tdaxp

The day is won. Israel has succeeded in its generational struggle with Arab National-Secularism.

Yet now the medium-term interests of the United States and the Jewish State diverge. The United States, the world's leader, desires a "rule-set reset" across the Middle East, replacing the divded and confused Arab regimes with something sustainable. Yet such division and confusion is precisely in Israel's interests, because weak and disoriented enemies cannot threaten her. In particularly, the map of Israel's near-abroad that America must strive for will naturally spook our allies in Jerusalem.

American actions not in Israel's preferred direction occurred soon after the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, and can be seen by comparing the recommendations of the seminal 1996 paper, A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm

King Hussein may have ideas for Israel in bringing its Lebanon problem under control. The predominantly Shia population of southern Lebanon has been tied for centuries to the Shia leadership in Najf, Iraq rather than Iran. Were the Hashemites to control Iraq, they could use their influence over Najf to help Israel wean the south Lebanese Shia away from Hizballah, Iran, and Syria. Shia retain strong ties to the Hashemites: the Shia venerate foremost the Prophet’s family, the direct descendants of which — and in whose veins the blood of the Prophet flows — is King Hussein.

with what actually happened

• Attempted implementation of an indigenous, secular, Shia government


• Actual implementation of an indigenous, religious, Shia government

Israel desired a restored Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq to calm the Middle East, as soon as possible. The United States desired a Shia Iraq to explode the Middle East, as soon as possible.

Such a disagreement extends beyond the failing state of Iraq to Israel's immediate neighborhood. With the internal remnants of Arab National-Secularism, the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Fatah patronage machine, in shambles, Israel's best medium-term future was a globalized Lebanon and weak (and easily blackmailed) Egyptian and Syrian regimes. Yet America's goal is continuing the 3/20 Revolution wish must include replacing the Arab National-Secularist governments of Egypt and Syria with the Muslim Brothers. The Global War on Terrorism requires replacing dysfunctional worldly rule with Islamic Law.

Sharia's modernizing track record in the Middle East is positive, National-Secularism's is negative. Don't believe it? Compare the religiosity of Egyptians and Iranians. Compare the strength of Egypt and Iranians.

In a recent post, Tom Barnett wrote:

And yes, forcing us all to live together in connectedness (known today by the moniker of globalization) will force a tremendous amount of change on both those who welcome it (by all indications, the bulk of the populations throughout the Gap) and those who revile it (a small minority who will fight these changes to the very end, and yes, for them, the conflict will be "genocidal" in that they will not survive it).

In that conflict process, which I believe is both inevitable and good, it will be harder before it gets easier, but putting off the hard part only ensures greater conflict and death totals down the line, because if integration isn't achieved, colonial mercantlist-style economic transaction patterns will predominate, as will local authoritarianism and failed states, and the death totals associated with those pathways will (as they do today) dwarf the death totals of integrating conflicts (and if you don't believe that, then you are woefully ignorant of what's happening every day in Africa right now).

The challenge before us is not one of deciding "yes" or "no" to this historical process. That train left the station a generation ago when the East decided to join the global economy.

The only question that remains is how we rise to this challenge. How we get smarter about how we wage both war and peace.

To pretend that the choice lies between war and peace is self-delusional, just like pretending we must choose between globalization-the-integration-process and globalization-the-disintegrating/reformatting-process. Life is simply not that binary.

Israel, being only a state, is too weak to influence systems and instead must play for time, merely surviving into her surroundings are magically improved. But America is a system-level power, and America has the power to change the nature of Israel's surroundings.

It is by bringing 3/20 to Cairo and Damascus that we can truly prevent another 9/11. Redirect the violent feedback of the National-Secularists to the National-Secularists. Bring the rage of crooked Arab economies to crooked Arab states. Shrink the Gap by destroying-in-detail the National-Secularism that helped expand it.

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A New Middle East, a tdaxp series
A New Middle East 1: Our Vanquished Enemies
A New Middle East 2: Iran
A New Middle East 3: Israel
A New Middle East 4: Islam is the Answer

"Al Qaeda's Grand Strategy," by Tigerhawk, Tigerhawk, 31 March 2005, http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2005/03/al-qaedas-grand-strategy.html (from Glittering Eye).

After the Iraqi elections, I blogged President Bush's olive-branc to the Muslim Brotherhood. It is important that the Muslim Brethren be allowed to contest Egyptian elections fairly. If they are engaged as a democratic organization, the Jamiat al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun will begin the integration of significant portions of Egyptian society with the rest of the world. Else, the Society of Muslim Brothers could revert back to terrorism.

I'm not alone in this belief

How do al Qaeda intellectuals explain what has happened in Afghanistan?

“They do not explain this well. This is why I think we will win in the long run. There are some things they do not think well about. They don’t trust the average Muslim. They do not have a good example. Whenever something bad happens to them, they say ‘The situation is clarified.’ They always say this. They also do not think very clearly about the sectarians. They are going to lose in Iraq because their message is not attractive to the Kurds and the Shiites."

How is this going to play out in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood is advocating democracy?

