The US scramble for Allies in the Middle East
WARSAW - On February 13th, the U.S government hosted “The Ministerial To Promote a Future of Peace and Security in the Middle East” in the Polish capital. The conference took place over two days and touched upon topics crucial to Middle Eastern stability such as security issues, weapons proliferation, humanitarian crises, as well as terrorism and energy.
Albeit the ambitious name of the event not all of the principal actors of the Middle East were invited. States like Israel, Saudi Arabia, The UAE, and Bahrain, attended while Iran was missing from the list. This was widely seen as an attempt to create an alliance of Anti-Iran states around the U.S. As the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, further expressed “It is impossible to achieve peace in the Middle East without opposition to Iran”.
Most EU member states were not eager on attending either and opted to send only low level delegates to the conference. Russia, Turkey, Lebanon, and the Palestinian Authority declined their invitations mainly due to the perceived anti-Iranian nature of the event.
The Stork went and asked some IE students about their opinion on this summit.
“Isolating Iran from the international community is a core component of US foreign policy. Due to today’s globalized economy, doing that solo is essentially impossible. The US needs partners to be able to do this. Interestingly enough it has United traditional arch rivals, like Saudi Arabia and Israel in their pursuit to weaken Iran,” stated Andrew Fitzgerald, a 4th year BIR student from the US.
Fitzgerald also noted “to not forget the fact that Iran is the US’ number one enemy right now. U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East is built around weakening them. I agree, dialogue is needed but this was not the right forum.”
Considering the fact that the Trump administration withdrew from the Iran Nuclear Deal, declared that the war against ISIS was won, and subsequently announced to pull U.S. troops from the region, it indeed doesn’t come as a surprise that the U.S. is doing anything in their might trying to shift responsibility to fill the upcoming power vacuum to their allies. Given that most of their interests run against those of Iran, Fitzgerald is right in pointing out that it wouldn’t have made sense to include them.
On the other hand, Pola Nachyla, a Polish 3rd year BIR student commented on Poland’s role to host.
“Poland has always been trying hard to prove its worth to its Western neighbors. Hosting the conference helped making it more visible on the international stage,” she stated, “I would not be surprised to see it try to appease as many actors as possible, whether it’s the EU, the US, or even China knocking on our doors with its One Belt One Road Initiative.”
While this enthusiasm to cooperate with their Western allies surely is something positive, it has taken on forms that make a coherent EU coordination more difficult. The EU still upholds the Iran Nuclear Deal and tries its best to improve diplomatic relations with Iran. Thus, the Polish decision to host this event in their capital didn’t go well with other EU member states. Another example of Poland moving without prior coordination with its allies is their request to the U.S. for a military base in their territory to counterbalance potential Russian aggression.
When asked about this the Polish BIR student agreed that these dynamics certainly played a role in the decision to support the U.S. conference. Nachyla makes the remarks that “Russia remains a “hot topic” in Polish Foreign Policy. Since Poland already has a strong representative in the EU with Donald Tusk, it hopes to establish tighter relations with Washington as well - especially given that the current party in power in Poland shares certain values and ideology with Trump.”
In addition, given the strong tension between Israel and Iran, Ariel Segal, an Israeli 3rd year BIR student, commented on the American idea to not include Iran.
“Iran and the USA are enemies. I don’t believe Israel had much of say in including Iran or not. Iran and Israel have attended international summits together, so this summit wouldn’t have made a difference,” said Segal, “Also, their security circles are talking to each other despite official relations. It is more of a diplomatic statement of the US to not include Iran. Still, peace won’t be achieved if a crucial actor like Iran is excluded.”
Some Arab countries were present that do not recognize Israel as a sovereign state, i.e. Saudi Arabia. Nevertheless, this event made it clear that they share their opposition to Iran with Israel and that they are willing to build a relationship on this foundation. Also, elections in Israel are taking place in April and Netanyahu might want to leverage this event as a diplomatic success.
Segal further points out that “Israel has grown in favor of many non-recognizing Arab countries over the years and security and governmental ties are growing stronger. Israel and Saudi Arabia have been getting closer, due to potential mutual benefits.” Nevertheless, she continues that “ some ties are getting stronger, others are getting trickier. Regarding the upcoming elections; there are bigger things on his plate that he needs to think about now.”
With seventy nations in attendance and the announcement of creating working groups to support a “Global forum of experts, the Middle East Strategic Study Group”, the U.S. showed that its event might have the potential to shape the future alignment of powers in the region. The comments by our IE Students made clear that each country had understandable reasons for participating and promoting this event despite its perceived hostile nature regarding Iran. They also agreed that for any real progress Iran needs to be part of the dialogue.
Furthermore, the fact that the EU is not united on this issue and the subject of the Iran Nuclear Deal, as well as the meeting between Russia, Iran and Turkey on February 14 to discuss the future of Syria together, shows that the U.S. isn’t the only influential actor in this game. Only time will tell how successful Trump’s government will be with bringing stability to the region.