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http://fortune.com/2016/10/22/middle-east-isis-syria/
FORTUNE INSIDERS INTERNATIONAL
What the Middle East Needs
Now from America
Commentary by: Thomas J. Barrack Jr.
OCTOBER 22, 2016, 9:00 AM EDT
DAMASCUS, SYRIA. MARCH 13, 2016. People in a Damascus neighborhood, an area liberated when a
ceasefire agreement between the Syrian Army and the rebels controlling the district came into effect on
February 27, 2016. Valery Sharifulin/TASS (Photo by Valery SharifulinTASS via Getty Images)Valery
Sharifulin — TASS/Getty Images
For decades, the U.S. has pursued misguided policies.
At pivotal moments in our history, America has courageously
concluded that a central tenet of its foreign policy, conceived with the
best intentions, simply isn’t working. Hard though it’s been for this
proud and mighty nation to admit failure, trading a losing strategy for
a fresh course has brought such triumphs as the Nixon-Kissinger pacts
with China that isolated the Soviet Union and helped to end the Cold
War.
Today, America faces just such a reckoning in the Middle East. Our
objective is clear: halting the spread of terrorism that’s headed for our
shores, threatening mass murder in our suburban shopping malls, city
tunnels, and crowded parks. With the Middle East in chaos—as though
a raging desert sirocco is destroying all sense of order––the US should
make a radical, historic shift in its outreach towards the Arab world.
Given the reluctance of America and its Western allies to launch a
military offensive, it’s impossible to know when peace will be restored.
But right now, while the battles rage, the US can take decisive
diplomatic steps to stem the poverty and despair that makes the
Middle East a breeding ground for radical Islamic terrorism. America
should forge alliances with a new generation of Arab leaders whose
principal goal is improving the daily lives of their people. Providing
jobs and raising hope among the region’s impoverished youth is the
best protection for the world’s wealthy nations, from America, to
Europe, to the Arabian Peninsula.
Once peace is restored, the US should take the lead in establishing a
21st century “Marshall Plan” of economic aid to durably lift living
standards in the Middle East’s poorest areas.
So what went wrong? For decades, the U.S. has pursued a misguided
policy I’ll call “embrace and abandon.” It started with the “embrace:”
recruiting and financing leaders who were blatantly autocratic, yet at
the time qualified as America’s allies. Then, the U.S. invariably
exhorted these strongmen to champion revolutionary democratic
reforms in the name of “nation building.” Yet the newly-installed
regimes owed their existence to denying freedoms that would rally
dissidents to overthrow them. So the democratization America
encouraged was doomed from the start.
Then came the “abandon.” Time and time again, when the
governments America had nurtured and praised faced resistance or
rebellion, Washington deserted their leaders, citing the popular excuse
that their repressive measures were enslaving their own people.
Supporting leaders when they kept the Middle East stable, then
dumping them when they failed to adopt Western ideals, was a
blueprint for disaster. And it’s disaster that ensued. Many of those
strongmen––from Mubarak in Egypt to Gaddafi in Libya––have
fallen. Once dominated by repressive but stable nation-states, vast
swaths of the Middle East are now borderless, a hodge-podge of
territories controlled by warring factions that’s a throwback to its
tribal past.
The search for a solution to this chaos requires a clear understanding
of how we got here in the first place.
For centuries, the Ottoman Empire had neutralized the historically
rooted sectarian divisions within Islam. Those divisions stem from its
ancient political legacy as a “caliphate,” a religious state with united by
military might, but with constantly shifting borders. Following the
Ottoman collapse after World War I, European colonial powers
assumed the role of regional administrator, and colluded to redraw
boundaries (i.e. Sykes-Picot) in the Middle-East to create nation states
that satisfied competing Western interests. Those newly-created
nations, occupying territories defined by legal borders, ignored Arab
history and tribal custom. Modern Western notions of distinct nations
bound together by geography, language, self-determination or political
ideals been relevant in the Arab world. To Arabs, tribe and religion
always trump an imposed political structure, especially the Westernexported
concept of the nation-state.