“There is a difference between the Muslim Brotherhood and the radicals. It is kind of the tap root of these organizations, but it is not itself radical. Al Qaeda hates the Brotherhood, because it operates within a nationalist framework, which al Qaeda is very much against.”

Dr. was reportedly denied tenure by a Leftist academic department for his critical work on al-Qaeda. He isn't some dove.

Every success in the Cold War came from using nationalists against ideologues. In China and Yugoslavia we helped turn a radical ideology into a patriotic party. We can do so against in Egypt.

In the new Egyptian elections, let the Muslim Brothers run.

"Earthquake in Egypt!!," by GM, Hello From the Land of the Pharoahs Egypt, http://bigpharaoh.blogspot.com/2005/02/earthquake-in-egypt-i-never-imagined.html, 26 February 2005.

Hello From the Land is to Egypt what Iraq the Model is to mesopotamia: a great source for native, on-the-ground news and opinion. I first heard the news this morning, but GM's description speaks for itself

I never imagined what President Mubarak said today. He asked the parliament to amend the Egyptian constitution to allow multiple candidates to run for the presidency. This means that Muabark will have opponents running against him.

Now, I am not stupid nor am I living in la la land. Mubarak's decision today came after immense pressure from the US and the current earthquakes (the purple revolution in Iraq and the Hariri revolution in Lebanon) that shook the region days ago. However, I credit US pressure as the number one reason. Condoleezza Rice cancelled a trip to Egypt scheduled for next week because of the arrest of Ayman Nour and Mubarak's failure to "change". Well, it seems that Bush turned out to be bloody serious about this democracy in the Middle East thing. It also seems that Bushie will in fact make it to the history books that my grandchildren will be reading at school 50 years from today. If Syria or Iran fell, Bush can rest assured that he will add his name to the Lincoln-Wilson-Roosevelt-Reagan quartet.

Well, what do I think about all this? I mentioned before that I didn't want Egypt to rush to the ballot box. I wanted Mubarak to be pressured to open up the civil society of Egypt so that alternatives to his rule start to pop up. We simply do not know better and we needed time in order to see the alternatives and decide who is better.

Unless I am 100% sure that one of the candidates who will compete with Mubarak will be better than him, I'll probably vote for Mubarak next October whom I believe will win because of the resources he has as the country's sole authority.

GM speaks of the events of the last few days, but Bush's actions in the last few years have been even more important. The Big Bang strategy took down Saddam and ushered in Baghdad Spring. Lebanon may slip out of Syria's orbit and the big prizes of Iran and Eastern Arabia are just out of reach. And maybe we will get Egypt too!

I'm assuming Collounsbury's take will be biting, sarcastic, and informative, but for now I will be happy too!

"Mubarak, $2 Billion and Change," by Max Boot, Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-boot10feb10,0,6165289.column?coll=la-news-comment-opinions, 10 February 2005 (from Daily Demarche).

Dovetailing nicely with talk of regime transformation in Syria, this article

Strong words alone will not dislodge an entrenched dictator like Hosni Mubarak. Obviously we're not going to send the 3rd Infantry Division to achieve regime change in Cairo. How, then, is Bush going to back up his demand for democracy? Here's a modest proposal: Reduce or eliminate altogether the $2-billion annual U.S. subsidy to Egypt unless there's real economic and political progress.

Since 1975, Washington has provided Cairo more than $50 billion in military and economic aid. Initially this largess had two justifications: first, to keep Egypt out of Soviet clutches; second, to reward it for concluding a peace treaty with Israel. The first rationale no longer applies. And the second? Egypt has lived in peace with Israel, but so for the most part has Syria — and it hasn't gotten a cent from U.S. taxpayers. Arab states coexist with Israel because they have failed to destroy it, not because they've been bribed.

...

Mubarak has been an expensive but hardly a model ally during his 24-year reign. His most recent outrage was the arrest on Jan. 29 of Ayman Nour, head of the liberal Ghad party, on trumped-up charges of forging signatures on a petition. Mubarak's economic ineptitude is also a given. The Egyptian economy, with its high unemployment rate and low growth rate, recalls the glory days of the Warsaw Pact. Notwithstanding recent reforms, no serious liberalization is likely as long as U.S. subsidies prop up the status quo.

...

Given the poisonous climate of opinion fostered by the Mubarak mafia, it is little wonder that the leader of the 9/11 hijackers was Egyptian or that Osama bin Laden's deputy is Egyptian. Egypt has long been a breeding ground of Islamist extremism. Mubarak uses this to his advantage by telling the West that if he falls, the fundamentalists will take over. To forestall this catastrophe, the 76-year-old generously proposes to "run" for a fifth term this fall as the only candidate on the ballot. But there is little evidence that Islamists are popular enough to win a free election in Egypt. They have flourished mainly because little mainstream opposition is allowed. The U.S. government should be funding the opposition, not the apparatus that represses it.

What has fifty billion bought us? Not much. Cutting the flow of aid is a gentle way of removing the IV of dependency and forcing Egyptian reforms. Think of the two billion a year as seed money for the Vasco de Gama Project.