Tag: United States
Where diplomats earn their pinstripes
Hillary Clinton’s visit today to Egypt this weekend is one of those awkward diplomatic moments: she has to convey to all concerned that the United States backs a democratic transition whose fate is contested between the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) and President Morsy, who spent a lifetime as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. That would be the SCAF’s arch enemy for many decades.
For now, the SCAF seems to have won its tug-of-war with Morsy over the future of the parliament Egypt elected last winter. The President has accepted the court decision to dissolve it. This leaves the democratically elected Morsy with little power, as the self-appointed SCAF has arrogated to itself legislative authority and fenced off the military and its budget from presidential decisions.
But it is the SCAF that is vital to America’s most important interest in Egypt: maintenance of the peace treaty with Israel, which Morsy and the Muslim Brotherhood have criticized for a long time. They are likely to seek changes in its provisions and have threatened to subject it to a referendum, which it could well lose. Morsy can also be expected to be friendlier to Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood affiliate that now controls Gaza, than the Americans or the SCAF will like.
No wonder the Secretary of State waxed eloquent on the need for dialogue as she made it clear that the United States expects the SCAF to give up its governing authority and return to a security role, presumably one subordinated to a democratically elected president. She meets with Field Marshall Tantawi, the SCAF’s chair, tomorrow. Rarely have American values and interests been more obviously in conflict. This is where diplomats earn their pinstripes.
The transition in Egypt is a mess. It is no longer clear how and when the new constitution will be written, or how and when the SCAF will surrender its legislative powers. Morsy is so far president in name only, though he has a good deal of popular legitimacy. It is no doubt awkward for the Americans to be helping a Muslim Brotherhood president to pry the powers of his office from a military establishment they have long supported and funded. But that is the only route to a decent outcome in Egypt.
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Iraq and its Arab neighbors: no port in the storm
Speakers painted a bleak picture of a lebanized Iraq, weakened by internal divisions and unable to craft coherent regional policies, at a Middle East Institute event today.
Ambassador Samir Sumaida’ie, former Iraqi ambassador to the United States, likened contemporary Iraq to a leaking ship, barely floating on the regional political waters as storms rage all around. The Ambassador bemoaned the lack of support for secularists after the American invasion and lambasted American support to Iraqi Sunni and Shi’a Islamists. This policy worsened sectarianism. The United States left Iraq with a constitution that forbids discrimination on the basis of religion, but with an unwritten political pact that “lebanizes” the executive branch, with the presidency Kurdish, the prime ministry Shi’a and the speaker of parliament Sunni. This built-in sectarianism weakens the Iraqi state.
These internal divisions are at the heart of Iraq’s tepid relations with its Arab neighbors, who are standoffish, especially towards the Shi’a and Kurds. The Kurdistan Regional government conducts its own foreign policy, including a representative in Washington. The Ambassador is pessimistic about Iraq’s immediate future in the region: “it is in a crisis, but the horizon seems to be more of the same.” Only if Iraq improves its internal cohesion and mends fences with Kuwait and Turkey can it avoid being engulfed by the ongoing political firestorms raging in Syria.
Kenneth Pollack, Senior Fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institute, focused on the “brightly burning” Syrian flame. Like Ambassador Sumaida’ie, he bemoans Iraq’s internal lebanization, especially with regard to policies towards Syria. There is no coherent Iraqi policy, but rather multiple Iraqi policies toward Syria. The complex interplay of internal factionalization within Iraq’s weak state muddles its external relations, as each faction approaches the region in general, and Syria in particular, with an eye towards its own interests. The Kurds see events in Syria as an opportunity, not a threat; Masoud Barzani is strengthening ties to Turkey, trying to reassure the Turks that Kurdish interests are aligned with their own in the case of Syria. Sunni tribal leaders also see Syria as more of an opportunity than a threat: Syrian Sunnis in their view are throwing off the yoke of an Iranian-backed Shi’a minority. If it can happen in Syria, the thinking goes, why not in Baghdad? Despite some sympathy for the Syrian opposition, Iraqi Shi’a associated with Moqtada al Sadr are still wary of developments there, which threaten a regime aligned with Tehran. Prime Minister Maliki fears spillover from Syria that may damage Iraqi stability and security. This multiplicity of Iraqi approaches to Syria is driven by internal Iraqi political divisions, and is emblematic of the larger foreign and domestic policy problems facing Iraq.
