Debate Now Thoughtful Discussion About Middle East?

[jwoodie]

I recently heard a novel strategy for dealing with Iran and the Middle East. Basically, it proposes to let Iran establish some sort of hegemony over this area as a way of keeping a lid on all of the factions involved in continuously fighting each other, somewhat like when Yugoslavia governed the Balkans (Serbia et al). At first blush, this seems like a direct threat to Israel's existence, but Israel has more than enough deterrent power (i.e., nukes) to prevent this from ever happening. Also, it would be hard to establish that a nuclear Iran would pose any greater risk to the U.S. than a nuclear North Korea. (Both countries would face instant obliteration.)

Are we engaged in an endless game of knocking down one puppet only to have another one pop up? Middle East oil is no longer an indespensible component of our economy. Maybe we should let someone else take up the thankless task of trying to pacify this area. What do you think?

 

[Dogmaphobe]

What I think is that any approach to the middle east needs to take into account the nature of those living there. In our hubris, we have long assumed they are like us in the way they react to things and in doing so, greatly overestimate not only our abilities, but theirs.

The culture of so much of the middle east is predicated to a great degree upon patriarchal systems of honor and family structure rather than ideology or political persuasion. In many places in the middle east, good percentages of the population are married to their very close family members, with first and second cousin marriages predominating as well as uncle-niece marriages. The consequences of all this inbreeding are many as studies have shown a rise in schizophrenia and loss of intelligence from first cousin marriages, but more importantly, the custom results in a people whose first loyalty is to blood. It's Hatfields vs McCoys on a massive scale.

There is really only way to keep in check all the natural hostilities that arise between clans, and that is through the imposition of some sort of authoritarian system of governance. Looking at what has happened in Iraq after the deposition of their strong-armed leader should give any thinking person a clue as to how the people react when the cork is popped from the bottle. The same goes throughout the rest of the region where, in our naivete' and hubris, we just assumed that the removal of all the various strong-armed leaders would result almost magically in the population embracing western, liberal values like democracy. A few did and will. The majority didn't and won't, and they won't because of all this inbreeding.

My own opinion is that he lines of demarcation between countries in the middle east should be redrawn altogether to reflect cultural differences to a better degree and that they should should be once again led by strong-armed leaders who can keep the order. We assume that democracy leads to liberalization. It doesn't. Liberalization leads to democracy and the profoundly illiberal cultures of the middle east simply aren't ready for it. What they actually need IMO, are leaders who are both authoritarian, but secular and modern. The authoritarianism is necessary to keep a lid on the clan violence and the modernity is necessary to lead the cultures out of the seventh century.

 

[Coyote]

jwoodie: "At first blush, this seems like a direct threat to Israel's existence, but Israel has more than enough deterrent power (i.e., nukes) to prevent this from ever happening. Also, it would be hard to establish that a nuclear Iran would pose any greater risk to the U.S. than a nuclear North Korea. (Both countries would face instant obliteration.)"

I actually tend to agree - in terms of an actual nuclear confrontation I worry more about NK with it's isolated populace and spoiled boy king. I would also have more concerns about Pakistan given it's difficulty in controlling radical groups in some of it's regions and a high rate of corruption.

Dogmaphobe - you make some good points and I strongly agree with your analysis.

I think you are spot on about the culture and part of the failure of democratic reforms is due to a system that places a higher value on blood and tribal loyalty or loyalty to a religious faction than it does on state identification. Such a system fosters a huge amount of corruption and human rights abuses and "pay back". Another aspect of the culture that makes democracy difficult is that "winners" lavishly reward those with tribal or family ties at the expense of investing in the state or in unification. There is a lot of similarity to the Balkans.

It was completely naive to think that all we needed was to remove a despot or allow an "election" and everything would be peachy keen in a system that has never had any of the institutions to begin with. Those institutions need to precede democracy, not the reverse. We've seen a lot of the same failures in African nations, where tribal identity is more important than state identity and, likewise - borders drawn with complete indifference to those inhabiting the regions.

Where I disagree is the emphasis you place on the genetics of close interbreeding - ya, it's problematic, but when you start to assign value to it as part of the overall problem, I'm not so sure. Hatfield and McCoy aspect though, I totally agree with and it's very ingrained in Arab culture.

That's a really really good post. Thanks for posting it.

 

[Osomir]

What I think is that any approach to the middle east needs to take into account the nature of those living there. In our hubris, we have long assumed they are like us in the way they react to things and in doing so, greatly overestimate not only our abilities, but theirs.

I'd rather suggest that it is rather indicative of a high level of hubris to assume or attempt to label a wide swath of people as a monolith or as indeed "one" singular people / culture. The Middle East has never operated that way, even among more solidly Arab populations we saw pan-Arabism fail completely. The notion of the clash of the civilizations has always been a rather weak one because it supposes the existence of rigid homogenous civilizations in the first place, which has never been a very good reflection of reality.

