But the minute we say ‘bugger off, I don’t want anything to do with you‘ then any hope of engagement is lost.

Haven’t you said this about Brown?

This is an appalling decison that significantly devalues the Nobel brand. He has achieved practically nothing other than be elected, making this gesture politics at its worst.

Dismissing the race card as boring is a cheap contrivance for simply being unable to deal with the fact that this gong is being handed out as a reward for being the first non-white president of the USA. Get over it.

He has not done anything yet. He has only been in the job less than a year. One day he might deserve it, but I fail to see how good intentions are worth the Nobel prize now.

There are plenty of people out there who have done ‘stuff’ year in year out for decades. They deserve regcognition. It can take 20 years for science work to be recognised by Nobel. That is because it is judged ultimately on its outcome and impact on the world. Thats how it should be.

If the in the future, some part of the the Mid East ends up a pile of irradiated ruins because it turns out that Obama failed to deal with Iran now would the academy ask for the award back?

I can’t tell the future, not even tomorrow. I am stunned the academy thinks it can.

It seems to me that the awarding of the Nobel Prize to Obama is something that could quite possibly have waited until the end of his 2nd term – i mean, what if he now (quite inexplicably) does a Tony Blair? The committee will have egg on its face in a major way.

Nevertheless, they’re clearly a fairly eccentric lot, and i like the fact that they didn’t go for a safe choice this time round. Ultimately, Obama might be able to use this award; he might also, paradoxically, be pilloried for it. Even if the Nobel committee was simply trying to help Obama by giving him the gravitas of a Peace prize winner, i’m not convinced they actually have.

In the words of the poet: “You just haven’t earned it yet baby.”

Well the Nobel foundation has been on the right-wing shit list for quite some time now, so to hell with it, why not?

This is an appalling decison that significantly devalues the Nobel brand. He has achieved practically nothing other than be elected, making this gesture politics at its worst.

Come on, he might have killed thousands of people but he’s got a nice logo.

Every now and then the Nobel panel go a bit mad – Begin, Kissinger, Obama.

I would like to congratulate President Obama [swallows] on this great achievement [twitches]. I am delighted [dips head] to be joined by my (now) fellow Nobel prize winner [smiles frightening children in the audience], who I am looking forward to seeing [clasps arms and swallows] when I pick up my Nobel Economic Prize later this year [wanders away from the podium with his mic still attached].

Sunny, you say lots of sensible things I agree with here .. but they don’t amount to an argument that he should have been awarded this prize now.

Here’s an article by Mehdi Hasan arguing that Obama is just like Bush. Lawks!

I would have guessed it was as much as a 50/50 bet that Obama would do enough, over his term of office, to deserve the prize. By historical terms, doesn’t need to be very much, just some piece of paper, some war avoided.

The idiot Norwegians have made that impossible. At least, unless Obama does the smart (probably unrealistically so) thing and turns it down, saying ‘give it to me in 5 years, or don’t give it to me at all’.

Err, idiot Swedes

At best, premature.

He hasn’t killed enough people to have earned the Nobel Peace Prize yet.

‘And so, with Obama, he will always be the President I worked to elect’

Wow.

That has to be the most deluded, egotistical comment I’ve ever seen.

@13 – afraid so

the winning scientists and writers have to have a lifetime of achievement behind them

still I look forward to my Olympic gold in swimming – I’ll take it now if that’s ok

No need to wait til the actual race is there?

Oh, why, why, why are you right-wingers so uptight and po-faced about this?

he should give it back

I don’t see how working on the campaign automatically makes you biased. I know plenty of people who helped out who are willing to criticise Obama when it’s appropriate.

Agree that it’s good for lefties to resist the urge to yell “traitor”, and that denunciation is too easy, and think that applies to the current UK government too (which after all, is well to the left of Obama).

Still think that this is not a good move by the Nobel prize committee. It is however only the latest in a recent set of moves to try and contribute to change rather than simply award achievement in the “peace” field – Al Gore was another example of someone who was used as a signifier rather than because he’s achieved anything in the field.

#13 and #14 – I remember NUS conferences where some people standing for election seemed to be taking credit for ending apartheid in South Africa – that has to top anything.

Although I’m curious as to what Mr Obama might have done to deserve this award, I’m loving watching conservative heads explode!

@18 – brilliant, isn’t it? It’s fly-paper for wankers.

