Brian M Downing
In coming years, a decade or two at most, domestic fiscal and political pressures will force a pullback from many of the US military bases in some eighty-five countries across the globe. For reasons elaborated upon earlier, Persian Gulf bases might be on the cut list. Oil imports from the region are low now and likely to decline further. Arms exports there are high but come with vexing entanglements which perversely pull the US into Saudi wars, as in Yemen, Syria, and perhaps Iran in coming months.
The US and key allies are generally though not universally supportive of human rights and political reform. Gulf nations are ruled by hereditary monarchs who care little for human rights and are determined to stamp out democratic movements from the Maghreb to South Asia.
A pullout would be one of the most jarring changes the world has seen since European powers left their empires after 1945, voluntarily or not. The sight of American flags pulled down and one day replaced by Chinese and Russian ones will be hard to take in America, evocative as it is of fading might and defeat. However, it will bring benefits to the US and impose burdens on China and Russia.
Arms
The US will save billions by leaving the Gulf but lose out in the lucrative arms trade as the princes will look elsewhere for protection. The winners will of course be Russia and China which have already established themselves in the Gulf arms bonanza. Russia already cooperates with the Gulf states on oil quotas, and China buys huge amounts of oil from them all. Moscow and Beijing’s ascendance is already underway.
Losing out in the arms trade will undoubtedly hurt the US economy. Many high-paying blue collar jobs depend on it. The US, however, will be rid of those vexing entanglements conducive to wars not in the national interest.
Oil
The importance of the Gulf doesn’t rest on the strength of its armies, technological innovation, cultural achievements, or soft power. It’s oil. It was that way when western navies shifted away from coal a century ago and when their publics bought more and more cars fifty years later. No oil, no strategic importance.
Looking well into the future, the importance of oil, perhaps especially oil from the Gulf, is in doubt. Conservation and alternative energies are on the rise. The US, Canada, Brazil, Israel, and Egypt will be exporting formidable amounts of oil and gas. Venezuela will return to former levels one day.
Many nations will prefer to purchase their hydrocarbons from countries with less than odious human rights records. More calculating nations will prefer to buy from exporters whose stability is assured in the longterm.
Instability
The Middle East has never been stable. Colonels seize power, assassins fell kings, and religious passions erupt. Demographics loom as perhaps one of the most important sources of instability as some sixty percent of the populations are under the age of twenty-five. Their hopes for jobs and families are unpromising. They view their leaders as inept, corrupt, hypocritical, and help up by foreign powers.
Opposition ranges from liberal reformers, disgruntled members of royal families, Shia minorities, members of the Muslim Brotherhood, and followers of al Qaeda and ISIL. They agree on very little except for the need to end privileged monarchy.
With export revenue flat or in decline, demographic and political pressures will worsen. Subjects of Gulf kingdoms will question their rulers’ opulent palaces, reliance on foreign powers, subsidies to foreign countries, and dubious wars – especially those on fellow Muslims.
Russia and China
Benefiting considerably from the oil and arms trade, Russia and China will be pressed to prop up tottering scepters across the Gulf. In many cases this will require military force, especially where indigenous armies are not up to the task or are taking part in insurrections.
Indeed, one of the several reasons for the Gulf states’ drift toward Russia and China is their skill in crushing rebels. The US on theater hand wouldn’t do the same for Pahlavi or Mubarak. The Chechen capital, Grozny, was leveled, as were several Syrian cities. The violent dispersion of protesters at Tiananmen Square was an impressive feat to the rulers of the Gulf. The repression of the Uighurs might be met with ambivalence because of their religion, but large-scale re-education camps hold attraction.
While Washington is aligned with East Asia and Europe in a reasonably smooth way, Moscow and Beijing will be saddled with managing timeless sectarian hatreds and deepening resentments toward Saudi hegemony. The presence of foreign engineers and soldiers involved with the economy and internal order will bring resentments and more. What the British and Americans were in past years, the Russians and Chinese will be in the future. The focus of al Qaeda, ISIL, and kindred groups will shift away from the West and toward the most recent trespassers on sacred land.
The prize Moscow and Beijing win for outmaneuvering the US may be far less than it appears now in the heady days of rising and resurrecting power. The prize may also come with vexing entanglements.
© 2019 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to Susan Ganosellis.