http://www.newsmax.com/PrintTemplate.aspx/?nodeid=716023Newsmax
Joe Lieberman: World 'Never Seemed as Dangerous and Leaderless'
Thursday, February 25, 2016 08:31 AM
By: Sandy Fitzgerald
The absence of real leadership on the part of the United States and other countries is leaving the world at a more unstable place than at any point since the end of World War II, former Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman says in an opinion piece Thursday.
"The absence of American leadership has certainly not caused all the instability, but it has encouraged and exacerbated it," Lieberman, who now chairs United Against Nuclear Iran, wrote in an op-ed piece for The Washington Post.
Lieberman said he has appeared nearly half the meetings of the Munich Security Conference, but there have been none as the one held this month.
"That is because the world has never seemed as dangerous and leaderless as it does now," he said. "Only the extremists and bullies act boldly, and therefore they have seized the initiative."
The threats are coming from "emboldened expansionist powers" such as Iran, Russia, and China, as well as terrorist threats from the Islamic State and al-Qaida, and "the enemies of freedom are on the march."
At the same time, the United States has chosen to become more passive, Lieberman said, including allowing a vacuum to be created in the Middle East by pulling troops out of Iraq and failing to intervene in Syria.
Russian President Vladimir Putin also moved to exploit the vacuum by seizing Crimea and moving into Ukraine, but the United States reacted only with words of outrage, not by giving Ukraine any defensive weapons, Lieberman said, and then Putin then moved on to Syria to bolster its weakening leader, Bashar al-Assad, which also met with a weak U.S. response.
"In too many places in recent years, the United States has treated its adversaries as essential partners to be courted, while dismissing or denigrating its historic allies and partners as inconveniences or obstacles to peace," said Lieberman.
