OMG, pigs can fly! Finally something of value from the folks at Time Magazine. Specifically, the first edition of 2012 has a cogent article on the Middle East that is on the one hand graphic and on the other hand reasonably accurate in its presentation of some of the major problems. This is more gas on the fire that the United States will most likely be sucked into, if only for our Treaties with Israel. The tow-page spread on pages 26 & 27 lay out the situation very clearly. It’s a shame that from Libya to Iran, from Yemen to Turkey, the Arab Spring is headed toward the Arab Bloodbath. It seems to me that folks in this region of the World have a passion with in-fighting, tribalistic land grabs, and a general distaste for each other. I do hope that the United States resists the temptation to once again play global peacemaker, and get involved in something we will regret more than anything we have done to date.
A Map of Trouble
What will the
Middle East look like in a year? Private intelligence firm Stratfor
plots the possibilities:
Libya-
The country will remain
in a state of contained chaos. In the absence of centralized power, fissures
will continue to develop along east-west and tribal fault lines in the scramble
for political power and rights to oil revenue. Militias will be the tool of
choice for various competing factions.
Israel-
The Jewish nation remains economically and
militarily robust, but its national security rests on its peace treaty with
Egypt, a Jordanian government favorable to Israel and a Syrian government
that--while on the surface hostile--has quiet understandings with its local
enemy. Uncertainty in Israel's neighborhood will grow, but Israel alone lacks
the means to significantly influence the outcomes of any of the political
crises surrounding it. In Syria, the most immediate case, Israel fears that the
collapse of the current regime could lead to an Iranian-allied Islamist
government in Damascus. Israel may thus face a more immediate threat from Iran
on its northern frontier than from Tehran's nuclear-weapons program.
Syria:
President Bashar Assad, backed by Iran, is
running an intensive crackdown to keep the Assad clan in power. But even if he
quits or is removed, the balance of power may not shift
Lebanon:
The future of Lebanon rests in ethnically and
religiously divided Damascus. If the Syrian regime survives, Iranian-allied Hezbollah
will see its position in Lebanon dramatically strengthened; if Assad's rule
collapses, an element of restraint imposed on Hezbollah by Syria disappears.
The former scenario appears more likely. Either way, this will be a difficult
year for Lebanon as proxy battles intensify between Iran and Saudi Arabia.
Egypt:
Whatever civilian government emerges from the
elections, keep one thing in mind: the military will retain control. The
Egyptian opposition is deeply divided and lacks the weight to force the
military to yield power. In fact, as unrest compounds the difficulties of daily
life, the public will increasingly view the military as a source of stability.
Egypt's insular focus on its economic and political troubles will undermine its
ability to patrol the Sinai buffer region, thus increasing tensions with
Israel.
Turkey:
Dramatic economic growth has made it the
largest economy in the Islamic world and one of the fastest growing in Europe,
but the pace will slow. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's cautious
experimentation with his new role as leader of a regional power will continue,
but Turkey will not undertake foreign adventures, certainly not alone.
Iran:
An ideological tussle over conservative
leadership has turned into open warfare between President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
Yemen:
President Ali Abdullah Saleh promised to step
down after February's elections. But a new government is unlikely to bring
peace to a country beset by decades of civil strife
Syria:
It is difficult to see how the Syrian regime can
be overthrown without outside intervention, given that internal opposition
groups are divided and disorganized. Military intervention, which would have to
be led by the U.S., does not appear likely. The campaign in Libya took seven
months, and Libya's defenses were not nearly as robust as Syria's. And unlike
Libya, Syria is not a significant oil producer. The emergence of fractures
within President Bashar Assad's clan cannot be ruled out, and Assad could be
coerced into making a political exit. But Iran's goal for Syria is overall
regime preservation, regardless of the political personality in power in
Damascus.
Saudi Arabia
The Saudi royals face the rise of Iran and
uncertainty about the U.S.'s ability and willingness to guarantee their
interests. Unrest in Bahrain and in Saudi Arabia's Shi'ite-dominated and
oil-rich Eastern province are warnings of Iran's ability to exploit
instability. With increased Iranian influence along their northern border, the
Saudis will face an extraordinarily difficult decision in 2012: maintain faith
in their dependence on the U.S. for their national security or reach a painful
accommodation with Iran. We expect the Saudis will choose the U.S., given the
limits on Iranian power, but the Saudis will need demonstrations of U.S. will
and ability to play a dominant security role in the Persian Gulf.
Iraq:
Iraq will not become an Iranian satellite, but
Tehran will be able to exert tremendous influence to secure its western flank.
Iraq--particularly northern Iraq--will become a more visible arena for
Iranian-Turkish competition, since Mesopotamia is the primary place for Turkey to
work on limiting the spread of Iranian influence. The vacuum created by the
U.S. withdrawal will lead to a general deterioration in security conditions in
Iraq as sectarian fault lines again come to the fore.
Iran:
This will be a decisive year for Iran. The U.S.
withdrawal from Iraq leaves Iran the pre-eminent military power in the Persian
Gulf. Knowing this window of opportunity will not remain open long, Iran will
try to consolidate and extend its new regional influence. As long as Iran is
able to keep its allies in Syria in power and thus make them even more
dependent on Tehran for survival, Iranian influence will stretch from
Afghanistan to Lebanon. Even without that foothold in the Levant, Shi'ite-led
Iran is in a position to intimidate Sunni-led Saudi Arabia and its neighbors.
Iran is still operating under considerable constraints, however, and will prove
unable to fundamentally reshape the politics of the region in its favor.
Bahrain:
Bahrain will remain under heavy Saudi influence
and continue to host a significant Gulf Cooperation Council security presence.
It exemplifies the Persian Gulf dynamic: Iran can create problems that the
Saudis must respond to, but Iran cannot create more problems than the Saudis
can manage. Iran, whose support for the mostly Shi'ite uprising in 2011 caused
tension between Iran and Bahrain, is content with Bahrain's being a long-term
problem for the Saudis.
Jordan:
Jordan's Hashemite rulers face a large
Palestinian population that has little love for the royal family. But this
dynamic is not new, and the same factors that have allowed the Hashemite
government to survive for decades--an excellent army and security
apparatus--remain in place. Jordan will work to build credibility among Islamists
and among its non-Jordanian population to help manage its unrest.
Yemen:
After the 2011 political crisis, 2012 will be a
year of reconsolidation for outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh's faction. It
will work to engage the most formidable elements of the opposition while taking
advantage of foreign backing to re-entrench itself in the key organs of the
state. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) will continue to benefit from
Sana'a's distractions, but Saudi Arabia's dominant role in Yemen and continued
U.S. operations in the country will act as a check on AQAP's expanded
influence.
o
Power struggle
o
Economic crisis
o
Religious or ethnic conflict
o
Internal violence
Stratfor, based in Austin, Texas, provides
intelligence and analysis to corporations, governments and individual
subscribers
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2103273,00.html#ixzz2ozCIcuXU
