Re: Stratfor Weekly: The Region After Iraq (fwd)

Comment :

In this article "The Region After Iraq" from Dr. George Friedman there is no
reference to Israel. Why?

In this article from Israeli source (1996) " Coping with Crumbling States: A
Western and Israeli Balance of Power Strategy for the Levant (1996)
http://www.iasps.org.il/strat2.htm you can read :
Cit" HaAretz reported that in Peres' December meetings with top American
officials, he even proposed the creation of NATO-style alliance among
Israel, Jordan, a post-Saddam Iraq, and Turkey. "

It's seem that this is a Western  (USA) and Israeli Strategy.

Sorry for my english.

> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Wed, 05 Feb 03 18:42:18 CST
> From: alert@stratfor.com
> To: redalert@stratfor.com
> Subject: Stratfor Weekly: The Region After Iraq
>
> Here is your complimentary Stratfor Weekly, written by our
> Chairman and Founder, Dr. George Friedman.
>
> Please feel free to email this analysis to a friend.
>
> The Region After Iraq
>
> Summary
>
> Desert Storm was about restoring the status quo ante. The 2003
> war with Iraq will be about redefining the status quo in the
> region. Geopolitically, it will leave countries like Syria and
> Saudi Arabia completely surrounded by U.S. military forces and
> Iran partially surrounded. It is therefore no surprise that the
> regional powers, regardless of their hostility to Saddam Hussein,
> oppose the war: They do not want to live in a post-war world in
> which their own power is diluted. Nor is it a surprise, after
> last week's events in Europe indicating that war is coming, that
> the regional powers -- and particularly Saudi Arabia -- are now
> redefining their private and public positions to the war. If the
> United States cannot be stopped from redefining the region, an
> accommodation will have to be reached.
>
> Analysis
>
> Last week, the focus was on Europe -- where heavy U.S. pressure,
> coupled with the internal dynamics, generated a deep division.
> From the U.S. point of view, regardless of what France and
> Germany ultimately say about the war, these two countries no
> longer can claim to speak for Europe. Ultimately, for the
> Americans, that is sufficient.
>
> This week, U.S. attention must shift to a much more difficult
> target -- the Islamic world. More precisely, it must shift to the
> countries bordering Iraq and others in the region as well. In
> many ways, this is a far more important issue than Europe. The
> Europeans, via multinational organizations, can provide
> diplomatic sanction for the invasion of Iraq. The countries
> around Iraq constitute an essential part of the theater of
> operations, potentially influencing the course of the war and
> even more certainly, the course of history after the war. What
> they have to say and, more important, what they will do, is of
> direct significance to the war.
>
> As it stands at this moment, the U.S. position in the region, at
> the most obvious level, is tenuous at best. Six nations border
> Iraq: Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Turkey and Iran. Of
> the six, only one -- Kuwait -- is unambiguously allied with the
> United States. The rest continue to behave ambiguously. All have
> flirted with the United States and provided varying degrees of
> overt and covert cooperation, but they have not made peace with
> the idea of invasion and U.S. occupation.
>
> Of the remaining five, Turkey is by far the most cooperative. It
> will permit U.S. forces to continue to fly combat missions
> against Iraq from bases in Turkey as well as allow them to pass
> through Turkey and maintain some bases there. However, there is a
> split between the relatively new Islamist government of Turkey,
> which continues to be uneasy about the war, and the secular
> Turkish military, which is committed to extensive cooperation.
> And apart from Kuwait, Turkey is the best case. Each of the other
> countries is even more conflicted and negative toward an
> invasion.
>
> Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Iran are very different countries
> and have different reasons for arriving at their positions. They
> each have had very different experiences with Saddam Hussein's
> Iraq.
>
> Iran fought a brutal war with Iraq during the 1980s -- a war
> initiated by the Iraqis and ruinous to Iran. Hussein is despised
> by Iranians, who continue to support anti-Hussein exiles. Tehran
> certainly is tempted by the idea of a defeated Iraq. It also is
> tempted by the idea of a dismembered Iraq that never again could
> threaten Iran, and where Iran could gain dominance over its
> Shiite regions. Tehran certainly has flirted with Washington and
> particularly with London on various levels of cooperation, and
> clearly has provided some covert intelligence cooperation to the
> United States and Britain. In the end, though -- however
> attractive the collapse of Iraq might be -- internal politics and
> strategic calculations have caused Iranian leaders to refuse to
> sanction the war or to fully participate. Iran might be prepared
> to pick up some of the spoils, but only after the war is fought.
>
> Syria stands in a similar relation to Iraq. The Assad family
