Hosam Matar: U.S. “Smart” Strategy to Confront Hezbollah

The Consultative Center for Studies and Documentation - Beirut, published a research paper titled “U.S. Smart Strategy to Confront Hezbollah" (12 pages) written by Hosam Matar (an international relations researcher).

 
Matar argues that the end of Israel's aggression in 2006 against Lebanon and its failure to achieve its political objectives against Hezbollah, has led to increase the American involvement in the confrontation against Hezbollah, but on the basis of a new strategy based on soft power. the paper highlights how the American effort was transformed to areas that fall outside the military sphere by trying to target the community which Hezbollah stems from. This was done through the use of media, political and cultural tools in order to form a new image of Hezbollah in the Lebanese and regional conciseness, which make him vulnerable to the possibility of military defeat at the later stage. This U.S. policy aims – according to Matar - to achieve four basic goals: to reduce the legitimacy of the resistance, deepen the national division about its role, isolate it at the external level, and to limit its policy options and flexibility.

 
The paper aims to explore the change in the U.S. policy towards Hezbollah since the 2006 war, as a fundamental, deep and comprehensive change. The importance of examining this change appears on two levels, first at the theoretical level is allows evaluate the effectiveness of soft power in certain circumstances, a debate which is taking place recently between proponents (Liberals like Joseph Nye, Fareed Zakaria) and opponents (neo-conservatives in particular) of the idea of ​​resorting to soft power. Secondly practical importance in that it allows a better understanding of a series of events and political events, at the Lebanese and regional level, as part of a specific strategy and not the product of improvisation and chance. Then, this in turn allows better ability to predict the shape of confrontation in the foreseeable future at a regional moment characterized by confusion and uncertainty. The paper is based primarily on Joseph Nye concept of soft power that had already developing since the beginning of 1990, in addition to the "the U.S. Government Counter-insurgency Guide”  issued by the U.S. State Department in 2009.

 
The paper is divided into the following sub-headings:

• Soft Power: The magnet instead of the hammer 

• Hezbollah: "Hydra" cannot be killed 

• The option of soft power: targeting the social incubator

• reduce the National influence of Hezbollah 

• demonizing Hezbollah: the criminal charge

• marginalizing Hezbollah’s message

In conclusion, instead of "hunting" Hezbollah, Washington is seeking to pollute the environment that Hezbollah lives in it, which make it an "alien body" within the national and regional environment which will then isolate Hezbollah, and only then it becomes possible to defeat Hezbollah through war. In the initial analysis, it seems that the U.S. policy achieved many successes, benefiting mainly from the Lebanese social divisions and regional sectarian tension which was deepened by the Syrian crisis by portraying it as a sectarian conflict and not a political and strategic one. Hezbollah seems aware of this situation, but even it will not push him to change his position in the Syrian crisis, Hezbollah is trying to reduce its costs by devoting large effort to interpret and explain his position about the Syrian crisis to the public, particularly through the speeches of its Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah who holds mainly this crucial task. 

Matar concludes also that the reality of the Middle East as a region full of weak and failed States accompanied with identity crisis, which means a region falls under the domination of corrupted elites that serves the globalized capitalism, with weak political identities, strength of historical emotions and enmity , and the contradiction between belonging to certain state and a certain cultural group, all that enhances the effectiveness of American soft power in the region against resistance movements as Hezbollah

The final evaluation of this U.S. smart strategy still needs more time because it was originally designed to reshape identities and values, a process that needs many years. Also the region is going through a moment of chaos and therefore we need to observe what will settle after the end of this ugly sectarian tide. In addition, Hezbollah experience and historical achievements against “Israel” are still alive has a place in the hearts and minds of Muslims and Arabs even they were faded recently. More importantly, Hezbollah began recently to realize the goals and tools and the nature of the new U.S. police, and to respond to it through media, political, social and cultural policies and steps. But also evaluating Hezbollah’s response needs more time to be studied and tested in a more detailed way in the foreseeable future.

 The full paper can be downloaded from the following link:

 http://www.dirasat.net/uploads/item_mak_m/4410741.pdf

Tehran and Washington: The Marathon Never Ends

 Hosam Matar,  (originally published in Al-Akhbar newspaper), Watching America.com Translated to english By Jackson Allan, Edited by Bora Mici, 22 March 2013

It is said that U.S.-Iranian relations follow the rules of a marathon and not those of a 100-meter sprint. After 30 years of tension, hostility and rival maneuvering, it seems that this expression certainly holds true. 

