Category Archives: Wars of the Middle East

CrISIS 7.

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The war against ISIS has been small-scale, rather than a grand effort.[1]  The total American force in Iraq has slowly risen from 275 troops sent as trainers and advisers after the Iraqi Army collapsed in Summer 2014 to about 4,000 today.  American Special Forces spotters are directing American air-strikes in support of both Iraqi forces and Kurdish fighters (in both Iraq and Syria).  Others have been raiding ISIS targets and a number of ISIS leaders have been killed: notably the war minister and the finance minister.  An earlier effort at intelligence gathering (either human intelligence or signals intelligence) has led to targeted air attacks on the oil fields that provide much of the funds for ISIS and other sites.  Now, more Special Forces troops are being sent to Syria to bolster the efforts of those Sunnis who are willing to fight ISIS.  The Iraqi government forces don’t look too effective, but they are in the field and moving forward in fits and starts.

The results of this patched together strategy have been more impressive than one might think from the daily news: 26,000 ISIS fighters killed; 40 percent of the territory it once held recaptured; 3 million of the 9 million people inside the caliphate liberated; 30 percent of its revenue lost.[2]  Next on the agenda is a strike at Mosul.

That’s the good news.  What’s the bad news?  First, a large part of the explanation for the sudden expansion of ISIS in Summer 2014 lay in the political divisions, incompetence, and corruption of Iraq’s government at that time.  The US engineered the eviction of the then prime minister Maliki and his replacement by Haider al-Abadi.  However, things have not improved very much.  Corruption and division continue to plague the government.  Recently, Muqtada al-Sadr, a powerful Shiite cleric (and an old opponent of the Americans) forced al-Abadi to fire many of the government officials most deeply implicated in corruption.  In addition, the Sunni minority—whose “Awakening” greatly contributed to the defeat of the original insurgency—continue to be persecuted by the Shiite government.  All of this can impede the drive on Mosul.

Along the same lines, the Kurds have played a valuable role in the fight against ISIS, but now that success has become a problem.  The 250 additional Special Forces troops bound for Syria are intended to recruit, train, and coordinate Sunni Arabs because it is feared that the intrusion of Kurds into the area will set off ethnic conflicts that could derail the war effort.

Second, radical Islamism of the al-Qaeda-ISIS type has a widespread following in the Muslim world.  At the moment, the most troubling bastion of ISIS adherents outside the caliphate itself is in Libya.  Adherents of ISIS have been bolstered by ISIS fighters sent from Syria.  They have seized the oil port of Sirte.  They appear to be attempting the conquest of the Sirte oil region.

Third, the recent terrorist bombings in Brussels have led to reports that ISIS has sent a sizable group of terrorists to conduct operations in Western Europe.

It is natural to ask if, in the waning days of the Obama administration, victory or something like it will be in sight by the time his successor is inaugurated.  That would surely add to his legacy.  However, the continuing governmental disaster in Baghdad and the refusal of the Shiites to make a just peace with the Sunnis is a problem that is not going to go away.  The same is true of violent radical Islam.  Frustrating, infuriating, and humiliating as has been the Obama administrations course in the fight against ISIS, it is only a campaign in a larger, longer-running war.  Many of the dilemmas of engagement in this fight will plague the next administration.

[1] “The war against ISIS,” The Week, 6 May 2016, p. 11.

[2] Apparently, there is a military solution to the problem of ISIS.  The same may be true of the Syrian civil war.

World Have Your Say 1.

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Recently, President Obama stated that the failure to plan for the “day after” in Libya constituted his “worst mistake.”[1]  He does not regret overthrowing Gaddafi, but he does regret not having given any thought to what would happen afterward.

How have commentators responded?  According to the BBC’s “World Have Your Say” comment page on the story, informed opinion shapes up like the following.

The three most approved comments were:

HugoFrost remarked that “This is what happens when you “take out” leaders like this in the middle east. It leaves a huge power vacuum for terrorists to exploit.  Gaddafi, Hussein, and to an extent Assad. These were the front liners holding back a much worse fate, which is what we’re seeing in Europe at the moment.  307 Positive versus 10 Negative = Plus 297.

