This week marked the commemoration of the
20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, which threw the world and the
Middle East in particular into a prolonged period of conflict and instability. There
was a tremendous amount of solidarity with the United States and support for
their legitimate right to retaliate against
Al-Qaeda after the attacks.
However, the consensus was that the attacks, and terrorism in general, were an
affront to humanity. That support changed considerably as time went by.
اضافة اعلان
The turning point of when support began to
wane may very well have been the war in Iraq and the deception that went into
launching it. As we now know, the main pretext for the war, that Iraq possessed
weapons of mass destruction, was fabricated by a combination of political
opportunists and business interests. Support decreased considerably once the
campaign morphed into an ill-defined objective, broadly referred to as the War
on Terror, whose unintended consequences included rolling back public freedoms
and the rule of law. In addition, the failed outcome of nation-building efforts
in Afghanistan and Iraq undoubtedly contributed to dwindling support. From a
regional perspective, the way the destruction of Iraq pushed the country out of
the orbit of the Arab world and into that of Iran was challenging to accept.
In many ways, President Biden’s decision to
withdraw US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan effectively formalizes the end of
the War on Terror. However, the decision was a long time coming considering
that there have been no significant attacks on US soil since 9/11 and that each
US president since then has vowed to end the “forever wars” that were born out
of it. It seems like it was just as ill-defined and impalpable an objective for
US presidents as it was for the rest of the world. As a result, victory
measures for the War on Terror became as elusive as victory measures in the War
on Drugs and other slogans against thematic adversaries. The end of the War on
Terror was also primarily a result of the reordering of US priorities, mainly
focusing on a future confrontation with China and reaching some level of
accommodation with Iran. Formerly, US strategists seemed to recognize the drain
these wars have had on the US military, specifically how they could detract
from the country’s ability to counter China. Additionally, a US withdrawal from
the firing range of Iranian missiles in countries neighboring Iran (Iraq,
Afghanistan and Qatar) simultaneously denies Iran leverage during their
negotiations and is generally considered a goodwill gesture.
Considering that the threat posed by
terrorism is still real, it is yet unclear what the US pivot to Asia means for
the region’s security situation. The US is unlikely to openly commit troops in future counterterrorism efforts unless they
could directly threaten them. Instead, they will likely prefer to commit to
other forms of support such as training, working covertly through other
non-state actors, deploying unmanned systems, or even more worryingly,
autonomous ones in support of regional-led efforts. These efforts could
accelerate the region’s progress towards greater self-reliance in security and
defense, making the region less dependent on outside security guarantors. In an
ideal situation, it could lead to a doubling down on efforts to address root
causes of terrorism, stemming from the recognition that terrorism thrives where
governance and politics have failed. Perhaps all this means is that the War on
Terror is not over after all but merely entering a new and entirely different
phase.
Read more Opinion and Analysis
.jpg)
.jpg)