> despises the Husseins, ideologically, politically and personally.
> Syria sided openly with the United States in 1991. Hussein's
> demise would cause no grief in Damascus. Yet, in spite of a
> flirtation with Britain in particular -- including a visit with
> both Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Charles for Syrian President
> Assad -- Syria has not opted in for the war.
>
> Nor have the Jordanians -- at least not publicly. There are
> constant reports of U.S. (and Israeli) special operations troops
> operating out of Jordan. U.S. Marines have trained during the
> past month in Jordan, but the government remains officially
> opposed to the war -- and what support it will give, it will give
> only covertly.
>
> Finally, there is Saudi Arabia, which has been one of the pillars
> of U.S. power in the region since the 1950s and which has, in
> turn, depended on Washington for survival against both Arab
> radicals and Iraq itself. The Saudis have been playing the most
> complex game of all, cooperating on some levels openly,
> cooperating on other levels covertly, while opposing the war
> publicly.
>
> For all of the diversity in the region, there is a common
> geopolitical theme. If the U.S. invasion is successful,
> Washington intends to occupy Iraq militarily, and it officially
> expects to remain there for at least 18 months -- or to be more
> honest, indefinitely. The United States will build air bases and
> deploy substantial ground forces -- and, rather than permit the
> disintegration of Iraq, will create a puppet government
> underwritten by U.S. power.
>
> On the day the war ends, and if the United States is victorious,
> then the entire geopolitics of the region will be redefined.
> Every country bordering Iraq will find not the weakest formations
> of the Iraqi army along their frontiers, but U.S. and British
> troops. The United States will be able to reach into any country
> in the region with covert forces based in Iraq, and Washington
> could threaten overt interventions as well. It would need no
> permission from regional hosts for the use of facilities, so long
> as either Turkey or Kuwait will permit transshipment into Iraq.
> In short, a U.S. victory will change the entire balance of power
> in the region, from a situation in which the United States must
> negotiate its way to war, to a situation where the United States
> is free to act as it will.
>
> Consider the condition of Syria. It might not have good relations
> with Hussein's Iraq, but a U.S.-occupied Iraq would be Syria's
> worst nightmare. It would be surrounded on all sides by real or
> potential enemies -- Israel, Turkey, Jordan and the United States
> - and, in the Mediterranean, by the U.S. Sixth Fleet. Syria --
> which traditionally has played a subtle, complex balancing game
> between various powers -- would find itself in a vise, no longer
> able to guarantee its national security except through
> accommodating the United States.
>
> A similar situation is shaping up for Saudi Arabia. The United
> States is operating extensively in Yemen; it also has air force
> facilities in Qatar and naval facilities in Bahrain. U.S. B-1
> bombers and some personnel are going to be based in Oman. The
> United States has established itself along the littoral of the
> Arabian peninsula. With U.S. forces deployed along the Saudi-
> Iraqi border, and with U.S. domination of the Red Sea and Persian
> Gulf, the Saudis will be in essence surrounded.
>
> The same basic problem exists for Iran, although on a less
> threatening scale. Iran is larger, more populated and more
> difficult to intimidate. Nevertheless, with at least some U.S.
> forces in Afghanistan -- and the option for introducing more
> always open -- and U.S. forces in Iraq and the Persian Gulf, the
> Iranians too find themselves surrounded, albeit far less
> overwhelmingly than would be the case for Syria or Saudi Arabia.
>
> The only probable winners would be Turkey, which would lay claim
> to the oil fields around Mosul and Kirkuk; Jordan, whose security
> would be enhanced by U.S. forces to the east; and Kuwait, which
> is betting heavily on a quick U.S. victory and a prolonged
> presence in the region.
>
> If we consider the post-Iraq war world, it is no surprise that
> the regional response ranges from publicly opposed and privately
> not displeased to absolute opposition. Certainly, Syria, Saudi
> Arabia and Iran have nothing to gain from a war that will be
> shaped entirely by the United States. Each understands that the
> pressure from the United States to cooperate in the war against
> al Qaeda will be overwhelming, potentially irresistible and
> politically destabilizing. This is not the world in which they
> want to live.
>
> Add to this the obvious fact of oil, and the dilemma becomes
> clear. The United States is not invading Iraq for oil: If oil was
> on Washington's mind, it would invade Venezuela, whose crisis has
> posed a more serious oil problem for the United States than Iraq
> could. Nevertheless, Washington expects to pay for the
> reconstruction of Iraq from oil revenues, and there will be no
> reason to limit Iraqi production. This cannot make either Riyadh