The Big Fish argued that “the only way you can run such countries is with a dictator. It’s always tribe first, religion second. And any interference is always perceived as being against the religion and simply fuels the propaganda against the so-called West.  Stay out, even if they do have oil.” 229 Positive versus 9 Negative = Plus 220.

Fishermans_Enemy observed that “Yet he is a Nobel Prize winner… Libya’s troubles are far from over, frankly, some say they are just beginning.  Still, Obama is following on from this Libya mistake by trying to topple another leader in Syria but this time arming Al Qaeda aligned ‘rebels’ to fight Assad whereas a few years ago prior they were terrorists.  The problem isn’t so much Obama but US supremacy in general.”  165 Positive versus 16 Negative = Plus 149.

Conversely, the three least approved comments were:

U16440316 believes that [Obama’s] “worst mistake was running for president in the first place. He had the chutzpah to say that 10 Trillion Dollars of debt was UNPATRIOTIC.THEN HE DOUBLED IT. The man is a disaster.  Yet the left wing media treat him like some god.  That’s leftism for you.”  108 Positive versus 192 Negative = minus 84.

Gary H argued that “The Middle East need[s] dragging up to Western standards, out of the dark ages. Even their own people don’t want to live there.  Do we care when they stone their own people to death? We prefer to leave it that way?  Shame on us every time we turn our backs.  It’s our duty.”  10 Positive versus 37 Negative = Minus 27.

Mike from Brum said that “I’ve said it before. Go to Israel, tell them they have a month when no one is looking and to sort them out. By the time the Israelites are finished, the whole region with be devoid of anything but tumbleweed. Good riddance.”  12 Positive versus 36 Negative = Minus 24.

The top three Positive comments equal + 666.  The bottom three Negative comments equal – 135.

Thus, there is a lot more consensus on the Positive comments than on the Negative comments.  Among the Positive comments, there is a belief that the Middle East [and other places outside the West] needs dictators to keep dangerous forces in line.  This is a repudiation of President Obama’s embrace of the “Arab Spring.”

In contrast, the Negative comments are more varied, from attacks on President Obama as a leader to a plea for intervention in benighted places to a belief in violence as a solution.

If leaders are listening to thinking citizens, then they will be very cautious in the future about toppling authoritarian regimes.  That doesn’t mean that they will not do it.  Perhaps they will prepare better for the consequences.  Or time will pass and they will forget.

[1] See: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36013703

Look at what I almost stepped in.

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Western European countries needed extra workers during the great economic boom that took off after the Second World War.[1]  They imported these workers from the old empires and other developing areas.  Then the European Union allowed a considerable mobility of the immigrants after they arrived.  Generally, these countries didn’t give any thought to the assimilation of the immigrant “guest workers.”  Either it was assumed that they would go home after working in Europe or the possibility of problems didn’t occur to any government official.  So, all countries now have a problem with the descendants of the immigrants who never went home and—often—did not assimilate.

Belgium brought in lots of Turks and Moroccans.  Today there are about 640,000 Muslims living in Belgium, where they make up about 5 percent of the population.  Belgium turned out to be a particularly difficult country for assimilation.  It is, in a sense, a “made-up” country created for the convenience of other countries back in the 19th Century.[2]  It is divided between French-speaking Walloons and Dutch-speaking Flemings.  Efforts to pacify the factions produced competing and overlapping government bureaucracies. Quarrels between the two groups continue, so no one gave much thought to the immigrants and the immigrants had no clear national identity to try to join.

Then the oil shocks of the 1970s heralded a period of economic troubles that included the dying of the coal and steel industries in which the immigrants and many native Belgians labored.  The immigrants and their descendants adapted less well to the changes than did the native Belgians.  Poverty and isolation compounded each other.  Now Belgium has a large population of citizens who are considerably angrier with their country than are the supporters of Donald Trump.  Many of them turned to petty crime and drugs.  In these miserable conditions, street preachers arose and won followers by preaching that their victimization arose from their faith.  An uncertain share of them has embraced radical Islam.[3]  Even when not violent activists themselves, many Belgian Muslims are so estranged from Belgian society that they are willing to turn a blind eye to the violent among them.

