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The Washington Times: US foreign policy generating global bewilderment

Politics Materials 29 January 2015 17:29 (UTC +04:00)
At a time when the direction of America’s foreign policy is generating abundant global bewilderment, policymakers in Congress and the administration must be mindful not to alienate more allies and increase doubt and distrust of America’s promises,
The Washington Times: US foreign policy generating global bewilderment

Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 29

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At a time when the direction of America's foreign policy is generating abundant global bewilderment, policymakers in Congress and the administration must be mindful not to alienate more allies and increase doubt and distrust of America's promises, according to Alex Vatanka, said the Washington Times article of a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington, D.C. Alex Vatanka.

He noted that Azerbaijan is one of those ally countries.

"Authorities in Baku are increasingly speculating about Washington's commitment to its strategic allies and its own stated values," Vatanka said. "Some of America's latest policy maneuverings, including an inconsistent and largely toothless response to Russia's actions in Ukraine, have not helped alleviate Baku's fears."

He further noted that Azerbaijan, since its independence upon the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, has considered the United States as one of its principal strategic partners.

"This conscious, but at times hazardous, choice to turn to Washington was, from the outset, rooted in a belief in American strength and hope in Washington's fairness in mediating among disputing nations," he noted. "It was a conviction that drove successive Azerbaijani governments to accept American arbitration in Baku's conflict with neighboring Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azerbaijani region occupied by Armenian forces since the end of a war in 1994."

Vatanka said that for 20 years Azerbaijan has patiently stuck to this belief in the US as the foolproof arbiter that will somehow and someday help engineer a peaceful resolution to this frozen conflict in the South Caucasus.

"Increasingly, however, the Azerbaijanis question whether the United States prioritizes short-term goals over long-term objectives of peacemaking and the upholding of key American values, including respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of nations," he further noted.

Vatanka said Azerbaijan's anxieties about Congress and the administration's stance on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict recently surfaced again following Russia's annexation of Crimea in March.

"Officials in Baku quickly grasped the possible impact of Moscow's actions on the fate of other forcefully annexed territories, including Azerbaijan's Nagorno-Karabakh region," he said.

"At a minimum, Baku had hoped that the United States would adhere to the same principles when adopting policies to deal with international territorial disputes," Vatanka added.

He went on to note that the US policymakers in Congress and the executive, however, seem more preoccupied with scoring symbolic geopolitical points against Moscow than applying international laws on the question of territorial integrity of states.

"It is one thing to pursue a muddled foreign policy that leaves US allies puzzled; it is an entirely different proposition - and with potential grave consequences for America's global leverage - when Washington's policies foster a sense of American double standards or its undependability as a partner," the author added.

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