- The tragedies in the Palestinian territories and Afghanistan underscore the fragility of the Biden administration’s efforts to disengage from the region
- Unless the US radically overhauls its Middle East strategy, it will struggle to compete with China in the Indo-Pacific
“It is difficult to understand the universe if you only study one planet,” the great sage Miyamoto Musashi observed. The same logic also applies to 21st-century geopolitics, whereby one cannot understand the future of Sino-US rivalry by focusing on the Asian region alone.
In many ways, Washington’s strategic capital and foreign policy bandwidth continue to be determined by developments in other vital regions, most especially the Middle East and North Africa (Mena).
The twin tragedies in the occupied Palestinian territories and Afghanistan , where hundreds of civilians have been killed in recent weeks, underscore the fragility of the Biden administration’s efforts to disengage from the region. This provides strategic rivals such as China a unique opportunity to expand their influence across the Mena region, where the US enjoys little goodwill among the masses.
The region’s population is comparable to the European Union’s, while its combined gross domestic product is similar to that of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. However, there are three reasons the region continues to dominate US foreign policy, thus complicating Biden’s pivot to the Indo-Pacific against a rising China.
First, as US congressman Tip O’Neill once said, “all politics is local”. Although a global superpower, America’s democratic institutions are vulnerable to institutionalised capture by vested interests.
A recent study by Princeton University showed how the US was more like a civil “oligarchy” than a true democracy since “economic elites and organised groups” tend to “have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence”.
The same dynamic is at play in US foreign policy. In their book The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, political scientists John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt show how a few well-funded, deftly organised interest groups have exercised disproportionate influence on Washington’s policy in the Middle East.
In recent years, other major Middle East countries such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have developed a robust lobbying presence in Washington, from Capitol Hill to influential American think tanks. As a result, successive US administrations have struggled to pivot away from the Mena region and, in the words of former president Barack Obama, transcend the “Washington [lobby] playbook” on US foreign policy.
The second factor is the stubborn presence of transnational terrorist groups across the region. After almost two decades of the “war on terror” , the Pentagon admits that al-Qaeda is stronger than ever, while remnants of so-called Islamic State are still active across parts of Iraq and Syria.
Finally, the Mena region is still the predominant global supplier of hydrocarbon resources, despite major strides in renewable energy development. It also hosts vital sea lanes such as the Suez Canal and the Strait of Hormuz, through which pass the bulk of global hydrocarbon exports.
In an attempt to focus on China under its Indo-Pacific strategy , the Biden administration has pursued a retrenchment strategy in Mena. It cancelled large arms sales to Saudi Arabia, ceased backing the former’s brutal war in Yemen and is set on ending “forever wars” from Afghanistan to Iraq.
But there are few signs Washington will be able to extricate itself from long-standing geopolitical entanglements in the region. America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, for instance, could trigger a civil war between Kabul and the resurgent Taliban.
In recent weeks, Taliban forces and extremist groups have stepped up terrorist attacks across major cities, targeting women and minority groups with growing brutality. The Shia Hazara community, for instance, is preparing for renewed civil conflict against hostile Sunni forces such as the Taliban.
Just as the Trump administration shamelessly abandoned its Kurdish allies in Syria, the Biden administration appears to be abandoning its Kabul allies in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza has exposed the West, which imposed coordinated sanctions against China for its alleged persecution of Muslim minority groups in Xinjiang .
Following more than a week of constant bombardment, Israeli Defence Forces have destroyed dozens of hospitals and clinics, including the only Covid-19 testing centre in occupied Gaza. Critical infrastructure such as sewage systems and water pipes, serving more than a third of the total population in the occupied territory, have also been devastated.
Even more tragic is the killing of 63 children, including 11 who were part of a rehabilitation programme from past traumas of conflict, among hundreds of civilian casualties. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres was “horrified” by “the continued air and artillery bombardment by the Israeli defence forces in Gaza”.
“If there is a hell on earth, it is the lives of children in Gaza,” the UN chief said, underscoring the global outcry over the continuous bombardment of the civilian population in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories. Yet, the Biden administration reportedly blocked an earlier China-sponsored Security Council proposal , which aimed to end the latest round of hostilities, to protect Israel from criticism.
As for the Washington-brokered ceasefire , it is too little, too late, since it fails to address the root cause of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
America’s strategic struggles in the region place Beijing in position to implement its own “March West” strategy in the vital region. After all, China has been more openly critical of Israel ; publicly supportive of the deeply resonant Palestinian cause across the Muslim world; friendly with both Sunni and Shia powers; and a pre-eminent source of infrastructure development and trade, including in post-war Afghanistan, under its Belt and Road Initiative.
Beijing’s statecraft is holistic enough to understand superpower rivalry with the US will not be confined to a single region alone but extend throughout the Eurasian land mass and beyond. Unless the US radically overhauls its Mena strategy, it will struggle to compete with China in the Indo-Pacific.
Richard Heydarian is a Manila-based academic and author of “Asia’s New Battlefield: US, China and the Struggle for the Western Pacific” and the forthcoming “Duterte’s Rise”