Then came the Islamic State.  Some 560 Belgian Muslims are believed to have gone to fight for the Caliphate. Belgian cops were glad to see them go.  Belgium’s counter-terrorism forces are under-staffed and overwhelmed.  Maybe the Islamists would get killed.  Many did die in all likelihood.  Now, some 120 of the veterans have returned.  They have been at the heart of the recent spectacular terrorism: the guns for the January 2015 “Charlie Hebdo” attack came from Belgium; the November 2015 Paris attack was planned in Belgium; and the March 2016 attack in Brussels was carried out by Belgian-born Islamists.[4]

Now Belgium is trying to make up a lot of lost ground in both security and assimilation.

NB: The title to this piece is the punch-line to a French “Belgian joke,” equivalent to the one-time Polish or Blonde jokes in the United States.

[1] In Germany it’s called the “wirtschaftwunder” (the Economic Miracle); in France it’s called “Les trente glorieuse” (the Glorious Thirty [Years].”

[2] The Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) redrew the map of Europe after the Napoleonic Wars.  To guard against a resurgence of French imperialism, the Congress tried to strengthen the countries on France’s northeastern and southeastern borders.  In one case this meant adding the Catholic former Austrian Netherlands (today Belgium) to the Protestant Kingdom of Holland.  The Catholics rebelled against Protestant rule in 1830.  Rather than  resist this by force or partition the territory between France and Holland, the Great Powers accepted independence.  Ooops.

[3] See: http://www.warpoetry.co.uk/brooke3.html

[4] “Belgium’s jihadi problem,” The Week, 8 April 2016, p. 11.

The Count 2.

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Nowruz (aka Newroz, Nevroz) is the first day of Spring in the Iranian calendar.  Lots of other cultures in the region took up the celebration in the many days ago.  Among them were the Kurds, who see Nevroz as the most important holiday of the year.[1]  The holiday has assumed a nationalist form as cultural associations and veiled political parties sponsor events at which “young men wave flags of green, yellow and red, the colors of the Kurdish people.”

            Far away from Kurdistan, both in distance and in culture, is Istanbul’s Istiklal Avenue.  The street is in “Pera” or “Beyoğlu,” across the “Golden Horn” from the main part of the old city.  You pass the cheery chaos of the ferry dock; you walk across the Galata bridge; you wander through little streets that mount the hillside; and you arrive at the Galata tower.  It is the “European” part of the city with cafes, restaurants, art galleries, and many Westerners living in apartments with a bad plumbing and an excellent view of the Bosphorus.  Nearby is Taksim Square.

            Turkey might be described as having played a “bad boy” role in the recent migration crisis.  However, it has other pressing concerns as well.  On the one hand, the government is assaulting its restive Kurdish minority.  In July 2015 a truce broke down and the government turned loose its forces in southern Turkey.  On the other hand, it has belatedly engaged ISIS in neighboring Syria.  Under heavy pressure from the United States, Turkey has finally clamped down in the flow of foreign fighters through Turkey to Syria.  As a result, Turkey has been under attack by suicide bombers in recent months. ISIS has been blamed for bombings in Ankara (October 2015, 103 dead) and Istanbul (10 dead, January 2016).  For their part, Kurds have been blamed for a suicide bombing in Ankara (March 2015, 37 dead).

            On 19 March 2016, a suicide bomber blew himself up on Istiklal Avenue in Istanbul, killing three Israeli tourists[2] and an Iranian,[3] and wounding thirty-six.  Five of the wounded were Palestinians.  (There may have been an interesting conversation in whatever group they belonged to, or perhaps just a studied silence.)  The Israelis were, it seems, a bunch of “foodies” sampling the fare of Istanbul.[4]

This bombing, too, is attributed to ISIS.  The bomber has been identified as Mehmet Ozturk, but little about him has appeared in print.  He was born in 1992 in Gaziantep (which is both a city and a province).  Gaziantep, in turn, is a part of Turkey’s Southeastern Anatolian Region, which runs along much of the border with Syria.  Gaziantep is a very old city (by American standards anyway).  It has a thriving machine carpet-weaving industry and is surrounded by groves of olives, pistachios, and grapes.  It also is home to a number of high schools and universities.  However, it is also on the main route from Turkey to Syria for foreign fighters trying to join ISIS.  According to one report, his parents reported him as missing after he went to Istanbul in 2013.  Pretty quickly after the attack the Interior Ministry identified him as the bomber and confirmed it through DNA.  His father had provided the DNA for the comparison.