Has the time come for a resolution to the U.S.-Iranian conflict? We could safely assume that this question deserves the Guinness world record as the most obscure question regarding the Middle East. It goes without saying that the absence of a resolution reflects the severity of the divisions in interests and ideology between the two sides. The Iranians have only experienced the U.S. as an arrogant, hegemonic power that does not respect the principles of domestic sovereignty, international law or even the legitimate interests of regional powers. On the other hand, the “shock of the [takeover of the] embassy” still governs the consciousness of the American people in relation to Iran. In addition, they understand Iran through a “defeated” people, the supporters of the Shah who left the country. Then, there is the ideological contradiction — similar to the one that existed between the U.S. and the Soviets — that prevents peaceful coexistence between the two sides. Martin Hollis and Steve Smith have written that the American and Soviet powers — from this perspective — did not belong to the same world: Each had a distinct form of life; therefore peaceful coexistence was impossible.

When it comes to Iran, the U.S. debates two core questions: Is our strategy containment or prevention? And, if it is prevention, what path must we follow in order to achieve that aim? 

The first question has become as conventional as the answers to it. But the remarkable thing is that the second Obama administration has openly announced, through Secretary of State John Kerry (on Jan. 24, 2013) and Vice President Joe Biden (in March 2013), that its policy is “not containment, it is prevention,” which means that allowing a nuclear Iran, in military terms, is out of the question, even if that means resorting to war. [Zbigniew] Brzezinski harshly criticizes the logic of the idea that Iran possessing nuclear capabilities is an impermissible scenario, because “unacceptable is one of those words which means a lot and at the same time sometimes nothing.” According to him an alternative is deterrence: “We are deterring North Korea. We can deter Iran. I think the guarantee from the United States of complete protection ... can work in the Middle East ... 

"We also have to say a conflict is not in our interest because we know if there's a conflict, we will be hit by the Iranians. ” 

But in his July 2012 Foreign Affairs article "Why Iran Should Get the Bomb," Kenneth Waltz has gone even further, reasoning that Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons would create a more sustainable balance of military power in the Middle East, and that this would reinforce regional stability and not detract from it.

Regarding the second question, a U.S. trend supporting the idea of presenting an offer to Iran with the aim of reaching a resolution is growing. This trend believes that the effectiveness of potential military action is doubtful and that the sanctions, despite their ability to inflict damage, are not enough to alter Iran’s behavior, especially “when their objective is to humiliate the Iranians,”** as Brzezinski has said. The sanctions have become ineffective because Washington has not seriously put the question of [the conditions under which] they would be raised on the table. Obama could overcome the errors made by his predecessors if he accepts the limited nature of U.S. military power and puts his trust in diplomatic power, contends Reza Marashi in his Jan. 22, 2013 Foreign Policy article "Obama's Moment of Truth on Iran." The latest Gallup poll results, published on Feb. 7, 2013, support the “sterile” sanctions hypothesis: Sixty-three percent of Iranians support the continuation of the nuclear program in their country even though 48 percent said that they are directly suffering from the sanctions. The most important thing is that 47 percent blamed the sanctions on the U.S., while 10 percent blamed the Iranian government, and 23 percent are split between Israel, the Europeans and the United Nations.

In an Oct. 7, 2011 Washington Post editorial, Graham Allison had previously called upon Obama to seize Ahmadinejad’s offer to exchange uranium [for "specialized fuel enriched at 20 percent, for use in its research reactor that produces medical isotopes to treat cancer patients"]. He compared this step to the one Reagan took toward Gorbachev after the latter announced a new era of "openness." From Berlin, Reagan called upon Gorbachev to “tear down this wall,” and that is what happened two years later. 

Similarly, in his article Jan. 16, 2013 article "Obama, Offer Iran a Generous Deal," published in The Atlantic, Patrick Clawson has called upon the Obama administration to present a generous offer to Iran that includes softening the sanctions and allowing flexibility on the uranium enrichment issue. Clawson believes that the P5+1 group adopted an old tactic to revive negotiations: “Change the question.” This tactic did not aim to stop enrichment but to guarantee that Iran is unable to manufacture nuclear weapons by [having Iran] ship uranium overseas [instead]. 

Dennis Ross, for his part, agrees that Iran, under the escalating pressure of the sanctions and given the seriousness [with which Iran’s opponents are considering the] military option, seems ready to accept a diplomatic initiative, especially if it includes acknowledging Iran's right to a peaceful nuclear program. 

“The proper environment now exists for diplomacy to work. The next few months will determine whether it succeeds,” he concludes in his article.

One of the risks of making this offer, on which Clawson, Allison and Ross agree, is that Tehran will neglect to take reciprocal steps or will execute them slowly to buy time. The most dangerous risk, though, is that any offer to Iran will be seen as an acknowledgment of its territorial aspirations, an idea that must be refuted in front of the Iranians, on one hand, and the allies of Washington, on the other. According to them, if the Iranians reject a generous offer, it would reveal the country’s true intentions and give legitimacy to a military operation, as a “necessary evil,” against it. Therefore, Robert Satloff, WINEP executive director, believes that Obama will probably present a “grand deal” to the Iranians during his second term.

