Tag: Yemen
Neutrality of sorts
The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) hosted a discussion on March 11 about how Pakistan navigates the Saudi Arabia-Iran rivalry, with Alex Vatanka, Senior Fellow at Middle East Institute. He was joined by Ankit Panda, Senior Editor at The Diplomat and Karen Young, Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute.
Panda spoke about the competition of Saudi Arabia and Iran in South Asia, mainly in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Pakistan has historically sought to play a neutral role in the Saudi-Iranian conflict. It remained neutral in the Saudi-led Decisive Storm campaign against the Houthis in Yemen. The 5000 troops Pakistan sent to Saudi Arabia were intended to protect the Kingdom’s borders, not to get involved in Yemen’s war. In a bid to avoid heightened tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran following the Saudi Arabia’s execution of prominent Shia Sheikh, Nimr Al-Nimr, Pakistan tried to mediate between the two countries. While its neutrality has been successful so far, it will not prevent Pakistan, if forced to pick sides, from supporting Saudi Arabia over Iran, which was unhappy with Pakistan joining the Islamic Military Counterterrorism coalition (MCTC) led by Saudi Arabia.
Looking at the relationship from an economic perspective, Young claims that Saudi Mohammed bin Salman (MBS)’s visit to South Asia targeted mainly India and China, not only Pakistan. In Islamabad, he had two goals:
- to strengthen military relations and build a regional anti-terrorism coalition;
- to gain access to nuclear technology.
Pakistan exports light weapons to Saudi Arabia and benefits from a Saudi loan of $3 billion for oil and gas supplies. More than two million workers from Pakistan and Bangladesh live in Saudi Arabia. Before his visit to Islamabad, Saudi MBS released 200 Pakistani prisoners.
Vatanka gave an overview of Iran’s perspective on the MBS visit to Pakistan. Pakistan’s neutral position since the eighties between Saudi Arabia and Iran is calculated to avoid fighting with the Arabs against Iran. Islamabad does not criticize what Iran is doing in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen or object to its recruitment of fighters from its population, which is 20% Shia. From the Iranian perspective, MBS’s visit entailed animosity towards Iran. But it produced more noise than substantial results. Unlike Saudi Arabia, Iran can not do much to help Pakistan in terms of arms, money, or foreign policy. Tehran and Islamabad have talked for twenty-five years about their pipeline connection, which is yet to be completed.
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The state of State
President Trump’s FY2020 budget cuts the foreign affairs budget by 23%, while significantly boosting the Pentagon. The cut is mostly from Overseas Contingency Operations (wars and post-war stabilization and transition), which is zeroed out. Trump expects America’s future wars to be fought entirely without the civilian component that helps to fix the damage after the military is done. Yemenis, Libyans, Syrians, Somalis, South Sudanese, Ukrainians and others can expect little or no civilian assistance once their wars are over, if Trump gets his way.
The Administration also anticipates no need for international disaster assistance and a small fraction of what was spent in the past on refugees and migration. Big percentage cuts also hit the already very small National Endowment for Democracy (almost 2/3, to $67 million and change) and United States Institute of Peace (almost 50% to $19 million), which both engage in trying to prevent wars and in post-war efforts stabilization, the former by promoting democracy and the latter by promoting conflict resolution.
This presidential budget has little practical significance, since it will be dead on arrival in Congress, but it signals the Administration’s priorities all too clearly: it intends to continue to overuse the military instrument and to forget about civilian contributions to the projection of American power. Conventional diplomacy of the embassy/cocktail party type is not cut. In fact, the “representation” budget for that activity is increased. You wouldn’t want your big campaign contributors not to get reimbursed for entertaining foreigners. Trump is saying he doesn’t need state/nationbuilding, conflict prevention, post-war stabilization and reconstruction, countering violent extremism, refugee protection and repatriation, and response to emergencies abroad. In short, all the most pressing needs of the past two decades and more.
He is not alone in thinking we can ignore civilian commitments to national security. A good part of America believes Washington spends more than one-quarter of the national budget on foreign aid, apparently because they think it includes military spending abroad. If I thought that, I’d want to cut the foreign affairs budget too. In fact the non-military figure is around 1%, counting not only foreign aid but also all operations of State, AID and related agencies, including international organizations. I’ve had people tell me the reason we have a big national debt is foreign aid, which in fact accounts for an infinitesmal portion of it.