Mr Obama needs to think long and hard about accepting this award. The vapidity of the criteria used for his selection could ratify in the public mind the vapidity of his prior and current achievements.

Is this our new standard? Do nothing, speak well, and be rewarded? The President needs to drive to substance as fast as possible before this tag catches up to him.

Sunny, on this occasion I don’t even think you believe what you’re saying, and that you’re just keeping in practice at arguing for lost causes.

But at least there’s a delicious irony to savour, as the president of a country gets a big prize for peacefulness on exactly the same day as that same country takes aggressive action towards another, apparently defenceless big round thing in space, for the first time in human, or indeed lunary, history?

Question

Might this award influence Obama’s actions in the future in anyway? After all, he’s facing a big decision on Afghanistan and is continuing the drone attacks in Pakistan. What if one of them goes wrong and hundreds of civilians are killed accidently? And there is Darfur, North Korea, Iran and possibly others we don’t know about yet. If any of those blow up, might Obama’s instincts be to live up to his award, or do what some might consider to be the right thing and act with military force?

BTW, does anyone know who nominated him? Would it have been the Nobel committee or his supporters?

Finally, Sunny:

Enough of the race-card playing, it’s getting boring.

I hope that’s directed as much at the left wing commentariat as it is the right.

Obama wins the Nobel Peace prize and Churchill did not. Makes sense as neither J Conrad or G Greene won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

maybe it was in compensation for not getting the olympics?

I don’t see why people have such a problem with recognising potential rather than only rewarding the end result. To be fair he has been more promising than any other new president, tackling Middle East peace head-on. If anyone has the charisma, energy and pure cheek to tackle the world’s problems surely it’s Obama? He is deeply flawed but he’s the most promising president we’ve had since Kennedy…

somebody else saying he should turn it down

‘I don’t see how working on the campaign automatically makes you biased.’

I was less concerned about bias than the chutzpah for taking credit.

I mean, The Hoff bringing down the Berlin Wall was a bit much..!

Great article, but you said little to support your claim – whether it is that Obama deserves the Nobel Prize or not.

One of the principal reasons for rejoicing at the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama is the effect this will have on the political friends of Sarah Palin.

I agree with #10 – the smart and gracious thing to do is to turn it down, for now. I suspect, however, that Obama is sufficiently big-headed to keep it.

(And honestly, if awarded the fricking Nobel Peace Prize you’d have to have a pretty tiny head to be able to turn it down!)

My take is that the Nobel committee and the New Statesman cover story are equally daft,
http://www.nextleft.org/2009/10/even-obamamania-has-its-limits.html

Obama has indeed significantly changed the atmosphere of international politics – as the Pew global opinion research shows – but that does not seem to me to be sufficient reason to award a Nobel peace prize
http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1289/global-attitudes-survey-2009-obama-lifts-america-image

The committee seem to me somewhat deluded if they think this will significantly assist the global disarmament talks, where it could well if anything mildly harm their prospects.

Frankly, I think that the only case that could be made for an Obama Nobel now would be about race, not just the achievement of being the first black US president but the way in which the campaign itself addressed the domestic history of race and reconciliation in the US. But if that was what they meant – which might well also have been unwelcome to Obama – they should have said so.

The Taliban have condemned the award.

(Not sure they were shortlisted)

Hmm … might need to now rethink whether such a bad idea after all!?

http://tiny.cc/uIzYi

“Oh, why, why, why are you right-wingers so uptight and po-faced about this?”

Where’s the joke?

What a surprise, haters gonna hate…

Common misconceptions about the Nobel Peace Prize

Myth: The prize is awarded to recognize efforts for peace, human rights and democracy only after they have proven successful.

More often, the prize is awarded to encourage those who receive it to see the effort through, sometimes at critical moments.

So basically, suck it y’all.

I love the fact he got this on the day the USA bombed the Moon!

Obama clearly doesn’t deserve this, however on the up side it massively strengthens his hand at home and could well help to pull US foreign policy towards what I call ‘the sanity zone’.

If it does contribute to that then I’m very happy that the peace prize is being used to promote peace rather than simply rewarding pseudo-saints.

An interesting turn of events.

He has done a lot to promote world peace and to combat global warming. I for one, am happy for news. Now if he would only end Bush’s wars.

@35

Myth: Candidates can be nominated until the last minute.

The nomination deadline is eight months before the announcement, with a strictly enforced deadline of Feb. 1.

