The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat

by Vali Nasr

  CHAPTER 5: IRAQ: THE SIGNAL DEMOCRACY

  1. “Vice President Biden: Iraq Could Be One of the Great Achievements of This Administration,” ABC News, February 11, 2011, http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2010/02/vice-president-biden-iraq-could-be-one-of-the-great-achievements-of-this-administration/.

  2. Kenneth Pollock, “Maliki Dilemma,” National Interest, February 1, 2012, http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/the-maliki-dilemma-6418.

  3. Toby Dodge, “The Resistible Rise of Nuri Al-Maliki,” Opendemocracy, March 22, 2012, http://www.opendemocracy.net/toby-dodge/resistible-rise-of-nuri-al-maliki.

  4. Liz Sly, “U.S. Policy on Iraq Questioned as Influence Wanes, Maliki Consolidates Power,” Washington Post, April 8, 2012, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/us-policy-on-iraq-questioned-as-influence-wanes/2012/04/08/gIQAHEAU4S_story.html?hpid=z1.

  5. Joseph R. Biden and Leslie H. Gelb, “Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq,” New York Times, May 1, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/opinion/01biden.html?pagewanted=all.

  6. Joseph R. Biden, “A Plan to Hold Iraq Together,” Washington Post, August 24, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/23/AR2006082301419.html; “Biden Vows to Fight Troop Surge in Iraq,” CBS News, February 11, 2009, http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-250_162-2299237.html.

  7. Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor, The Endgame: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq, from George W. Bush to Barack Obama (New York: Pantheon, 2012), pp. 628–50.

  8. Michael R. Gordon, “Failed Efforts and Challenges of America’s Last Months in Iraq,” New York Times, September 23, 2012, p. A1.

  9. Martin S. Indyk, Kenneth G. Lieberthal, and Michael E. O’Hanlon, Bending History: Barack Obama’s Foreign Policy (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2012).

  10. Gordon and Trainor, Endgame, p. 657.

  11. Sly, “U.S. Policy on Iraq Questioned.”

  12. Serena Chaudhry, “Feeling Marginalized, Some Iraq Sunnis Eye Autonomy,” Reuters, January 1, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/01/us-iraq-politics-sunnis-idUSTRE80005620120101.

  13. “Kurdish Leader Accuses Iraqi PM of Leading Country to ‘Dictator-ship,’ ” Al-Arabiya News, March 21, 2012, http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/03/21/202063.html.

  14. Salah Nasrawi, “2011: Why Did Iraq Miss the Arab Spring?” Ahram Online, December 31, 2011, http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/30638/World/Region/-Why-did-Iraq-miss-the-Arab-Spring.aspx.

  15. Vali Nasr, The Shia Revival: How Conflicts Within Islam Will Shape the Future (New York: Norton, 2006).

  16. Vali Nasr, “When Shiites Rise,” Foreign Affairs, July/August 2006, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/61733/vali-nasr/when-the-shiites-rise.

  17. David Laitin, Hegemony and Culture: Politics and Religious Change Among the Yoruba (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).

  18. There is rich scholarship explaining the absence of communal violence when states can make a case for minority rule making rebellion difficult. Donald Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987); Roger Peterson, Understanding Ethnic Violence (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002); Stuart Kaufman, Modern Hatreds: The Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001).

  19. Vali Nasr, “Regional Implications of Shi’a Revival in Iraq,” Washington Quarterly 27, no. 3 (Summer 2004): 7–24.

  20. Vali Nasr, “Syria After the Fall,” New York Times, July 29, 2012, p. SR4; Fouad Ajami, The Syrian Rebellion (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2012), pp. 111–34.

  21. On the importance of these civic ties see Ashutosh Varshney, Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus and Muslims in India (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2002).

  22. On how political interest could entrench the politics of identity and turn it violent see Paul R. Brass, The Production of Hindu-Muslim Violence in Contemporary India (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2011).

  23. Steven Wilkinson, Votes and Violence: Electoral Competition and Ethnic Riots in India (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004).

  24. Benjamin Miller, States, Nations, and Great Powers: The Sources of Regional War and Peace (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

  25. Niall Ferguson, The War of the World (New York: Penguin, 2006), pp. 28–30, 255.

  26. Vali Nasr, “If the Arab Spring Turns Ugly,” New York Times, August 27, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/28/opinion/sunday/the-dangers-lurking-in-the-arab-spring.html?pagewanted=all.

