2010 may turn out to be a similar year of destiny. In 2009, the United States gave Iran at least four deadlines to stop its nuclear program. All were ignored. Does an emboldened theocracy believe this now is the year to become nuclear and change the entire strategic makeup of the Middle East?
For much of 2009, the Obama administration boasted that it would shut down the Guantanamo Bay terrorist detention facility, despite having no final idea of where or what to do with all the detainees -- many from terror-infested Yemen.
We renounced prior notions of a "war on terror." We reiterated that the now-quiet Iraq war had been a mistake. We apologized to the Islamic world for purported past American sins, while inflating Muslim achievements.
After months of hesitation, in Janus-fashion we both announced we were sending more troops to Afghanistan and promised to start soon bringing them home. We reached out to Putin's Russia at the expense of our democratic Eastern European allies.
All of this has not been lost on Islamists. In general, al-Qaida interprets our outreach as a sign of moral weakness. Since 9/11, more than one-third of all terrorism-related incidents in the United States occurred in 2009 alone. Maj. Nidal Hasan's murderous rampage at Ford Hood, and al-Qaida's foiled Christmas Day effort to blow up a jet over Detroit are just precursors of what to expect this year.
Meanwhile, the cash-flush Chinese have not been idle. This year they will continue to use their vast budget surpluses to expand their armed forces -- as skyrocketing debts in the years ahead force us to curtail our own.
With America engaged in two wars, and drowning in trillions in debt, our Asian allies are already starting to take their respective measures of Barack Obama and the Communist cadre in Beijing. Expect allies like Japan, Philippines, South Korea and Taiwan to begin to make regional accommodations with a rising China -- while distancing themselves from a floundering and confused U.S.
In 2010, our year of decision, events may come to a head and overwhelm the existing American-led global order unless President Obama can galvanize Western allies to meet the mounting danger.