ISIS is now targeting tourists in Istanbul; and it has a bomb-maker there.  The hunt is on.

Turkish officials now have banned Nevroz celebrations this year.

[1] Apparently, Kurds don’t believe in Santa.  Them being Muslims and all.

[2] Two of whom held dual Israeli-American citizenship.

[3] Tim Arango and Ceylan Yeginsu, “Istanbul Suicide Bomber  Linked to Islamic State,” NYT, 21 March 2015.

[4] The NYT reports that one was from Dimona (the site of Israel’s “secret” nuclear weapons program); another was from Herzliya (a generally wealthy beach town near Tel Aviv, named for the Zionist leader Theodor Herzl).

On the Obama Doctrine.

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The New York Times recently summarized some of President Obama’s thought as revealed in an important article in the Atlantic.[1]

President Obama believes that Asia and Latin America are far more important for America’s future than is the Middle East.  He believes that some of America’s allies try to draw the United States into Middle Eastern conflicts that have little relation to American national interests.  Then they don’t do anything to pull their share of the weight.  He believes that Saudi Arabia “need[s] to find an effective way share the neighborhood [its arch-enemy Iran] and institute some sort of cold peace.”  He sees parts of the Middle East as plagued by “the malicious, nihilistic, violent parts of humanity.”  He recognizes that Ukraine matters more to Russia than it does to the West, especially the United States.  The same will be true if it comes to a military confrontation.

It’s hard to quarrel with any of that as general principles.  The interest of the United States in the Middle East stems from Cold War efforts to keep the Soviet Union from expanding into a key area from which Europe drew its oil and which provided an important link in world communications and transportation.  An ill-considered, but still understandable American commitment to Israel got layered-on after the Six Days War of 1967.  Today, Middle Eastern oil is far less important; the Soviet Union is dead; and Israel does not face any formidable coalition of enemies.  ISIS poses no existential threat to the United States as did Nazi Germany or Communist Russia.  However, decades of engagement created of powerful traditions and institutions dedicated to dealing with the Middle East.  Inertia, rather than thought, carries on.

More troubling are some of the president’s specific reflections.

In the wake of the recent pair of articles in the New York Times on the overthrow of the Libyan government in 2011, President Obama acknowledged that the intervention had been a “mistake.”  However, that mistake had been motivated in part by his belief that Britain and France would shoulder much of the burden.  “Free riders aggravate me.”  Well, they should.  However, it is up to the President and his senior officials to define what each country will do beforehand.  The president is a lawyer.  This should be second-nature to him.

British Prime Minister David Cameron became “distracted by other issues,” in the words of the New York Times, during the Libyan operation.  What were those other issues?  In August 2011, race relations boiled over as massive rioting swept across several major British cities, including London.  In early 2012 the Scottish nationalists won approval for a referendum on independence from the United Kingdom.  These may have been distractions, but neither was a petty matter.

President Obama is “openly contemptuous of Washington’s foreign policy establishment,” which always ends up favoring “militarized responses.”  That may be true in some cases, but in the case of Libya, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, and the leaders of the intelligence agencies all were—apparently—opposed to intervention.  In the case of Egypt, all these and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were cautious about tossing overboard the dictator Hosni Mubarak.  Those initiatives were on the president.  What of Syria?  Was it the “foreign policy establishment” that persuaded the president to insist that Bashar al-Assad had to go as the part of any solution?  Then, the Russian intervention has shown that there is a “military solution” to the civil war.  It just isn’t the one that President Obama wanted.  As has been so often the case for the president.

[1] Mark Landler, “Obama Criticizes the ‘Free Riders’ Among America’s Allies, NYT, 10 March 2016.

The Count 1.

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As best I understand it, before ISIS launched its Summer 2014 attack into western Iraq, it engaged in a long campaign of bombings in the heartland of Iraq. These spread terror and distrust of the government. As best I understand it, the defeat of Boko Haram on the battlefield led to a campaign of bombings in Nigeria and Cameroon. These spurred mass flight and a economic paralysis. So, bombings can be harbingers of victory or of defeat. It’s too bad that they aren’t more clear in their meanings. Still, I thought that I would watch this “variable”—as social scientist call it. See if anything becomes clear to me.

