The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat (2 page)

But perhaps the most important story this book tells is this one: the story of the price the United States will pay for its failure to understand that the coming geopolitical competition with China will not be played out in the Pacific theater alone. Important parts of that competition will be played out in the Middle East, and we had better be prepared for the jousting and its global consequences.

The American people are tired of war, rightly so, and welcome talk of leaving the region—not just packing up the soldiers but closing up shop altogether. Indeed, the president has marketed our exit from the Middle East as a foreign policy coup, one that will not only unburden us from the weight of the region’s problems but also give us the freedom we need to pursue other, more pressing, initiatives to address significant national security concerns.

Ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention the broader ill-defined “war on terror,” is, I agree, a very good idea, provided it is done properly without damage to our interests or the region’s stability. But we should not kid ourselves that the rhetoric of departure is anything more than rhetoric; we are bringing home our troops and winding down diplomatic and economic engagement, but leaving behind our drones and Special Forces. We should not expect that the region will look more kindly on drone attacks and secret raids than they did on broader U.S. military operations. But the more important point is that none of the issues that brought us to the Middle East in the first place have been resolved—not those that existed at the end of World War II, when Britain handed over to us the role of the great power in the region, not those that have kept us there for over sixty years, and certainly not those that attracted our attention after 9/11. If anything, the region is less stable and more vulnerable to crisis than ever before. And its importance to commerce and global order has not diminished.

Here is what America’s leaders and the American public cannot afford to miss. The near- and even long-term prospects for the Middle East are not difficult to predict. Either some outside power will have to step in and impose order on the region or it will collapse into chaos and instability, becoming the stage upon which untold numbers of nonstate actors, each with a different script, will attempt to wreak havoc upon us. China would love to play the role of great power in the region, and, one might argue, is preparing to do exactly that. Just as we pivot east, China is pivoting farther west. And it is doing so through its close and growing economic and diplomatic relationships with the Arab world, Pakistan, Iran, and Turkey. Indeed, while we scratched our heads about how to turn Pakistan our way during my tenure in the Obama administration, Chinese leaders were serenading Pakistan with reassurances that
Sino-Pakistani relations are “higher than the mountains, deeper than the oceans, stronger than steel, and sweeter than honey.”
¹

Will we be comfortable having China pull the Middle East into its sphere of influence? Letting China manage al-Qaeda or Iran’s nuclear ambition? Or try to resolve Arab-Israeli conflicts? Of course not. The Middle East will once again become the region where a great rivalry is played out, with China now playing the role of the Soviet Union.

These past four years presented us with an unrecognized opportunity to build regional economic, political, and military institutions to help the region resolve its many crises and allow it to manage on its own without constant new infusions of American lives and dollars. We could have simultaneously reduced the threat of al-Qaeda and strengthened the push for democracy, and figured out a way to draw Iran into the fold and minimize China’s influence in the region, not to mention saving the lives and money spent on yet another surge whose ultimate benefits remain questionable. But there is no equivalent to NATO or ASEAN in the Middle East—no organization anchored in an economic and security alliance with the United States. Nor does the Obama administration, despite its own claim to engaging the region and building comity and community, show any indication of understanding the need for such institution building. This, of course, would be even truer of a Republican administration. And so instead, after China further strengthens its position in the Middle East, we will find ourselves on the back foot, having to play catch-up with money we don’t have or will have to borrow from China.

But it is not too late. It is still possible to look ahead and deal with the problems in the region before they become another major crisis. This is why I have written this book.

—Vali Nasr, November 1, 2012

Once a year, in mid-September, dozens of heads of state and many more foreign ministers fly into New York City for the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. Generally speaking, it is not the speeches that draw these diplomats to New York. It is the chance to see and be seen, to exchange ideas and compare notes, to talk shop and even gossip. And it is an ideal place for a diplomat looking to drum up support for his country’s plans to get things done.

That’s what Richard Holbrooke intended to do in September 2009. Seven months earlier, he had been appointed by the president as his special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan. During the campaign and once in office, the president had made clear that getting Afghanistan right would be a high priority for his administration. I knew how seriously Holbrooke took that charge. If we get Afghanistan right, he told me when he brought me on board as his senior adviser, it will be the end of America’s wars in the Muslim world, and if we get it wrong, the “forever war” will continue, well, forever.

By late summer of 2009, the final plan for Afghanistan—more troops and serious nation-building—was clear enough for Holbrooke to inform some of our most important allies where we were heading. He told me he intended to start by meeting with a half dozen of those allies in New York during the UNGA meetings and that he wanted me to go with him. It was a week I will never forget.

Our very first meeting was with Egypt’s foreign minister, Ahmad Abu Ghaith. He was Holbrooke’s longtime friend and could not have been more gracious in his greetings. Holbrooke launched into his presentation
of our plans for Afghanistan—defeating the insurgency and building democracy, a vibrant economy, a large army, and a strong civil society. He spoke with enthusiasm and grace, and Abu Ghaith nodded gently throughout. But whenever there was the slightest pause on Holbrooke’s part, and sometimes even before Holbrooke had quite finished his thought, Abu Ghaith interjected in rather blunt, borderline-rude terms that everything Holbrooke was saying sounded a lot like our plans for Iraq, none of which worked out as we had hoped. When Holbrooke finished, the foreign minister immediately launched into his own presentation, certainly not one we were expecting.

“Richard,” he began, “of course we will support you, we always have. But why do you want to get mixed up in another war? This will only help the terrorists. All the talk among our youth now is of going to Afghanistan for jihad against the Americans.”