Congress fortunately has been fairly supportive of foreign affairs in recent years. The one virtue of this presidential proposal is that it is guaranteed to arouse opposition. Most members travel abroad and know what embassies, consulates, aid workers, and other civilians do. Most Americans do not, despite my efforts. At least 64% of Americans do not have a passport and therefore do not travel abroad or care much about what happens there, though they believe the U.S. should play a strong international leadership role. I imagine the Congress will save the day, as it did last year, and restore a lot of the funding the President would like to cut. Leadership depends as much on civilians as on the military.
Restoring the foreign affairs budget will depend however on a broader budget agreement, since sequestration will come back for 2020 if there is none. Trump will not want that, since sequestration would cut Defense back 13%, instead of the increase he is proposing. So yes, there is likely to be a compromise. But getting there will not be easy.
The state of State is weak, and getting weaker.
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Doha impressions
I’ve been slow to write my impressions of Doha, where I spent four days last week after four days in Riyadh the week before (my impressions there are reported here). It’s fitting though that I should publish on Qatar the very day that its soccer team won the Asian Cup, defeating Japan 3-1 after triumphing in the semifinal 4-nil over arch-nemesis United Arab Emirates (in addition to beating Saudi Arabia).
The Qataris are riding high, at least in their own estimation and not only on the soccer field. They have more than survived what they term the blockade by Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt imposed in June 2017. After an initial panic that emptied grocery stores, cut off family and other personal ties with compatriots, and caused a sharp fall in central bank reserves, the Doha government triggered a successful emergency response planned since the 2014 flare-up of their frictions with the Saudis and Emiratis.
The costs have been high, but the plan stabilized the situation and enabled Qatar to take advantage of its natural gas-derived wealth to make alternative arrangements and also begin to stimulate domestic production to replace imports. People recount the story of flying in 3000 cows for milk production with smiles on their faces. Saudi food supplies, which dominated the market before the “blockade,” are no longer missed.
Relations with Iran and Turkey have improved. Turkey is often credited as having prevented a Saudi invasion early in the Gulf crisis by deploying 3000 troops. The massive US air base at Al Udeid is seldom mentioned, but Qataris clearly treasure their close relations with Washington. Outreach around the world to other countries has grown. Qataris regard the Gulf crisis as a “blessing in disguise,” a phrase heard repeatedly. It compelled Qatar to diversify and strengthen its ties around the world.
The result is pride and allegiance, including (from my limited contact) among the 90% of the population that is expats. Qataris and foreign experts think the government has done well and that the country’s star is rising. Portraits of the Emir, once ubiquitous, are still much in evidence, despite government instructions to remove them. World Cup 2022 preparations are said to be going well. Criticism of labor conditions on the many construction projects has declined, as accidents have proven much less common than some had predicted. The $6-7 billion of direct World Cup spending is only a drop in the bucket, as the government is building another $200 billion or so in new infrastructure. That’s on top of already lavish spending over the last two decades.
The ideological underpinnings are not, of course, democratic. Qatar is an autocracy that does not permit political organizations of any sort. But a lot of people we talked with are convinced that the traditional system of tribal consultations enables the top to hear from the bottom and the bottom to register its discontents. There is talk of elections this year or next for a newly empowered Shura Council, which now issues legislation on behalf of the Emir. But there are also concerns that elections will give the largest tribes dominance that the current system does not permit, thus reducing the diversity of voices and narrowing the political base of the monarchy.
Why did tiny, non-democratic Qatar support the Arab Spring and in particular the Muslim Brotherhood? The most common answer is that Doha supported the political forces it thought Egyptians, Syrians, Yemenis, Tunisians, Libyans, and others wanted. It has dialed back on that support and blocked private financing of radical groups, monitored by the US Treasury.
Doha claims to be a strong supporter of economic and military integration through the Gulf Cooperation Council, whose work has been disrupted. But Qataris want to conduct an independent foreign policy, not one dictated by Saudi Arabia or least of all by the UAE, which is believed to still resent Qatar’s choice to remain independent and not join the other sheikhdoms. Bahrain is the paradigm for what the Qataris do not want: a country forced to follow in the Kingdom’s footsteps wherever it goes.
