Amid the seemingly endless barrage of negative or embarrassing news stories during the Trump administration, a ray of hope may be shining from the Middle East. The Iraqi city of Mosul has been liberated by a coalition whose only commonality may be it's determination to eradicate the scourge of ISIS from the geopolitical landscape. ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Bagdadi, has reportedly been killed, his jihadist soldiers sent scurrying from their city strongholds and into the hinterlands. To some, victory or something close to it, appears to be in short order regarding the United States versus Islamic Jihadism.
A closer look beyond the surface reveals cracks and failures of logic. The narrative of joint US and Iraqi forces teaming together to push back ISIS ignores the multipolar realities of the military effort to recapture ISIS controlled lands. Iranian backed Shia militias and Kurdish forces have played an instrumental part of recapturing land in both Iraq and Syria. This creates serious complications since oftentimes, Sunni civilians in ISIS ruled territory fear their Shia "liberators" more than their ISIS rulers. Marginalization of Sunnis in northern Iraq by the Shia dominated government in Baghdad was a major driver of ISIS' rise in the first place. The Shia militia's theocratic backers in Tehran have a different and far more expansive agenda than American military leaders in Washington. Kurdish ambitions are set on carving out a nation for themselves, possibly covering territory from both Iraq and Syria - not to simply return these countries to their pre-ISIS state. Not to mention implicit US alliance with Iran runs directly counter to overall regional strategy in regards to states of affair in Syria, Yemen, Israel (to the extent there is an overall strategy).
So what role, if any, should the US play in the region given the many convoluted and opposing forces involved? Both Iran, and traditional US ally Saudi Arabia pose serious strategic and moral problems for any rigid alliance. How can the US act to advance Iranian ambition given its demagogic rhetoric toward the US, and its funding of terrorist organizations like Hezbollah. How can the US shift more decisively towards Tehran given its significant weapons trade and security arrangements with the House of Saud and it's Gulf allies? Yet how can the US simply remain a staunch ally of Saudi Arabia with its miserable human rights record and its Wahabi preachers sewing seeds of discontent - leading to the explosion of fundamentalist organizations like ISIS? Is it even rational for the US to remain in the Saudi's corner given their deteriorating economic position with the collapse of the price of oil?
There are no easy answers, but a possible path forward may lie in a historic treaty reached in Europe almost 400 years ago. The Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years War and established a new political conduit to address and limit inter-state aggression. The core philosophy was the equal co-existence of sovereign states. The idea was that if one power in Europe became too dominant and encroached on another state's sovereignty, the other powers in Europe would rally to the weaker side in order to prevent hegemony on the continent. The basic premise of this Westphalian peace prevailed for almost 200 years. After decades of bloodshed and religious zealotry, this practical application of inter-state relations promoted the structural integrity of Europe as a continent - allowing the region to expand it's influence throughout the world and foster in the Enlightment.
During its reign as world power, the British Empire would often use its dominant Naval force to maintain the balance of power in Europe. Might not the United States apply Westphalian logic to its actions in the Middle East today? To look at Middle Eastern chaos and propose for America to "wash it's hands" of the region in self-righteous disgust would be to naively allow the sectarian tension to fester. For all it's faults and contradictions abroad - America is not solely responsible, nor the largest driver of Islamic extremism. Eventually terrorism would wash up on western shores. Utilizing Westphalian principles would be different from "America First" unilateralism. Once a brokered peace is negotiated, America could serve as a balancer of power to prevent hegemony by either Saudi Arabia or Iran. This philosophy would ensure stability for any sort of economic or social progress to be made between actors while mitigating the effectiveness of violence for short term gains by those same actors. Regional stability as a goal in itself, as opposed to dictating universal values that America is at best inconsistent and at worst outright hypocritical, may provide a more palpable arrangement for middle eastern leaders. Admittedly, this strategy would lack the distinctly American approach of universal values and promotion of democracy and human rights. The limited scope of simply acting as an ensurer of peace seems dull and technocratic - an approach that rarely has won favor in American politics. However, American policy in the region has been a failure thus far. A Westphalian strategy where peace is achieved, and a mechanism to maintain stability established, could provide future leaders with a policy "victory" in a region where they are seldom realized. Perhaps after such a system proved itself effective, could more ambitious ideas be tested.
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