Hilla, Iraq is about 60 miles south of Baghdad on the Tigris River. It’s near the site of ancient Babylon, a vital center of Mesopotamian civilization that is unfamiliar to generations of American college students. From about 1000 AD on it was a sleepy farm town and administrative center. In the early 20th Century, an interesting episode in environmental history led to the construction of a dam to insure the proper irrigation of local farmlands.[1]

Saddam Hussein was hard on both the ancient and modern faces of Hilla. He had workmen knock down a bunch of the Babylonian ruins in order to build one of his palaces. After the war in Kuwait in 1991, a rebellion broke out around Hilla. Government troops killed several thousand people and buried them in a mass grave.

On 1 April 2003, there was a good-sized fight at Hilla between American armored forces and an infantry battalion of the Republican Guard. Then the insurgency began. One feature of that insurgency appeared in the efforts by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to foment a Sunni-Shi’ite civil war. Hilla is a predominantly Shi’ite city, so it came in for its share of trouble. In February 2005, a suicide bombing killed 125 people waiting for treatment outside a medical clinic; in May 2005, two suicide bombers killed 31 and wounded 108 Shia police; in September 2005, a car bomb killed 10 and wounded 30; in January 2007, suicide bombers killed 73 and wounded 160; in February 2007, a pair of suicide bombers killed 45 and wounded 150; in March 2007, two car bombs killed 114 and wounded 147; in May 2010, a multiple car bomb attacks killed 45 and wounded 145. Then things calmed down as the “Sunni Awakening” and the “Surge:” took hold.

At a security check-point near Hilla, on 6 March 2016, a gasoline tanker waited for approval to move ahead in the middle of a crowd of vehicles and pedestrians.[2] When guards waved at the driver to halt, the truck lurched ahead and then exploded. At least 33 people were killed outright and 115 were wounded. (Almost 30 of the wounded subsequently died.) A witness said that the explosion 350 feet away from the blast felt like “an earthquake.” The witness is 54 years old. That means that he was born in 1962. He has lived through the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988); the American air campaign associated with the 1991 war over Kuwait; the American invasion (2003) and all that followed from it (2003-2007).

The key point here is that there are a lot of people outside “the West” who have heard explosions before and know what to do. “I immediately lay on the ground and saw flames all over the checkpoint.” After a while he got up to go check on friends in shops closer to the check-point. “One of them was beheaded and others were killed.” A 32 year-old school teacher who had been waiting to pass the checkpoint to get to work described it as “a very hard scene.”

What is it like to know what a suicide bombing sounds like? What about knowing that the bombings come in pairs, usually the second happening after people rush from cover to help the victims of the first bombing?

[1] See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindiya_Barrage

[2] Omar al-Jawoshy, “Truck Bomb Kills at Least 33 At Checkpoint in Central Iraq,” NYT, 7 March 2016.

Exporting jihadis.

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Who goes to fight for ISIS? An estimated 8,000+ from the Middle East; 8,000 from North Africa; 5,000 from Western Europe; 4,700 from the former Soviet Republics; 900 from Southeast Asia; and 280 from North America. If we refine it to individual countries then there are 6,000 Tunisians; 2,500 Saudi Arabians; 2,400 Russians; 2,100 Turks; and 2,000 Jordanians. Given the small size of its total population, Tunisia appears to be massively over-represented.[1]

If one plays with the numbers then 8,000+ from the Middle East – (2,500 Saudis + 2,100 Turks + 2,000 Jordanians = 6,600) = 1,400 from other places in the Middle East. Where? Yemenis, Qataris, Iraqis? Similarly, 8,000 from North Africa – (6,000 Tunisians) = 2,000 from other places in North Africa. Where? Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Morocco. Egypt, Algeria, and Morocco are sufficiently strong police states to bar most emigration. In Libya, the Islamists are preoccupied with a civil war they still hope to win. Otherwise, they’d go to Syria.

