Fragility of Middle East alliances becomes ever more apparent
By James M. Dorsey
Three recent developments lay bare the fragility of Middle
Eastern alliances and a rebalancing of their priorities: the
Russian-Turkish compromise on an assault on the rebel-held Syrian region of
Idlib, the fate
of troubled Abu Dhabi airline Ettihad, and battles over reconstruction of
Syria.
These developments highlight the fact that competition among
Middle Eastern rivals and ultimate power within the region’s various alliances is
increasingly as much economic and commercial as it is military and geopolitical.
Battles are fought as much on geopolitical fronts as they are on economic and
cultural battlefields such as soccer.
As a result, the fault lines of various alliances across the
greater Middle East, a region that stretches from North Africa to north-western
China, are coming to the fore.
The cracks may be most apparent in the
Russian-Turkish-Iranian alliance but lurk in the background of Gulf cooperation
with Israel in confronting Iran as well as the unified front put forward by
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Russia, prevented, at least for now, a rupture with Turkey, by
delaying an all-out attack on Idlib despite Iranian advocacy of an offensive.
Turkey, already home to three million Syrians, feared that a Syrian-Russian
assault, would push hundreds of thousands, if not millions more across its
border.
If Iran was the weakest link in the debate about Idlib, it
stands stronger in its coming competition
with Russia for the spoils of reconstruction of war-ravaged Syria.
Similarly, Russia appears to be ambivalent
towards a continued Iranian military presence in post-war Syria, a
potential flashpoint given Israel’s opposition and Israeli attacks that led
earlier this month to the downing
of a Russian aircraft.
By the same token, Turkey, despite its backing of Qatar in
its 15-month-old dispute with a Saudi-UAE-led alliance that is boycotting the
Gulf state diplomatically and economically, poses perhaps the greatest
challenge to Qatari efforts to project
itself globally by operating one of the world’s best airlines and positioning
itself as a sports hub.
Turkey, despite its failure this week to win the right to
host Euro 2024 and its lack of the Gulf’s financial muscle, competes favourably
on every other front with Qatar as well as the UAE that too is seeking to
project itself through soft as well as hard power and opposes Mr. Erdogan
because of his Islamist leanings, ties to Iran, and support of Qatar. Turkey
wins hands down against the small Gulf states when it comes to size,
population, location, industrial base, military might, and sports performance.
That, coupled with a determination to undermine Qatar, was
likely one reason, why the UAE’s major carriers, Emirates and Etihad that is troubled
by a failed business model, have, despite official denials, been quietly discussing
a potential merger that would create the world’s largest airline.
Countering competition from Turkish Airlines that outflanks
both UAE carriers with 309 passenger planes that service 302 destinations in
120 countries may well have been another reason. Emirates, the larger of the
two Emirati carriers, has, a fleet of 256 aircraft flying to 150 destinations
in 80 countries.
These recent developments suggest that alliances,
particularly the one that groups Russia, Turkey and Iran, are brittle and
transactional, geared towards capitalizing on immediate common interests rather
than shared long-term goals, let alone values.
That is true even if Russia and Turkey increasingly find
common ground in concepts of Eurasianism. It also applies to Turkey and Qatar
who both support Islamist groups as well as to Saudi Arabia and the UAE who
closely coordinate policies but see their different goals put on display in
Yemen.
The fragility of the alliances is further underwritten by
Turkish, Russian and Iranian aspirations of resurrecting empire in a 21st
century mould and a Saudi quest for regional dominance.
Notions of empire have informed policies long before
realignment across Eurasia as a result of the focus of the United States
shifting from the Middle East to Asia, the rise of China. increasingly strained
relations between the West and Russia, and the greater assertiveness of Middle
Eastern states like Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Iran.
Then president Suleyman Demirel told this author already in the 1990s
in the wake of the demise of the Soviet Union and the emergence of independent,
mostly ethnically Turkic Central Asian republics that “Turkey’s world stretches
from the Adriatic to the Great Wall of China.”
In a world in which globalization is shaped by geopolitical
zones rather than individual countries, Russia’s imperative is to be a region by
defining itself as an Asian rather than a European power that would be on par
with China, the European Union, and a US zone of influence.
“Putin does not think along national lines. He thinks in
terms of larger blocks, and, ultimately in terms of the world order,” said
former Portuguese minister for Europe, Bruno Macaes in a recently published
book, The
Dawn of Eurasia.
In doing so, Russia is effectively turning its back on Europe
as it reinvents itself as an Asian power on the basis of a Eurasianism, a
century-old ideology that defines Russia as a Eurasian rather than a European
power.
The Eurasian Economic Union, that groups Russia, Kazakhstan.
Kyrgyzstan, Belarus and Armenia, is a vehicle that allows Russia to establish
itself as a block in the borderland between Europe and Asia.
Similarly, Eurasianism
has gained currency in Turkey with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who enabled
by the demise of the Soviet Union and the re-emergence of a Turkic world,
projects his country as a crossroads between Europe, Africa and Asia rather
than a European bridge to Asia.
In that vein, Turkish columnist Sinan Baykent projected this
week’s fence-mending visit to Germany by Mr. Erdogan and his proposal for a
summit on Syria of Turkish, Russian, German and French leaders as a Eurasian
approach to problem solving.
The meeting between Mr. Erdogan and German chancellor Angela
Merkel was meant “to pave the way for a
Eurasian solution for the region… There is a new axis forming today
between Berlin, Moscow, Ankara, Tehran and maybe Paris… All of these countries
are fed up with American unilateralism and excessive policies displayed by the
Trump administration.,” Mr. Baykent said.
If Turkey and Russia’s vision of their place in the world is
defined to a large extent by geography, Iran’s topology dictates a more
inward-looking view despite accusations that it is seeking to establish itself
as the Middle East’s hegemon.
“Iran
is a fortress. Surrounded on three sides by mountains and on the
fourth by the ocean, with a wasteland at its centre,” noted Stratfor, a geopolitical
intelligence platform. Gulf fears are rooted not only in deep-seated distrust
of Iran’s Islamic regime, but also in the fact that the foundation of past
Persian empire relied on control of plains in present-day Iraq.
As a result, the manoeuvring of Gulf states, in contrast to
Turkey and Russia, is driven less by a conceptual framing of their place in the
world and more by regional rivalry and regime survival. Countries like Qatar,
Saudi Arabia and the UAE walk a fine line focusing geopolitically on an
increasingly unpredictable United States and economically on China and the rest
of Asia, including Russia, Korea and Japan.
What the plight of Idlib, potential change in aviation and
competition for reconstruction contracts highlight is the brittleness of Middle
Eastern alliances that threatens to be reinforced by economics becoming an
increasingly important factor alongside geopolitics.
“Stakes for all parties are starting to divert from each
other in Syria and the prospects
of cooperation with Russia and Iran are becoming more challenging,” said Turkish
columnist Nuray Mert commenting on the situation in Idlib. Her analysis is as
valid for Idlib as it for the prospects of many of the Middle East alliances.
Dr.
James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International
Studies, co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture,
and co-host of the New Books in Middle Eastern Studies podcast.
James is the author of The Turbulent World
of Middle East Soccer blog, a book with the same title and a co-authored
volume, Comparative Political Transitions between Southeast Asia and
the Middle East and North Africa as well as Shifting
Sands, Essays on Sports and Politics in the Middle East and North Africa
and just published China
and the Middle East: Venturing into the Maelstrom
Comments
Post a Comment