  27. Ayad Allawi, “How the U.S. and the World Can Help Iraq,” Washington Post, August 31, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-the-us-and-the-world-can-help-iraq/20U/08/30/gIQAIPZxsJ_story.html

  CHAPTER 6: THE FADING PROMISE OF THE ARAB SPRING

  1. Fawaz Gerges, Obama and the Middle East: The End of America’s Moment? (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).

  2. Martin S. Indyk, Kenneth G. Lieberthal, and Michael E. O’Hanlon, Bending History: Barack Obama’s Foreign Policy (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2012), p. 112.

  3. Ibid., p. 121.

  4. Ibid., p. 122.

  5. Ibid.

  6. Dan Ephron, “The Wrath of Mahmoud Abbas,” Daily Beast, April 24, 2011, http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/04/25/mahmoud-abbas-interview-palestinian-leaders-frustration-with-obama.html.

  7. Jim Lobe, “US Standing Plunges Across the Arab World,” Al-Jazeera, July 14, 2011, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/07/2011714104413787827.html.

  8. “President Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address,” White House Blog, http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/inaugural-address.

  9. “Obama Pledges Support for Tunisia,” Al-Arabiya, October 8, 2011, http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/10/08/170747.html.

  10. Indyk, Lieberthal, and O’Hanlon, Bending History, pp. 146–48. Also see the president’s comments, “Remarks by the President on the Situation in Egypt,” http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/02/01/remarks-president-situation-egypt.

  11. “Clinton Calls for ‘Peaceful, Orderly Transition’ in Egypt,” McClatchy, January 30, 2012, http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/01/30/107726/clinton-calls-for-peaceful-orderly.html.

  12. Steven Cook, The Struggle for Egypt: From Nasser to Tahrir Square (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 272–307.

  13. James Mann, The Obamians: The Struggle Inside the White House to Define American Power (New York: Viking, 2012).

  14. Ibid., p. 279.

  15. Helene Cooper, Mark Landler, and David E. Sanger, “In U.S. Signals to Egypt, Obama Straddled a Rift,” New York Times, February 12, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/world/middleeast/13diplomacy.html?pagewanted=all.

  16. Robin Wright, Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012); Marc Lynch, The Arab Uprising: The Unfinished Revolutions of the New Middle East (New York: Public Affairs, 2012), pp. 43–66.

  17. Alaa Al Aswany, On the State of Egypt: What Made the Revolution Inevitable (New York: Vintage, 2011); Tarek Osman, Egypt on the Brink (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2011).

  18. Alexis de Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the French Revolution (New York: Anchor, 1955), p. 177.

  19. The Muslim Brotherhood had a plurality win of 38 percent of the vote and 235 of 498 seats in the 508-member assembly (a token ten seats were filled by appointment). The Salafist al-Nour party, Islamists like the Brotherhood only more so, won 28 percent and 123 seats.

  20. Martin Indyk, Kenneth G. Lieberthal, and Michael O’Hanlon, “Scoring Obama’s Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 2012, p. 38.

  21. Tony Smith, America’s Mission: The United States and the Worldwide Struggle for Democracy in the Twentieth Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994).

  22. Mary Elise Sarotte, 1989: The Struggle to Create Post–Cold War Europe (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011).

  23. Lynch, Arab Uprising.

>   24. Vali Nasr, “Economics Versus Extremism,” Newsweek International, November 2, 2009, pp. 56–58.

  25. Steven Cook, “On the Economy, Egypt’s New Leaders Should Follow Mubarak,” Bloomberg View, May 26, 2011, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-26/on-the-economy-egypt-s-new-leaders-should-follow-mubarak.html.

  26. Ari Paul, “Egypt’s Labor Pains: For Workers the Revolution Has Just Begun,” Dissent, Fall 2011, http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=4048.

  27. Sinan Ülgen, “Supporting Arab Economies in Transition,” International Economic Bulletin, July 5, 2012, http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/07/05/supporting-arab-economies-intransition/ck6p.

  28. “Unfinished Business,” Economist, February 4, 2012, p. 49.

  29. Ülgen, “Supporting Arab Economies in Transition.”

  30. Ibrahim Saif, Challenges of Egypt’s Economic Transition (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2011), p. 4, available at http://carnegieendowment.org/files/egypt_econ_transition.pdf.

  31. Hafez Ghanem, “Two Economic Priorities for Post-Election Egypt: Macro-Stabilization and Corruption Control,” Brookings Institution, June 25, 2012, http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2012/06/25-post-election-egypt-ghanem.

  32. Ibid.

  33. Carrie Rosefsky Wickham, Mobilizing Islam: Religion, Activism, and Political Change in Egypt (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002).