Abu Ghaith was not altogether correct; many of Egypt’s youth were then dreaming of democracy. But the correlation between U.S. attacks and Arab (but also Pakistani) youth packing up to fight America was surely correct. Still, it was not just the words he used that came through loud and clear to us. It was his dismissiveness and frustration at having to once again support a plan that made no sense to him and that was being presented as a near fait accompli.

Reactions only worsened after that. At our next meeting with an Arab foreign minister, we sipped tea and nibbled on dates as Holbrooke went through his talking points, this time giving a long, glowing description of what America hoped to accomplish in Afghanistan. By this time he had a good idea what the reaction would be, but Holbrooke was always a loyal soldier. It was his job to sell our plan. And he tried.

Once again the diplomats on the other side of the table made it painfully clear that they thought we were way off in la-la land with our talk of building democracy and a strong civil society and everything else we were offering.

And when it was their turn to talk, they said just that. “It is much better you buy local warlords to keep al-Qaeda out of Afghanistan,” our host responded. “I figure that will cost you $20 billion, which is what, one fifth of what you spend every year in Afghanistan? Spend that and then just go home!”

I had to repeat those last words to myself—just go home!—to have the meaning sink in. It was such a stunning rebuke that for a moment neither side said anything. It wasn’t as if the foreign minister was trying to put us down; you could tell from the way he spoke that he truly believed that we didn’t understand and that he was doing us a favor. Once again it was not the response we were looking for, but perhaps it was a response we should have listened to. About a year later, Rajiv Chandrasekaran of the
Washington Post
reported that in the parts of Afghanistan that experienced the least violence, credit went to American-backed local warlords.
¹

Between this meeting and the next, I asked Holbrooke about the responses we had encountered. I could see that he was deeply disturbed by how dismissive our interlocutors were about America’s ability to do good in the region. At first he said little, fumbling for an answer. Then he managed the rejoinder that the doubters did not understand our strategy. Our problem was communication—we had to exorcise the ghosts of Iraq before we could create new hopes for Afghanistan. And then, after a pause, he came clean. “They have a point,” he said.

Next on our list was another Arab foreign minister. I could have closed my eyes and thought I was in the previous meeting. In fact, had there been more time between the two meetings we could have concluded that the two foreign ministers had compared notes. As Holbrooke went through the same talking points—which, I have to admit, had lost a little oomph by now—our host fidgeted, as if he were impatient for Holbrooke to finish so he could bring the discussion back to reality. When his turn came, he jumped right in.

“You can pay to end this war,” he began. Then he moved to the edge of his seat and raised his index finger in the air and said, “One billion dollars. It will cost you one billion dollars, no fighting needed.” He put out the number as if he were giving us his best discount price!

Then, as if he were talking to someone who clearly had little to no understanding of the dynamics in the region, he told us we were fighting the wrong war. “You should talk to the Taliban, not fight them. That will help you with Iran.” Then he gave us a big, knowing smile. Since the Iraq war, Persian Gulf countries have been worried about the rise of Iran’s influence in the region, and are especially worried about its
steady march toward nuclear capability. They wanted America to focus on Iran—even if it meant playing nice with the Taliban.

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia couldn’t have agreed more. “You have to look to the root of the Taliban problem,” he told Holbrooke. And what did the king think was the source of our problems in Afghanistan? Iran, of course.

Holbrooke was correct when he referred to the ghosts of Iraq diminishing our credibility in the region. As far as the leaders of the Middle East were concerned, we didn’t understand the difference between defeating an opponent on the battlefield (which we did quickly enough) and psychologically breaking his will to resist. We’d been flummoxed by—and totally unprepared for—what came after military victory in Iraq, a long-simmering but predictable outbreak of Sunni-Shia violence. What our allies understood—even if we couldn’t admit it to ourselves—is that after ten years of war, Iraq was a country broken into dozens of pieces held together by a few pieces of Scotch tape. The tape started to come off the moment we left. Should it really have come as a surprise to us that there was no more confidence in our wisdom regarding Afghanistan than in the delusions that got us into Iraq?

When the week was over and we returned to Washington, Holbrooke dutifully reported what our allies thought of our plans for war. He did so carefully, in terms that would not make it seem as if he were scoring points. For his part, Holbrooke was concerned enough to caution against doubling down on war. But his counsel was dismissed as overblown and outdated. “When I talk about counterinsurgency and Vietnam at the White House,” he once said, “those guys roll their eyes as if I am from another planet.”

Six weeks later, on December 1, 2009, with no further discussion of the clear reservations on the part of the allies in the region whose cooperation we needed to make our plans work, President Obama announced his much-anticipated decision about the war in Afghanistan. It was reported that he spent hours and hours, indeed months, considering all the relevant information before sending another 33,000 American troops to continue the fighting there. The world held its breath for a new vision, one that would not be a mere reiteration of the familiar impulse to turn to the generals to fix a vexing foreign policy problem. But Obama did
just that. There would be no attempt to restore diplomacy to primacy in foreign policy. To the American people it seemed that Obama had shown resolve, telling the world that America would fight the war to victory. But those whom America had to work hardest to convince of its wisdom were unimpressed. They did not think our strategy would work, and at any rate, they did not believe we would stick with it for long.

The drumbeat of skepticism continued. Almost a year later, in October 2010, during a visit to the White House, Pakistan’s army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, gave President Obama a thirteen-page white paper he had written to explain his views on the outstanding strategic issues between Pakistan and the United States. Kayani 3.0, as the paper was dubbed (since it was the third paper Pakistanis gave the White House on the subject), could be summarized as follows: You are not going to win the war, and you are not going to transform Afghanistan. This place has devoured empires before you; it will defy you as well. Stop your grandiose plans and let’s get practical, sit down, and discuss how you will leave and what is an end state we can both live with.