bases and dangers
the possibility of spillover ahead
I have always been an early riser, though happily it’s no longer 0330 as it was my last three years working full time. Now my mental alarm clock ensures being in my seat with a cup of black coffee as the 0500 news begins. I just can’t help it, though i have tried to cut back—sort of.
I just lay there looking the ceiling early if i don’t arise. Besides, it’s vital for capturing early sunrises when the sun peaks out in the Chesapeake prior to 0500 in the glory days of summer. No, that isn’t the case right now (the pinks and oranges begin piercing the darkness more like 0645 and we still have a distressing two months ahead before the sun reverses its semi-annual journey) but I still look forward to taking at least one daily shot of something. Today’s wonderful greeting occurred a bit after 0700. The wave in this shot, in conjunction with the sunlight on the sailboat, was magical.
Appreciation for the news dates back to living overseas where we had a couple of highlights daily, whether the Bangkok Post, El Tiempo, or The Stars and Stripes. New today frames my day. I confess the last few days have drained me with the horrors of Israeli developments and the incapacities on the Hill. I won’t be surprised to awaken one of these days to the rumours of Vlad the Impaler’s death which the internet assures me is about to happen, much like a frequently-cited China critic telling me the CCP is collapsing as he has said since 2000.
My right arm with welcome coffee did stop dead in the air this morning when I heard a retired combatant commander state that he worried about Israel’s retaliation unleashing greater problems for us in the greater Middle East because of our ‘bases in Iraq and Syria’.
What? ‘Bases in Syria?’ We have bases in Syria? Did he misspeak, meaning to say something else? What??
What is he talking about?
Perhaps my hearing is deteriorating like everything else. Perhaps he misspoke, meaning only to our troops near Syria. But it sure sounded like he said our ‘bases in Syria’.
Why is this such a show stopper to me? Well, for several reasons.
Virtually all of the global community supported moves to oust Bashir Assad as a murderous dictator in Syria beginning in 2011 as the Arab Spring movement blossomed. That popular-driven upheaval sought a new, fresh, and more representative period for the Middle East after a Tunisian fruit seller died at the hands of the long-running Ben Ali regime. Street protests succeeded in a single month, reclaiming their government from the dictator while also motivating both inspiration to Egyptians, Bahrainians, Syrians and ultimately Libyans while terrifying Beijing that any popular repudiation of authoritarianism was yet another U.S. plot to overthrow the CCP.
The Syrian protestors faced an absolutely brutal regime which appeared more than once to be teetering on collapse between 2011 and the present. President Obama charged that regime, one supported consistently by Putin, with gassing its own population along with persistent massive air strikes, thus crossing a ‘red line’. This implied unequivocal retaliation he never initiated, leading administration critics to argue the failure to follow through encouraged others to test the U.S. will.
The United States has had poor relations with Damacus for half a century, certainly back to 1970 when the Syrians sought to murder Jordan’s King Hussein who we now know had better ties with Israel that publicly known. Bashir Assad’s father, the long running dictator Hafez, governed brutally, with Soviet support, from 1970 through his death thirty years later. A nationalist who opposed neighbouring dictator Saddam Hussein as two Ba’athists with different views of the future, Assad was a cagey force in the region.
Bashir abandoned his ophthalmology career in London as his father’s heir in 2000. He had a tolerable if distant relationship with the westerners ousting the Iraqi regime in 2003. With the advent of the Arab Spring in his country, however, any trust with the Americans stopped. U.S. objectives of seeing more representative governments will would never coincide an Assad dynasty in this state, particularly after the utterly bloody response Damascus employed to level cities much as Hafez had in 1982 when an internal uprising occurred.
Basing forces in a sovereign state is not an easy, arbitrary move done willy nilly because we want to do so. Sovereignty is an international legal concept developed over centuries in western jurisprudence and philosophy. As we discussed Monday, I am not a philosopher but the idea of sovereignty is a pillar in the Westphalian system. This refers to the Peace of 1648 where the idea of nation-states largely originated, with each state requiring recognition by another sovereign state without any higher authority operating within this established borders of the specific political entity. The political scientist Stephen Krasner has written eloquently on the topic if you care to pursue it.
Why am i mentioning this? Because I have an extraordinarily hard time seeing the sovereign government of Bashir Assad negotiating with us for bases in his country as we seek his overthrow. Put another way, for us to have bases and the vast logistical train associated with that enterprise, the government of Syria would have to authorise that base. And that, my friends, ain’t happening.
The risk of spillover from the anticipated Israeli retaliatory campaign against Hamas is indeed quite high. Reports of both Teheran’s and Washington’s surprise that the terrorists launched such a well-organised, vast campaign inside Israel indicate Iran surprisingly may have played no role in these particular horrifying events but the Mullahs’ hatred of Israel’s sovereign existence remains well documented. Once Jerusalem launches against Hamas, it seems plausible they will use the opportunity to curb any potential Iranian threat as well. This is where the retired combatant commander’s fear of a much wider conflict seems spot on.
The United States has forces in several countries around the region. The U.S. Central Command may operate from a headquarters in Tampa but with in theater forces ready for precisely this possible scenario of a regional conflict. We know of a formal base in Bahrain, where the Fifth Fleet is headquartered, and other smaller, non-permanent basing for task forces in places like Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
The act of a government surrendering its sovereignty—its role as the highest authority within a political entity—to the United States, which similarly refuses to turn over control over its forces in other countries, has to be deliberate and gradual as the two governments cultivate mutual respect and trust. U.S. bases do exist in Japan, Korea, and the Philippines, for example, but even those formal relationships have had rough spots over their decades’ existence.
The Middle East has not yet seen Jerusalem’s retaliation. Perhaps feared spillover and exacerbating tensions won’t occur but that seems unlikely. Americans are already known dead since Saturday when this began unfolding but the military operations will escalate as israel takes action is in Gaza. Those murdered Americans tragically may only be a part of our losses as this unfolds.. But, this is part of alliances and partnerships.
Far less understood and public is the extent of forces around the world, many of whom are U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF). I have no idea but perhaps the retired combatant commander referred to Special Operators in Syria. I have absolutely no way of knowing but we outside of that rather opaque community prefer keeping their actions less transparent.
Following the death of four SOF operators in Niger six years ago, WarisBoring.com reported American SOF deployed to 149 countries around the world, rather an astonishing figure. If true, these operators prefer not attracting public attention by design as an instrument of statecraft intended to use lower-visibility military operations to advance national interests in locations where we might otherwise be less welcome. The decision to use SOF appears a fine line between conducting actions which could dramatically upset the public in the relevant countries and challenging those states’ sovereignty.
The war ahead will be bloody for certain. Overwhelming public opinion in America supports Israel’s actions as just response to heinous actions. That doesn’t mean this is going to be easy for anyone, not merely for Israelis or Palestinians.
Thank you for reading this column. I welcome your thoughts as i do read each and every one. Please feel free to recirculate this piece if you think it would be something worth further consideration. Those of you who pay for a subscription have my deepest thanks.
Be well and be safe. FIN
Stephen D. Krasner, Problematic Sovereignty: Contested Rules and Political Possibilities. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001.
Nick Turse and wombatman1, ‘U.S. Special Operations Forces Deployed to 149 Countries in 2017’, warisboring.com, 15 December 2017, retrieved at https://warisboring.com/u-s-special-operations-forces-deployed-to-149-countries-in-2017/