Rethinking US Foreign Policy in Syria

    Is it ethical to take part in supporting one side in a foreign civil war?  I would put forward that it is only ethical on the large scale where American support would ensure a swift and efficient end to hostilities.  I lobby that the slow and tepid American support of anti-Assad factions in Syria is actually less humane than staying out of the conflict despite the tragic validity of the rebel cause.   If we truly cared about the wellbeing of the Syrians, we would have invaded the country en masse.  Instead, we have prolonged the civil war by using the rebels as a proxy fight against Russia.   Perhaps the Russian troop drawdown will impact American policy or allow for a quick resolution, but our record of answering atrocities with short and shallow speeches is not promising.  Imagine two great outside forces taking sides in the American Civil War.  Sure, each side would have welcomed assistance, but at what cost?  What if the war had lasted years longer because each time one side came close to defeat it received an influx of supplies from a third party?  What if these were never enough supplies to actually turn the tide of the war but instead felt more like a pay day loan that keeps someone who is treading water from drowning completely if only for a little while.  History would look back at this hypothetical situation with disdain and condemn the person in the boat for only throwing out a couple of children’s lifejackets when they could have reached out a hand and pulled the victim up over the side once and for all. 

    Syria needs regime change, and it needs it quickly – but if we are not prepared to push hard to make it happen we have no business prolonging someone else’s civil war.  If we continue with mild support, the currently six-year-old conflict could continue for many more.  Go big or go home should be the mantra of an American Doctrine of Compassion.  And if you believe that it is not in our interest to be majorly involved in another ground war in the Middle East at this time, the hard decision to stop trying to help must be made.  At what point does being ruled by a tyrant outweigh thousands of civilians dying in the streets for over half a decade?  After all, it is all relative anyway.  For those ideologues who will stand up and decry my position as inhumane, you must ask yourself the question: why Syria?  Are their people any more valuable than the citizens of Iran or the debacle of Libya that we so cleanly washed our hands of already?  Our foreign policy in the region is inconsistent at best and borders on whimsical at worst.  What values are we currently standing on in Syria – it certainly is not human rights.

#remembertheredline

Legalized Looting of the Less Fortunate is Never the Best Option

The government of Denmark is currently debating the controversial proposal to confiscate valuables from all asylum seeking refugees attempting to enter their country as an ad hoc form of payment for services that the Government is predicting that they will provide at an equal or higher cost.  There are several ethical problems with this proposed solution, and we must address the most obvious first.  On a base and completely amoral level, confiscation prior to any service being provided to them is misguided as a free market principle.  What services are being offered?  What guarantee will there be that these do indeed equal the value of the property seized?  A big issue relating to this is the reality that everyone will possess items of varied intrinsic value.  While some may have a cell phone and a wedding ring, others may have a case of reserve cash, precious metals, or a valuable watch.  At its heart, this socialist principle that takes everything from all to provide for the whole will only lead to corruption and distrust. 

Secondly, what hope do you have in a government for giving refuges a better life in their future if they strip them bare of anything that might have helped them get started on the road to prosperity in their new life?  This is placing the entire responsibility of their success in the hands of government officials and truly dropping everyone to the lowest common denominator rather than looking to embrace those who might contribute to society in a positive way much sooner if they had private assets with which to buy goods and services that they deem necessary.  But of course, the government would have to tell them what was necessary if they get their way.

Now we get to the heart of the issue.  This is not an effort to recover costs.  This is truly a deterrent masquerading as a tariff on humanity.  While those in America that called out for a ban on refugees were often misguided and angry, all who spoke out were vilified.  The EU has given little space for dissenters as well, so this action allows for a de facto ban on refugees that will be self imposed, all the while saving face with those who require them to keep their borders open.  If passed, this will become a big issue only if refugee quotas are enforced, and all of a sudden, thousands of refugees are assigned to go to Denmark without a choice of their own and they are robbed blind at the border.

We have seen where this leads.  History has shown us in the form of stolen artwork from Jewish homes across Europe and mountains of gold fillings in concentration camps.  This legalized covetousness will only lead to an increase in the social divide between ethnic minorities and those in power.  Ban all refugees or accept them with open arms, but do not make them purchase your salvation by stripping them of the last vestiges of their lifelong possessions.  Thievery does not become us as humans - we waste far more in political adds everyday than what you would ever hope to gain by robbing the needy.