Wow – 11 days in!

Oh, why, why, why are you right-wingers so uptight and po-faced about this?
I should expect most of them see it as a wonderful demonstration of the self-regarding unreality of the Left.

Obama must have been President for less than eleven days before he was nominated.

It is a fine way of making both Obama and the Nobel Prize committee look ridiculous.

If Obama had any say in this, and did not try to stop it, he’s a fool.

@38

11 days into his presidency maybe. But he was greeted by thousands of cheering supporters all across Europe before he was even elected. If you’re going to say that the parties across the globe on November 5th 2008 weren’t testament to his position as a unifier, then you’ve not been on the same planet as the rest of us these last 18 months.

All you guys do is complain and bitch about Obama this and Obama that, what has he done to you that Bush didn’t start, Hello wasn’t Bush the one that started the war ? Or wasn’t he the reason Gas went sky high, also he’s the reason we lost our jobs and our houses are in foreclosure since Obama came in office I was able to afford school, and make something out of my self you people that talk all this nonsense about one’s accomplishments are simply selfish ignorant morons who have nothing better to do but throw your tea partys and juice up prejudice if he had been a White man you would be happy and cheering but because he is black you are talking shit and spreading nothing but hate if you even dare claim to be a christian I cast your sorry asses to hell. Because of Obama your un-employed asses are able to log online and talk and spread this hate, I mean think about all the drama in florida with everything going on Republicans did this to our Country not Obama and if you believe everything the press says you are a stupid fuck, Wake up people wake the hell up.

And yes I’m proud to be BLACK

Reading these comments has firmed up my view that this is a neat move. It does give Obama something to live up to in the future decisions he has to make. That could save a lot of innocent lives.

“Conservative cabbie” @23 has got the point right, even if he comes at it from the wrong side:

“Might this award influence Obama’s actions in the future in anyway? After all, he’s facing a big decision on Afghanistan… … might Obama’s instincts be to live up to his award, or do what some might consider to be the right thing and act with military force?”

And, as a bonus, it pisses off the usually slavishly Atlanticist Tory twats.

This isn’t about any accomplishment that he’s yet done. As you noted he’s done little concrete yet. It’s about the promise of what can be done by someone like him in the position he’s occupying. Pres Barack Obama awarded Nobel Peace Prize.. too early?

There is also the spectre over him of the Nobel Committee asking for the award back.
You never know, but a thing like that could make the difference on a decision whether to escalate Afghanistan or Iran or wherever, whenever.

Comparing Obama to Kissinger is the height of hilarity and stupidity.

Anyway – wasn’t it obvious why they awarded him? The prize is also for people who have shown the potential to get far in achieving peace. He’s already done more than anyone else – why the hell should he give it back? Stupid idea.

Here’s an article by Mehdi Hasan arguing that Obama is just like Bush

I don’t buy it. I think Obama hasn’t gone far enough on some issues such as foreign policy but to compare him to Bush is just silly. And not just because the main issue being debated here is foreign policy while everything else is largely being ignored.

I’m loving watching conservative heads explode!

Me too.

I hope that’s directed as much at the left wing commentariat as it is the right.

The race card is usually played by the right when a black/Asian person does good. Most seem to believe he/she only got there because of his race. This was a common argument on the British right when Obama got elected.

Jo: To be fair he has been more promising than any other new president, tackling Middle East peace head-on. If anyone has the charisma, energy and pure cheek to tackle the world’s problems surely it’s Obama?

spot on!

I was less concerned about bias than the chutzpah for taking credit.

I worked on the campaign to get him elected. I didn’t say he was elected because of me. Not so hard to understand the difference.

Strategist: Reading these comments has firmed up my view that this is a neat move. It does give Obama something to live up to in the future decisions he has to make. That could save a lot of innocent lives.

Good point – I should have made that too…

It is an utterly preposterous decision. Still, with Henry Kissinger and Shimon Peres as winners in the past it is not the first time the committee has wantonly dished out the award to someone who stands in violation of the most basic principles on which the prize is based.

I wonder if Obama will carve a notch in whatever bauble he receives every time his armed forces kill someone in Afghanistan or one of his drones obliterates a civilian in Pakistan.

Sunny, I agree – I’d go as far to say that with that article Hasan has identified himself as a lunatic.

