« The Army's story
Is guns and glory
From Gibraltar to Peshawar[1].
When they are at a loss
And chance to come across
New and unruly races
With brown or yellow faces
They chop them into little bits
of beefsteak tartare!»
Bertolt Brecht
«The Threepenny Opera»
«From the Mediterranean Sea to Hindu Kush» is how the well-known American agency STRATFOR entitled its brand-new strategic forecast for the uneasy region. It is written by the Stratfor CEO himself, Dr. George Friedman. It’s hard to say whether Dr. Friedman is familiar with the works of a great German 20th century playwright Bertolt Brecht, but the name of his article sounds suspiciously similar to one the main songs of Brecht’s play that was written in 1928.
The plot of a Threepenny Opera ascends to the great Jonathan Swift, who prompted it to Jon Gay in 1728. The latter one, co-authored by Johann Pepusch, wrote the play named The Beggars’ Opera, while Brecht, adopting the Swift’s plot for his Threepenny Opera, brought it a hundred years forth — into the Victorian England. Victorian age was the period of British colonial expansion to Asia and the start of the Great Game between British and Russian Empires for the dominion in Middle Asia. That is the literary-historian overture for nowadays events in this contemporary Heartland that includes the Middle East and Middle Asia. Alas, the Brecht’s play, ironically addressed to the past, happened to be prophetic. Song of a Captain Brown and his former brother-in-arms bandit Macheath that was used as an epigraph for the article, might have been sung these days, yet not by the lone Brits. After the 9/11 terrorist attack against America, its warfare is concentrated in this very region — from Gibraltar to Peshawar.
That’s exactly the spot where the interests of a huge variety of countries are intertwined and clashed — each of those powers attempts to bear them alone or in alliance with the others, at times failing to foresee the consequences of their unilateral actions. In the recent months an amateur, yet quite active, player emerged there — Turkey.
Neo-Ottomanism or the Turkish way to play Russian roulette
It all started with the Turkish enlivening at Islamic direction. Disappointed with a chilly attitude of the European Union concerning the prospects of joining the united Europe, Turkey has undertaken a number of actions, which (according to Recep Erdoğan’s concept) had to turn the Turkish Republic into the most authoritative champion of Islam. Those actions were deliberately harsh — including the aggravating relationship with Israel (caused by Turkish patronage over the Freedom Flotilla), attacks against Syria (up to direct threats to send the troops to a sovereign country), bellicose rhetoric addressing Cyprus (the EU member, I might add) accompanied by the threats to resort to a military force in order to prevent the Mediterranean shelf prospecting, disrespecting UN documents that negatively estimate Turkish role in the organization of humanitarian convoys to Palestine. All of that made us think that the true reasons of inadequate Turkish behavior are hardly rooted in its concern for Middle-Eastern and Mediterranean peace, but rather in the far-reaching projects of exchanging the increased influence in the Islamic world for some palpable profits in the Christian world. Recklessly raising the bets in this Middle-Eastern casino, Turks have obviously reckoned to “cash” their jackpot in the European-American till. Unfortunately, having got carried away with the game, Ankara failed to notice the game turning deadly dangerous kind of a Russian roulette. Comparing the Middle East to a powder keg has long ago become a platitude, which is why we’re free to say that the Turkish fuse in the explosive region might have triggered the unforeseen consequences.
Moreover, a single battlefront (fiddling with an Islamic factor) was not enough for Turkey to sate its ambitions and Turkish President Abdullah Gül has opened the second one. In the beginning of October Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ataturk Cultural Center and the International Turkish-Kazakh University of Hoja Ahmet Ýassawiy have held an international conference in Ankara titled “20 years of independence for Turkic-speaking states”. While opening it, Abdullah Gül said: “Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Kirghizstan and Uzbekistan are one nation but six different states”. Given the numerous attempts of Turkish politicians to expand the sphere of their influence for the account of Turkic autonomies of Russia (with Tatarstan being the most vivid example) it’s getting clear that pan-Turkism once again becomes the Turkish official ideology. Unfortunately, Russia hasn’t made the appropriate estimate of new and aggressive Turkish role in the world, despite the fact that it clearly threatens Russian national interests. After all, the Russian Federation has all the grounds to consider Middle Asia a sphere of its influence due to the historically-established relations, tight economic, political and cultural ties between the former Soviet republics. Turkish attempts to stretch its influence over the Turkic-speaking Russian regions though, require no comments at all.
From the Mediterranean Sea to the Arabian one
(Saudi Arabia — Iran — the USA — Israel — Iraq — Afghanistan — Pakistan)
Few years ago only theology scholars were familiar with the term “Wahhabism”. These days it has unfortunately become a household word, despite the desires of any sane man. Here in Russia the words “Wahhabist” and “terrorist” are synonymous. And while membership in the extremist Wahhabi organization makes a sufficient ground for ending up in jail in many countries including Russia, in Saudi Arabia it is an official state ideology. This may seem paradoxical at first glance, but Riyadh, the prime Middle-Eastern ally of America, is also the motherland of terrorist #1 Osama bin Laden and has ideologically fostered the martyr-terrorists, who committed a disastrous terrorist act of 11 Sep 2001. Shamil Basayev and his henchmen, who attacked Budennovsk and took the hostages at Moscow theatre at Dubrovka also professed Wahhabism.
