What does the American attack on Syria mean for the global order?
Dr. Neven Cvetićanin, President of the Forum for Strategic Studies
Since the founding of this unusual republic of capital at the end of the 18th century and during its entire existence in the previous two and a half centuries, there have been essentially only two foreign policy doctrines in US history – isolationism and interventionism or interventionism and isolationism, depending on which factor was more prevalent in the various US presidential administrations. This depended both on the spirit of the era itself (the 19th century was for America mostly a century of isolationism, while the 20th century was mostly its “century of interventionism”), and on the specific strategic vision of individual administrations that led the country, which eventually resulted in policies closer to interventionism or isolationism, or even combined elements of these two doctrines. Thus, the previous administration of Donald Trump, due to domestic political needs and the electorate prone to them, mostly flirted with isolationism, but it also knew how to intervene on the outside, like when they killed the “desert fox” of our time with a drone – General Qasem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s special Quds Force and undoubtedly the main and most capable Iranian operative in the Middle East.
Unlike the Donald Trump administration, the current Joe Biden administration is returning to classical interventionism, but in its dosed and more limited variant in comparison to Obama and his tenure. Analysts have had certain doubts about this possible strategy since it became clear that Biden would move into the White House, but it became quite obvious in practice in late February when his administration carried out its first external military strike, choosing as target the pro-Iranian militia base of Kata’ib Hezzbolah in Syria. Namely, on Thursday, February the 25th, two American F15E (Strike Eagle) fighter planes dropped 7 bombs on the same number of targets in the eastern Syria, on the border with Iraq, aiming for several buildings in the village of Al-Hurri near the border town of Abu Kamal (Arabic: Al-Bukamal), destroying them for suspicion of serving as a base for the aforementioned pro-Iranian militia with the accompanying transport infrastructure and trucks with ammunition. According to some sources, 17 Iranian fighters were killed in the attack, and 22 according to others, while the pro-Iranian militia Kata’ib Hezbollah itself officially announced that only one of its fighters was killed, while four were wounded. The attack was a response to attack by Iranian forces on US bases in Iraq on February the 15th and February the 20th, in which, again, officially, only one person was killed (officially from a heart attack), while seven were wounded.
These are the raw facts of this last episode of the eternal war in the Middle East, in which oil, blood, tears and sweat have been mixed for decades, and in which different powers of state, para-state, business and religious entities participates, in one intricate knot of history, religion and sole national and business interests. The Middle East thus remains a combination of all the best and worst that humanity has, the holy place of the three Abrahamic religions, but also desert soaked in the blood of believers, infidels, righteous and thieves, lions and foxes, generals and merchants, in its unique, typically Middle Eastern milieu. If love and war are the two everlasting constants of humanity and its strongest and most enduring archetypes, then these archetypes are nowhere to be found in such mixed forms as in the Middle East, where love for “one’s own”, usually, from a numerous strategic reasons, means suspicion (and war) towards “others”, and where even the famous battles from the Second World War, like the one at El Alamein, were much more archetypal in relation to the prosaic European slaughterhouses.
But what can we conclude from the previous events of bloody Middle East in a strategic sense and what it tells us about the future behaviour of great powers in this region and, above all, the stance of new Biden administration. Will there be a “Third World War” in the Middle East now, since “the Americans will bomb the world again” and the “Russians will answer” to them, as the porter of the building where I work asked me that day, getting ready for Coppola’s Apocalypse (now). I calmed the man down and told him that nothing special would happen after this, which was confirmed shortly after the described event. A middle-ranking Russian official said after the event that America’s last intervention in Syria could provoke a wider conflict, but that official was not actually a representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but “only” a senator and a representative of the Federation Council. It was obvious that Russia will not take any visible revenge after the American intervention, because, in that game of old competitors, who, as in a football match of city rivals, are fighting, but also know and understand each other very well, Russians understand what is really going on and what American intervention means.
And what is really going on and what does this American intervention actually mean?
First, it sends the message that the Biden administration has not given up on the United States military presence in the Middle East. That presence will be proportionate to the challenges and in accordance that America does not want any escalation in the Middle East. The action taken was proportional to the previous Iranian shelling of American bases in Iraq (even in official losses where it is 1-1) and the reason for it was the “stay” of Iranian forces in Syria, and America hereby sends the message that similar “stays” will not be observed in good faith, which is primarily a message to Iran to “reformulate” its presence in Syria (and Iraq). Behind this superficial message is a deeper and more important message that, if Iran “reformulates” its presence in Syria and Iraq, the negotiations about America return to a nuclear deal with Iran could be undertaken, from which the Trump administration unilaterally withdrew, while Biden is ready to renew it under certain conditions and thus remove one strategic problem from his neck. Relaxation of relations with Iran is especially important for America because of the Israel security, of which it is actually the guarantor – and Israel’s security is the main reason why World War III will probably never break out in the Middle East (although minor “gunfights” like this will continue in the future) – because that would put Israel, surrounded by Arabs, in an impossible strategic position (even if some of them are not enemies, but a security buffer zone). On the other hand, in previous years, Russia has taken a mediating position in the Middle East and gained the image of a state that is ready, if its specific interests are met, to “solve problems” and mediate between Iran, the Assad regime in Syria and Israel. That concludes that the whole Middle East package is actually in the hands of America and Russia, and that they are not overly interested in further escalation of the situation at the moment, while the third great geopolitical power – China – does neither prefer escalation in the Middle East, because it would interrupt its “New Silk Road” (Belt and Road Initiative), which aims to connect China with Europe.
It is difficult at this time to assess whether the multiple interest in de-escalation in the Middle East will result in a concrete revival of negotiations on a nuclear agreement with Iran and the return of America to it (which will not be easy because the agreement should be returned to “factory settings” and Iran has progressed in the meantime with his nuclear program), as well as whether there will be a general relaxation of relations between the main geopolitical powers (USA, China, Russia), but it is certain that the Biden administration is self-conscious enough to understand that the world has changed in the four years of Trump’s term. America’s position after those four years is not much stronger (among other things because Trump was not very interested in strategic issues at all, since he gave priority to internal economic recovery) and that it is not possible to return unilaterally to Obama’s administration strategic behaviour.
All this could be derived precisely from the specific action described in this article, whose conciseness and scope show that America itself will “reformulate” its presence in the Middle East during the Biden administration, being more (militarily) present in comparison Trump tenure, but still less than during Obama’s two terms. This testifies that, beyond all official ideological rhetoric, whether they speak of human rights or “our” model of socialism /capitalism, pragmatic realism has returned to international relations and that the leaders of the new-old multipolar world in the West and in the East are looking to “reformulate” international relations in the 21st century, being aware, at the same time, of the geopolitical multipolar reality and interdependence, in which, instead of frontal conflicts, a strategic stability and balance will have to be sought.
There is no doubt that this ongoing “reformulation” of world relations will cause similar minor “gunfire” like the one described in this article, but for now we should not be afraid that these “gunfire” will turn into a wider world conflict.
(published in the weekly Serbian newspapers NIN, March 2020)