I think those who suggested he gave it back are motivated by the reception they expect from the US electorate – did you read George Packer, linked @16? Plus, it would be pretty cool, no?

Sunny

The race card is usually played by the right when a black/Asian person does good. Most seem to believe he/she only got there because of his race.

Try telling that to Chris Matthews, Maureen Dowd, Daily Kos, Balloon Juice etc who for some strange reason have started calling him “the black President”.

@strategist

It does give Obama something to live up to in the future decisions he has to make. That could save a lot of innocent lives.

I’m not sure it’s a good thing at all that a mere awards committee is trying to direct the foreign policy of a democratic country.

#41: “11 days into his presidency maybe. But he was greeted by thousands of cheering supporters all across Europe before he was even elected.”

In the [London] Times – a Murdoch newspaper – a panel of historians ranked President GW Bush, along with President Nixon, at 37th in the listing of 42 US Presidents in terms of achievements during their terms of office:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article5029204.ece

Herbert Hoover (1929-33), US President at the onset of the Depression, was also ranked in the bottom 10 but in the 36th place, one better than GW Bush. Btw Lincoln was ranked as best at No 1.

In cheering on Obama, before he was elected President, Europe was just celebrating the prospect of finally coming to an end of Bush’s Republican presidency.

I think those who suggested he gave it back are motivated by the reception they expect from the US electorate

This is silly on various levels.

Firstly, for Obama to embarrass the Nobel committee would be a pretty stupid thing to do.

Secondly, the American public aren’t going to be as cynical as many think. In fact as the intelligent (except on creationism) pointed out that if Republicans cry too much they’re going to look whiny to the US public.

The likes of Limbaugh and Glenn Beck are gonna go wild. But the more wild they go the more stupid they look.

Bob B

In cheering on Obama, before he was elected President, Europe was just celebrating the prospect of finally coming to an end of Bush’s Republican presidency.

Because

1. Saving millions of Africans from AIDS and Malaria
2. Being the first American President to recognise a Palestinian state
3. Freeing millions from tyranny
4. Ending Libya’s nuclear program
5 Helping bring peace to liberia
6 Signed a treaty to reduce strategic nuclear weapons by two-thirds
7. Called on Syria to leave Lebanon

aren’t worth being glad for.

I get the criticisms that people have of Bush on foreign policy, but maybe some balance wouldn’t go amiss. By any stretch of the imagination, those are not insubstantial accomplishments…and there’s that word…accomplishments. If Obama achieves half of that, perhaps he will be deserving of a Nobel Prize.

#54: “I get the criticisms that people have of Bush on foreign policy, but maybe some balance wouldn’t go amiss.”

C’mon. As former US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill revealed in a TV interview in 2004, the Bush administration started planning for the forthcoming Iraq war as soon as it came into office in January 2001, months before 9/11
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/01/10/oneill.bush/

And there was much arranging to do, wasn’t there?

“WASHINGTON — A soon-to-be-released audit will show that at least $8.8 billion in Iraqi money that was given to Iraqi ministries by the former U.S.-led authority there cannot be accounted for, FOX News has confirmed. And three senators want to know where the cash is.”
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,129489,00.html

“(CBS MarketWatch) — A second former Bush administration official is set to accuse top presidential aides, including Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, of planning retaliatory strikes on Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, despite briefings from intelligence officials explaining that Iraq likely wasn’t responsible. The accusation from Richard Clarke, a counterterrorism official at the White House until February 2003, will come first in an interview on CBS News ’60 Minutes’ set to be broadcast Sunday, the network said. Former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill made similar accusations on ’60 Minutes’ in January.”
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/03/20/clarke.cbs/

The failings in the Bush administration’s economic policy and regulation of financial institutions led to the recent financial crisis, which could easily have led to a repeat experience of the 1930s Depression.

Some of us were saying many years ago that the Bush administration was a disaster. IMO any American with the prospect of blocking the possibility of another Republican administration would have been cheered on in Europe last year. Some in Britain are now saying that if the likes of Sarah Palin can be taken seriously in America, why in heaven’s name do we want a special relationship? Harold Wilson as PM, had no qualms in the 1960s about turning down LBJ’s requests for Britain’s engagement in the Vietnam war.

Btw Ex-President Clinton is usually warmly welcomed if he makes public appearances in Europe. Why do you suppose that is?

Bob B

All very interesting, but none of which addressed the point that Bush did have foreign policy successes.

