economic and nuclear nonproliferation issues while also standing up for democracy and human rights.
It has repeatedly been shown that the exact opposite is true.
The U.S. does not cede leverage with authoritarian governments when it confronts them about their crimes. Instead, the U.S. increases its credibility and influence with foes and friends alike. Placating regimes like those in Russia and China today only entrenches hostile, antidemocratic forces.
Commercial agreements, arms control and other mutually beneficial projects can be pursued without endorsing dictatorship. During the same interview, Sen. Obama spoke of enlisting China to help write the "international rules of the road." This is the same logic that led the United Nations to place China, Cuba, Russia and Saudi Arabia on its current Human Rights Council. Do we really want to live under rules created with the approval of such regimes?
While Mr. Obama talked about the importance of receiving Russia's help in containing Iran's nuclear ambitions, Reuters reported that Tehran is acquiring advanced S-300 surface-to-air missiles from the Kremlin. This is the cooperation the West has earned by including Russia in the G-8...
There's always an honest debate on how to handle these things. Even Reagan believed in "constructive engagement," but Reagan also understood that the USSR needed detente far more than we did, and that gave him strength at the negotiating table -- something Jimmy Carter never understood, and he was played the fool for it.
Within a few years China will have it's first very serious post boom economic crisis. Their institutions lack transparency and corruption is the norm, which will lead to a much more dramatic crisis than would otherwise occur (some kind of down cycle would happen under even the best circumstances).
We need a president who will understand the enormous implications of that moment, both its opportunities and its dangers, and who will be able to exploit it for the expansion of liberty. It will be a moment of opportunity for a UN agenda as well as on matters such as Taiwan and Sudan and in a number of other areas where China is the primary obstacle to progress, not least domestically in China itself.