  34. Jean-Paul Carvalho, A Theory of the Islamic Revival, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, March 2009, p. 39, http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/Research/wp/pdf/paper424.pdf.

  35. Nathan J. Brown, When Victory Becomes an Option: Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood Confronts Success (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2012), available at http://carnegieendowment.org/files/brotherhood_success.pdf.

  36. Zeinab Abul-Magd, “The Egyptian Republic of Retired Generals,” Foreign Policy, May 8, 2012, http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/05/08/the_egyptian_republic_of_retired_generals.

  37. David Sanger, Confront and Conceal: Obama’s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power (New York: Crown, 2012), pp. 314–15.

  38. “The Other Arab Spring,” Economist, August 11, 2012, http://www.economist.com/node/21560243?fsrc=scn/tw_ec/the_other_arab_spring; Vali Nasr, Forces of Fortune: The Rise of the New Muslim Middle Class and What It Will Mean for Our World (New York: Free Press, 2009); Christopher M. Schroeder, “The Middle East Could Be a Cradle of Innovation,” Harvard Business Review, October 12, 2012; http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/10/the_middle_east_could_be_a_cra.html; Wright, Rock the Casbah.

  39. Michael Mandelbaum, Democracy’s Good Name: The Rise and Risks of the World’s Most Popular Form of Government (New York: Public Affairs, 2007), pp. 91–92.

  40. “Hillary Clinton Deserves Credit for U.S. Role in Libya: View,” Bloomberg View, September 7, 2011, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-08/hillary-clinton-deserves-credit-for-the-positive-u-s-role-in-libya-view.html.

  41. Mann, The Obamians, p. 279.

  42. William Arkin and Dana Priest, Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State (Boston: Little, Brown, 2011).

  43. Sanger, Confront and Conceal, pp. 243–72.

  44. Peter Bergen, “Warrior in Chief,” New York Times, April 29, 2012, p. SR1.

  45. David Rodhe, “The Obama Doctrine,” Foreign Policy, March/April 2012, pp. 65–69.

  46. Greg Miller, “U.S. Set to Keep Kill Lists for Years,” Washington Post, October 24, 2012, p. A1.

  47. Michael O’Hanlon thinks that the administration has lacked an effective strategy for dealing with failing states: “Obama’s Weak and Failing States Agenda,” Washington Quarterly 35, no. 4 (Fall 2012): 67–80.

  CHAPTER 7: THE GATHERING STORM

  1. Hassan Bin Talal, “U.S. Can’t Abandon the Middle East,” Los Angeles Times, April 17, 2012, http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/17/opinion/la-oe-hassan-middle-east-engagement-20120417.

  2. Daniel Yergin, The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991), pp. 167–83.

  3. Andrew Scott Cooper, The Oil Kings: How the U.S., Iran, and Saudi Arabia Changed the Balance of Power in the Middle East (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011), pp. 137–98.

  4. See Gene Whitney, Carl E. Behrens, and Carol Glover, “U.S. Fossil Fuel Resources: Terminology, Reporting, and Summary,” U.S. Congressional Research Service, March 25, 2011, p. 22, Table 6, http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/R40872_20110325.pdf.

  5. Alex de Marban, “North Dakota Crude Elbows Alaska Oil Out of Washington Refinery,” Alaska Dispatch, June 13, 2012, http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/north-dakota-crude-elbows-alaska-oil-out-washington-refinery.

  6. Thomas Friedman, “The Other Arab Spring,” New York Times, April 8, 2012, p. SR1.

  7. “Lights Out: Another Threat to a Fragile Country’s Stability,” Economist, October 8, 2011, http://www.economist.com/node/21531495.

  8. Michael Kugelman, “Pakistan’s Climate Change Challenge,” Foreign Policy, May 9, 2012, http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/05/09/pakistans_climate_change_challenge.

  9. John Bongaarts, Zeba Sathar, and Arshad Mahmoud, “Seven Billion People, How Many Pakistanis?” News, November 1, 2011, http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-9-75429-Seven-billion-people-how-many-Pakistanis; “Pakistan to Become the World’s 4th Largest Nation by 2050: Survey,” Pakistan Defence, June 28, 2010, http://www.defence.pk/forums/economy-development/63702-pakistan-become-4th-largest-nation-population-2050-a.html.

  10. Robert Worth, “Earth Is Parched Where Syrian Farms Thrived,” New York Times, October 13, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/14/world/middleeast/14syria.html.

  11. Ruchir Sharma, Breakout Nations: In Pursuit of the Next Economic Miracles (New York: Norton, 2012), p. 23.

  12. Zuliu Hu and Mohsin S. Khan, Why Is China Growing So Fast? Economic Issues series, no. 8 (Washington, DC: International Monetary Fund, 1997), p. 1, http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/issues8/issue8.pdf.