Following World War II, as European colonialism waned, the US
assumed a more significant role in the Middle East. US foreign policy
was driven primarily by oil interests, the protection of Israel and
resistance to Soviet aggression. To prevent the region from dissolving
in sectarian conflict, the US established a series of autocracies. The
campaign included restoring the Shah of Iran to the throne after the
democratically elected Mosaddegh regime nationalized oil fields, and
supporting for the Baathist overthrow of the Qasim government in
Iraq, which gave rise to Saddam Hussein.
Following the end of the Cold War, America’s foreign policy gravitated
toward nation building, and the widespread promotion of democracy
and human rights abroad. However, an iron fisted policies the
strongmen imposed to remain in power conflicted with the moral
endeavor to curate democracy afar. Hence, America’s crusade
undermined its original goals by threatening the same autocratic
regimes the US had helped establish.
As the leaders the West once championed are toppled one by one, the
boot-prints of Western Power are clearly visible. Regimes once
supported by the US have fallen, marking the failure of embrace and
abandon. In Egypt, Mubarak was in, then deserted. In Iraq, Hussein
was in, then deposed. In Libya, Gaddafi was in, then overthrown with
US support. In Syria with Assad, it was the same scenario. The
instability created by contradictory Western interests has invited far
worse atrocities by the new regimes than the crimes perpetrated by the
previous order. The massacres in Syria and Iraq are obvious, bitter
examples.
Filling the void are a multitude of warring sectarian groups from ISIS
to Syrian rebels. The factions each generally fight under their own flag
of political Islam. The rise of Islamic factions battling for territory is a
legacy of the Iranian revolution that established a state rooted in
religion.
Now, nearly four decades old, the Revolutionary Guard’s rise to power
remains the catalyst for Islamic sectarian division today, releasing
forces of fury once confined first by Ottoman rule and then by US
dominance in the region. The threat to Arab nations and the West that
ensued is the same as that led by the Ottomans: the spread of a radical
Islamic caliphate based on religion, not country. In Iran, this is credo
is championed by the Revolutionary Guard and an Ayatollah who
lectures two billion Muslims that he is an infallible ruler directly
responsible to God. US diplomats are faced with an impossible
balancing act: limiting nuclear proliferation and, at the same time,
firmly standing against the religious intolerance fanning Islamic
terrorism.
The outbreak of these historically opposing forces, compounded by
declining oil prices, is heightening the ferment.
The Arab World’s best hope is the rise of a new generation in
government. In the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, brilliant young
leaders are crafting forward-looking policies to effectively forge a new
Middle East. American foreign policy must persuade these bold
visionaries to lean West rather than East. This endeavor will not
simply benefit the nations they lead. It’s the most effective strategy to
safeguard America’s interests. By supporting their anti-terrorism
platforms abroad, America enhances its anti-terrorism policies at
home.
Like Asian rulers who launched the Tiger Economies of the mid to late
20th century, these new Arab leaders are searching for policies aimed
at economic and educational development. Those policies are designed
to reduce internal tensions and secure their countries’ rightful place in
a future dominated by global trade. The fate of America’s Middle
Eastern allies, as well as its own foreign policy interests, hinges on
these reform efforts. These leaders need and deserve active, engaged
US support. Yet America’s recent retreat from the region, following
clumsy attempts at nation building, has destabilized and discouraged
its allies.
Iran is supporting militias in Iraq, Syria and Yemen whose stated
purpose is to eradicate Israel. That threat may create what has been a
previously unthinkable alliance between our Gulf Cooperating Council
partners and Israel. It’s in the interest of all these allies, including
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Palestine, other GCC members, along with Israel,
to join forces. That alliance would provide a countervailing balance to
the Revolutionary Guard in Iran, the ISIS caliphate and the aggressive
aspiration of Turkey, which is further fueled by a renewed Russian
push.