And what relevance to America is the popularity of America in Europe? Europe has always been happy to suck at the tit of America, I don’t think Americans really give a monkeys what Europe thinks.

I’m a conservative, I tend to the think the best route to peace is through strength. I realise that that will be a minority view on this blog. Fair enough. But it means that I will disagree with most of Obama’s policies on international matters. But at the end of the day it’s about achievements. If by the end of his first term, Iran has been de-nuclearised, Afghanistan is relatively peaceful and there is significant progress in the Middle East then I would have no problem with him being given a peace prize. But none of that has happened, there is no certainty that it will, so maybe ti would have been more appropriate for the Nobel committee to show some patience. Why not give the award to FDR or Harry Truman, shocking omissions from the history of the prize (assuming postumous awards can be given).

#55: “All very interesting, but none of which addressed the point that Bush did have foreign policy successes.”

I go for the facts. The successes of the Bush administration were entirely trivial compared with the huge human and economic costs that the administration imposed on the world, not to mention the missing billions in Dollar bills and the multi-million contracts that went to friends of the administration. Never mind my view, a panel of historians, convened by the Murdoch press, ranked the GW Bush administration at number 37 out of 42 American presidents for its achievements in office.

IMO Europe last year would have cheered on almost anything where there was the slightest prospect of getting rid of a Republican administration.

How do you suppose Europeans regarded the Republican campaign after seeing this video about “Straight talking McCain”?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEtZlR3zp4c

As for WW2, the fact is that for all Roosevelt’s assessment of the growing threat of Nazi Germany when Britain was already at war since 3 Seprember 1939, many, if not most Americans didn’t want to be dragged into a war in Europe even after the attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941.

William Shirer, the distinguished American journalist and historian of the war, wrote in his seminal book: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich:

“My own impression in Washington at that moment was that it might be difficult for President Roosevelt to get Congress to declare war on Germany. There seemed to be a strong feeling in both Houses as well as in the Army and Navy that the country ought to concentrate its efforts on defeating Japan and not take on the additional burden of fighting Germany at the same time.” [chp. 25]

In the event, Germany resolved the challenging political dilemma in America by (stupidly) declaring war on 10 December 1941. Prior to that declation of war, prevailing sentiment in much of America was summed up in speech of Charles Linbergh, the pioneering aviator, at Des Moines, Iowa, on 11 September 1941.

“The three most important groups who have been pressing this country [America] toward war [WW2] are the British, the Jewish and the Roosevelt administration.”
http://www.charleslindbergh.com/americanfirst/speech.asp

Try this:

“George Bush’s grandfather, the late US senator Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar

Btw Nobel prizes cannot be awarded posthumously.

They gave him the prize Nobel,

Their view of the world to sell,

You’re just one in the world,

Stars & Stripes, keep it furled,

To belong, just do as we tell.

Perhaps the Rev Cannon White of Baghdad and his team should have been put forward for the Nobel Peace Prize? Here is someone with MS who risks his life trying to reconcile Sunni and Shia clergy in Iraq.

Conservative Cabby, you slay me.

@50: “I’m not sure it’s a good thing at all that a mere awards committee is trying to direct the foreign policy of a democratic country.

That’s a cracker. But this is a belter:

@53 “I get the criticisms that people have of Bush on foreign policy, but maybe some balance wouldn’t go amiss.”

That must go on the honours board of the daftest LibCon comments of all time.

If you look at substance rather than style, it is easy to see that Obama is even more of a bloodthirsty war monger than Bush. The Nobel Committee has turned the “Peace Prize” into a propaganda tool for Big Oil, the mercenary corporations, and the arms merchants.

The should rename it the Orwellian Peace Prize.

I love this article.
You are obviously wrong Sunny but as an exercise to bring out borderline racists and trolls it is wonderful.

The World Cup Committee announced today that England had been awarded the trophy.

While the games themselves are still six months away, fans all agreed that the award was wholly justified in recognising the plucky team’s achievement in qualifying in the first place, and would incentivise them to excel once the actual contest had begun.

@strategist

That must go on the honours board of the daftest LibCon comments of all time

Ahhh! The famed leftist propensity for engaging in rational debate.

But then when someone says:

And, as a bonus, it pisses off the usually slavishly Atlanticist Tory twats.

You know you’re not dealing with someone for whom intelligence is one of their strong points.

