Fast and Furious, Middle East Style: Why Should Obama Help Bring America’s Second-Worst Enemies to Power?
Here’s still another of a series of self-serving leaks from the Obama Administration. In this case, however, different from the half-dozen previous examples, it reveals something very important about policy. Call it, “Fast and Furious, Middle East Style.”
In the Fast and Furious operation, the U.S. government funneled weapons to Mexican drug gangs. Now it is funneling weapons to anti-American, antisemitic, radical forces in Syria. That is, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. I am certainly not saying all the arms are going to that movement’s cadre and units they control. Yet what we know gives us ample reason to believe that it is the biggest beneficiary.
Suppose that there was one Mexican drug gang that was a bit more brutal. Would Fast and Furious then have been a great idea because it left that one out of the weapons’ distribution? No.
Yet that is precisely what is happening in Syria. Read closely the New York Times article on this matter because it reflects the precise information leaked by “American officials and Arab intelligence officers.”
“A small number of C.I.A. officers are operating secretly [not any more!—BR] in southern Turkey, helping allies decide which Syrian opposition fighters across the border will receive arms to fight the Syrian government….”
What does this mean? Read on:
“…in part to help keep weapons out of the hands of fighters allied with Al Qaeda or other terrorist groups, one senior American official said.”
This must be seen in the context of Obama Administration policy which can be fairly and accurately summarized as follows: Al-Qaeda bad; other revolutionary Islamist groups good. By “good,” they mean that it is possible to work with these groups, reasonable to help them, and logical to believe that they are already or will be moderate.
Reading further removes all doubt:
“The weapons, including automatic rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, ammunition and some antitank weapons, are being funneled mostly across the Turkish border by way of a shadowy network of intermediaries including Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood and paid for by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the officials said.”
So we can conclude:
–The fact that a lot of the weapons are being smuggled by the Muslim Brotherhood means they will go to Muslim Brotherhood cadre, strengthening that group’s ability to seize power first in the opposition and later in Syria as a whole
–While al-Qaeda is the group most likely to massacre Christians and Alawites, the Muslim Brotherhood is second on that list of potential mass murderers.
–Does the administration’s strategy mean that arms will not be given to radical Salafist groups not affiliated to al-Qaeda—which are much more important in Syria than formal affiliates of al-Qaeda—also likely to commit massacres and help produce an extremist Syrian regime some day?
–Doesn’t the fact that two of the three countries engaged in arms’ financing and supplying—Qatar and Turkey—are pro-Islamist create a real danger that the Syrian Islamists will be disproportionately armed? The same may also be true of the Saudis who backed Sunni moderates in Lebanon but helped anti-American Sunni Islamists in Iraq.
–This is in tandem with the continued Obama Administration support for the Muslim Brotherhood-dominated Syrian National Congress (SNC). Despite the fig leaf of putting a Kurd as the head of the group, the Brotherhood’s control continues. Since U.S. policy is being coordinated with the SNC, despite the opposition of other Syrian rebels, one can assume that the Brotherhood will be the big winner from this arms’ supply.
Now there are those in the West who favor the survival of Bashar al-Asad’s regime because they say that a revolution will bring something worse, that is, a radical Sunni Islamist regime. And there are also those in the West—like myself—who favor the overthrow of that regime because we believe that there is a chance for a better regime (better for Syria’s people and U.S. interests). Still others, believing no good solution is possible, think it best that the fighting continue, keeping Syria weak and reducing Iran’s strategic power.
Yet nobody should want to see U.S. help that makes the creation of a radical Sunni Islamist government, determined to wage jihad on America and on Israel, more likely. None should want to see a revolutionary and repressive Salafist state installed in Syria that would link up with other radical Sunnis (in Tunisia, limited by a coalition; in Egypt, if it beats the army challenge; in the Gaza Strip and the main opposition in Jordan) to form a bloc that would further destabilize the Middle East.
Is the administration secretly seeking to build up such a bloc, foolishly thinking this will counter Iran thus “serving” U.S. interests? That’s a logical speculation but so far I see no evidence that this is a conscious idea. As an al-Qaeda measure, yes, but is there a broader strategic “genius” at work here?
Let’s be clear. Obama Administration policy is promoting Sunni Islamism rather than fighting against it.
Is anyone in political life and especially in Congress going to suggest that U.S. help in arming radical Syrian Islamist forces should be banned? All arms to the greatest extent possible should be funneled to Syrian Sunni moderates, units competently led by Syrian officers who have deserted, or Kurdish and Druze nationalists.
Otherwise, one day we might wake up to find Syria governed by a new dictatorship dedicated to destroying U.S. interests in the region, waging a jihad to destroy Israel, and spreading radical Islamism elsewhere, violently suppressing Syria’s people, and producing a massive flight of the country’s large Christian minority.
If this were to happen that would not be the result of a failed U.S. policy that tried to prevent it but a successful U.S. strategy that helped bring America’s second-worst enemies to power.
