I will describe in detail what it was like to sit through these kinds of negotiations, first with Richard Holbrooke at the head of our side of the table, and later with Hillary Clinton. I will also relate what world leaders and foreign policy professionals I have known for years have seen and heard in these settings. For many Americans this will be an eye-opening view of how their country presents itself in world councils. It will give voice to those who call the shots in the Middle East and ask whether their responses to our plans are worth hearing and perhaps heeding. For the American public has to understand that when your grand plans for a region persuade no one but yourself—not your friends, not your “frenemies,” not your collaborators, and certainly not your enemies—it’s time to start asking some hard questions back home.
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
PROLOGUE:
“A WEEK IN SEPTEMBER”
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.”