Bob B

Fair enough on the postumous Nobel. I’m a bigger fan of Truman than FDR anyway.

My point about Bush was that he had foreign policy accomplishments regardless of the perceived negatives. Obama hasn’t. And it’s interesting that Europe is now supportive of someone who has failed to close Guantanamo as promised, has imposed a similar regime at Bagram instead of Guantanamo, is continuing rendition and the Patriot Act, is killing civilians in Drone attacks, has escalated the war in Afghanistan and might do so further, has interfered in the internal affairs of a sovereign country (ie Honduras), has refused to meet the Dalai Lama to placate China, has defunded a human rights agency to placate Iran and has failed to act on Don’t Ask don’t tell.

Many conservatives are happy with much of what Obama has done national security wise (including myself), although with some exceptions. It’s interesting that the left are happy with them too, which suggests it wasn’t Bush’s policies they objected too, just the man.

Obama has done more than enough to earn the Nobel Peace Prize. A lot of the many things he has done have not been widely publicized but he has made the world a much better place that’s for sure.

@67 perhaps you could let us know what some of these “many things” have been

Cjcjc

In the cult of personality that surrounds Obama, just being Obama is enough. Rationality doesn’t apply.

perhaps you could let us know what some of these “many things” have been

I know that some of you folks obviously prefer not to read what I’ve written, but these have been mentioned above:

There have been various attempts by Obama to go further than we expected, just on foreign policy. He said nothing much about pushing for a complete phasing out of nuclear weapons, and yet he’s stuck his neck out on that. He didn’t say anything about cancelling the Star Wars programme and yet he’s effectively done that.

He has been more critical of Israeli settlements and foreign policy than he was during the election campaign. He’s made huge overtures to Russia and is giving Iran more space to wriggle out than even his population would like.

His proposed plan to phase out nukes, if Russia and others can be persuaded, would be the most far-reaching policy to save millions of lives.

@65: Conservative Cabbie

From current media commentary in Britain, several sources are suggesting the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama was premature and that this could damage the standing of the prize. But wasn’t it Tom Lehrer who said satire was dead after the prize was awarded to Henry Kissinger?

Obama, himself, seems to have been genuinely surprised by the award. I’ll certainly go with the theory that Obama got the Prize by way of Europe celebrating that he wasn’t President GW Bush.

I’m unsure how many Americans appreciate that President Bush, when in office, was regularly portrayed in BBC radio comedy shows as a slow-learner or half-wit and that studio audiences evidently found that portrayal hilarious.

Neither Clinton nor Obama were/are portrayed that way. All the evidence suggests that both are warmly regarded in Europe and both are seen as “clever”.

My impression is that both FDR and Truman are generally held in high esteem in Europe for their historic achievements in office. Not too many folks posting to online forums nowadays were also around during their presidencies. It happens that I was. Someone in another forum posed an interesting question to readers there: What is the earliest important news story you can personally recall? I chipped in with D-Day on 6 June 1944, although my memories go back a bit before that.

Bob B

I certainly don’t hold the award against Obama, I agree that it was news to him. The blame goes on five silly norwegians, which puts the Nobel prize in some perspective.

TBH, I don’t think too many Americans really give a damn what the Europeans think of them. Quite rightly, we’ve become discredited in their eyes.

Thankyou for that historical info. have you read McCullough’s biography of Truman? One of the best I’ve read. I knew very little about him, but few american Presidents ended up with as much foreign policy experience as he did. Not bad for a farm boy.

“have you read McCullough’s biography of Truman? ”

No – but thanks for the tip. I’m presently mostly stuck into my economics stuff because of the financial crisis.

I’ve long rated Truman and posted years ago in another place that he was an under-rated and modest president who, in fact, accomplished much, especially in setting up NATO and implementing the Marshall Plan, which helped Europe get back on its economic feet after the slaughter, destruction and chaos inflicted by WW2. I guess most of those posting here now have no idea of what it was like. In June 1944, a V1 flying bomb had dropped down at one end of the road where I was living in London then and, in January 1945, a V2 ballistic rocket landed at the other.

The curious thing is that Truman, as a (mere) store-keeper from Missouri, was picked almost as an incidental VP candidate for FDR’s presidential ticket in 1944 and FDR seems to have rather kept him away from the important decision-making in foreign policy, a rather important gap given the political complexities of the alliance between America, the Soviet Union and Britain. What we know in retrospect is that after the ailing FDR’s unanticipated death in spring 1945, Truman had to be especially briefed about the Manhattan (Atomic Bomb) project, which he apparently knew nothing about.