What about Al Jazeera, the TV news channels that spare only Qatar and not its Gulf neighbors from criticism? Qatar’s neighbors view Al Jazeera Arabic in particular as promoting rebellion and extremism. At least some Qataris are willing to contemplate modifications in editorial policy, but all assume Al Jazeera is not going away, as the Saudis and Emiratis would like. Though said to be privately owned, it is under the government’s thumb and can be reined in when and if need be.
At times in Doha and Riyadh, I felt I was in a hall of mirrors: both claim leadership in modernizing the Arab world, both see the Gulf conflict as a struggle over what one Saudi termed “seniority” in the region and many Qataris termed Saudi/Emirati “hegemony.” In both Saudi Arabia and Qatar these days conservatism is bad, diversity is welcome, dialogue and consultation are promoted, and freedom to organize political activity is restricted. These are absolute monarchies with the deep pockets required to buy their way into the 21st century.
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Pompeo pontificates
Secretary of State Pompeo took the occasion of his speech in Cairo today to assert what few in the Middle East believe: that the US is a force for good in the region. Offering little evidence for this assertion that would be convincing to anyone but Middle Eastern autocrats, he instead focused on criticizing the Obama Administration.
He criticized it for failing to respond adequately to Sunni extremism, to the Iranian crackdown on the Green Revolution, and to Bashar al Assad. He also praised President Trump for destroying the Islamic State (ignoring completely Obama’s role in that fight) and for bombing Syria when it used chemical weapons (to little effect). The message was clear: American foreign policy is going to be unfailingly partisan. No more non-partisanship at the water’s edge. That’s for sissies.
Iran, Pompeo suggested while vaunting his evangelical credentials, is evil. He reviewed the full array of US efforts to counter Tehran, ignoring US withdrawal from the nuclear deal and its negative implications for relations with Europe and its impact on America’s credibility in future nonproliferation efforts. He ignored the lack of progress in getting Tehran to renegotiate the agreement, which is what he has been pleading for.
While acknowledging President Trump’s decision to withdraw from Syria and underlining that Middle Eastern partners will need to do more, Pompeo reiterated America’s maximal demands without considering the means available. The US won’t provide assistance to Syria until Iran withdraws and a political transition is irreversible. He also challenged Hizbollah and Iranian dominance of Lebanon, promised to work for peace in Yemen, and pledged an agreement on Israel and Palestine.
As Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass put it,
.
@SecPompeo articulated ambitious goals-to expel every last Iranian boot from Syria, to reduce Hizballah’s missile arsenal, to help build an Iraq free of Iranian influence-while backing reduced US presence in the Middle East. No policy can succeed with ends and means so divorced.
In concluding, Pompeo claimed that the US had never been an oppressor or empire-builder. That betrayed a serious lack of education on American history, especially in the Western Hemisphere, and insensitivity to how Washington is viewed in the Middle East, where US interventions are often viewed as imperial. Pompeo pledged allegiance to all the autocrats of the region except Iran’s and ignored even the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. How should Middle Easterners who want more open societies and freedom of expression feel about that?
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Trump is right
Donald Trump said earlier this week about the Middle East:
Now, are we going to stay in that part of the world? One reason is Israel. Oil is becoming less and less of a reason because we’re producing more oil now than we’ve ever produced. So, you know, all of a sudden it gets to a point where you don’t have to stay there.
This is more sensible than 99% of what the man says, even if I think Israel can more than take care of itself. But the main reason for US military deployments in the Middle East is oil, which is far less important than it was in the 1970s and 1980s. That is what prompted President Carter’s 1980 pledge to defend the flow of oil from the Gulf:
Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.
President Carter’s Doctrine was a response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which he feared presaged a thrust towards the Gulf. The Soviet Union is gone, Afghanistan is a mess, and the US economy is now far less dependent on oil imports and energy of all sorts than it was in 1980. The Gulf oil producers, especially Saudi Arabia, are far more dependent on oil exports, which they send predominantly to Asia, especially China, Japan, India, and South Korea.
The US nevertheless spends about 12% of the Pentagon budget on protecting the flow of oil from the Gulf and holds a Strategic Petroleum Reserve of well over 100 days of imports, thus protecting our principal economic competitors from the effects of an oil supply disruption while they free ride on our preparations. It is true of course that an oil supply disruption would also affect the US economy, since oil prices are set in a global market and US consumers would feel the price hike in imports of goods of all sorts. But changed circumstances should affect burden-sharing: we need to do less and other oil consumers need to do more.