> or Tehran happy, since it will drive prices down and increase
> competition for market share.
>
> Saudi Arabia, Iran and Syria have every reason to oppose a war in
> Iraq. The consequences of such a war will undermine their
> national interests. They were depending on Europe's ability to
> block the war, but that strategy has failed. The Saudis and
> Syrians then launched into an attempt to find a political
> solution that would prevent a U.S. occupation of Iraq. That
> centered around either Hussein's voluntary resignation and exile,
> or a coup in Baghdad that would produce a new government -- one
> that would cooperate fully with weapons inspectors, and remove
> the U.S. justification for occupation.
>
> This attempt, in collaboration with other regional powers and
> countries like Germany and Russia, is still under way. The
> problem is that Hussein has little motivation to resign, and his
> security forces remain effective. Hussein apparently still is not
> convinced that the United States will invade, or that he will be
> defeated. His seems to assume that, if his troops can inflict
> some casualties on U.S. forces, then the United States will
> accept a cease-fire without toppling him. He will not abdicate,
> nor will his followers overthrow him, until those two assumptions
> are falsified. What that means is that the United States still
> would occupy Iraq militarily, even if there was a coup or
> resignation as the campaign unfolded.
>
> If you can't beat them, join them. The European split -- and the
> real possibility that France and Germany ultimately will endorse
> war in some way -- mean that war cannot be prevented. Hussein
> will not abdicate or be overthrown until the war is well under
> way. Therefore, it is highly likely that the war will take place,
> the United States will occupy Iraq and that the map of the Middle
> East will change profoundly.
>
> Continued opposition to the war, particularly from Riyadh's
> standpoint, makes little sense. The issue until now has been to
> cope with the internal political challenges that have arisen in
> the kingdom since Sept. 11, 2001. After the Iraq war, this issue
> will be supplemented by the question of how the United States
> regards the kingdom. It is not prudent for a nation surrounded by
> a much more powerful nation to allow itself to be regarded as an
> enemy. Therefore, we are witnessing a shift in the Saudi position
> that might evolve to reluctant, public support for the war by the
> time an attack is launched.
>
> Iranian leaders do not feel themselves to be quite in such
> desperate straits -- since they are not. However, the presence of
> U.S. power on Iran's borders will create an urgent need to settle
> the internal disputes that divide the country. The need to do so,
> however, does not guarantee a successful outcome. The division
> between those who feel that an opening to the United States is
> essential and those who feel that protecting Iran against the
> United States is paramount might become exacerbated and
> destabilize the country. However, there is no immediate, overt
> threat to Iran, although the possibilities for covert operations
> increase dramatically.
>
> Jordan will do well, but Syria's future is cloudier. Washington
> has concerns about Syria's long-term commitment to U.S.
> interests, and Damascus might find itself squeezed unbearably.
> Turkey will fatten on oil and manage the Kurds as it has done in
> the past. But nothing will be the same after this war. Unlike
> Desert Storm, which was about restoring the status quo ante, this
> war is about establishing an entirely new reality.
>
> The United States is, of course, well-aware that its increased
> presence in the region will result in greater hostility and
> increased paramilitary activity against U.S. forces there.
> However, the U.S. view is that this rising cost is acceptable so
> long as Washington is able to redefine the behavior of countries
> neighboring Iraq. In the long run, the Bush administration
> believes, geopolitical power will improve U.S. security interests
> in spite of growing threats. To be more precise, the United
> States sees Islamic hostility at a certain level as a given, and
> does not regard an increase in that hostility as materially
> affecting its interests.
>
> The conquest of Iraq will not be a minor event in history: It
> will represent the introduction of a new imperial power to the
> Middle East and a redefinition of regional geopolitics based on
> that power. The United States will move from being an outside
> power influencing events through coalitions, to a regional power
> that is able to operate effectively on its own. Most significant,
> countries like Saudi Arabia and Syria will be living in a new and
> quite unpleasant world.
>
> Therefore, it is not difficult to understand why the regional
> powers are behaving as they are. The disintegration of the
> European bloc has, however, left them in an untenable position.
> The United States will occupy Iraq, and each regional power is
> now facing that reality. Unable to block the process, they are
> reluctantly and unhappily finding ways to accustom themselves to
> it.
>
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