President Biden may be thinking just that as he ponders how to respond to the recent U.S. military attack that claimed the lives of three U.S. soldiers in Jordan.
Since the second term of the George W. Bush administration, the US government has sought to reduce its involvement in the Middle East. This argument makes sense logically. The United States imports only a small amount of oil from this region. Efforts at regime change and reform in Iraq backfired spectacularly. The most important challenges to the US-led international order come from Russia in Europe and China in Asia. The Middle East is a sideshow.
But crises don’t come at a time or place of your choosing. And the withdrawal of American power itself has set in motion a series of movements that are currently shaping the region. As Washington loses focus on the Middle East, anti-American militias, from the Houthis to Hezbollah to the Islamic Resistance Movement in Iraq (the umbrella organization blamed for attacks that killed American troops), are gaining strength and influence. It is increasing.
Iran’s alliances with all these groups allow it to maintain its influence and importance in the region. Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza provided an ideal opportunity for these powers. Because they can claim to be protesting Israeli actions, thereby asserting themselves, demonstrating their power, and gaining legitimacy.
Ironically, the Biden administration, which has worked hard to prevent these militia attacks from escalating into large-scale attacks, must now decide whether to escalate and respond on a large scale. be. Biden is under pressure from Republicans at home who accuse him of appearing weak.Senators such as Lindsey Graham (South Carolina) encouraging This is to attack Iran in order to protect America’s credibility.
A major U.S. escalation would be a mistake. These militias thrive in conflicts with existing militaries. The Houthis withstood nearly a decade of heavy Saudi shelling and returned largely unscathed. As Henry Kissinger wrote in his diplomatic essay on Vietnam just weeks before he became Richard M. Nixon’s National Security Advisor, there is a simple rule: Regular armies lose if they don’t win. ” The tragedy of U.S. foreign policy is that once Kissinger entered the administration, he saw the dilemma clearly and was seduced by the need to maintain U.S. credibility and the constant pressure to not appear weak. . He supported large-scale military action against North Vietnamese forces, which ultimately failed. In Vietnam, the North won by not losing, and the United States lost by not winning.
Iranian proxies are trying to create as much chaos as possible in order to force the United States and Israel into major strategic failures, which among other things will undermine any possibility of normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. become. Attacks on U.S. forces by Islamic resistance groups in Iraq have the specific purpose of pressuring the Iraqi government to expel U.S. troops stationed there. This group’s militias are the ones supporting the current Shiite-majority government in Baghdad. In a fight between Washington and these militias, the Baghdad government will have to side with these groups that remain in power. This will complete Iran’s occupation of Iraq, symbolized by the expulsion of US forces. And that would further Iran’s larger goal of dismantling the security system the United States has built in the Persian Gulf.
The Biden administration must respond to attacks on U.S. forces, but it must find ways to respond without large-scale escalation. Iran is also sending signals in various ways that it has no intention of escalating.
The most effective response to widespread Iranian-backed pressure on U.S. interests in the region is not to indicate that the U.S. could escalate militarily (which, of course, is possible), but to respond politically. This will demonstrate that it is possible to de-escalate the situation. That means using the Gaza crisis to address Israel’s security needs and Palestinian aspirations for statehood, and to create conditions for long-term stability. Success on this front would make reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and the broader Arab-Israeli community much easier. This type of political and diplomatic response will not appease the war hawks in Washington, but it may be the most effective countermeasure against America’s enemies.
As Michael Corleone says in the same movie, “Never hate your enemy. It will affect your judgment.”