Gregory Gause, professor of political science at the University of Vermont characterized Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy toward Iraq as passive. The Saudi view of Iraq and the Maliki government is negative, because they view the prime minister as an agent of Iran. The Saudis have done little or no outreach to Kurds or Iraqi Shi’a, and even with the Sunnis they have made no real appeal to Arabism. Saudi policy toward Iraq is a policy of complaint, not outreach. Saudi elites are focused on what appears to them a losing struggle for influence in the Middle East against Iran. This struggle for influence in the region plays out not through armies, but through contests for influence in the domestic politics of weak Arab states. The Saudis find Sunni allies, and Iran finds Shi’a allies. This sectarian alignment is counterproductive for the Saudis, because it gives Arab Shi’a in the region no choice but to ally with Iran. Ultimately, this will cause long-term problems for Saudi Arabia, Iraq and America, as it creates an atmosphere where al Qaeda type ideas can flourish. Other GCC states have largely followed Saudi Arabia’s lead.
John Desrocher, Director of the Office or Iraq Affairs at the Department of State focused on the positive, in terms of Iraq’s relations to its regional neighbors: Iraq and Kuwait have made “considerable progress in terms of resolving disputes,” relations with Jordan have improved, Saudi Arabia named an ambassador to Iraq for the first time since 1990, and Qatar airways now flies to Iraq. However, internal political divisions in Iraq have led to “real political gridlock” both in terms of domestic policy and regional relations.
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Hang together
There is something special about celebrating July 4 in Tripoli. This is a country that made a revolution only after 42 years of dictatorship. Watching it prepare for elections July 7 is thrilling, even to an old salt. I’ll miss the reading of the Declaration of Independence on NPR this morning, especially this portion of the stirring preamble:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
These are the founding principles of the American republic. I am not by nature a proselytizer. I think everyone should find their own form of government. But if you start from these principles, it is hard–pretty much impossible–to come to other than democratic conclusions.
All the revolutions of the Arab spring have to some extent been inspired by similar thinking, but the Libyan and Tunisian ones more than others have been able to fulfill the hope of throwing off absolute despotism. Egypt experienced something more like a creeping military coup than a revolution. Yemen is enjoying, if that is the right word, a negotiated transition. Syria is lost in a civil war. Sudan (Khartoum) is seeing only the first stirrings of discontent. Bahrain has put the genie back in the bottle, for the moment. Other Gulf states have bought off and repressed their protest movements.
It is hard to fault those who decide the weight of oppression is too great to claim the dignity inherent in the idea that all men (and women) are created equal and endowed with inalienable rights. But if you believe that the premise is true, it is difficult not to want to support those who do decide to take the risk.
In the Libyan case, support came in military form, in response to a threat the dictator posed to Benghazi. But it is a mistake to believe that this is the only form of support, or even the most effective one. It is hard for me to imagine how military support to the Syrian rebellion, short of full-scale intervention well beyond the level in Libya, will do much more than widen and worsen the violence. Someone may get lucky and kill Bashar al Asad, but even then his Alawite sect and its allies will likely continue to fight a war they believe is “existential.” Thinking that way likely makes it so. It is easy to understand, and impossible to justify, their self-protective abuse of power.
Syrians and others engaged in the fight against tyranny would do well to remember Benjamin Franklin’s injunction at the signing in 1776:
We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.
May we all hang together.
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Libya and Egypt are not in the same place
It will strike some as strange to write about Libya on the day Egypt’s new president takes the oath of office, but the contrast is instructive.
Oil- and gas- rich Libya had a violent revolution that swept away Muammar Qaddafi’s one-man dictatorship and has proceeded more or less on schedule with a transition roadmap laid out almost a year ago. Virtually 100 per cent Muslim and predominantly Arab, Libya has big problems with armed militias and many local conflicts but little in the way of organized national resistance.
Egypt, a far larger, poorer and more diverse country with limited natural resources, underwent a largely peaceful revolution (violence came mainly from the regime) that forced out President Mubarak but failed to sweep away a highly institutionalized military autocracy. Egypt’s political roadmap has changed many times in the past year and a half, so much so that Marc Lynch has satirized the process as #calvinball. Experts can’t agree whether Egypt has even yet begun a democratic transition. With lots of help from the Supreme Constitutional Court, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has been very much in charge, though it now faces a serious challenger in President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood.
