Trump’s Wrong Policy in the Middle East and Macron’s Mistake

Lucio Levi
Member of WFM Council and UEF Federal Committee, Former President of UEF Italy

On the night between 13 and 14 April, 2018, the armed forces of the United States, the United Kingdom and France bombed three sites in Syria connected with the production of chemical weapons, which Assad used on 7 April against the civil population in Douma near Damascus.

It was a dangerous step forward in the escalation of violence underway in Syria, which could transform the conflict into a wider clash that involves the great powers. The genocide underway in Syria, which the world looks on powerless and indifferent, and the growth of tension between the United States and Russia led some observers to mention the risk of a Third World War, that Trump’s silliness and Putin’s cynism can fuel more.

However, the fact that the targets of the air raids were fairly restrained, without casualties and probably announced in advance and Russia’s moderate verbal reaction shows the will of both contenders to keep the clash under control. The limited nature of the strike shows that it was a demonstrative action, a deterring operation against the future use of chemical weapons.

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The weakness of the military operation in Syria lies in the fact that it was disconnected from a plan for peace. Two international coalitions are clashing: on the one hand, Russia, Iran and Turkey, on the other hand, the United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel. None of them is so strong to prevail. While the United States plans a retreat from the Middle East and the Mediterranean region, Russia is filling the power vacuum left by the United States’ withdrawal and by the powerlessness of Europe.

We usually assert that the world has become multipolar. In fact, a more flexible international system than that we have left behind is forming. Potentially, it is more able to prevent violence, manage disputes and deal with crises, as the figure of a mediator between the powers in conflict can assert itself.

What is lacking, for the time being, is a full awareness that the EU can play that role. Since Macron has proposed himself as the leader of the refoundation of the EU and its transformation into a “sovereign, united and democratic Europe” announced in a speech at the Sorbonne university, he has a special responsibility in pursuing that objective. Yet the Syria air strikes contradict that commitment. Instead of promoting a European initiative for peace, he tagged along with the United States. This is not the way to assert an independent international role for Europe. Macron’s unilateral initiative has divided the EU, since Germany and Italy were not willing to participate in the military operation. But there is also a subordinate responsibility of both of them, as they have offered their logistic support to the military operation.

Even today the EU would have the means to play a mediating role between the United States and Russia and to promote the intervention of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. It is to be recollected that in 2013 Putin obtained from Assad not only the submission of his chemical weapons to international control, but also their destruction according to the convention on the prohibition of those weapons. The EU could do the same thing. On the other hand, since 2006, three EU countries (Italy, France and Spain) have successfully provided an interposition force at the border between Israel and Lebanon under the aegis of the United Nations.

Russia and Iran have obtained a double success in the war in Syria. First, with the maintenance in power of Assad whom the United States would like to remove; second, in gaining the alliance of Turkey, so far a pillar of NATO, who aims to expel and kill the Kurdish population based in northern Syria. As a matter of fact, the plan for the partition of Syria designed by Putin, Rohani and Erdogan can represent the starting point of a more ambitious plan aiming to expand their influence in the Middle East.

Two additional destabilizing elements in the turbulent situation of the region are Trump’s decisions to withdraw the United States from the Iran nuclear deal – with the risk that Iran restarts the uranium enrichment – and to recognize Jerusalem as capital of Israel transferring there the US embassy from Tel Aviv – the cause of the current massacres at the border between Gaza and Israel –. With this senseless policy, tensions in the Middle East are irremediably destined to grow. The EU partners have not shared those decisions, but have rather criticized them. If we consider that there are other contentious issues between the EU and the United States, above all the conflict between protectionism and multilateralism, we can expect they will widen the gap between the two shores of the Atlantic. There is only one political actor in the world who can promote the patient search for a peaceful coexistence in the Middle East – the EU – provided that it learns to speak with one voice.

Taking into account the aversion of the United States and Russia to the creation of a European supranational power, it is high time that Brussels adapts its strategy to the current evolution of international relations.

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The other voice that is lacking is the one of the peace movement. The history of the workers’ internationals shows that the peace movement is unable to stop wars. More generally, at the decisive moment of war, national solidarity and patriotism have always prevailed over the ties which unite the nongovernmental organizations at the international level. It is impossible to fight against war with organizations which are subordinate to governments, the institutions which hold the monopoly of violence in their own hands.

However, in the past century the peace movement has played a significant role in the armaments reduction policies and in the creation of international institutions, like the International Criminal Court, which pursue the goal of extending at the international level the principles of the rule of law. Its decline began with the Iraqi war, which was waged in spite of the mobilization of millions of demonstrators.

It is clear that the peace movement has been unable to answer the challenge of globalization. The social media have spread the illusion that the unprecedented possibility to communicate with everybody would mean to have a new and powerful mobilization tool available. The reality is that the potential of the global civil society movements has been lost in a thousand streamlets and has been sterilized. Moreover, the dependence of the movements on a leadership of paid officers has exposed them to the corrupting power of money owned by the great lobbies. Lastly, the states governed by authoritarian and nationalist leaders have criminalized the civil society movements and accused them to be foreign agents.

However, in a time in which the political leaders are not willing to offer to the citizens “blood, toil, tears and sweat”, like Churchill did on May 1940, but are inclined to follow the guidance and direction of opinion polls in order to please their own public opinion, what can rein in Trump is the fact that people are against military interventions, as they entail casualties and waste of public money.