Is Obama high-handed with European friends?

Vladimir Putin, prime minister of Russia, was in Gdansk on Tuesday, making friends and influencing people. He was in Poland to attend ceremonies that marked the time and place where the Second World War started on Sept. 1, 1939.

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Adolf Hitler attacked Poland and three days later, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany. A week after that, Canada, Australia, South Africa and the rest of the British Empire joined the struggle against Nazi tyranny. Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union’s brutal leader, was Hitler’s partner in crime. He attacked Poland on Sept. 17. Burying this nasty history appears to have been part of Mr. Putin’s purpose in Central Europe. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama, who famously "reset the button" on relations with Russia, stayed home, coping with the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan, his most pressing problem. On the home front, he is absorbed with fulfilling his national health insurance promise, a "yes, we can" pledge that can make or break his presidency. I imagine Warsaw was fully aware of Mr. Obama’s pressing obligations and nobody seriously expected him in Gdansk. What Poles and their government did expect, though, is a respectful stand-in, like Vice-President Joe Biden or Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, rank-appropriate among European leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Mr. Putin, Francois Fillon and Silvio Berlusconi, respectively prime ministers of France and Italy, British Foreign Secretary David Milibank, and Greg Thompson, Canada’s minister of veterans affairs. Top-level dignitaries from all over Europe and beyond were in Gdansk. Mr. Obama, however, decided to stiff the occasion and that is already showing up as a foreign policy blunder that Moscow may seek to exploit and Washington can ill afford. Mr. Obama promised to restore America’s tattered image abroad, repair strained relations with allies and friends, and provide openings to foes in search of solutions to old conflicts. On the foes front, Mr. Obama is doing rather poorly. An offer of direct talks with Iran has, so far, produced only insolent foot-dragging from the mullahs ruling in Tehran; and there is nothing to write home about from North Korea. Friends are a different matter — and Poland has been America’s most steadfast friend in Europe for the last 20 years. Friends lose interest, start looking around if always taken for granted and slighted, as Poland was in Gdansk. Here’s what happened. Warsaw sent out invitations three months ago. Washington answered five days before the date, informing that former secretary of defence William Perry would represent Mr. Obama. But Mr. Perry is not anywhere near the Obama administration. He is a private citizen, having retired from public life some years ago. Any serious White House official would know that sending him to Gdansk would be badly received in Poland and read in Europe as a signal that Mr. Obama doesn’t give care about half of Europe. I find it hard to believe that was Mr. Obama’s intention. He may be unskilled in foreign affairs — and that’s not a criticism, but merely a fact flowing from his experience in state-level micro-politics and just one term in the U.S. Senate. But national leaders are expected to have intelligent advisers — and have trust in their advice. That, I suspect, is where the dog is buried. It may be over-the-top, but unfortunately, the Meg Greenfield "government by zombie" question comes to mind. "Have you considered the chilling possibility they are telling the truth?" she wrote about the Clinton administration in 1997, two years before she died. Bill Clinton’s advisers coined two slogans worth recalling: "It’s the economy, stupid!" and "Foreign policy? What’s that?" The Obama White House finessed the Gdansk envoy rancor by dumping Mr. Perry and putting national security adviser General James L. Jones in his place. But the last-minute switch at a solemn ceremony, marking the time and spot where history’s most terrible war started 70 years ago, is not washing right now. Mr. Obama promised to purge arrogance from America’s dealings with other nations. His dealings with Poland, a friend and a NATO ally never shirking to fight, as in Afghanistan right now, suggests the opposite. In June, over two dozen former national leaders, diplomats, opinion shapers and academics from East and Central Europe sent an open letter to Mr. Obama. Apprehension about the drift of American foreign policy is spreading in their region, they warned. His administration did not respond — except in anger at the temerity of questioning Washington. Is it time to consider that Mr. Obama is high-handed? He continues to point to George W. Bush as being guilty of losing friends.