Politics | US is refocusing its energies in West Asia

Donald Trump

KP Nayar

Terrorist lynchpin Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s death notwithstanding, American policy in the Levant is in tatters. Dangerously, the policy-making process itself in Washington on Syria, Turkey and Iraq has come apart. United States President Donald Trump is determined to end American military involvement in Syria before his re-election campaign is in full flow and US’ entrenched deep state is equally determined to prevent this.

Trump may boast about the death of the leader of the Islamic State — and possibly that of his successor too — but the sum total of American actions in the Levant in October is that northern Syria is effectively trifurcated for now, with no significant role for the US. Russia is now the pre-eminent foreign force in Syria. Following Trump’s decisions to vacate two US bases, Russia is in parts of Syria which have been virtual American protectorates since the war which overthrew Saddam Hussein in Iraq.

Between them, Russia and Turkey now own northern Syria. Additionally, Washington’s reactive policies have paved the way for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to regain control of all of Syria either directly or by trifurcation through his proxies for the first time since the Arab Spring erupted in March 2011. This democracy movement was supposed to see off Assad like Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt.

The result of all this is that the US is refocusing its energies in the Gulf and making intense efforts to create an alternative ‘Near East’ narrative for Washington’s interests in the Arab world.

In the last week of October, the heavily partisan US Congress surprised even the biggest sceptics in Washington by passing a Bill in the House of Representatives to underwrite America’s participation in Expo 2020 Dubai, the six month-long World Expo which will open in the United Arab Emirates on October 20, 2020.

World Expos are usually held in different parts of the world every five years. It will be the first time this event will be held in West Asia since World Expo made its debut in London in 1851. From New Delhi’s standpoint, it is highly unlikely an Expo will be held in South Asia for another decade or two — since the Gulf is India’s virtual backyard — and competition for hosting this global event is intense.

So, to market its status as an emerging economy and as a potential great power, India needs to pull itself by its bootstraps to showcase its best at Expo 2020 Dubai. This also means that in strategic terms, a refocusing of American actions in the Gulf is very relevant to Indian interests in countries such as the UAE or Saudi Arabia. Since Narendra Modi became Prime Minister, India’s relations with the UAE have become one of its top foreign policy priorities, encompassing not only traditional sectors such as energy and trade, but also strategic affairs.

Trump has asked Congress for $30 million for the State Department to finance construction of the US pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. The US House of Representatives is completely engrossed in the procedural run up to impeach Trump. Even when impeachment of the President was nowhere on the horizon, let alone as a probability, the Congress and the Trump administration have been locked in perennial showdowns, paralysing statecraft in Washington. It is a good augury for American policy in the Arab world that there is rare agreement now on this score in Washington.

The true significance of setbacks to the US in Syria, Turkey and Iraq and the criticality of its renewed focus in the Gulf through events like Expo 2020 Dubai emerge when Democrats and Republicans — that includes Trump — agree to fund the US pavilion setting aside their bitter and protracted fights over virtually everything.

The House passage of legislation imprinting its financial approval for the Dubai Expo is doubly important because it makes a rare exception to a 20-year law prohibiting taxpayer funding for US participation in global expositions.

Peace, harmony and prosperity are among the objectives of Expo 2020 Dubai, which has an overarching theme of ‘Connecting Minds, Creating the Future’ to build partnerships and inspire ideas that will forge the world of tomorrow.

The organisers of Dubai’s Expo, billed as the ‘World’s Greatest Show’ ought to be pleased that their themes for the project have already brought together irreconcilable adversaries in the world’s only super power for a good cause and to protect the interests of all those involved. After all that is the rationale for countries to take part in world expositions.

KP Nayar has been covering West Asia for more than four decades. Views are personal.