The agenda an enemy would devise, Obama makes America weaker .. By Admiral J.A.Lyons (Ret.)

The agenda an enemy would devise, Obama makes America weaker .. 

By Admiral J.A.Lyons (Ret.)

In the current overload of Obama administration scandals and strategic disasters distracting our attention, it is easy to ignore a more central truth: The Obama administration is hastening the destruction of America from within.

The latest disaster is allowing Iraq to slide into a full sectarian civil war, which when added to the other scandals that include Benghazi, the Internal Revenue Service, Veterans Affairs, illegal immigration and Ukraine, the American public’s attention is clearly on overload. As a result, not much attention has been paid to the recent meeting in Switzerland between high-level U.S. and Iranian delegates that made absolutely no progress in resolving core issues on Iran’s nuclear program. Reaching a final agreement with Iran by July 20 would now seem to be out of the question. However, with President Obama desperate to sign an agreement with Iran, nothing should be ruled out.

Mr. Obama has already made significant concessions and may make more without regard to either our or our allies’ security. With President Obama now considering how Iran can help stem the ISIS advance on Baghdad, further disastrous concessions could be made regarding Iran’s nuclear program that would have far-ranging impact throughout the region and beyond.

Key unresolved issues involve Iran continuing to enrich uranium to the 20 percent level rather than the reactor-grade level of 5 percent, already conceded by the Obama administration (instead of zero). As Fred Fleitz of the intelligence and forecasting service LIGNET has pointed out, Iran’s 5 percent enriched uranium stockpile would only take about “3 weeks longer” to reach the 20 percent enriched uranium level needed to produce weapons-grade nuclear fuel. LIGNET has also reported that Iran now has enough 5 percent enriched uranium, if further enriched, to produce up to eight nuclear weapons.

In addition to Iran’s refusal to cease development of advanced centrifuges, another key problem area is Iran’s refusal to cease work on its heavy water Arak reactor. Iran has rejected a proposal to convert the facility to a light-water reactor, though it agreed to never build a reprocessing plant to extract plutonium from the reactor’s spent fuel rods. How comforting.

Another core issue is the number of operational Iranian centrifuges. The United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and France want Iran to reduce the number of operational centrifuges from 19,000 to 6,000. Iran has rejected this plan and stated it needed more centrifuges — possibly up to 30,000 — to produce fuel for its Bushehr light water reactor. This is nonsense. In August 1995, Russia offered to provide Iran with a 10-year supply of fuel for their nuclear plant at Bushehr for only $30 million. Iran adamantly rejected this offer because Russia insisted that Iran return the spent fuel rods to Russia for reprocessing. Instead, Iran has proceeded to spend billions of dollars in constructing underground hardened facilities for a “peaceful nuclear program.”

However, this fits an emerging pattern of arming our enemies. The Obama administration’s Middle East policy is in shambles. The embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood was always puzzling since their creed is to destroy the United States from within by our own “miserable hands.” The administration’s influence on our switching sides on the war on terror cannot be overestimated. In Libya, we armed al Qaeda-affiliated militias under the political control of the Muslim Brotherhood. We are now doing the same thing in Syria with no end in sight to that humanitarian tragedy.

Libya and Iraq, both previously declared success stories by the Obama administration, are now sliding into states of civil war, primarily due to Mr. Obama’s policies. The impact on our allies — Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey — cannot be overestimated, particularly with a nuclear-armed Iran.

Our emasculated response to the Ukraine crisis has only served to enhance Vladimir Putin’s global influence. NATO, led by the United States, appears to be irrelevant. Furthermore, our feeble response to China’s imperialistic actions in both the South and East China Seas has only served to encourage our enemies to take bolder action.

Compounding this unstable global situation is the crushing debt brought about by the feckless policies of the Obama administration. It has contributed to the unilateral disarmament of our military forces, jeopardizing our national security. As a result, it has weakened our influence throughout the world. Furthermore, the illegal immigration on our southern borders, with tens of thousands of children and adults infiltrating the country encouraged by the administration’s disastrous Dream Act policy, is unconscionable.

What’s happening to America’s standing in the world is not due to incompetence, as some have claimed. This is planned. We are witnessing the Obama administration’s embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood creed, which is to destroy America from within. Congress must be responsible to take back America. Nothing less is acceptable.

James A. Lyons, U.S. Navy retired admiral, was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and senior U.S. military representative to the United Nations.