If we look at the usual explanations for why young men become jihadis, we see discussions of “failed states” and economic stagnation that leads people to embrace radical Islam as a consolation.[2] However, Tunisia had one of the highest literacy rates and one of the most developed economies in the Arab world. In a way, then, it made sense that the “Arab Spring” first blossomed in Tunisia. That uprising gave birth to the most free of the Arab “democracies.” However, Tunisia is also the single greatest source of the foreign fighters going to join the ISIS Caliphate in Syria. This is more than a puzzle for political science theory.

How can we explain this development? First, Tunisia may be the world’s tallest midget in the eyes of casual Western observers, but it is a sore disappointment in the eyes of many Tunisians. The government remains deeply corrupt and oppressive in casual ways. (Cops still slap people on the street. Try that on in the US today.) Also, many pre-revolutionary figures have wormed their way back into public life.

Second, lots of Islamic fanatics had been locked up by the old regime that was overthrown in 2011. The new regime immediately let them out of jail as victims of the old order. (Bashar al-Assad did the same in Syria, although with a different purpose.) They circulate, they talk, and they make contacts inside the country and outside it. In 2012, a group of Islamists attacked the American embassy in Tunis. In 2015, two separate terrorist attacks killed 60 tourists and wounded 80 others, while a third attack killed a dozen members of the Presidential Guard. If 6,000 Tunisians have left to join ISIS, the government has barred 15,000 from leaving.

Third, the growing economy has not grown anywhere near fast enough to raise living standards in a significant way. In early 2014, 15.2 percent of the labor force remained unemployed. It has gotten worse since then. Two terrorist attacks in 2015 killed the tourism industry, the third ranked part of the economy, along with a lot of tourists.

Are there any lessons from this sad story? Yes. First, a lot of developing economies went down the wrong road after independence. Encouraged by soft-headed Western development theorists, they adopted the Soviet model of a controlled economy. These economies became deeply entrenched with local elites. As a result, they’ve been less nimble than Chain and India about changing course. It will take a while to fix this. Patience.

Second, human rights and personal dignity are important values. Middle Eastern governments have to learn to respect their citizens. It will take a while to fix this. Patience.

[1] Jaroslav Trofimov, “How Tunisia Became a Top Source of Islamic State Recruits.” I forgot to note the date.

[2] Certainly that has been my own sense of it, provided one extended this idea to the poverty stricken Muslim enclaves in Britain, Belgium, and France.

The end of Sykes-Picot 1.

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The Sykes-Picot Agreement was a secret agreement made between France and Britain during the First World War. It laid the foundation for the states of the modern Middle East.[1] The Arab parts of the Ottoman Empire were carved up into British and French spheres of influence. Soon thereafter, these spheres were re-labeled League of Nations “Mandates” out of deference to the self-righteous scold, Woodrow Wilson. Later, the British area got independence as Jordan, Iraq, and Israel; while the French area got independence as Syria and Lebanon. Events triggered by the American invasion of Iraq (2003) have now called into question the survival of some of these states.

First in line for the chopping block is Syria.[2] The Russians intervened to save their client Assad from defeat at the hands of his American-associated enemies. President Obama warned that the Russians were headed into another quagmire like Afghanistan. It doesn’t seem to have worked out that way so far. War in eastern Syria might be just such a quagmire. Vladimir Putin might just decide that half a loaf is better than none and also better than trying to get the whole loaf. That half a loaf is likely to include Aleppo. An Assadist state in western Syria seems an increasingly likely outcome.

There doesn’t seem to be any plan yet to settle the fighting in Western Syria so that everyone can turn their guns on ISIS. Also, it’s pretty hard to imagine the former foes in the civil war just deciding to let bygones be bygones. How would they co-operate with one another? It isn’t clear that the Russians have any interest in a longer war in eastern Syria. In any joint struggle against ISIS the Assad government would have the upper hand over the non-ISIS forces provided that the Russians continued to provide air support. Government territorial gains and the accumulation of captured arms would further shift the balance in favor of the government. All sides must be pretty war-weary at this point. Again, half a loaf is better than none.