“Mr. Obama, Tear Down this Façade:” Why the Arab Nations Hate the United States, Part 1

The year was 1967.  The world watched as the small nation of Israel went to war with its neighbors.  But in Cold War reality, the world also watched as East fought West.   However, little did everyone know that this proxy war would have so much more at stake than just territory or rights.  The end result shaped the Arab perceptions of the West and specifically the United States.   Fawaz A. Gerges,  a professor of Middle Eastern Politics and International Relations at the London School of Economics, argues that “the Six Day War had a devastating , negative impact on Arab views regarding the U.S. role.”  Perhaps more telling is Gerges’ later revelation that “as a result [of American support for Israel in the Six Day War], Arab nationalist did not trust the United States to act as a neutral mediator in the quest for peace.”¹

The year is 2012.  Anti-American violence thrives in the Middle East.  And for the first time since February of 1979 in Kabul, Afghanistan (33 years ago), an American ambassador was attacked and murdered while in office.²  Ambassador Chris Stevens died in Libya on September 11.  All the while, Washington has been operating under the auspices that the negative perceptions of the U.S. will be changed primarily by rhetoric.  However, what many people, especially those in the Middle East, have found is that rhetoric is futile if it does match a coherent policy for the region.  For many Arabs, the fact that perceptions have been set since the ‘60s makes it exceptionally difficult to change them without a radical shift in U.S. support of Israel – and it is naïve to assume anything else will serve as the magic bullet.  The situation is not hopeless, only bleak without a clear direction and vision from the top.  If we have learned anything from the history of the Middle East, it is that actions shape perception, not talk.  Clearly.

¹David W. Lesch, ed., The Middle East and the United States: A Historical and Political Reassessment, (Westview Press: Boulder, Colorado), 2003.  Gerges’ chapter is on pages 191-210.  The above quotes come from pages 191 and 204.

²Ambassador Arnold L. Raphel was actually the last sitting U.S. ambassador to die in office.  He died in a suspicious plane crash in Pakistan in 1988.  However, Adolph Dubs was the last victim of a direct attack in 1979 as mentioned above.

The US and Iran: Periphery Decay Creates Nuclear Spit-wads

Iran has clearly been a hotbed of issues for thousands of years; however, recent developments have proven that the Supreme Leader has little to no fear of outside interference. The tide has turned in such a way that rouge states have the upper-hand simply because they believe that the only viable options on the table for the UN or the US are empty threats and meaningless sanctions. With other terror threats spreading US militaries thin and wearing on home moral, Iran threatens to spit nuclear paper wads while the teacher is busy in the hall.

The single largest issue in play is the erosion of ‘Western’ supremacy. Whatever your opinion of American foreign policy, a century of dominance kept Iranian tension inside its borders (though with some local exceptions). While the US never actually had direct control of Iran, the model of periphery decay applies much the same as it does with many great imperial powers of the past. Ancient Rome began its downward slide many decades before its final ‘fall.’ A good example of this is their control of what is now much of Great Britain. When Rome was strong, they could afford to bulk up military assets on the island and wage a long-term pseudo cold-war. As tension at home in the form of infighting, poverty, and often poor leadership shifted the policy of strength and offence to one of preservation, local peoples rose to drive out the weak Roman forces along with many of their cultural attributes in an effort to restore what they felt had been overshadowed or taken from them for so many years by a foreign power. Later, the same islands saw the decline of the British Empire with the gradual independence of colonies into the mid-20th century. As Imperial power weakened, local nationals could vie for freedom (or slowly rip the decaying limbs of the empire apart, depending on your perspective).

As American power weakens – or is even perceived to have weakened abroad, there will be more nations like Iran. While the belief of American exceptionalism may still be true for some of us, President Ahmadinejad and others are no longer intimidated by the world police force that had belonged to the United States for so many years.