The culture of so much of the middle east is predicated to a great degree upon patriarchal systems of honor and family structure rather than ideology or political persuasion. In many places in the middle east, good percentages of the population are married to their very close family members, with first and second cousin marriages predominating as well as uncle-niece marriages.

All common practices throughout European history as well.

The consequences of all this inbreeding are many as studies have shown a rise in schizophrenia and loss of intelligence from first cousin marriages, but more importantly, the custom results in a people whose first loyalty is to blood. It's Hatfields vs McCoys on a massive scale.

Can you cite these studies? Every one that I have ever looked at that try to make such claims tend to have either very low sample sizes, or are riddled with poor methodology (trying to rely on R values in a multi-variable regression, or failing to utilize any dummy variables or controls, etc). If you feel that you have something more robust backing your claim then I would like to take a look at it.

There is really only way to keep in check all the natural hostilities that arise between clans, and that is through the imposition of some sort of authoritarian system of governance.

There isn't any statistical evidence of this. In fact regression modeling done by conflict theorists have shown that authoritarian governance systems after a certain point of GDP per capita tend to lead to increased incidents of violence and conflict, not lower levels. I would point to Paul Collier's work Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places for an overview of the irrationality of promoting authoritarianism in places like the Middle East.

My own opinion is that he lines of demarcation between countries in the middle east should be redrawn altogether to reflect cultural differences to a better degree

I don't disagree with this suggestion, but I find the logic for it to rather be contrary to your above assertions. If the cause of violence is primarily low intelligence through inbreeding or due to culture, then redrawing borders isn't going to change anything. It strikes me as odd that your suggested remedy doesn't address your purported causes of violence. Redrawing borders implies that there is something wrong with state structures and individual state identities in and of themselves, and there is: they are colonial borders. They are artificial borders imposed by external powers that never bothered to take cultural, ethnic, and ideological differences into account when they were first created.

What they actually need IMO, are leaders who are both authoritarian, but secular and modern. The authoritarianism is necessary to keep a lid on the clan violence and the modernity is necessary to lead the cultures out of the seventh century.

We saw this attempted already though during the Cold War. Far from helping, it made things worse because then the citizens living under such brutal governments equated modernism and secularism with dictatorship, foreign control, and oppression. It was what gave rise to the modern Islamism movement and Salafi style movements that seek to alter state structures through violence and a rejection of modernism and secularism. What you're advocating was what literally gave birth to movements like Al Qaeda, and the Muslim Brotherhood.

 

[Kosh]

At first blush, this seems like a direct threat to Israel's existence, but Israel has more than enough deterrent power (i.e., nukes) to prevent this from ever happening. Also, it would be hard to establish that a nuclear Iran would pose any greater risk to the U.S. than a nuclear North Korea. (Both countries would face instant obliteration.)

First off let us state that Israel having nukes is pure speculation.

Israel is widely believed to have been the sixth country in the world to develop nuclear weapons, with "rudimentary, but deliverable," nuclear weapons available as early as 1967. Israel is not a party to the NPT.

There is extensive evidence Israel has nuclear weapons or a near-ready nuclear weapons capability. There is also speculation that Israel may have tested a nuclear weapon along with South Africa in 1979, but this has not been confirmed, and interpretation of the Vela Incident is controversial.

Now if you want to deal in actual facts not based on speculation then it will be hard not to draw political lines in the conversation.

Now if one wants to assume that Israel has nukes, then why have they not used them? Will Iran get the Nuke and destroy Israel as they have said they would?

After a very long war with Iraq, Iran is now in Iraq as this country has been handed over to them.

But the problems in the middle east did not start just a short few years ago this stretches out over thousands of years. How do you defeat thousand year old hate?

If someone suggests dividing up the Middle East by drawing lines based on cultural differences, will you still draw Israel in those lines? If you do then it will most likely not be accepted. And if you think you are going to get people to give up their land over this, you will have a new war on your hands.

Russia is a modern country and many in the Middle East, but they are not exactly our allies by any means. Should we do the same to them, since their government is not so friendly with the US?

Segregation is something many in this country fought had to abolish and now we see that some want to implement that in the Middle East.

So what is the answer? Well if you are trying to find political way to fix this, one does not yet currently exist. So if can not be foxed political, through talks and negation, what are the alternatives?

 

[jwoodie]

First off let us state that Israel having nukes is pure speculation.

Israel is widely believed to have been the sixth country in the world to develop nuclear weapons, with "rudimentary, but deliverable," nuclear weapons available as early as 1967. Israel is not a party to the NPT.

There is extensive evidence Israel has nuclear weapons or a near-ready nuclear weapons capability.

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