None of this means that Libya will necessarily come out all right or that Egypt won’t. But the odds are in that direction. A lot depends on Libya’s election July 7, which I’ll be observing as a Carter Center monitor. Voting for real for the first time in more than 40 years, Libyans will be choosing an assembly (called the National Public Conference in English) with two main tasks: to select a committee to write the country’s new constitution and to name a government that will replace the National Transitional Council, the oft-maligned, self-appointed body that has steered Libya’s revolution for the past year and a half. Scheduled for drafting within 120 days (recently extended from 60), the constitution will then be approved (or disapproved) in a referendum, followed by new elections. This is a sensible sequence, even if the schedule remains tight. There is some discussion of whether the draft constitution should be sent to the assembly before the referendum.
By contrast, Egyptians have already elected a president, whose powers are uncertain because the military has continued to issue obiter dicta. While many of us assume these will be decisive, a great deal depends on how the tug-of-war between democratically elected president and judicially empowered military officers comes out. Nor is it clear how the constitution will now be written. The SCAF claims to have arrogated to itself legislative authority, dissolving a parliament elected only a few months ago in more or less democratic polls but declared illegitimate by a court mouthing what the military wanted said. It is completely unclear when a new parliament will be elected, or even when the next presidential election will be held.
Libya’s big challenge is to stay on track. The militias are the greatest threat to doing that, so it is important that the new assembly and government make more progress than the NTC has on dissolving them. If they become entrenched, or aligned with political forces, a revolution that seemed to be headed in the right direction could be pulled seriously off course.
Egypt’s big challenge is to find where the right tracks that lead to serious democracy lie. It is hard to believe that either the military or Morsi acting alone will find them. But the interaction between the two, guided in part by the Egyptian courts, may have a better chance. I suspect the Americans are also playing a role in pushing the military to turn over real authority to the civilians, but Morsi’s advocacy yesterday of freedom for a terrorist convicted in a U.S. court may make them hesitate. Admittedly, Morsi is navigating in difficult waters. He’d better learn quickly where the shoals lie.
Libya is freer of external constraints, but in some sense just as fraught with its own internal difficulties, on a far smaller scale than Egypt. What can a single American election observer hope to contribute in such a situation? Not much. Local observers who know the terrain and the people, never mind the language and culture, are likely to have a far bigger impact. But having a few of us around in Carter Center shirts may provide some top cover for Libyan political parties and nongovernmental organizations to be bold in insisting on good procedures in preparation for the polling, on election day and in the subsequent counting. Most newly democratic regimes would like a seal of approval, not a Bronx cheer, from the foreigners.
This is also an opportunity for me to sniff the atmosphere in Libya nine months after my last visit, when I returned more hopeful than I had been previously that Libya was on the right track. Circumstances in post-war and revolutionary places change rapidly. The security environment is nowhere near as permissive as it was last September, when I ran along the quay in Tripoli. I am most interested in talking with ordinary Libyans: what do they think about what they’ve wrought? Are they longing for a return to a strongman, as many Iraqis seem to be doing, or are they determined to forge ahead in the democratic direction? Do they have confidence in the electoral process? Will they view the results as legitimate, even if the results aren’t what they prefer? What are their priorities, and how do they think their needs can best be met?
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Keep quiet and send money
Yesterday’s discussion of Egypt moderated by Freedom House’s Charles Dunne and sponsored by the Middle East Institute at the Carnegie Endowment was way more optimistic than many, but not convincingly so.
Hafez al Mirazi of the American University in Cairo was the most upbeat. He is pleased that the revolution’s secularists joined forces with now President-elect Morsi in a civilian front intending to oust the military from power. This alliance will continue until the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) hands over power. Morsi, two of whose children are American citizens, is intending to bring a broad spectrum of people into his government. SCAF will have little influence, beyond the power to declare war. But then a few minutes later he admitted that the SCAF and the “deep state” (not further defined) will be a corrupting influence. There is a lot to be done to ensure accountability, including investigation of the secret police and publication of archives.
Khaled Elgindy of Brookings was less upbeat. The liberal consituency that brought about the revolution is now fragmented. None of its components seems to be capable of a good “ground game” among the Egyptian people. Morsi will try to maintain good communication with Egypt’s Christians, but he needs to go beyond tokenism if he is going to win them over. There is a real need to strengthen the judiciary and rule of law, including transitional justice. But it is unclear how strong the commitment to accountability of the old regime is. There is a palpable reluctance to dig up the past. Economic development and security may take priority. The “deep state” will persist, opening up to newcomers and trying to preserve its privileged hold on economic resources.
