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SINO + ASEAN + FTA = East Asian Unification? Not Quite
Part 1: by Collin Spears
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Leery Bear, Rising Dragon: Life Along the Sino-Russian Border
by Collin Spears
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June 2, 2009
In May 2009, the Obama administration sent a back channel intelligence communication to Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani warning that the U.S. might close its military bases should Qatar’s support for Iran, Syria and HAMAS continue. When Defense Secretary Gates and Special Advisor to the Gulf States, Dennis Ross toured the Middle East later in May, they conspicuously bypassed Qatar—home of U.S. Central Command headquarters, America’s largest air base (al Odeid) and storage facility for munitions in the Middle East. The chain of events underscores a dangerous and growing problem between the Obama administration and Qatar, one of its most important allies in the Middle East; how to grapple with Iran’s expanding influence from the Persian Gulf to the Levant. At a time when American interests and power are under strong challenge in the Middle East, the Obama administration’s mishandling of Qatar could result in a devastating setback.
There was a time when American threats against an Arab emirate the size of Lichtenstein would have been heeded with dispatch. But Qatar is not a typical Arab state and Emir al Thani, the founder of al Jezeera News is not a typical Arab monarch. Leading a nation of 1.4 million people with the fastest growing economy and the second highest GDP in the world, Emir al Thani has refused to allow Qatar to be held hostage to the strategic imperatives of the United States, Saudi Arabia and Iran. Nor will he defer Qatari’s growing capacity to lead on matters of war and peace to the “traditional powers” of the Arab League and Gulf Cooperation Council. Quite the opposite, al Thani is the architect of a new "Balanced Pragmatism” diplomacy that seeks to bridge the divide between Sunni and Shiia, moderate and radical Islamic movements and relations between authoritarian and more democratic Arab countries. To that end, Emir al Thani has mobilized Qatar’s considerable assets behind a risky but bold strategy he believes will insure Qatar’s survival as a prosperous nation, and prevent the roiling Middle East conflicts from escalating into a destructive regional conflagration.
On the surface, the Obama administration’s bullying tactics and arrogant threats against Qatar are mind boggling. After all, Qatar embodies virtually every attribute that America could hope for in an emerging Arab country; a dynamic modernizing economy, access to education and the electoral process for men and women, an active press, mediation of regional disputes and host country to a $1 billion U.S. military installation. But the crux of the dispute is this; President Obama’s aggressive agenda to diminish Tehran’s influence in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and the Gaza Strip is critical to pressure Iran to halt its nuclear enrichment program by the end of 2009. Qatar’s support of HAMAS and Hezbollah, and their mediation efforts in Lebanon have had the net effect of expanding rather than isolating Iranian influence. The Obama administration and their chief Middle Eastern client state, Saudi Arabia wants to put and end to Qatar’s gowing diplomatic role that is shaking things up in the region.
Qatar’s diplomatic initiatives over the past three years in Yemen, Palestine and the Sudan achieved limited but important successes. However, in June 2008 Qatar’s brokering of the Doha Agreement that ended the Lebanese governments’ shutdown and averted a civil war between Hezbollah and the March 14 Cedar movement was a “game changing” event. The agreement led to Michel Sulieman’s consensus election as Lebanon’s president, a redistribution of National Assembly seats between Lebanon’s confessional parties and Hezbollah’s opposition forces obtaining a “blocking third” legislative veto over any actions taken by the Lebanese government to diminish its power. Combined with Hezbollah’s military superiority on the ground, the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Egypt were furious that the Doha agreement tipped the balance of power in Lebanon to Hezbollah and enhanced its legitimacy in the international community. After the United States backed the Cedar forces and funded Lebanon’s National Army, and the Saudi’s bankrolled Sunni salafist militias as a counterweight to Hezbollah’s forces, the strategic setback resulting in the extension of Iranian influence in the Levant was enormous. Should Hezbollah’s electoral coalition with AMAL win Lebanon’s June 7 parliamentary elections, many will look back at the Doha Agreement as the turning point that allowed Iran to solidify a proxy state on Israel’s northern border.
Following its landmark mediation in Lebanon, Qatar’s rift with the U.S., the Saudi’s and Egypt deepened when Emir al Thani called for a January 16, 2009 emergency summit of Arab League members to respond to the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip. President Mubarak and Saudi King Abdullah immediately criticized Qatar's call for the meeting and announced a boycott of the Doha Summit along with Jordan and the Palestinian Authority. The Egyptians and Saudi’s insisted that holding high-level talks on the Gaza War two days before the planned Arab economic summit in Kuwait on January 19 and 20 was not necessary. But the timing of the meeting was not the issue. When Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani defended the emergency summit by stating that the "war crimes" Israel committed against the Palestinians in Gaza required an Arab summit to take collective action to pressure Israel to stop the war, it was clear that the growing chasm between the pro-American Saudi-Egyptian camp and the resistance front led by Iran and Syria was fully in play.