The Syrian Kurds represent another problem. Fighting ISIS when lots of Sunni Arabs would not has won them the favor and military assistance of the United States. However, Kurdish nationalism, rather than a principled opposition to ISIS, has motivated the Kurdish fight. Both the Sunni Arabs and the Turks recognize this reality. An autonomous or independent Kurdistan poses a serious threat to Turkey. The Turks—rightly—do not accept a distinction between Kurdish groups fighting in Syria or Iraq and Kurdish groups fighting inside Turkey. The recent suicide bombing of a military convoy in Ankara just turned up the heat in this conflict.[3] The United States has been trying to square this circle (just as it tried to reconcile Saudi Arabian and Iranian conflicts in the Iranian nuclear deal). The Russians have no such problem. The Turks shot down a Russian jet on a thin excuse. Putin will be happy to encourage the Kurds. The Syrian Kurds objectively allied themselves with the Russians and the Assad regime in recent attacks on Sunni Arab rebel forces. This may reduce American leverage on the Kurds.

For the moment, this part of the Sykes-Picot Agreement seems headed toward an Assad state in western Syria, a Kurdish state in northern Syria, and the ISIS Caliphate in eastern Syria. That’s unlikely to be the final word on the issue.

Then there is Iraq and Lebanon.

[1] To the extent that a place where ISIS can flourish can be called “modern.” This isn’t a permanent condition. Any culture can go through a bad patch. Mark Mazower called his history of 20th Century Europe The Dark Continent.

[2] Jaroslav Trofimov, “Prospect of Syria’s Partition Looms Despite Cease-Fire,” WSJ, 4 March 2016.

[3] “How they see us: Fighting against Turkey’s interests,”, The Week, 4 March 2016, p. 17.

Anglostan.

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The Wahhabist and Deobandi sects of Islam are particularly puritanical. The have important followings in Pakistan. However, Pakistan is a country of emigration and many people leave for Britain in hopes of finding more economic opportunity.   There are about 750,000 people of Pakistani descent in Britain, out of a total Muslim population of 1.8 million. However, that doesn’t mean that they want to become “British” or that they find opportunity. There are two themes here worth exploring a little.[1]

First, the lack of opportunity. Many of the immigrants settle in the decayed industrial towns of the Midlands where there is little opportunity. As a result, while the general unemployment rate in Britain is a low 5.5 percent, the unemployment rate among young male Muslims is a very high 22 percent. Second, there is the refusal of assimilation.   A recent survey found that 37 percent of young Muslims would rather live under a strict Muslim legal system. Many Muslim immigrants retain their traditional beliefs about gender roles. Many Muslims disdain the cultural and moral liberalism that characterizes British life.

These factors have contributed to a very uncomfortable situation. On the one hand, some immigrants have turned to the extremely puritanical forms of Islam from a combination of alienation and hope to save themselves from poverty, drugs, and crime. In a few cases, this turn toward religious radicalism has led to political radicalism. In July 2005 four Muslim suicide bombers killed 52 Londoners; in 2006 British authorities foiled a plot by 23 British Muslims to bring down twelve airliners over the Atlantic Ocean. On the other hand, Britons have grown leery of Muslims. Anyone on the Tube reeking of perfume and muttering to himself, with his wallet shoved into his sock, might be a suicide bomber. (Or another “victim of Thatcherism.”)

After the July 2005 bombings, Prime Minister Tony Blair launched a program called “Prevent.”[2] The goal is to encourage people to identify potential jihadis in their community and then to intervene with voluntary anti-radicalization programs. Then, in 2015, four girls from Bethnal Green (see: Jack the Ripper) did a bunk and ended up in the ISIS Caliphate. If “encouraging” didn’t produce satisfactory results, the government would “require” schools, hospitals, social service agencies, and local government authorities to report extremist behavior. The government issued a list of 22 “contributing factors” that might make Donald Trump look over his shoulder.[3] School computers track student searches, with little alarms going off if someone Googles “How to make a suicide vest out of materials in your Dad’s garden shed.”

These efforts arouse all sorts of civil rights concerns. What is “extremist behavior”? Especially in a young person? What sort of person is willing to “nark on” someone they know?   Who is willing to empower the neighborhood gossip? (See: “Brooklyn” for one example.) Isn’t this just profiling poor, conservative Muslims? Will stigmatization by an alien community just increase radicalization? Muslim communities have not supported “Prevent.”

