Chris Toensing
Bitter Lemons International (9/11/08)
Bob Woodward's four books chronicling the wars of President George
W. Bush are sensitive barometers of conventional wisdom in Washington.
Whereas the first volume, published in 2002 at the height of the self-righteous
nationalism gripping the capital after the September 11, 2001 attacks,
hailed Bush's self-confidence in acting to protect the homeland, the
2008 installment depicts the same man as cocksure and incurious. This
much is not news. More educational are Woodward's hints about the
worldviews that will outlast this unpopular administration, embedded
in the organs of the national security state.
Consider the words of retired Gen. Jack Keane, reported by Woodward
to have been spoken to Gen. David Petraeus in Baghdad in March: "We're
going to be here for 50 years minimum, most of the time hopefully
preventing wars, and on occasion having to fight one, dealing with
radical Islam, our economic interests in the region and trying to
achieve stability…. We're going to do it anyway because we don't
have a choice."
"Here," in Keane's formulation, was not Iraq, but the sprawling
theater of operations for US Central Command, or CENTCOM, of which
Petraeus will assume control when his tour in Iraq is over. Keane's
message to Petraeus was clear: CENTCOM, whose borders happen to coincide
roughly with those of the Islamic world, is where the action is, now
and as far as the eye can see.
While Keane is known as the architect of Bush's "surge"
in Iraq, and is a favorite of neo-conservatives and other hawks, his
ideas about US grand strategy are common across the ideological spectrum
that matters in Washington. Hardly anyone of political weight has
learned from the Iraq debacle, or the disaster in Somalia, or the
September 11 attacks for that matter, that the United States is too
heavily deployed or too bent on having its way in CENTCOM's domain.
John McCain and Barack Obama both speak of sending more troops to
Afghanistan, though Obama would remove them from Iraq first. No one
in a position to work in the next White House has advocated that the
US give up its role, inherited from Britain, as praetorian guard of
Persian Gulf oil or its more expansive mission to stamp out fires
throughout what Carter-era National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski
called the "arc of crisis." The arguments are about how
this hegemonic stance can be maintained to maximum advantage and at
minimum cost.
This is not to suggest, in crude fashion, that the existence of CENTCOM
caused the September 11 attacks and will inevitably provoke a reprise.
It is rather to say that the American strategic and political classes
are acutely aware, as never before 2001, of the importance of a "forward-leaning
posture" in the Middle East to the overall health of US superpower
status. The threats they perceive to the free flow of the region's
oil, two thirds of the world's proven reserves (as cannot be repeated
often enough), come not just from radical Islam and failed states,
but also from the grasping, and growing, giants Russia and China.
The prospects of relative US decline are to be confronted, not managed.
The Washington mandarins, of both parties, care little for international
cooperation: They believe in power, and they trust no one but themselves
to wield it.
Of course, both parties prattle, as they do every electoral season,
about weaning America off "Middle Eastern oil." But even
assuming a series of presidents with the political will and capital
to make the necessary policy changes, the task will outlive all of
their terms. Denmark, which has so many wind turbines it exports 90
percent of the electricity, still consumes vastly more oil than renewable
energy, in large part because of the automobile. The US, with its
wide open spaces and exurban subdivisions, will continue to need more
and more oil to sustain living standards at home, even as domestic
production slips and competition for control of foreign fields toughens.
More to the point, the strategic stakes in the Persian Gulf will only
heighten. Whosoever polices the Gulf safeguards the single most important
commodity for the world economy.
The peoples of the lands under CENTCOM's umbrella can hope for a smarter,
more inquisitive, less bellicose American president than the boy-king
whose bungling Woodward reveals. Such a chief executive might have
the skill to forestall the wars that Keane foresees. But, barring
the advent of a foreign policy establishment in Washington with genuine
vision and appropriate humility, the fundamentals of political economy
dictate that, in some shape or form, the greater Middle East will
remain a battleground for several Septembers to come.
---
Chris Toensing is editor of Middle East Report, publication of the
Middle East Research and Information Project.
Bob
Woodward’s four books chronicling the wars of President
George W. Bush are sensitive barometers of conventional wisdom in Washington.
Whereas the first volume, published in 2002 at the height of the self-righteous
nationalism gripping the capital after the September 11, 2001 attacks,
hailed Bush’s self-confidence in acting to protect the homeland,
the 2008 installment depicts the same man as cocksure and incurious.
This much is not news. More educational are Woodward’s hints
about the worldviews that will outlast this unpopular administration,
embedded in the organs of the national security state. Full
Story>>
The Egyptian
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time not in Egypt, but in the US. Earlier this month, an Egyptian court
convicted a prominent Egyptian-American activist for his outspoken
criticism of the regime’s poor human
rights record in American public fora. The court accused Saad Eddin
Ibrahim, of "tarnishing Egypt's image" abroad. The conviction
referred primarily to writings he published in the foreign press; most
notably among them an August 2007 op-ed in the Washington Post in which
he criticized Egypt's human rights record and questioned the reasons
behind US aid to Egypt. Full
Story>>
Militant
Islam is under global scrutiny for clues to conditions that foster
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is not in Islamic doctrine, US foreign policy or formal ties to various
nations, as many analysts have asserted. It lies at the community
level, with clan and local leaders. Full
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Kurdish
parties have become kingmakers in Baghdad , and they know it. As
no federal government can work without them, they are pulling every
available political lever to expand the territory and resources they
control, trying to build the foundation of an independent Kurdish state.
But even more than territory, they need security. If everyone acts
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debate over the war in Iraq follows a yellowing script: The minute
someone suggests that the US move to withdraw its troops, war supporters
cry “Havoc!”
True to form, when no less a figure than Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki stated he wants a timeline for a US pullout, John McCain
summoned the specter of dire consequences. “I’ve always
said we’ll come home with honor and with victory and not through
a set timetable,” McCain said. In his major foreign policy speech
on July 15, Barack Obama affirmed his support for a withdrawal timetable,
adding that the US must “get out as carefully as we were careless
getting in.” Obama’s position is the correct one, but he,
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At
the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee (AIPAC) earlier this month, presidential candidates
John McCain and Barack Obama competed over who would become the “candidate
for Israel.” The match came to a draw when both candidates
pledged undying and unconditional support for Israel. While their
support for “Israel right or wrong” was unquestionable,
at the end of all the commotion, the most pertinent question for
Americans and the world remained unasked and unanswered: Who is
the candidate for peace? Full
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