We learned when America retreats, chaos often
follows." This assertion was made by US
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during his
recent speech in Cairo. But the remark did little
to resolve the uncertainty among Washington's
friends and allies in the region. Are US troops in
Syria staying or going? If staying, for how long?
And if going, when?
Mr Pompeo's speech was a broader attempt to
re-set US policy in the region and to give some
sort of coherence after days of mixed messages.
But taking a leaf from his boss in the White
House, Mr Pompeo spent a good deal of his time
castigating the Obama administration's approach
and contrasting it with the apparent progress
made on Mr Trump's watch.
But there were some significant elements
missing in Mr Pompeo's remarks. There was no
mention of human rights in Egypt or Saudi
Arabia. Indeed there was only the briefest of
mentions to Saudi Arabia at all, a country that
surely should loom large in US policy.
The Yemen crisis got only a passing comment;
divisions amongst the Gulf countries were
papered over; and Mr Trump's much heralded
peace plan for Israel and the Palestinians was
not touched on at all. The emphasis was on Washington's friends and
allies in the region doing more. The US would
seemingly work behind the scenes - Mr Pompeo
noting that "in Syria the US will use diplomacy
and work with our partners to expel every last
Iranian boot" .
Containing Iran and its widening sphere of
influence seems to be the central goal of US
policy, but beyond economic sanctions there
seems no real strategy to achieve this aim.
The issue is not the presence or otherwise of
some 2,000 US troops on the ground in Syria. It
is how their presence or withdrawal serves wider
US policy goals.
The whole story of President Trump's decision
to announce the Syria pullout says a good deal
about his own approach to the region. It speaks
volumes too about how his administration works.
National Security Adviser John Bolton's
subsequent efforts to turn this into a conditions-
based withdrawal is the sort of input that should
surely have been there prior to the initial
announcement.
The response from many of the Washington
pundits and think-tank experts was predictable
and uncompromising.
Op-eds and blog posts spoke of the betrayal of
Washington's Kurdish allies; they suggested that
Moscow's influence in the region would only rise;
and that a vacuum was being created from
which the only beneficiary would be Iran.
All this may be to one extent or another correct.
But there is a deeper problem here, and it goes
to the heart of the Trump approach and his
antipathy towards military entanglements
overseas.
'No grand strategy'
A small number of pundits have condemned the
president's approach to policy-making and his
apparent lack of a strategic sense, but they have
nonetheless welcomed his withdrawal decision.
In part, their argument is to question what some
2,000 US troops can really achieve in Syria. They
sympathise with Mr Trump's gut sense. The
president, though frustrated by the efforts of
some of his advisers, is finally acting to at least
to scale-down, if not to end, the so-called
Forever War against Islamic extremism.
That war began in Afghanistan in the wake of
the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington.
But it quickly moved to Iraq and then more
recently to Syria.
As the scope of the war widened, the US had to
face up to some of the consequences of earlier
policy decisions.
Iran's regional prominence, for example, is a
direct outgrowth of the removal of Saddam
Hussein's regime in Baghdad, which provided a
strategic counter-weight to Tehran.
While the focus has been on President Trump's
Syria decision, he has similarly called for a
significant US troop withdrawal in Afghanistan. It
is suggested that about 7,000 - roughly half the
force - could be pulled out.
Here, too, the pundits and think-tankers divide
along familiar lines, with a minority questioning
the basis of the continuing US deployment;
stressing the futility of building up a coherent
national government whose writ extends across
the country; and ultimately doubtful of the logic
behind staying to fight a war that neither side
can win.
My aim here is not to suggest who is right and
wrong.
But President Trump's instinct suggests that
Americans are tired of the Forever Wars, and to
this extent he has a point. Where this should
leave US policy in Afghanistan or indeed the
wider Middle East is another matter.
As it so often is, Mr Trump's fundamental
compass is that of his supporters back home. He
does not really do grand strategy.
He sees international relations in transactional
terms - perhaps one of the reasons he seems to
prefer dealing with authoritarian rulers rather
than say Washington's often critical Nato allies.
The problem is that, viewed from many foreign
capitals, the US is indeed - to use Mr Pompeo's
word - seen as being in retreat.
A resurgent Russia and a rising China are making
much of the running. The Trump presidency has
been unable to translate the slogan "America
First" into a coherent approach to the wider
world.
International agreements are overturned; the
liberal order established by the US itself is
questioned. "America First" indeed risks leaving
considerable chaos in Mr Trump's wake.
