Editors’ note: this is the first of a series of monthly columns written by Dr. Dr. Harlan Ullman, a recognized American authority on national security whose newest book, Finishing Business----Ten Steps to Win the Global War on Terror, will be published this October. We have asked Dr. Ullman to be deliberately provocative in writing these columns as the best way of stimulating debate and reaction in Japan and among our readers. The title of the column “Owls and Eagles” is taken from his regular column in the Washington Times and is derived on the basis that an owl is far smarter than a dove and that an eagle is much more powerful than a hawk, a play on the American phrase “hawks and doves” that too often is used to characterize policies and people with excessive simplicity.
The war in Iraq ended over a year ago, at least as far as deposing Saddam Hussein and replacing his regime. The questions are whether or not the world is a better and safer place because of that short war and what is likely to happen in the Greater Middle East, beyond the fertile crescent of ancient Mesopotamia. Now, with Saddam gone, is there any chance of a broader peace being put in place? Or has the war created the makings of a “perfect storm” that brings new violence and danger to the region and to the world at large, a chaotic situation in which geography and distance can no longer protect even far away states such as Japan?
Grounds for optimism are not obvious. Broadly defining the Greater Middle East as a region bounded approximately by the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, extending through the oil rich states on both sides of the Persian Gulf and ending in the Bay of Bengal and the Indo-Pakistani conflict, this “crescent of crisis” is the likely source of the greatest dangers and threats to peace, security and the prosperity of much of the rest of the world. Hence, virtually every state in the world has a stake in what happens and what does not in the Greater Middle East.
Let us start this journey in the middle---examining the consequences of the war and the peace in Iraq---and work out too both eastern and western extremes of this crescent of crisis. That the world is a better place now that Saddam is in custody and out of power is indisputable. That the world is safer or more secure is another matter.
The administration of President George W. Bush asserts that the war in Iraq has made the world safer by cutting a link between Saddam, weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and terrorist groups such as al Qaeda. Failure to uncover any WMD and the absence of linkages between the old regime and terrorist groups have harmed the administration’s arguments, perhaps fatally. And bringing peace, security and stability to Iraq has proven more difficult than the White House assumed.
To some, safety, admittedly under Saddam’s reign of terror, has been replaced by chaos and violence under what is meant to be moving towards democracy in Iraq. While in a theoretical sense, Iraqis are better off with Saddam and his secret police out of the way, Iraq is not necessarily safer or even more prosperous. And there is no guaranteed timetable as to when democracy will take hold and the violence, unemployment and other obstacles to leading a civilized life will be partially or largely removed.
Indeed, Iraq may have provided for Islamic extremists, an ideal hunting ground for attacking both foreigners and Iraqis as a means of showing to the rest of the world the strength of these ideological and religious movements. If Iraq is not made safer and more secure in the near term, meaning the next year, it is very possible that a civil war or partition of the country among Shia, Sunni and Kurdish factions will occur. If either of those cases happens, then the quest for imposing democracy in the Greater Middle East as the best means for ending the violence will fail. That failure will not be without consequence.
The situation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict grows grimmer. The assassination in March of Hamas’ leader and religious icon, the elderly and wheel chair bound Ahmed Yassin, will provoke reprisals on the part of Palestinians and other terrorist groups. The killing of a significant number of Israelis in a terrorist attack would provoke an even more powerful retaliation by Israel, greatly escalating the growing spiral of violence. And, if an indictment against Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on charges of corruption were forthcoming, Sharon would be required by law to relinquish power until the allegations were resolved. The likely replacement, former Prime and Foreign Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, is even a harder liner than Sharon suggesting that Israel’s counter terror policies would not soften.
The result is that further violence is inevitable. The only question is the level and whether some catastrophic event could explode. This means that there is no chance of the situation calming. With presidential elections in the United States in November, no administration seeking a second term will heavily invest its scarce political capital to advance a peace in the Middle East until after the voters have decided who will lead the United States. With oil prices heading up and reports of OPEC cutting production further, the cost of energy will be a brake to economic growth such as Japan is finally experiencing. Hence, economic consequences of the violence are real.
There is a small light and the suggestion of an “end to the tunnel” that has defined the India-Pakistan dispute over Kashmir and other issues for the past six decades. The meetings between the two heads of state and the recent cricket matches were very positive signs of improved relations. Given the religious and political differences as well as the crisis over Kashmir and the presence of nuclear weapons in the arsenals of both states, defusing this longstanding conflict is crucial. Such improvement will strengthen Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf’’s hand against Islamic radicals, loyal to al Qaeda and other groups that are out to depose any non-fundamental regime, an outcome that would prove catastrophic to world security if it happened.
From a perspective that affects Japan, the current situation in the Greater Middle East is precarious at best and potentially catastrophic at worst. Further rounds of violence in Palestine and Israel are inevitable. The rising price of oil is almost certainly going to induce drag on economic growth. With the transfer of power and sovereignty to a still undefined new and unelected Iraqi government on June 30th, uncertainties will make restoration of peace, stability and prosperity exceedingly difficult.
Against this pessimistic assessment, the looming presidential elections mean that U.S. involvement in anticipatory as opposed to reactive actions to deal with these events are extremely unlikely. The next seven months until the elections will prove worrisome and probably stressful. But the larger questions are what happens in the next and subsequent years in redressing issues that are growing in complexity, consequence and challenge to our ways of life and standards of living.
JIME center.All rights reserved.