According to numerous Middle-Eastern experts (including the former CIA analyst Dr. George Friedman mentioned in the beginning of this article), Saudi Arabia backs the “permanent revolution” in Syria. The attempts to bring President Bashar Asad down, triggering the Egyptian-Tunisian kind of unrest in Damascus, surely benefit Riyadh, which treats the Syrian regime both as a dangerous neighbor and a part of an Iranian threat (Saudi Arabia has rather tense relations with the latter one). Saudi do their best to prevent Israeli-Palestinian conflict — such course of affairs would’ve allowed Asad to portray his rivals as the enemies of Palestine, because Syrian participation in the conflict on the side of Palestine (even through the indirect support of Hamas) would’ve substantially improved the public image of Syrian President all over the world.
This is the sophisticated background of the assassination attempt against the Saudi Ambassador to the USA. The main suspect is an Iranian expatriate, who has allegedly acted at the instigation of Iranian special services. When the first pieces of news have leaked into American press media, Riyadh appealed Washington to undertake a number of political actions against Tehran. Everyone suddenly remembered of Iranian nuclear program (lately, the hype around it has calmed down some). The worst Riyadh’s fear is the improvement of the Washington-Tehran relationship, allowing to stabilize the Middle-Eastern situation and to secure the oil supplies. The USA in its turn is afraid of peace between Iran and Saudi Arabia, depriving it of an opportunity to find common grounds with Tehran. The most curios detail in the entire assassination and “Iranian conspiracy” incident is the skeptical attitude of all (even the utterly anti-Iranian) media. The “conspirer” himself and utter absurdity of Iranian motives for a “plot” like this have started a number of rumors among the American political analysts. All of them tend to believe the entire crisis was staged (and rather awkwardly at that!) Iranian special services aren’t that clumsy, which is why we’re left with the assumption that it the Saudi special forces backed the exposure of “Iranian conspiracy” — after all, Saudi interest in the deterioration of American-Iranian relationship is rather obvious. President Obama, ill-fitted for the elections, is in the desperate need of some foreign-policy achievements to produce to voters. Improving the relations with Tehran (which doesn’t suit Riyadh at all) might be the one.
Despite the certain cool-down at the Tel-Aviv-Washington axis, Israel still remains the main U.S. ally in the Middle East. Bashar al-Asad’s regime, clearly hostile towards Israel, still suits the Israelites more than the Islamic Sunni state that may emerge at its ruins. In the middle of situation like this Tel-Aviv is equally anxious about the Saudi backing of Syrian opposition and the Turkish threat to send troops to Syria.
An entirely new power layout will inevitably emerge all along the “Gibraltar to Peshawar” line in case American troops pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan. Iraq, once free from American troops, will become the arena of major Iranian influence. A substantial Iranian faction is present both in the government and within the community. Surely, the gossips regarding the complete Tehran control over Iraq are nonsense, but whoever fetches himself at the helm of Baghdad government, would have to take Iranian opinion into consideration. Thus, when the USA withdraws its troops from Iraq, Iranian influence is to spread along the southern Turkish and northern Saudi borders.
New openings for Iranian foreign policy also emerge due to the NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan. This significant move is considered an option because of the drastic deterioration of Pakistani-American relationship, promoting the Iranian interests “around Peshawar”. Islamabad has all the grounds to believe that the USA has been defeated in Afghanistan, which is to mark all the future relations between the two countries. Americans aren’t welcome in Pakistan after the bin Laden’s assassination, while a number of showy Islamabad’s demarches clearly indicate that Pakistani aren’t satisfied with the “little-brother’s” role anymore. The USA gradually turns into an unwelcomed and uninvited guest in Pakistan. Islamabad has unequivocally hinted its mighty allies, arresting Pakistani citizens, who aided the CIA to track bin Laden, discussing the withdrawal of its troops from the territories that surround Afghanistan and acquiring an observer’s status within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Washington is especially anxious about the latter — this means no less than the change of Pakistani geopolitical priorities and the change of the power layout in this important region. Slight drift of Pakistan towards the SCO (with Russia and China playing the first fiddles there) surely smells of blackmailing. The USA cannot allow either losing control over Pakistani nuclear arsenal, or the eastern Afghani provinces, or the entire strategically important area in question. Islamabad is fully aware of that and attempts to hold the American financial aid on without burdening itself with any commitments whatsoever. It’s hard to say, for how long this poker bluff lasts, but one thing is clear — if Pakistan fails to negotiate with Americans, it may attempt joining the SCI in order to win the support of its new allies. Iran also has an observer’s status in the SCO, thus, creating a huge number of possible behavior patterns for all the described participants.
Political prophecies are a thankless trade, and strategic prophecies (Stratfor stands for “STRATegical FORecasts”) — even more so. Distinguished Dr. Friedman, who forecasted the opposite scenario, had a great opportunity to discover this for himself. We may confidently predict only one thing: Great Game will be better manned and rules of the game — turn all the more complicated. Therefore, he, who intends to triumph in this game, has to analyze the situation more thoroughly, foresee more moves and make the right moves himself. The main bugbear for all the players is the troubles with understanding the psychology and logic of their rivals. Thus, the future victor has to understand it first and do everything he can to change the situation to his benefit.
[1] These days the geopolitical pivot point of the Western civilization, once stretching from Cape Town to Cutch Bihar, shifted to the north. Today the destinies of the world are settled in the Mediterranean region, North Africa and Middle Asia including India and Pakistan.
No comments:
Post a Comment