This is undoubtedly very stupid on the administration’s part, but is it really so unprecedented? Remember that during the retrospectively celebrated Reagan administration, the CIA was funneling arms to some of the worst, most anti-American elements of the mujaheddin in Afghanistan (in a policy with bipartisan support), and that arms sales to the Iranian regime were being used to fund the Contras, at the same time that the Reagan people had no problem with Saddam’s Iraq. It seems to me that bipartisan ignorance and folly regarding the Middle East are a much likelier explanation of ongoing American fecklessness in this area than some sinister plot cooked up by Kenyan “anti-colonialists,” Bill Ayers and Saul Alinsky. Call it Occam’s Razor of Foolishness.
What are the alternatives ? None . Either you have a volonterous, US engagement to get rid of Bashar at the cost of a direct US army involvement , but that’s not anymore feasible given the disaster in Iraq, or you have a well-engineeered plot which costs much less , ends Assad rule with a 9mm bullet, or helps him and family to flee.My guess Assad is nothing elese but a puppet in the hands of various syrian secret polices factions.The second he wants to flee he is killed from within.Is the CIA able to build up such a plot ? I doubt very much .Who will reap the profit ? What comes after Assad ? Better to rely on Saudi ,Quatar involvement than can rein in through their financing power the lunatics.On a long term , Syri will break up as a unitary state -exactly like Iraq- and each ethnic group will receive by force and might more autonomy.
Barry,
I think your third option is best. America must learn how to properly wage tribal warfare. As an imperial power we must learn how to encourage sects and tribes to fight one another–the longer the better. There is no good situation that can come from Sunni consolidation or Alawite reestablishment. The Sunni-Shi’a split is ripe in the Middle East. We must take advantage of it until the last Shi’a uses his prayer beads to strangle the last Sunni who retaliates by detonating himself.
I do not think it matters much what the US does or says concerning Syria. Yesterday the Syrians shot down a Turkish warplane. The Turks can crush Assad whenever they want and they now have a causus belli. They may not send tanks over the border at this point but they will certainly provide more aggressive support to the rebels.
I do not think supporting any particular faction is going to work. The outcome is too uncertain and nobody wants to be seen as US backed anyway.
While Rubin makes some valid points, the alarming amount of armed support provided to the Muslim Brotherhood and its associate terror groups (AQ, Hamas, IHH) by the most amoral and reprehensible regime in US history, differs considerably in its basic premise from Fast and Furious. The regime openly supports anti-West Islamic movements (and NATO has yet to halt its subservience to the Islamist Turkish regime). Why else would it put its weight behind the effort to bring down Mubarak in favor of an anti-West, Sharia-based Islamist MB rule? (After all, Mubarak was a bastard, but he was our bastard to previous administrations to keep the peace.)
Fast and Furious, OTOH, was intended to undermine the Second Amendment by putting a large number of assault rifles into the murderous hands of the Mexican drug gangs. These weapons were bought from legitimate US gun dealers without any GPS tracking devices, acquiescence of the Mexican government or general plan to follow the gang members, as the Bush administration had done with Wide Receiver, which was pulled when the plan went awry. Holder, Obama, Napolitano, and probably others at the top conceived of the plan to go awry. They cynically wanted these murders so they could blame US gun dealers for those legitimate sales that wound up in the worst hands imaginable. However, the whole operation went off the rails with the cold-blooded murder of Agent Brian Terry. Now the regime is digging itself deeper into a hole by trying to cover up its nefarious plan.
The regime’s ME gunrunning scheme, with its stupid and witless supporters like McCain and Lieberman, will eventually need to be called to account as the region descends into horrific repression and bloodletting at the hands of a revived Islamic Caliphate.
Is there not some sword stroke that can unravel the Gordian knot that is the middle east?
What do we have here? An accumulation of enemies and allies made beginning in World War II, through the Cold War,the ongoing Arab Israeli wars, The Iraqui invasion of Kuwait (maybe in turn a bastard outcome of our meddling in the Iran Iraq war), September 1th and what ever future wars these idiots can dream up.
All these entanglements demanding money and blood. And what do we get in return? Natural resources so we can’t be bothered to get off our duffs and either exploit our own or come up with alternatives? A little less guilt over the holocaust?
If a modern day Rome had lost 2000 citizens to mass murder would they have squandered a decade of progress on some third rate powers or would they have decimated the Afghans, vaporized Meccas and called it a day? If that sounds harsh, would the death toll on either side be higher or lower? And what about material gains for the cultures if war could be made more savage and more final (and cheaper at least for the victor).
I don’t see it happening. The Russians will block it precisely to thwart American interests and a revolutionary Islamist regime next to Russia’s underbelly is something they won’t tolerate.
We would all like to see the Assad dictatorship replaced with liberal, pro-Western Syrian democracy. That is not going to happen. And if forced to choose, I would say its preferable all the sides lose and their internecine conflict continues forever.
A weak Syria is preferable to one run either by the current Assad dictatorship or a radical Sunni Islamist one.
What is the formula for excel to determine by yes or no if a set value is within a varying range?
Click my name to see a video of this.