Some analysts in the Middle East argue that concerns over China’s rapid military modernization and technology competition are pulling Washington’s attention away from the Mideast region. While the United States may not be the only global player in the region, others say its retreat from the Middle East is a myth.
Analysts see security and energy issues, Israel, and Iran’s nuclear threat as key issues for U.S. policy in the Middle East. As James Phillips of the Washington-based Heritage Foundation and others see it, Washington is pressing regional allies to assume more responsibility for their own defense. “Nervous Arab Gulf states are hedging and cultivating closer ties to China and Russia; Iran and Turkey are absorbing parts of Iraq and Syria, two [practically] failed states,” he told GIS reports.
Jennifer Kavanagh, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, says that while U.S. security presence is lower than it was at the height of the Iraq war, there are some “30,000 to 40,000 U.S. troops in the region, dozens of bases, including several large military facilities, pre-positioned stocks, and security force assistance is extensive in the region.” She told a Carnegie seminar that “about 54% of arms sales to Middle East come from the U.S.”
“The U.S. hasn’t pulled back entirely from its more diplomatic role. There are new security alignments," said Kavanagh. One of the biggest changes is that Russia and China are playing a bigger role. It’s less about a withdrawal of the United States and more about a shift in relative power. The U.S. is currently putting more force in the region. In some dimensions, they are actually doing more.”
Kavanagh says China’s conventional military presence in the Middle East is very small, while its economic activities are huge. Russia has a historic military presence in Syria, but it can’t deliver on weapons deals given its war in Ukraine.
Frederic Wehrey, also a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the seminar that although China has a “reach and influence in the region, it shouldn’t be blown out of proportion.”
“China and Russia do offer something to the region’s states. This is supplementing, not supplanting the U.S. role," Wehrey said. "Can these outside powers really offer the sorts of security guarantees for their partners’ defense that the U.S. has provided? The answer is no. They don’t have the capability or the will. China’s agreements are non-binding. The U.S. is still fulfilling that primary security role.”
Other observers like F. Gregory Gause, chair of international relations at the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University, has argued that the “debate on U.S. policy in the Middle East needs to move away from abstractions like “commitment” versus “withdrawal” and engage with the real questions of just what interests in the Middle East justify the presence of U.S. military force and what threats justify its use.
That notion becomes more relevant as Gulf Arab states work out their rapprochement with arch-foe Iran in a newly brokered Chinese deal.
