Messages for the world

The second inauguration speech of Barack Obama was, in my view, a clear message to America, not to the world. The reelected president in fact broached all the sore points that worry today’s US society – from the traditional headache of medical insurance to the weakening and even diminution, as a result of the economic crisis, of the middle class, the bulwark of American prosperity.

Obama’s message, which is important not only for the US, but also for the entire world, including Ukraine, said that “a decade of war is now ending and an economic recovery has begun.” This only confirms the opinion that the economy is the main challenge to US security today. At the same time, it was a relief to hear the US president admit that maintaining security and peace does not necessarily demand endless wars, so the US will try to settle all disputes with other countries peacefully – “not because,” to quote Obama, “we are naive about the dangers we face but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear.” What else can these messages mean? They can mean that, in Obama’s second term, his diplomacy stands a chance to really become the triumph of diplomats rather than of military or intelligence officers, as was the case before (especially with respect to the countries with which the US had the gravest problems), and “hard power,” once a very popular instrument of influence in Washington, may finally remain as an anachronism in US politics and fully leave the field of maneuver to “soft” or, at least, “smart” power.

Yet, judging from Obama’s speech, it would be wrong to claim that renunciation of war is a synonym to isolationism redux. The reelected president made it quite clear that the US would remain “the anchor of strong alliances in every corner of the globe… and support democracy from Asia to Africa; from the Americas to the Middle East.” It is not a mere coincidence that Asia was mentioned in the first lines – this very region is to be the president’s top foreign policy priority during his second term, and Obama himself has ample grounds to become the first really Asian president of the United States.