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The Middle East in Flux
Abdullah ibn Abdilaziz Al Saud, the long-reigning king of Saudi Arabia, passed away this week. While some observers worried about a power struggle, the new King Salman quickly reassured his national and international friends that it will be a peaceful transition.
However, it’s hard not to notice that King Salman is 79, just 11 years younger than his deceased half-brother Abdullah. Even if he stays in charge for a few years, he is the last of the old guard and a new generation rises. Will the younger Sauds have the same priorities of international trade and regional stability?
Further down the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen is in the midst of a violent coup. President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, a nominal U.S. ally in the war on terror, just resigned due to the rebel takeover of the capital city. These Houthi upstarts are basically a Shi’ite version of the Sunni Al Qaeda. Locals celebrated Houthi military success in downtown Sana’a by waving signs reading “Death to America! Death to Israel!”
Looking to north Africa, Libya is an anarchic nightmare, in spite of/because of the Western-led effort to topple Muammar Qaddafi. Militants carrying the banners of Al Qaeda, IS and other Islamist terror groups are thick both on the well-populated coastlines and the desolate inland.
Speaking of ISIS, they control vast swathes of Syria and Iraq and are now exporting terror to western capitals. Bashar al-Assad is brutally crushing other rebellious groups in country, while in the corners of Syria, Turkey and Iraq, heavily armed Kurds dream of an independent state.
A few days ago, Israel wiped out Hezbollah leadership and high-level Iranian generals who were gathering in the Golan Heights for an apparent invasion of the “Zionist entity.” Hezbollah’s supporters are demanding a bloody response, while Hamas attempts to step up their own terror campaign. And did I mention Iran’s nuclear program is still humming along as the feckless Obama administration finds new ways to placate the apocalyptic regime?
The above parade of horribles only scratches the surface of turmoil upending the region, any element of which could spark a far wider war.
Six years in, the President might want to consider a comprehensive plan of diplomacy, defense and trade for the Middle East. Because drones outfitted with speakers blaring James Taylor songs ain’t going to cut it.
It’s time for your prediction: What do you think the Middle East will look like in five years?
Published in General
I’ll start:
A vast uniform caliphate stretching from the Pakistan-Indian boarder all the way to the Shetland Islands off the northern coast of Britain flying under a black flag. All churches converted to mosques. Blazing hellfire. The armies of the undead, taking the form of fiery skeletons riding winged dragons, locked in an alliance with the jihadis mopping up the few remaining dissidents. Weather forecast of rain and overcast.
On a happier note…
Bonus points for excellent use of imagery.
More of the same – nothing will be resolved. None of the factions or interests is strong enough to comprehensively win at an acceptable price, and none of the factions is weak enough to be thus defeated.
The balance of power will move slightly in favour of dictatorships and monarchies – but political Islam will continue to be the dominant opposition in most countries, for lack of any other. (Except in Iran.) No great options for the locals or for the West. Governments will mostly become more repressive rather than less.
Random predictions: ISIS will contract somewhat, and its borders will start to stabilise, Iran will become the de facto Western ally that dare not speak its name, Afghanistan will not collapse but there will be an on-ground split of authority along ethnic lines – which will destabilise Pakistan (further), There will be no official Kurdish independence but the unofficial kind will increase for those in Iraq in tandem with US bases bedding down over there, Russian influence will start showing up in surprising places (say North Africa), Yemen will drive Saudi and the Gulf closer to the West.
One bright spot: Tunisia, though that will only be relative :-(
Israel stands.
I have no idea what the other nations devolve into but Israel will continue to shine.
A new American president will be elected in 2016. One of his first actions in 2017 will be to bomb the Iranian nuclear facilities buried underground. He will hit them until they are broached, then drop a tactical nuke and make them radioactive for the next millenium.
In tandem with America, Israel will clean out the house of vipers in Gaza, driving all miscreants into the Negev. Israel’s border will be stabilized at the Jordan River, as it stands today. The Palestinian Authority will be outlawed and deported to Syria, where it can plot the further ruination of either the local area OR Israel, whatever it desires.
1 year after these events have settled, in response to the further beheadings of IS (or ISIL or ISI or ISL or whatever alphabet soup you want), America will launch a major military assault into Syria, cleaning out THAT nest of vipers with lightening assaults and no quarter. Once done, it will retreat from there with the comment, “Don’t make me come back – I won’t be nice next time.”
Belgium will finally decide that islam is not welcome and evict all muslims. Those who decry will be tied to lamp posts naked with signs saying, “Look at me. Free love if you’re interested. Allah doesn’t like virgins.”
France will implode, becoming like Germany in the immediate aftermath of WWII. The Germans will look on in apathy.
In America the nation will divide into “regions”. There will still be a federal system but it will be gutted and made to ONLY do those things the regions truly can’t. Meanwhile, while the edges continue to bask in unreality (and debt), no one will come to their aid. In the center, welfare will be demolished and all will be required to work – or die. Their choice. No government handouts to ANY – rich or poor. No “good deals” to big companies with corporate jets.
Simon Templar becomes Secretary of War and DocJay Secretary of State.
OK. So I got a little carried away. ;-)))))
On a more serious note, I doubt that anyone has much of an idea what will transpire. Part of that is caused by the fact that we seem to have no viable strategy with how to deal with this cauldron.