  13. Niall Ferguson, “Mideast’s Next Dilemma: With Turkey Flexing Its Muscles, We May Soon Face a Revived Ottoman Empire,” Newsweek, June 19, 2011, http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/06/19/turkey-the-mideast-s-next-dilemma.html#.

  14. Ahmet Davutoglu, Civilizational Transformation and the Muslim World (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Mahir Publications, 1994); “The Davutoglu Effect,” Economist, October 21, 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/17276420.

  15. Sharma, Breakout Nations, p. 119.

  16. Vali Nasr, The Shia Revival: How Conflicts Within Islam Will Shape the Future (New York: Norton, 2006).

  17. Halil Karaveli, “Why Does Turkey Want Regime Change in Syria?” National Interest, July 23, 2012, http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/why-does-turkey-want-regime-change-syria-7227.

  18. “Alevis Fire at Government in Ongoing Cemevi Quarrel,” Hurriyet Daily News, August 11, 2012, http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/alevis-fire-at-government-in-ongoing-cemevi-quarrel.aspx?pageID=238&nID=25298&NewsCatID=339.

  19. “Growing Less Mild,” Economist, April 14, 2012, p. 61.

  20. Halil M. Karaveli, “Why Turkey Is Not Going to Help Midwife a Pluralist Syria,” Turkey Analyst 5, no. 15, Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, August 13, 2012, http://www.silkroadstudies.org/new/inside/turkey/2012/120813a.html.

  21. Ibid.

  22. “Erdogan Lambasts Opposition, Says Syrian Crisis Not Sectarian,” Today’s Zaman, May 15, 2012, http://www.todayszaman.com/news-280401-syrian-crisis-not-sectarian-but-humanitarian-issue-says-erdogan.html.

  23. Anthony Shadid, “Turkey Predicts Alliance with Egypt as Regional Anchors,” New York Times, September 19, 2011, p. A4.

  24. Matt Bradley, “Saudi Arabia Closes Embassy in Egypt,” Wall Street Journal, April 28, 2012, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304723304577371912180606218.html?mod=WSJ_World_LEFTSecondNews.

  25. Tony Karon, “Does Qatar Share the West’s Agenda in Libya?” Time, October 5, 2011, http://globalspin.blo
gs.time.com/2011/10/05/does-qatar-share-the-wests-agenda-in-libya/; Rod Norland and David Kirkpatrick, “Islamists’ Growing Sway Raises Questions for Libya,” New York Times, September 14, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/15/world/africa/in-libya-islamists-growing-sway-raises-questions.html?pagewanted=all.

  26. Golnaz Esfandiari, “Qatar Conquers Iran’s Airspace,” Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty, November 5, 2011, http://www.rferl.org/content/qatar_conquers_irans_airspace/24382213.html.

  27. Sharma, Breakout Nations, p. 213; Vali Nasr, “Will Saudis Kill the Arab Spring?” Bloomberg View, May 23, 2011, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-23/will-the-saudis-kill-the-arab-spring-.html.

  28. Sharma, Breakout Nations, p. 216.

  29. Robert Kaplan, The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts and the Battle Against Fate (New York: Random House, 2012), p. 258.

  30. Kiren Aziz Chaudhry, The Price of Wealth: Economies and Institutions in the Middle East (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997); Thomas W. Lippman, Saudi Arabia on the Edge: The Uncertain Future of an American Ally (Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2012).

  31. Toby Jones, Desert Kingdom: How Oil and Water Forged Modern Saudi Arabia (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010).

  32. Nasr, Shia Revival, pp. 147–68.

  33. Interview with a former Iranian official, July 2011.

  CHAPTER 8: THE CHINA CHALLENGE

  1. Jeffrey Bader, who worked on China at the Obama White House, writes of President Obama’s belief that America had neglected Asia because of its focus on the Middle East and al-Qaeda in Obama and China’s Rise: An Insider’s Account of America’s Asia Strategy (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2012); also see David M. Lampton, “China and the United States: Beyond Balance,” Asia Policy 14 (July 2012): 41.

  2. Ibid.

  3. Hillary Clinton, “America’s Pacific Century,” Foreign Policy, November 2011, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/10/11/americas_pacific_century.

  4. Ibid.

  5. Kenneth Lieberthal and Wang Jisi, Addressing U.S.-China Strategic Distrust, John L. Thornton China Center Monograph Series, no. 4 (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2012).