There are other ways in which the Middle East merits lower priority for American foreign policy. Middle East terrorism now has little impact on Americans both at home, where right-wing attackers are far more common than Islamic ones, and abroad, where relatively few Americans have suffered harm, most of them either by sheer accident or by travel into known danger zones. Nuclear proliferation is still an issue, but mainly a self-inflicted one due to American withdrawal from the nuclear deal with Iran, which is far from the giant threat the Administration is portraying it as. Even if that were not true, American deployments in the Gulf are far too close to Iran for war-fighting purposes. We would need to move them farther away in order to use them in an attack.
The problem is that withdrawal from the Middle East is as problematic as intervention there. That is what President Obama demonstrated. His restraint in Libya, Syria, and Yemen left vacuums filled by jihadis, Iranians, and Gulfies. The results have been catastrophic for each of the states in question. Intervention by middling powers without multilateral authorization and on one side or the other in a civil war is known to have little chance of success and to prolong conflicts. Where the US re-committed its forces in Iraq, whose state was in far better shape than those in Libya, Syria, or Yemen, the results were far more salutary, even if not completely satisfactory.
Part of the problem for the US is lack of diplomatic capacity. American diplomacy has become far too dependent, both physically and strategically, on military presence. Military withdrawal requires a diplomatic posture that can be sustained without the troops. Many other countries by necessity have learned the trick of hitting above their military weight with diplomatic capacity. Witness an extreme example like Norway, or a less dramatic one like Germany. These are countries that lead with their diplomatic and economic clout, not with their troops, ships and planes.
There has been to my knowledge no serious discussion of the difficulties of withdrawal and how they can be met. Part of solution lies in beefing up the political, economic, and cultural capacities of American diplomacy. But withdrawal will remain perilous anyplace a legitimate, inclusive, well-functioning state does not exist. Statebuilding has gotten a really bad name from the interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it remains a vital component of any effort to reduce US commitments abroad. About that, both Trump and Obama have been wrong.
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Divided
The midterms confirmed what we all knew: the United States remains sharply divided. Democrats won the House, though without the landslide Blue Wave they had hoped for. Republicans held the Senate, with a few gains for which President Trump will take credit (and may even declare a Red Wave). Democrats would have won many more seats in the House were representation proportional to their votes. But gerrymandered districts give the Republicans a boost in seats that is greater than their votes.
Winning the House is a big deal. Democrats will now have the power in the House to convene hearings and subpeona witnesses in order to investigate Administration malfeasance, which has been endemic. But Republicans will continue to approve Trump-appointed judges and other officials in the Senate. Legislation will be difficult for both parties. The next two years may amount to little more than a prolonged and painful campaign for the presidential election in 2020.
The House Democrats are expected to lean against continuing support for the Saudi/Emirati war in Yemen, against Vladimir Putin’s various efforts to project power, and against war with Iran and other American adventures abroad. Those positions may get some headlines, but the Administration can still do pretty much as it wants, unless Republicans join with Democrats in passing legislation to back up their preferences. The President retains control over foreign policy.
House investigations of the Administration may produce the most important results from these midterms. If, as many of us suspect, Trump real estate ventures have relied heavily on Russian money-laundering, that will come out. So too will any “dirt” the Russians may have on Trump. The Special Counsel investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, which would have been in peril had the Republicans retained control of the House, is likely now the least of Trump’s worries.
The Democrats are still fighting an uphill battle. There are some important races undecided, including Stacey Abrams’ bid in Georgia to become the first black woman to be elected governor. But both Beto O’Rourke, the Democrats high hope for Senate in Texas, and Andrew Gillum, their strong candidate for governor in Florida, lost. They can be comforted by a string of victories in the Midwest and Pennsylvania, where court-ordered redistricting undid Republican gerrymanders.
The election confirmed that Trump now owns the Republicans. Those who wholeheartedly backed Trump on the whole won. Those who tried to distance themselves from the President generally lost. With the retirement of several Republicans who were occasionally critical of the White House, Trump is set to command his party with little to no opposition. He will be emboldened, not chastened.
So divided we are, a bit more than the day before yesterday. I doubt we will fall, but we won’t exactly stand either. America divided is America unmoored. The consequences aren’t likely to be good.
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