We Three Kings: 50 Years of Egyptian Revolution

Rarely is the ancient history of a society more engrained in the common knowledge of the world than its modern one, but this is obviously true of Egypt. If you are one of the millions of people who heard about the turmoil in the streets along the Nile and scratched your head, you are not alone. Until recently, almost no American could tell you the background of the Egyptian government and only a few more could identify its long-term leader, President Mubarak. Perhaps the 2011 Egyptian Revolution is not isolated frustration with an authoritarian state, but a continuation of a failed hope began in the 1952 Revolution that racked the same ancient streets 59 years ago.
While a constitution insuring some liberty and balance of power was installed in 1923, Egyptian governments continued to fall short of expectations and this dissatisfaction created the perfect storm for revolution in the early 1950s. When revolution finally happened, civilian governments proved unstable and a group of 9 men known as the Free Officers took charge. They ferreted out communists and extremists including the Muslim Brotherhood. (In fact, the Brotherhood has been illegal since 1954). On June 18, 1953 General Mohamed Naguib became the first president. His tenure was short-lived and ended in confusion. By 1956, Gamal Abdel Nasser officially became the second president of Egypt. The nation grew stronger and more westernized under Nasser, and this included Western styles of entitlement programs that stabilized some of the unrest. They also moved towards modernization with the building of modern infrastructure such as the Aswan High Dam as well. The apparent social advances appear to have temporarily pacified the general population but failed to address true progress and created a false hope and reliance on the state. When the government failed to deliver to the same degree, the unrest began to ripen once again.
When Nasser died in September of 1970, his VP Anwar el-Sadat took control and was officially elected in on October 15, 1970. The administration continued to focus on a secular state, angering the many religious fundamental groups despite a war with Israel that ended in a peace treaty. On October 6, 1981, Islamic extremists assassinated Sadat during a military parade. 11 others were killed including four American military liaisons. The soon-to-be fourth president, Hosni Mubarak was injured but the then vice president was elected president later on that same month. He had been vice president since 1975 and faced many of the same problems that had been tied to Sadat.
Here’s the bottom line: Since 1956, the people of Egypt have seen only three presidents – all of whom served as vice presidents for their predecessors (in comparison, the US has had 11 different leaders beginning with Eisenhower’s 1956 successful re-election bid and there have been six shifts in political party). Consequently, the three Egyptian leaders carried on the ideals of their mentors/groomers essentially creating a monolithic persona for over half a century. This pseudo monarchy seemed to work well enough when the programs of Socialized Islam provided security and peace but failed when held up to the international standard of freedom in wake of the overthrow of the Tunisian President. So, when choosing sides, ask yourself if you would be happy with the Dwight Eisenhower administration in 2011 America. Love him or hate him, Ike would have needed to adapt to fit the modern world and that is exactly what the Nasser/Sadat/Mubarak administrations indeed are failing to do. Adopted in 1971, Egypt’s current constitution extols the power of the people: “The dignity of every individual is natural reflection of the dignity of his nation, for each individual is a cornerstone in the edifice of the homeland. This homeland derives its strength and prestige from the value of each individual, his activity and dignity.” Hopefully, the country that produced the Pyramids can once again realize the value of the human cornerstone before it is too late.

(http://www.parliament.gov.eg/English/Constitution/AnnouncementDocument/)

Mistrust Thrives at the Mideast Table

The background of recent Mideast peace talks in Washington, D.C. is notably long and complicated, but few could trace it to its modern day political origins. You could credit President Carter with taking the first step in formal peace talks with the Camp David Accords in 1978 but this agreement came after decades of tension and warfare and we’ve all seen how well it worked. To find the true origin of the 20th century conflict as we know it, one must look deeper into the aftermath of the First World War. As the Ottoman Empire, based in modern Turkey, crumbled after their ill-fated alliance with Germany, the great Western powers carved up this last vestige of the classic empires of old. Both France and Great Britain hoped to gain large portions of the newly available countries rich in history, and a newly desirable product: oil.
Representatives of both nations met behind closed doors to develop an agreement that divided the Middle East into “spheres of influence.” French representative François Georges-Picot and Sir Mark Sykes of Great Britain signed the secret Sykes-Picot agreement in 1916 essentially ending all hopes of Arab sovereignty that had been dangled in front of many local fighters in exchange for their aid in WWI. (You may remember the agreement if you paid close attention at the end of the 1962 film Lawrence of Arabia). This ‘gave’ Syria and parts of Turkey to the French, and Jordan and Iraq to the British while allowing Allied control of today’s Israel. This set up the later creation of the nation of Israel in 1948, but also significantly marked the lack of concern for Arab interests by Western powers.
The hard fact is that Arab nations and peoples do not trust the West, yet we continue to hold the exclusive reigns of any peace effort bandwagon. We should certainly not give up what we believe to be the noble cause because it is difficult, but America needs to look beyond the typical methods and make an effort to bring new negotiators to the table. The unanswerable problem remains that the nation of Israel was established by mandate of the West thus usurping local Palestinian control. Consequently, Israel can never break free of this ‘buddy’ status with the West. They are hated by many pro-Palestinian groups simply for existing, and regardless of your opinion on this issue, this prejudice makes the peace efforts truly a process that America is hardly helping by continuously reminding everyone of the privileged relationship of Israel. I have no good solution here but merely an observation. If you have 4 children and chose a favorite one publically, you would hardly be the person to sit down and discuss fair justice when they all got in a fight. Palestinians believe that the Americans will always side with Israel and that they are merely being pandered to. They need to believe that their presence and opinions are valued and that we are not merely listening just to say we let them talk.