Could the Obama administration in its second term be making a series of Middle East policy mistakes even more expensive and destructive than those the Bush administration made in its first? That is admittedly a high bar, but the trends are unsettling to say the least. The region is unraveling and American policy is in deep disarray. Our strategic options are getting worse, and the stakes are getting higher. When former President Bill Clinton is warning that his successor risks looking “lame” or like a “wuss” or a “total fool,” it’s a safe bet that the Kremlin and Tehran aren’t impressed by White House statements. Meanwhile the Obama administration seems to be locked into a sterile, short-term policy approach driven by domestic considerations; it is following the path of least resistance to a place that in the end will please no one and is increasingly likely to lead to strategic disaster.
An insightful article by the Democratic-leaning Bloomberg columnist Jeffrey Goldberg offers a deeply unsettling view of a Syria foreign policy process gone off the rails. If Goldberg has the story right—and he usually does—Secretary Kerry and the bulk of the White House security team want the President to authorize a no-fly zone and other strong measures in Syria, in part because they fear that American dithering in Syria is empowering the hardliners in Tehran and that by avoiding a small war in Syria now the White House risks a much uglier confrontation with Iran not all that far in the future. But the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs wants nothing to do with it, pointing to the difficulties and costs of the military mission. (One suspects that playing a role in this skepticism is military suspicion of a civilian leadership seen as indecisive and ready to order missions without providing the political backing necessary to bring the public along. The military fears—with some reason, alas—that the same White House that ordered it into action on day one would deep six the mission on day ten and throw the blame on the brass if things didn’t work out and the public wanted to bail.)
As Goldberg tells it, the biggest problem for the administration is that its early aggressive, poorly judged rhetoric that Assad “must” go now makes it impossible to avoid Obama’s looking like an irresolute bluffer if the Butcher stays put. This is the conclusion, anyway, that both Russia and Iran will draw, and they will respond by pushing the US along other fronts as well.
This is an entirely self-created problem; there was absolutely no objective reason for the administration to lay those markers on the table. There was no requirement in America’s foreign policy that the administration bounce in with the categorical demand that Assad step down.
But at the time those statements were made, the administration was focused on making the humanitarian hawks happy and looking tough and resolute. Making empty threats and promises about Assad looked like the easy course of action and so the administration lightly and foolishly made commitments it had no ability or intention to keep. This is the kind of mistake that a lot of presidents make early in their first term; most second term presidents wise up and stop creating unnecessary problems for themselves.
Apparently dissatisfied with just one way of narrowing its options and making itself look foolish and weak on Syria, the administration then set down another marker: chemical weapons were a “red line,” said our President in a headline grabbing statement, apparently, was uttered in haste and is now being repented at leisure.
Syria would be a difficult problem under any circumstances, but it has now become a dangerous, no-win blind alley because of politically opportunistic bluffs that the White House made for political effect.
Meanwhile at VM, we are beginning to worry that there are now no good options left in Syria. Intervention looks increasingly like it would lead to a nasty quagmire; we supported it at an earlier stage before things had unraveled to their present point but are increasingly convinced that the situation in Syria has deteriorated so much that there is not a lot the US can do that would help. The current policy appears to be to feed the rebels just enough arms to keep the civil war grinding on, further polarizing Syrian society and promoting the rise of fanatical jihadis with ties to rich backers in the Gulf. Victory for Assad, even partial victory, would leave the administration in the position of having its bluff called and standing revealed as an incompetent blowhard on a major world political issue. Russia would gain credit throughout the region and the world for forcing Obama to fold, and Iran’s prestige would grow as Obama’s wilts.
We’ve always thought the outcome in Syria would have an important bearing on the negotiations with Iran. The mullahs (and the Kremlin) may now increasingly feel that they are dealing with the second coming of Jimmy Carter and will be more likely to push toward the nuclear red line now that they see just how weak the response is to crossing the chemical red line. And they will also feel that the hesitation, dithering and palpable desire to avoid ugly confrontations at all costs in Washington give them a license to push back at American interests and use every twist in the diplomatic process to further damage US prestige.
Feeding those attitudes in Tehran makes war more likely across the region. It will lead the Saudis and others to step up their support for the rebels in Syria and radical Sunni forces elsewhere. The White House may think that its choices in Syria are now about as bad as they can get. If so, it is wrong. The current US policy of blustery rhetoric and weak gestures in support of the rebels is almost guaranteed to exchange already bad choices for even worse ones.
Meanwhile, as we’ve been trying to warn readers here at VM, the accelerating economic slide in Egypt could be creating an even bigger Middle East mess than the destruction of Syria. The Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt is failing on every front, but the political opposition looks as divided and incapable as ever. There is a kind of surface calm in Egypt these days, but bad times are coming. The Islamists look likely to cling harder to religious ideology as the situation gets worse in the hopes that hungry bellies can be filled by religious slogans. If this goes on, Egypt could wind up where Pakistan is, with a weakening government, rising violence, and greater polarization. Big protests are scheduled in Egypt for June 30; the food is running out.
We don’t see many signs that anybody—not the Arabs in the Gulf, not the Europeans, not the US—has any idea what to do about Egypt’s death spiral, but the consequences for regional security (as well as European security, if it produces hordes of refugees) could be even greater than the consequences of the Syrian madness. The administration does not seem to recognize just what kind of superstorm is taking shape in a region that has been vital to global economic and political stability since the Second World War. Caught between an aggressive Iran, a disintegrated Syria and a collapsing Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq are unlikely to remain serenely at peace—and the world oil supply is unlikely to be undisturbed.
The combination of grave and growing dangers in the Middle East with a lightweight policy response in Washington is genuinely frightening. We have no doubt that the administration wants a peaceful and stable Middle East that is moving toward greater democracy and greater respect for human rights. We share its desire to see this happen without massive US intervention. But the evidence is mounting that America’s present course in the Middle East is leading to a very bad place; real trouble looms unless the administration can begin to engage in a much more serious and thoughtful way.
This administration appears to start from the assumption that the only really bad thing that can happen to the United States in the Middle East is that we can get sucked into its wars if we aren’t careful. It’s an understandable error given what happened to George W. Bush, but it is an error nonetheless. The worst thing that can happen to the United States in the Middle East is that the Persian Gulf melts down and the oil flow stops, wrecking the global economy (and, despite our healthy domestic supplies, our own), bringing down the world financial system, causing mass unrest in country after country, and creating a messy situation in which a variety of ugly and expensive US interventions are absolutely required. The administration has been zealously guarding against the Little Satan of unnecessary involvement in a regional war while ignoring or even facilitating the rise of the Great Satan of full-blown regional strategic disaster. Its poor handling of an escalating series of regional problems is increasing the chance that those problems will cascade into a major global crisis.
We aren’t there yet, but the pace of history is accelerating in the Middle East the way a river begins to gain speed as it approaches a waterfall. It is still possible to steer ourselves to shore, but it is getting harder and harder to do so. Meanwhile, we should never forget that many other countries depend on America’s ability to safeguard the flow of oil from the Gulf. They are watching our policies very carefully, and as they lose faith in our ability or our will to do the job, their interests will compel them to actions on the world stage that Americans will not like.
[Obama photo courtesy of Getty Images. Assad photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons]
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