This is How F***** Up the Middle East Is

I may not have this exactly correct, but I think I am close and this why the Neo-Con belief that we need to keep the U.S. Military in harms way is simply wrong.  It also shows why we have to pay intense attention to the situation in order to protect ourselves.

The U.S. and the tyrannical Sunni Gulf States (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Abu Dhabi) are allies.  So it kind of makes sense that Shiite Iran and we would have difficulties, since the Sunni and Shia have difficulties.

But the Qatar's, which host a U.S. military base, provide (or at the very least allow) financial support to extremist Jihadist groups like Al Qaeda and ISIS, the former of which the U.S. is formally at war with.

The U.S. invaded Iraq to depose the tyrannical Sunni Saddam Hussein and allow the Shiite majority to elect so we ostensibly support democratization as a a U.S. Goal in the Middle East despite being an ally of all these tyrannically run states.  Saddam did violate the rules when he invaded Kuwait.

So, the U.S. invasion of Iraq allowed the formation of a Shia State that aligned itself with Iran, our ostensible enemy (neoconservative view who designed the invasion of Iraq).

The U.S. then cheers on the Arab Spring as creating democracy in tyrannical states and getting rid of our enemies like Gaddafi.  But then, we end up with the Muslim Brotherhood who are Sufi's and can support either Shia or Sunni conservatives and definitely do not believe in liberal democracy.  But what happens, the people rebel, and the tyrannical Army takes over again.  Democracy snuffed out.

Meanwhile, Syria erupts into a Civil War, the neoconservatives argue for air cover and arms support for the rebels, but it is not clear what kind of command and security support the rebels have and sophisticated arms could well find their way the hands of enemies of Israel, our only true ally in the region (albeit one who could make life easier for us by developing a 2 State solution to their own major problem).

So in Syria, we support the rebels who are Sunni against the Shiite Assad regime who is supported by Iran and Iraq (our ally and our enemy).  The Sunni rebels include ISIS, which is now trying to overthrow the Shia Iraqi government using the funding from Qatar.

The Assad regime is now attacking ISIS in Iraq believing they have over reached while the U.S. has military observers in Iraq trying to figure out if U.S. military action can be effective fighting ISIS.  This would make us allies of Iran and the Assad regime, both of whom we would like to overthrow.  But we have to do this because Al Qaeda and ISIS are enemies of the U.S., but allies of the Gulf States, who are our allies.

So our allies have allies who are our enemies.  We are helping our allies who are allies of our enemies fight our enemies who are allies of our allies.  And our enemies are fighting our enemies who are allies of our allies.

So who are our allies and enemies?  The Gulf States which support Al Qaeda and ISIS or Iran and Iraq which oppose Al Qaeda and ISIS.  But Iran is our original enemy in all this because we supported the Shah and he suppressed the Mullahs who eventually took over and hate the U.S. and Israel.  And Al Qaeda and ISIS are our newest enemies.

So we have both Shia and Sunni and Sufi who hate us for interfering in their countries and we have Shia, Sunni and Sufi allies who want our military support when it suits them, but then it usually upsets someone else in the region.

Remember, the original reason Al Qaeda was formed by Osama bin Laden was to oppose the U.S. military being in Saudi Arabia for the Gulf War to free Kuwait from Saddam Hussein.

For every action there is a reaction when it comes to the Middle East.

It seems to me the best solution for the U.S. is to let the Sunni and Shia fight it out amongst themselves.  The fewer of them there are, the better.  Israel needs to develop a secure 2 State Solution so the Palestinians cannot be an excuse for all sorts of activity, and Israel can hold another government responsible for security issues in the West Bank as they do Gaza.

Those poor 3 kidnapped teenagers were taken in an Israeli security zone of the West Bank and they would not have been there if the West Bank was Palestine.  As the Arab population of Israel and the West Bank grows and becomes radical because they have no sovereign state, these type of security issues will just become more widespread because of the relative population.

Israel needs a 2 State Solution and until the U.S. can figure out who is truly an ally in the Middle East, the fewer people we have in harms way, the better.  But we do have to pay attention.

I was thinking about this article this morning and then I saw Thomas Friedman's column this morning.  His key quote is;  "We tend to make every story about us.  But this is not all about us.  To be sure, we've done plenty of ignorant things in Iraq and Egypt.  But we've also helped open their doors to a different future...which are slammed shut for now......Where we see islands of decency threatened, we should help protect them.  But this is primarily about them, about their need to learn to live together, without an iron fist from the top, and it will happen only when and if they want it to happen."

Link to Fiedman column on ISIS and Sisi


And this is why Putin should think twice about radicalizing the eastern end of the Ukraine.  Russia has enough problems with its Muslims.  It should not be creating another zone of instability in a region not all that far from Chechnya.