The Egyptian plan Cairo negotiated with Hamas and Israel, was widely criticized on the Arab street as a Palestinian surrender to Israel. Egypt was also under fire for closing its Sinai border to Gaza, thereby denying critical aid to the Palestinians. The Egyptians and the Saudi’s supported Israel’s invasion of Gaza, and the Abbas-led Palestinian Authority joined the chorus by blaming HAMAS for the outbreak of the war. The Palestinian Authority’s accusation that Qatar’s emergency summit sought to “exploit the blood of the Palestinians to score political gains” was the font of hypocrisy as Qatar has been financially supporting HAMAS since it won the 2005 elections. Despite the Saudi’s and Egyptians efforts to sabotage the Doha Emergency Summit, the leaders of Algeria, Comoros, Djibouti, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Syria and Sudan were in attendance. Leading representatives of Iran and HAMAS addressed the meeting. The summit concluded with a call to suspend the Arab League Peace Initiative (API)—the Saudi foreign policy framework adopted by the Arab League. In addition, Qatar and Mauritania suspended their ties with Israel. In response to the Doha emergency summit, Arab League president Amr Moussa, minimized its importance by saying the meeting failed to achieve a quorum of the 22 member Arab League, and therefore its actions were of no significance.
Emir al Thani’s willingness to take issue with the United States, challenge Saudi Arabia’s political hegemony in the Arab world, and fight for a new orientation of the Arab League and GCC, are not the acts of a reckless or even militant Arab leader. Most national leaders around the world regard HAMAS and Hezbollah as legitimate “resistance movements” rather than terrorist organizations. Thus, Emir al Thani’s support of the two groups can hardly be considered as support for extremism and more importantly should not be characterized as explicit acts of anti-Americanism. On the contrary, Qatar's housing of America’s largest military complex in the Middle East is an act of self-preservation, insulating Qatar against possible attacks and subversion from its neighbors—Iran and Saudi Arabia. While Qatar’s hosting the U.S. military increases their vulnerability to attacks by salafists and al Queda forces, Emir al Thani's insurance policy has been to open Qatar as a sanctuary for radical Arab leaders across the Middle East and occasionally allowing extremists to transit Qatar in-route to their destination points.
Equally as complex is Qatar’s relationship with its neighbor Iran. Regardless of the United States desire to see Qatar “tie off” friendly relations with Tehran, the reality on the ground is that Iran is the dominant military power in the Gulf. Its potential to go nuclear means that Qatar’s national interests won’t be well served by a hostile relationship with Tehran, purely for the benefit of the United States. Qatar and Iran are separated by the Persian Gulf, and have a long history of lucrative trade relations. Of the six Gulf Cooperation Council states, Iran and Qatar maintain the closest ties. Unlike the other Gulf States that have sizable Shiia populations, Qatar is overwhelmingly Sunni, and therefore does not worry about Iran’s manipulation of a fifth column inside its borders. Both countries are major oil and gas producers, and share the North Field and South Pars gas platforms. While Qatari and Iranian claims to the energy platforms have never been fully resolved and tension has flared in the past over Qatar’s aggressive exploration of both sites, Qatar and Iran have managed their affairs well. Notwithstanding their support of Iran’s regional allies and giving Tehran a fair hearing in the region’s affairs, Qatar as a United Nations Security Council member voted for Resolution 1747 imposing tougher sanctions against Iran. At the same time Qatar has defended Iran’s right to peacefully develop nuclear power under the provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
If Qatar’s independence has rattled the United States, it has infuriated Saudi Arabia. Since al Jezeera News stormed on the scene 10 years ago battering down the walls of silence and news censorship that served the old Sunni monarch’s well, Saudi Arabia has been the subject of unflattering press coverage by the Qatari based station. Relations between the two nations have been strained since then. In addition to the Saudi’s refusing to allow more than 1,250 Al-Jazeera employees to travel to Mecca for the Hajj, the Saudi’s blocked a proposed $2 billion 600 kilometer natural gas pipeline running from Qatar’s North Field to Mina Al Ahmadi in Kuwait. The Saudi’s also rejected the building of a causeway between Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. But it is Qatar’s growing role as a mediating and political force that has undermined Saudi Arabia’s prestige and power and deepened the quarrel between the two nations.
In the New Middle East, increasingly divided between the pro-American coalition led by Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and the “resistance” alliance led by Iran and Syria, every Arab country is being forced to choose sides or maneuver in open space between the two camps. It is the failure of the traditional Sunni powers, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, to solve the region’s trenchant conflicts and staunch Iranian expansion that has created a leadership void. Qatar’s and Emir al Thani’s bold move to fill the leadership void in the Middle East with its “Balanced Pragmatism” approach to problem solving in Yemen, Palestine, Lebanon and the Sudan should be welcomed by the United States.
Qatar has and will make mistakes in attempting to chart a new course for Middle East diplomacy and engagement. All their efforts will not result in outcomes favorable to the United States—that goes with the territory. However, labeling Qatar as a pro-Iranian proxy state or supporter of terrorism simply cannot be supported by the facts. For an Obama administration that came to office trumpeting a new day of diplomacy and outreach in the Middle East, the veiled threats against Qatar were not only counterproductive; they were an embarrassment. For those looking for change in the Middle East, look no further than Qatar. **************
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