Life may well get “interesting”.
Duuuude! Are you in Colorado?
Utterly fantastic, but it was a fun read, especially your choices for cabinet posts.
Heh, heh, heh!
Ah, … no. Worse. I live in … Illinois. How rude an awakening THAT is!
Well, it could someday come back to the sort of state that produced Reagan and Rumsfeld.
But the odds are more like Syria today.
Maybe I SHOULD move to Colorado and start smoking.
After all sides have suffered enough pain (that should be soon), there will be a peace conference a la Dayton, sponsored by the US, EU, Russia and China. Some borders will be redrawn and there will follow a 1,000 years of peace, progress and prosperity. Riyadh, Tehran, Istanbul, Damascus, Bagdad, Beirut and Jerusalem will then be the new Vienna, Paris and London of the world. The Anbar province will be the new Silicon Valley and Doha the new Wall Street.
Seriously, there is some reason for optimism. With oil down 50%, there is less money for fighting. It makes everyone more reasonable.
That was my view here in April –>
http://ricochet.com/archives/to-solve-syria-crush-the-price-of-oil/
and it is still my view.
Didn’t you listen to the President’s State of the Union address? EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!
Interesting theory. We’ll see how it plays out.
Iran goes nuclear.
A couple of years later a EMP launched from a container ship in the Gulf of Mexico by unknown actors brings the U.S. to its knees.
Afterward, in the U.S. life get short, nasty and brutish for a while.
More probable than some of these predictions.
Does anybody remember the movies that brought Mel Gibson to stardom? I expect the Middle East will highly resemble a Mad Max movie.
Randy, why do you write in the future tense?
Iran announces they have the bomb. In fact, they don’t. But it doesn’t matter because nobody will believe the Obama Adminstraion or the CIA.
The Israelis will use this as an excuse for a free strike at the Iranian nuclear infrastructure.
Zafar is the only one making any sort of sense.
Shop Smart. Shop S-Mart.
What’s the fun in that? So:
Here’s a fact: 100 US troops going to Syria to train opposition fighters.
But who would they be training?
Apart from the Syrian Kurds the only major Syrian armed group that is not actively malign towards any and all minorities seems to be….the Asad regime.
Through the looking-glass, man. Though, ironically, this is the same point that the loony Buchananites were making back at the start of this whole mess (though in service to Russian interests, at least partially).
It already does.
I can’t help thinking building a functioning state that the West would like from the ground up, starting with a number of sectarian militias, is less likely to be successful than reforming a functioning Ba’athist state (admittedly with a sectarian dominated army of its very own). How did that work out in Iraq?
Becoming Assad’s new patron would be more of a poke in the eye for Iran than defeating Assad, and with likely better consequences. Or is that crazy talk?
Isn’t Assad an eye doctor?
I can’t answer those questions but I can tell you I have an incredible anxiety over the middle east situation given that Obama is in charge. What a hapless dolt. The inspector Clouseau of the presidency.
Little of column A, little of column B…
It probably is crazy, but hoooooo-boy, it would be awesome if we could pull it off.
It’s much more likely that Iran announces it has 20 bombs while having 50 and about to build 100 more. Given the visible size, duration, expenditures, and access to third party technology, it is possible they already have 20. It is unambiguous that they are building a cold war size weapons infrastructure.
This causes Saudi Arabia to reveal a Pakistani-built arsenal of 40 warheads.
Despite possible this possible nuclear standoff, Shiite-Sunni bloodshed will be ongoing.
The Shiite world is united under Iran: Iraq; Hezbollah; the Assad family; Shiites in the Western Gulf states. The Sunni world is not. You have quite a multipolar world: Saudis and some other Gulf ruling families; Egypt; Turkey; and ISIS and lesser players. All sorts of temporary alliances will be involved. Will the Saudis and ISIS ally against Yemeni and other Gulf Shiites? Will Morsi’s Egypt be allied with the Saudis or will a Brotherhood Egypt oppose the Saudis.
Turkey is in an odd position. It seems to want to encourage its natural adversaries. This may be a game to encourage war with Israel (by Egypt and/or Iran), after which Turkey would pick up the pieces.
That brings us to Israel. Israel is deterred from attacking Iran. Thus, the question is what Iran does to Israel. Do they massively attack with nuclear weapons first or do they attack with conventional weapons and use the nuclear strike as a follow-up. The conventional strike might be intended to best degrade Israel’s defenses and take out some of its nuclear deterrent. 50k Hezbollah rockets would likely substantially degrade Israel’s missile defense infrastructure. Commando raids could take out key Israeli nuclear infrastructure.
One way or another, Iran pulls the trigger by 2017 and removes Israel from the map. If Iran survives unscathed what does that do for the Islamic Civil War? What if Israel is able to take out Tehran and Qom in response?
My guess is Iran gets away with it and it gives them a political upper hand in the Islamic Civil War. This brings Turkey to its semi senses and Turkey decides to forge an alliance with the Saudis. Thus year 5 finds a bit of a standoff while Turkey nukes up. Turkey and the Saudis try to come to terms with ISIS and direct ISIS toward Shiite targets that threaten the Saudis.
No, but blasting them with Slim Whitman might work.
https://youtu.be/cMj-dvivlB8?t=3m31s