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Middle East serves US some humble
pie
By Sreeram Chaulia
Since World War II, the Middle East has been one of the most
penetrated regions in the world in terms of American
presence, influence and domination. Apart from South
America, no other area on the planet has experienced as
gigantic a footprint of the United States, stretching during
its zenith from Cairo in the west to Tehran in the east. If
great powers are prone to throwing their weight around where
they perceive vital interests, the US has done it with all
means in the Middle East for over six decades.
By imposing itself on Middle Eastern countries in a rainbow
of avatars - exploiter, peacemaker, ally, enemy, eminence
grise and occupier - the US became an arbiter of the
region's destiny. One measure of the colossal impact that
Washington had as a result is that no major diplomatic
initiative could afford to ignore "what the Americans want".
On the occasion of any significant political event in the
Middle East, it used to be commonplace to ask whether it had
an American hand or if it reflected American will. The very
axes of change were shaped by American preferences and
opposition to them. Until recently, that is.
A series of new developments raises doubts about whether the
US can still be the ultimate intersection in the Middle East
through which all roads must cross. The just-hammered
ceasefire between Hamas and Israel to halt violence across
the Gaza Strip lacked American inputs and bypassed
Washington's stated goal of marginalizing the democratically
elected Islamic militant movement.
The reason why Egypt could mediate the ceasefire without
apparent American backing is because both parties to the
conflict had confidence in the contextual neutrality of
Cairo. If Egypt had taken the advice of its American friends
and brought in American wishes through backdoor channels,
Hamas and possibly even Israel would have walked out of the
dialogue process. The hostile and punitive policies of the
George W Bush administration towards Hamas ruled out any
chance of Washington itself being a mediator or facilitator
of the negotiations.
A similar logic underlies the "indirect peace talks" being
held in Turkey between two long-time antagonists, Israel and
Syria, the first in eight years. Turkish mediation is
palatable to Syria and Israel due to Ankara's general
non-involvement and neutrality in Arab-Israeli disputes. As
the only non-Arab Muslim country in the region besides Iran,
Turkey is viewed favorably in Tel Aviv. Ankara is also
acceptable as a third party for Syria as a means of breaking
free from the American stranglehold that denies Damascus the
chance to normalize relations with so-called "moderate
states" of the region.
Turkey's mediation of the ongoing Israel-Syria entente went
against Washington's desire of isolating Damascus owing to
its closeness to Tehran. Absence of the writ of American
blessings thus did not deter either Egypt nor Turkey from
enacting constructive roles. These actions bring to the fore
the question of how unbalanced the US's patron-client
relationships in the region have grown. If Egypt and Turkey,
two staunch "friendly regimes" cultivated by the US, are
setting out on their own in ways that displease their
patron, it conveys distinct loss of American leverage.
The most startling departure of a client regime from the
American patrimonial grip is the announcement that Saudi
Arabia has signed a massive $4 billion arms deal with
Russia, breaking the American monopoly over military
hardware supplies to the kingdom. The Saudis had earmarked
$12 billion for defense upgrading this year and the
revelation that one-third of it was awarded to Russian
companies dismayed Washington to no end. The deal places
Russia in an enviable position in the Middle East as a
seller of weapons to both Saudi Arabia and Iran, a luxury
for potential future Russian mediation to manage the intense
rivalry between the region's predominant Sunni and Shi'ite
powers.
So weak is the US in its current state of dependency on
Saudi Arabia to overcome the staggering price of oil that it
could not convince Riyadh to spurn the Russian arms
manufacturers. In fact, in a bid to placate Riyadh, the Bush
administration is mooting a new civilian nuclear cooperation
agreement with the Saudis against stiff opposition from
Congress. The irony of the world's largest oil producer
being offered nuclear technology for alleged energy
generation purposes is not lost on observers.
Apart from the Russian angle, the proposed US-Saudi nuclear
cooperation is aimed at countering Iran's own obstinate
march towards nuclear power status. In the American
imagination, Washington is the stabilizer of last resort in
the Middle East. Since Iran is thumbing its nose at the US
and EU by playing hardball on its nuclear ambitions,
Washington thinks that it must stoke Saudi Arabia's nuclear
program in order to keep the "balance of terror" in the
region.
Iran's shadow also looms heavily on the US's difficulties in
getting Iraq's Nuri al-Maliki government to acquiesce in the
new "Status of Forces" agreement, which legalizes permanent
American military bases and immunizes American soldiers and
contractors from prosecution. Prime Minister Maliki's latest
assurances to Iranian leaders that he "would not allow the
use of Iraqi territory for staging attacks against Iran" are
clear signals that Baghdad shares Tehran's concerns about
prolonging the American occupation of Iraq.
Maliki's threat of asking US troops to go home at the end of
the year when their United Nations mandate expires might be
political posturing for domestic consumption, but it
certainly adds to the erosion of American traction in the
region. If one of the original intentions of occupying Iraq
was to use it as a bridgehead to topple the Iranian
government, Washington is being forced to eat humble pie.
Last, but not least, in the saga of depleting American
hegemony in the Middle East is Washington's loss of face in
last month's stand-off between Hezbollah and pro-Western
forces in Lebanon. Hezbollah emerged as the victor of the
tense showdown with the Lebanese government and bagged a
favorable negotiated settlement in a manner that rubbed the
American nose to the ground. Washington could only watch as
a bystander as Iran and Syria demonstrated that their proxy,
Hezbollah, was strong enough as a state within the state to
dictate to American-backed elements.
As was the case with Egypt and Turkey, another American ally
- Qatar - mediated an end to the worst internal Lebanese
conflict since the end of the civil war in 1990. Thanks to
its image as an honest broker, Doha was instrumental in
bringing about a crisis closure that benefited Hezbollah.
So widely appreciated was Qatar's intervention in the
Lebanese case that speculation now rages that it might be
able to pull off a rapprochement between Hamas and Fatah in
Palestine. Here too, the Americans have been working
overtime to keep the two main Palestinian guerrilla groups
divided and weakened. If Qatar or Saudi Arabia can wheedle
Fatah and Hamas into an elusive truce, it would further
sideline the US as the grandmaster that wins most outcomes
of the Middle East chessboard.
It is still early to conclude that the Middle East is the
graveyard of Pax Americana. The flow of localized negotiated
settlements could clog and return to old stalemates,
necessitating grand "roadmap for peace"-style solutions that
Washington espouses. The array of American troops and
battleships in the Middle East is quite formidable and far
from being quickly routed. Most autocratic Arab regimes are
beholden to the US for survival, another card that
Washington can bank on.
However, the paradox that the world's largest possessor of
diplomatic resources and skills has to rely on its military
machine and the loyalty of despots to remain relevant in the
Middle East speaks of how poorly Washington harnessed its
cachet under George W Bush. It is now left to a possible
Barack Obama administration to ensure that the American
voice gets heard again in the region, not due to fear of
attack but respect for its wisdom.
Sreeram Chaulia is a researcher on international
affairs at the Maxwell School of Citizenship at Syracuse
University, New York.
(Copyright 2008 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights
reserved. Please contact us about
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