The competition for a caliphate has more contestants than just Iran,
including ISIS, of course, as well as Turkey, and the Muslim
Brotherhood. As the US withdraws, Russia is taking its place as the
non-Arab power player in the Middle East. The chill in US-Russia
relations has left President Putin free to defy Washington. Without
predictable US-support, our allies may have only one direction to turn
as Russia capitalizes on every USA misstep in the region.
The emerging alliance between Putin and Turkey’s Erdogan has
evolved in perfect Kissingerian fashion; sovereign relationships can be
as ephemeral as their counterparties’ interests. And now that Russia
and Turkey seem to have a growing relationship, a counterbalancing
alignment needs to be crafted between the GCC and the Arab nations.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been our longest and strongest ally
and, to many Westerners’ amazement, it is impossible for the US to
move against any hostile Islamic group anywhere in the world without
Saudi support. Almost two billion Muslims look to Mecca and Medina
as their spiritual heartland and challenging any faction of Islam
without the support of its guardian, Saudi Arabia, would be foolhardy.
The Saudis are reliable defenders of the West’s diverse interests in the
region, and have been America’s principal ally in the Middle East for
more than seventy years. The confused notion that Saudi Arabia is
synonymous with radical Islam is falsely based on the Western notion
that “one size fits all.” Fundamentalists supporting the Islamic State in
the Kingdom violate the rule of law at home, and the Saudis’ strong
efforts to prevent the export of terrorism. Saudi senior leaders desire
good relations with the West and see the Islamic State and Jihadist
terrorism as threatening to their very rule. Through the safeguarding
of the Holy Cities of Mecca and Medina, which remain open to tens of
millions of foreign visitors and differing Islamic beliefs, the Kingdom
has a unique window into the actions and motivations of radical
fundamentalists who pass in and out of those always accessible cities.
By sharing that intelligence, the Saudis greatly enhance America’s
security.
Like it or not, the military option most unpopular with America’s
voters and politicians may be its best. Bashar Assad may well be our
only hope in fighting the various terrorist factions that are attempting
to form an ISIS state. If America agrees that putting boots on the
ground would be impractical and ineffective, then a self-governed
“Syria State” must be the entity that reaches settlements with the
various factions that are causing the mass migration of thousands of
Syrians to Europe, the USA and elsewhere. The only solution is one
that works with Russia and not against them. Our vacuum forced that
hand, because we are no longer the lonesome superpower shaping
Middle East foreign policy.
When the USA had a narrow set of interests during the Cold War era,
acting prudently in favor of well-defined and communicated
objectives, its actions were more effective. But as the objectives
changed, and America attempted to democratize autocracies, the
broadening of goals led to a corresponding weakening of results. A
clear direction in the Middle East is imperative, not just to enhance
Middle Eastern nation-state interests, but to protect US interests at
home, as well as abroad.
America’s nation-building exercise of the past twenty years was
founded on self-contradictions that have tarnished US foreign
credibility. The geopolitical framework for that policy has been
“embrace and abandon,” a formula that has caused frustration,
confusion and concern to America’s allies in the region and displaced
many millions of young refugees.
As America rethinks its interests in the Middle East, its primary
concern is the elimination of domestic terrorism. The path forward
replaces fear with hope and poverty with prosperity. Once security in
the Middle East is attained, including a negotiated peace between the
Israelis and the Palestinians, the USA must respond with an “endstate”
perspective to draw a comprehensive solution similar to the
Marshall Plan. Going from promoting then dumping dictators to
drawing a new manifesto for economic rebirth would mean that
finally, the America is finally doing right in teeming, oil-rich desert
lands where it did wrong for decades.
Thomas J. Barrack Jr. is an international private equity investor and
the founder and executive chairman of Colony Capital. He is also
foreign policy and economic advisor to GOP U.S. Presidential
candidate Donald Trump. The views expressed in this article are his
own and do not reflect the campaign.