Michael Totten has an interesting piece in World Affairs on American involvement in the Middle East. Given the geopolitical significance of the region, the US doesn't have the luxury of being able to sit back and wash its hands of the whole lot. Each country presents different challenges, though.
He looks in particular at three cases: Egypt, Libya and Syria. With Egypt, he concludes, there's nothing to be gained from further US aid. Just walk away. Libya, on the other hand, is potentially the most US-friendly country in the area (the US, after all, was always an enemy of their tormentor Qaddafi), and it's makes every kind of sense to help ensure that the place doesn't become a breeding ground for Islamists.
Syria, finally:
Syria is the last country we can afford to ignore right now, even though large numbers in both parties—for perfectly logical reasons—are averse to doing anything more than shuddering at a distance.
But what happens there is our business because it affects us. Syria isn’t Belize. It matters who runs that country, and it matters a lot.
Bashar al-Assad’s regime is the biggest state sponsor of international terrorism in the Arab world, and it’s aligned with the Islamic Republic regime in Iran, the biggest state sponsor of international terrorism in the entire world. Obviously, then, it’s in our interest to see him defeated.
One of his principal enemies on the home front, though, is the al-Qaeda–linked Nusra Front. Obviously it’s not in our interest to see these bin Ladenists replace Assad....
[T]here are those who say let them kill each other because, as Daniel Pipes argues, it “keeps them focused locally” and “prevents either one from emerging victorious.” It brings to mind Henry Kissinger’s famous quip about the Iran-Iraq war. “It’s too bad they can’t both lose.”
The operative word in Kissinger’s sentence is “can’t.” Opposing sides don’t zero each other out. That’s not how wars work, or end. Wars end when somebody wins.
The worst-case scenario from an American point of view is that they both win. That’s an actual possibility. Syria could fracture into pieces. In a way, it already has. An Alawite rump state backed by Iran, Hezbollah, and Russia existing alongside a Sunnistan ruled by Islamists could very well emerge as a semi-permanent reality of Middle Eastern geography. At the very least, the United States needs a policy that reduces the likelihood of that most horrible outcome.
A few months ago, I asked the Lebanese MP Samy Gemayel what he thought about Washington’s confusion in Syria. “Before you can know what to do,” he said, “you have to know what you want.” One way or another, we should want both Assad and al-Qaeda to lose. But they aren’t going to lose simultaneously. They’ll need to lose consecutively. One of them first has to win.
So fight and defeat Bashar al-Assad, or support someone who will do it instead. Then fight and defeat the Nusra Front, or support someone who will do it instead.
Or face the fact that one or both are going to win. If the Nusra Front wins, we’ll have an Afghanistan on the Mediterranean. And if Assad wins, he could end up under an Iranian nuclear weapons umbrella.
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