Truman’s comfortable re-election to the presidency in 1948, contrary to the predictions of all the polls at the time and expectations of the US press, probably surprised Truman as well.

The expansion of Soviet hegemony across eastern Europe, the invasion of South Korea with the ensuing war in the peninsula and the Berlin Air-lift were each huge challenges which had to be confronted but without tipping the world into another universal conflict.

Even into the 1970s and early 1980s, there were proper apprehensions among British politicians about the Soviet Union’s superiority in conventional weapons in Europe – notably in tanks. There was no reassuring NATO strategy for a credible response to the possibility of a Soviet blitzkrieg attack across the north German plane. By the account of Gordievsky of the KGB – and a British agent – Reagan’s belligerent rhetoric led the Soviet hierarchy in the early 1980s to speculate on whether the US administration was planning a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union. . .

The higher they rise the harder they fall.

I agree entirely with Sunny, so many leftish leaders are undone by their own side or constrained by their fickle support. Bush never worried about the right turning their backs in him, he just got on and did what he wanted. It’s a pity the left can’t do the same.

Bob B

Reagan’s belligerent rhetoric led the Soviet hierarchy in the early 1980s to speculate on whether the US administration was planning a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union.

And look what happened. Peace through strength. Which is why I don’y buy Sunny’s idea that caving in to Russia and Iran is necessarily peace inducing.

What I find interesting about Truman is that there is no way he gets elected to the VP today, or at least if he did, the opposition and media would turn on him like they did Palin. Multiple failed businesses and the servant of the Kansas City corrupt political machine. Worked out quite well for him in the end though.

I’m glad to see George Marshall got a nobel prize, one of America’s greatest statesmen.

Conservative Cabbie,

“And look what happened. Peace through strength”

It was due to good fortune, as much as anything.

There was Reagan’s little “joke” when preparing for a broadcast during his campaign for re-election in 1984:

“On August 11, 1984, United States President Ronald Reagan, while running for re-election, was preparing to make his weekly Saturday address on National Public Radio. As a sound check prior to the address, Reagan made the following joke to the radio technicians:

‘My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.’”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reagan's_%22We_begin_bombing_in_five_minutes%22_joke

Fortunately, the test wasn’t broadcast.

Behind the scenes, the Soviet hierarchy was assured that the Reagan administration wasn’t planning a pre-emptive nuclear strike. For all Reagan’s belligerent posturing, the early stages of Reagan’s affliction with Alzheimer’s became increasingly apparent and the Soviet hierarchy could comprehend that from their close experience of Brezhnev’s failing health and the poor health of his immediate successors in office.

Also, by an account in Tony Benn’s diaries of a visit he made to see friends in Moscow in the late 1980s, Gorbachev’s election to the post of General Secretary of the Soviet Communist by its central committee in 1985 was a lucky break. Gorbachev was elected by a majority of just one vote.

It could all have gone horribly wrong with catastrophic consequences.

George Marshall greatly deserved his Peace Prize. Sadly, Britain received more than any other country but then we wasted it by maintaining an over-extended military presence around the world – see Correlli Barnett: Lost Victory.

Conservative Cabbie,

Gorbachev’s fundamental mistake was in attributing the deep malaise in the Soviet system to Stalin.

He thought Stalin was the cause of the malign detour from the path to true socialism as prescribed by Lenin.

The problem with that analysis was that the basic apparatus for despotism had been created by Lenin. He established CHEKA, the ultimate ancestor of the KGB, as well as the constitutional framework of “democratic centralism”, which meant that any deviation from the decisions of the Soviet hierarchy, or criticism of party policy, could be treated as amounting to treason, which led to the Moscow show trials of 1936 and 1937, long after Lenin’s death. Thousands of party members were tried in people’s courts around the Soviet Union, convicted and shot or sent off to the gulags.

Stalin’s grandson (by Stalin’s first wife) is in the news in Britain now saying that Stalin is greatly misunderstood. Stalin never broke any Soviet laws, he says. But then no historian has ever found a credible piece of paper with Hitler’s signature authorising the Holocaust.

Let’s get back on topic shall we?

Who deserved the Nobel Peace Prize the more?:

A. Barak Obama

or

B. Morgan Tsvangirai