As the new report highlights … a potential disaster on the same scale as World War II looms while America remains complacent in the same way that it was in 1941.
If you’re among the supermajority of Americans who believe that domestic societal and economic conditions have deteriorated under nearly four grinding years of the Biden/Harris administration, imagine what awaits if a major conflict involving China, Russia, North Korea or Iran gets underway.
Unfortunately, that likelihood may stand higher than any point since World War II.
Because that intervening period since World War II includes such dangerous Cold War flashpoints as the Cuban Missile Crisis, that speaks volumes.
That assessment isn’t the inflammatory rhetoric of Republican hawks, however. It’s the grim warning of a new bipartisan report from the National Defense Strategy (NDS) Commission chaired by Democratic former Congresswoman Jane Harman of California.
With American voters consistently rating economic conditions as their top concern as November’s election date approaches, it’s understandable that Americans maintain a default focus on domestic issues.
As the new report highlights, however, a potential disaster on the same scale as World War II looms while America remains complacent in the same way that it was in 1941:
The strategic environment in summer 2024 presents more, and vastly more serious, challenges to U.S. security interests than since the end of the Cold War, if not the height of World War II. Many of the threats are intertwined and compounding, making them more difficult to overcome. The NDS prioritizes challenges and threats posed by China, then Russia, and then from North Korea, Iran, and violent extremist organizations. It also highlights the threat to the U.S. homeland and lists transboundary challenges.
The Commission agrees with the prioritization of the threats in the NDS, but we believe that the magnitude of the threats the United States faces is understated and significantly worse than when the NDS was issued, especially when viewed globally and as compounding. Since the release of the NDS, we have witnessed but not fully accounted for the strategic impact of the “no limits” partnership between Russia and China and their partnership with Iran and North Korea, the outbreak of war in the Middle East, and the scope and duration of the war in Europe.
That’s a grim assessment, and responsibility for the progressively declining situation lies with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
Beginning with Russia, Biden and Harris have empowered it since the administration’s early missteps. First and foremost, their catastrophic and humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan, including bungled attempts to target terrorists that ended up killing innocent civilians instead, signaled to Vladimir Putin that he could expect a weak, Jimmy Carter-like foreign policy. Biden and Harris also reversed former President Donald Trump’s sanctions against Russia’s NordStream petroleum pipeline to Europe. Their administration also dragged its feet in supplying Ukraine with weaponry after Russia’s invasion in 2022, and then placed handcuffs on Ukraine’s ability to use what American weaponry it did supply in a way that could hit Russia where it hurts along its deeper logistical supply lines.
And how does Kamala Harris share responsibility for that? She explicitly confirmed that she was the last person in the room with Biden as he made those decisions relating to Afghanistan, and that she supported them.
It’s also worth noting that Putin captured vast amounts of bordering nations’ territory during the Bush/Cheney administration, the Obama/Biden administration and now again under the Biden/Harris administration. He took none, however, under Trump.
It defies logic to suspect that a Harris presidency would somehow be tougher on Russia or show more strength.
The Biden/Harris administration’s incompetent empowerment of Iran has been equally egregious.
Reversing Obama/Biden administration weakness toward Iran, President Trump imposed his “maximum pressure” agenda that quickly depleted Iran’s oil export revenues, which in turn choked off their ability to fund international terrorism. He also took such decisive steps as killing Iran’s leading general Qasem Soleimani, which then-candidate Biden condemned as reckless.
Upon entering the White House, however, Biden and Harris reversed the Trump era gains against Iran by reviving nuclear negotiations and allowing it to replenish its oil export revenues. The predictable result? Iran resumed its funding of terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, which remain at war with our ally Israel since the gruesome October 7 attacks.
Meanwhile, China has only increased its international menace while Biden/Harris administration has attempted to placate it and keep it on the proverbial back burner. The administration’s border failures have invited the homeland security threats that the NDS references, and its impotence has also allowed terrorist groups like Houthi rebels to interrupt world commerce with its Red Sea missile attacks.
Cumulatively, the NDS report paints a picture that should alarm Americans. While it’s understandable that voters focus on more immediate economic and social hardship here at home, we ignore a growing worldwide threat fueled by Biden/Harris weakness at our peril.
