Ars Regendi Forum

from morocco to afghanistan - there isnt a country in the arabic cultural sphere without serious social and political problems. currently the european media are focused on areas from egypt to afghanistan. there, in the middle east, invasions and occupations are a common thing. corrupt regimes grow wealthy off the misery of the rest. wars, threats of war, civil wars and terrorism are common. colonialism is on the rise again.

from the totalitarian islamic state of saudi arabia, to the concrete walls preventing the residents of the gaza strip from buying food in egypt, to libanon barely recovering from israeli bombings and a still divided zyprus... through a militarist turkey, an isolated syria and an occupied iraq in civil war... through the civil wars and separations of kurdistan and the kaukasus, an iran facing economic sanctions and an imminent threat of US invasion, a pakistan which is a military dictatorship in the mornings and a neoliberal islamic republic in the evenings (depending mostly on the weather), turkmenistan which has replaced cotton-picking machines with forced child labor and political opposition with graveyards. plus an afghanistan occupied by the NATO... the middle east is a warehouse of powderkegs just waiting to explode.

meanwhile the nuclear arms race continues as more asian countries see nukes as the only effective form of defense for an independent state.

what solutions do you propose for this troubled region? could you solve any of the many crises at hand? how?
and which are the biggest problems you can identify there?

Well I think you covered most of the major problems in the Middle East and North Africa! I’d say the root of all the issues is simply religious control. No society is truly free or can progress if it is hindered by religion.

The US took over as the primary foreign influence in the region from the former British Empire in the 60’s. The policy first had been to use the region as a road block to communism and cause the Soviet Union to become mired in regional conflict. This policy worked exceptionally well, however the US supported (and armed) anyone including despotic regimes who agreed to fight the Soviets.

After the Cold War ended, the policy shifted to reform from within. The US attempted to encourage internal democratic reform, however used models that worked well with Eastern European nations but did not with the Arabs and Persians.

Since Bush came into power, you now see the neo-conservative stance which is impatient with waiting on internal reform and favors direct military intervention and colonial-like "nation building".

Now that the reputation of the US has been so severely damaged over the last seven years, there are few options left.

1. Let go of control and rely on the UN to facilitate reform. Should have been done in the first place, but the UN has its own problems and probably needs reform itself before it can be effective in the region.

2. Withdraw all military forces and eliminate most foreign influence including the oil trade. The region survives almost solely on oil profits/foreign banking and isolation would immediately cause social and political reform. In which direction, radical or liberal would be a gamble, but change would come quickly.

3. Full scale military action to conquer the entire region and replace all governments with forced reform. You might say this is extreme, but its already started. The problem is that Bush assumed reform would be simple, welcomed, and that American oil profits would be huge. Well, he got one out of three right.

4. “Stay the course” as Bush loves to say. Engage in a conflict of attrition and figure one side or the other will eventually get tired and quit in a couple decades.