On the other hand, in truth, how many people destined for Oxbridge or Silicon Valley are going to be attracted by ISIS? Then, school teachers, as opposed to London lawyers, aren’t necessarily concerned. They’ve been dealing with issues like the forced marriage of Muslim female students. Others have been threatened. “You are on my beheading list,” reported one. Naturally, some of them favor a “counter-narrative” to the ISIS recruiting media. I would.

[1] “Britain’s restive Muslims,” The Week, 4 May 2007, p. 17.

[2] Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura, “British Effort to Identify Potential Radicals Spurs Profiling Debate,” NYT, 10 February 2016.

[3] However, they appear to have been boosted from drug abuse awareness leaflets.

The Shores of Tripoli: An Attempt at Perspective.

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What were some of the consequences of American action? First, there were the weapons. Over the years, Qaddafi had stockpiled conventional weapons. The victorious groups looted this arsenal. Some they used to increase the violence in the Libyan civil war that still rages. Some may have flowed toward ISIS in Syria. Many flowed to Islamist groups in the Sahel and West Africa. Second, there was the collapse of order in Libya and the rise of factions with ties to organized crime. This, in turn, opened a gateway for paying passengers who wished to cross the Mediterranean in search of a better life in Europe.

At the same time, it is important to recognize that for a long time many of the Sahelian and West African countries are or have been on the verge of becoming “failed states”. People have been eager to flee for years. The collapse of Libya opened a pathway for migrants. It did not create the underlying conditions that make people want to leave. This has great importance for the future of Islamist movements in the region.

Some of the proponents for action in Libya in 2011 now suggest a stark dichotomy: “a blood bath in Benghazi and keeping Qaddafi in power, or what is happening now.”[1] Were these the only choices? How can democracy be created in a country that has no experience with democracy or politics? Can it be done over the short-term by toppling a tyrant, creating political parties, and holding elections under international supervision the first few times? Is it a long-term project that can span several generations of political education under outside control? One Human Rights Watch official has remarked that there have been international peace-keeping forces in Bosnia for twenty years. Bosnia figured as one of the “lessons of history” in Secretary Clinton’s decision to favor intervention in Libya. America’s foreign policy in the early 20th Century may offer useful “lessons of history.” In Panama, the United States rigged-up a coup, then put in power a puppet government, and then stayed for a hundred years while the Panamanians developed a viable democracy. In Mexico, Woodrow Wilson set out to “teach the Mexicans to elect good men.” Then he went home. The League of Nations “Mandates” system provided a cover for European imperialism, but it offers a model for less predatory governments.

The whole episode suggests some of the psychological vulnerabilities of Hillary Clinton. She decided to support intervention after a single meeting with rebel leaders (men in suits) who assured her that they represented the whole country and that they had a plan for building a democratic Libya. Apparently, she just took their word for it. The experience of Iraq, where similar figures had sold the Bush II administration a pig in a poke made no impression on her. This suggests that she is credulous. Her arguments for intervention and for arming the rebels—if we don’t do it, then somebody else will—suggest that she is reactive and imitative. In private discussions with her advisors, she often cited her husband’s advice.[2] This suggests that she is unsure and indecisive. According to one aide, Clinton’s “theory on [Vladimir] Putin is, this is a person with some passions—if you get him going [talking] on those passions, your capacity to try to deal with him is improved.” This suggests that she has a shallow understanding. Did she get him talking about Anna Politkovskaya?  If elected, a President Hillary Clinton will have to deal with a powerful foreign leader about whom she understands nothing.

The real burden of decision not to sustain American involvement in Libya rests with President Obama. Secretary Clinton merely adopted the policy he seemed to favor. President Obama has acknowledged his error, while contending that the initial intervention had been the right choice. In contrast, Secretary of Clinton appears to have learned nothing at all from this particular “lesson of history.” She told The Atlantic that “’Don’t do stupid stuff’ is not an organizing principle.” Maybe not, but it’ll do.

[1] Gerard Araud, then French ambassador to the United Nations and currently French ambassador to the United States, quoted in Becker and Shane, “Clinton,…” .

[2] “That’s what Bill said, too.”—Dennis Ross, quoted in Becker and Shane, “Clinton…” So, who will be president if Hillary Clinton wins in 2016? Just asking.