Nathan Brown of George Washington University was somewhere in the middle. The West has gotten used to the idea of Morsi as Egypt’s president and support has been more forthcoming than anticipated. The Americans have gotten the reassurance they need on Israel; the Europeans have gotten what they need on human rights. The problem for Morsi is lack of resources. The naming of a Christian vice president will be seen as a big and controversial step by the Muslim Brotherhood, but it won’t count for a lot with the Christians if it is tokenism. Morsi’s primary concerns will be security and the economy. The stock market rose 15% on his win, but he will have to sort out priorities among the Brotherhood’s economic directions: social justice, sharia compliant finance and liberal “Washington consensus” policies. The courts, which have played a major role in the transition so far, will now have to tussle with a democratically legitimated president. SCAF influence in the courts remains substantial, with individual Supreme Constitutional and administrative judges beholden to the army.
Tellingly, the three presenters gave different answers to the question whether Egypt was really in a democratic transition, or not. Hafez al Mirazi said yes, of course. Morsi represents the revolution, which is now beyond the violent stage. Khaled Elgindy said no, it has not yet really started. Only now with Ahmed Shafiq’s concession of defeat can a real transition begin. Nathan Brown thought there had certainly been a move towards democracy after the fall of Mubarak, but the process is unclear and losing momentum.
On the U.S. role, the advice was the same as I used to give alumni when I was an undergraduate: keep quiet and send money. That’s going to be hard to sustain unless there is clearer evidence that Egypt is moving in a direction the West finds acceptable. Morsi’s vow today to seek freedom for Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is serving life in prison for conspiracy to blow up the World Trade Center eight years before 9/11, is not going to endear him to Americans.
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A lot depends on your priorities
I did a quick writeup of Senator McCain’s appearance yesterday at the Middle East Institute Turkey Conference, which is posted on their website this morning (thank a spam filter for the delay):
Senator John McCain was uncharacteristically subdued in a key note address yesterday to the Middle East Institute/Institute of Turkish Studies conference on Turkey. He prodded President Obama to be more outspoken in denouncing the Assad regime and advocated a “safe zone” inside Syria along the Turkish border, but only in response to a question. He discounted the likelihood of NATO action, which the Europeans oppose, and suggested that the U.S. and Turkey should form the core of a coalition of the willing to support the Syrian opposition with arms and training.
The Senator opened with a denunciation of the Syrian downing of a Turkish jet, calling it an unnecessary and unacceptable act of aggression. But then he turned quickly to focus on Turkey’s positive evolution into a more inclusive and representative democracy experiencing strong economic growth. He also noted troubling developments: Turkey’s jailing of journalists, its prosecutions of army officers and the deterioration of its relations with Israel.
The U.S., McCain said, should give wholehearted military and intelligence support to Turkey in its fight against Kurdish terrorists (the PKK). But the bilateral relationship should broaden its focus to free trade, military modernization, missile defense and strategic cooperation in Afghanistan, the Arab Spring and other contexts where democracy, human rights and rule of law are at stake. Turkey, he said, sets a standard for democracy in Muslim countries and is an attractive example to many throughout the Muslim world.
McCain appealed for stronger U.S. leadership in speaking up for the people of Syria and countering Russian and Iranian support to the Assad regime, which includes both arms and personnel. A “safe zone” on the Turkish/Syrian border would provide the fragmented and unreliable opposition with a place where it could coalesce. This would require intervention from the air (as in Bosnia and Kosovo) but not, he thought, boots on the ground (forgetting of course that on the “day after” U.S. troops were needed in both Bosnia and Kosovo). Asked about the Annan peace plan that provides for a peaceful transition, McCain reacted with disdain, saying that Bashar al Assad would have to be forced out.
The current situation, McCain emphasized, is not acceptable. Sectarian violence is on the increase, as is exploitation of the situation by extremists. It will only get worse if the U.S. fails to lead. It is not even leading from behind at this point. It is not enough for the White House to say that Bashar al Assad’s fall is inevitable. We have to make it happen.
McCain acknowledged American war weariness but underlined the moral imperative to speak out and to act. Absent from his remarks was consideration of the impact of American and Turkish air attacks to create a “safe zone” on Russian support for the P5+1 negotiations with Iranian on its nuclear program and on the Northern Distribution Network that supplies NATO troops in Afghanistan. Those who think Afghanistan and Iran should have priority in American foreign policy won’t go along with the Senator, almost no matter what Bashar al Assad does to his own people. A lot of what people think should be done in Syria depends on what your priorities are.
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