ClarkCast 009 - The State of the Middle East
May 7, 2006
Transcription by RichardD

Today I'd like to give you an update on the Middle East as I see it.

This is the first week of May and obviously in this region things change every single day, but I'm just going to give you the impression I've got right now

You know the region is under prolonged stress from a number of different issues: modernization, the stress of the fundamentalist religion, the impact of our military action against Iraq, the presence of our troops in Kuwait, the need for our troops elsewhere in the gulf, Iranian nuclear pretensions, the meddling of other outside powers and the tremendous opportunities, growth and change wrought by the explosion of petrol-dollars flowing into the area right now. Everything is moving in this region.

But we've also, as Americans, our nation has been less than consistent with what we're saying and doing in the region. For example, the United States has long been committed to supporting gradual democratization consistent with supporting our allies who are not able to transition immediately to democracy. But when the Bush administration accelerated the pace of democratization as a cover rationale for invading Iraq it sent shockwaves into the region.

The impact of that democratization is clear.

Hamas won the Palestinian elections and neither Hosny Mubarak in Egypt nor our friends in Saudi Arabia would recommend to us that they transition to selecting governments by popular election. A whole lot of work has to be done on this basis first. We can't be in the region telling people that we're committed to stability but then talking about how quickly we can leave. And we can't talk about American leadership and then subcontract to France, Germany and Britain and Russia the leadership and the dialogue that goes on there. So we've sent, as a nation, a lot of mixed messages in the region. It's time to look at what we really want to do to move us ahead in the region.

So let me give you my prescription for the region right now.

First of all, Iraq. We've always said it takes three ingredients to be successful in Iraq: diplomacy in the region, to talk to all of the actors in the region, political work inside Iraq to help pull together a government, and work by the military, both to go after insurgents and the bases and sources of supply and to help control the borders, and work to stand up train the Iraqi police and security forces. In broad outline, that's exactly where we need to be. Where we are right now in Iraq, is that a new government is apparently taking form.

This new government must do two things in order to be effective, two principle things: number one, it must reform the constitution, so that the oil wealth that right now is located in the Shi'ite and Kurdish areas will be shared equitably with the Sunni population of central Iraq. Secondly, action has to be taken to separate the militias and disarm the militias, pull them out of the security forces, police and the military. Those two actions are critical to maintaining the legitimacy of the government and setting the stage for broader economic recovery and political development inside Iraq. It's not clear that it can be done, but it is also not clear that we've failed in this effort. So what I've been saying is that we can go between a C-/D+ solution and an F. if we lose patience, pull out now, or say lets just go for a division, we're moving toward the F. if we try and stick with this a little bit longer, and put maximum leverage on the Iraqi government, on the political side, then we have a chance of getting a C-/D+ solution: that is the country stays together, it may be fundamentally anti-western and Islamic, it certainly wont be our idea of democracy, but it might be a country that doesn't contribute further to instability in the region or threaten its neighbors.

So that's Iraq.

Let's work with it, apply maximum leverage, politically at this point it is a political problem. And by the way, the United States government and all of us need to understand that Iraq is part of a regional equation of American interests. Our interests in the region include, not only the presence of troops in Iraq but they include the stability of the Persian gulf states that are exporting oil and increasingly large amounts of natural gas to the United States and elsewhere. They include the protection of the state of Israel, they include supporting our friends, blocking Iranian hegemonic aspirations and the Iranian acquisitions of nuclear weapons, and of course, the most important interest of all is preventing a wider war in the region which would further damage our interests and the interests of all our friends.

So we have a lot at stake in this region, not just the presence of our troops in Iraq.

I recommend that in moving forward we need to establish stronger dialogue with nations in the region; including Iran and Syria. Syria is ripe to receive US consultation and maybe even to move in the direction of greater western rapprochement, as opposed to being pulled back into the orbit of Iran. At the same time we need to be talking to Iran. They have many interests in the region other than the acquisition of nuclear weapons and maybe there is a way through dialogue that we can craft a solution that avoids the military option or even the economic sanctions option. We'll never know if we don't talk to them. So that's the Middle East.

There are other things we need to do.

We need to strengthen our program against Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and other terrorists. This involves, principally, refraining from the kinds of actions which can be used for terrorist recruiting like another military action, and also it involves strengthening our cooperation with law enforcement, exchange of information, and training programs for law enforcement elements throughout the region. We need to be working with the government of Pakistan; we also need to be pushing Musharraf to do more against the Kasiristan area where Osama bin Laden reported to be.

One important part, maybe a vital part of national securing of the United States in the future is going to be a national energy policy. It's not that we're pulling in so much oil from the middle east ourselves, although we do import some, the world oil marked of 84 million barrels a day is pretty much an integrated world market, and a shortage from a supplier anywhere in the world affects every purchaser of oil. So, what we need to do is reduce our reliance on petroleum, whether its natural gas or crude oil or refined products. We just need to be using less of it. We need to be developing our own substitutes. We can use other forms of sustainable, reusable energy. I like solar myself, active and passive, plus there's wind, plus there's abundant coal which can be converted into liquids and other forms of energy to power automobiles and power plants. And so there are differing means. We've got to have an effective national energy policy that reduces our exposure to the risks of the international oil market. If we don't we're going to find our foreign policy driven by our energy needs.

So I've talked about Iraq, I've talked about the region, a national energy policy and reinforcing our friends an allies. We know how to do this. This is the United States of America; we're still the preeminent power in the world. Still, some of the current leadership in Washington doesn't want to do the hard work, they don't want to talk to people they disagree with. They don't want to talk to people at the risk of being criticized by the hard right wing in this country. So I would say that we need a fundamental course correction.

We've got to strengthen our ability to work effectively with others, and to do that we've got to have the courage to do it at home. I believe it's still not too late to try to salvage something from the mess this administration has made in Iraq.