On the other side, the “hawk” contingent, which includes Michael Singh and Michael Eisenstadt of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, still calls for more serious consideration of the military option. Going even further, Matthew Kroenig wrote in an eponymous feature, published in the January/February 2012 issue of Foreign Affairs, that it is "time to attack Iran" with a surgical military operation and then absorb the country’s response, quickly making moves to contain the crisis. Otherwise, Washington will be forced to face a greater cost in the future, a cost that could reach the point of nuclear warfare. But the remarkable conclusion came from the RAND think tank, which argues that neither diplomacy nor attempts at regime change will be useful. Therefore, the only thing left to do is to support reform in Iran by encouraging democratic change among its neighbors — a reference to the Arab Spring. Doing so would give credibility to U.S. efforts to support reform in Iran.

Despite these calls for presenting a grander bargain to Iran — a bargain whose features manifested in the round of negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 group in Kurdistan , opening a small window in the deadlock — a grander resolution is still unachievable. This is especially true because “the 30-year-old U.S.-Iran enmity is no longer a phenomenon; it is an institution,” argues Trita Parsi, president National Iranian American Council, in his Jan. 25, 2012 article "How the U.S. and Iran Keep Failing To Find a Peace They Both Want" published in The Atlantic. Parsi concluded that the tendency of diplomats in each country to play on the deviltry of the other, internal complications, regional restrictions and the obscurity that a resolution could create all stand in the way of a grander resolution.

It follows that Iran appears to have extracted partial recognition of its status as a nuclear power and its right, in principle, to enrich uranium. Additionally, it has proven that sanctions and coercion are ineffective against it. The two sides need to cool the conflict, but their capacity to do that is directly tied to what is happening in Syria: The closer the Syrian conflict is to a resolution, the more flexibility the Iranians will show and vice versa. But, in conclusion, it is an issue of institutionalized enmity, in Parsi's words. The marathon will continue, even if is interrupted by some rest breaks.

 http://watchingamerica.com/News/201927/tehran-and-washington-the-marathon-never-ends/

The Mahdi and Iran's foreign policy

By: Hosam Matar

Published Friday, January 11, 2013

 

How does Mahdism influence Iranian foreign policy?
It’s a question that requires a probing of Iranian foreign affairs and the Shia belief that, the Mahdi, or 12th Imam, will return before judgment day.To understand Iran’s foreign policy, one must consider two particulars: national interests and the religious-historical identity of society and the regime. Between the two, there is a certain level of tension that must be resolved, particularly in the Shia conception of the return of the Mahdi. 

When it comes to how Shia perceive their role in waiting for the Imam, it is useful to look to the two categories of millenarian movements defined by Eric Hosbawm: passive and revolutionary.

In discussing European millenarian movements, Hosbawm writes that those in the latter category have “fairly definite ideas on how the old society will be replaced by the new one,” namely through the “transfer of power.”On the other hand, passive millenarian movements expect the revolution to make itself through “divine revelation, by an announcement from on high, by a miracle...” 

The traditional Shia approach of ”waiting” means praying to God to send the Imam. Once the believers accomplish their individual worship – and when corruption and oppression fill the world – the Imam will return and spread justice.However, the Khomeini approach is more similar to modern revolutionary millenarian movements; the believers must strengthen their faith individually and socially, promote Islam, and build the necessary power to prepare for his return. 

Ayatollah Mortada Motahhari, a leading figure in the Islamic Revolution of 1979, divided these types of waiting into destructive and constructive, both based on different views of evolution and changes in history.

The constructive waiting views the issue of the Imam’s return as one circle in the circles of struggle between the powers of good and evil. Both Khomeini and Khamenei emphasized this concept repeatedly, thus refusing the traditional approach. Khomeini once said, “We place this revolution in the hands of the Mahdi. If God pleases, let this revolution be the first step toward the appearance of the One Whom God Has Preserved, and let it pave the way for his arrival.”In the era of occultation, Iran is the base from which the believers will accomplish the necessary conditions for the return of Mahdi.

The Islamic Republic of Iran acts as the “Medina” in the era of Prophet Mohammad, Medina being the city that Mohammad used as a center to build an Islamic nation. In the era of occultation, Iran is the base from which the believers will accomplish the necessary conditions for the return of Mahdi.Without Iran, the return of Mahdi will be delayed, therefore its existence is a necessary condition for this return. For that, Andrew Grotto considers Iran to be controlled by “religious hardliners afflicted with a messianic fervor whose primary goal is not to sustain their earthly dominion over the Iranian state, but to hasten the return of the Mahdi.” 

One main approach to the issue of how Mahdism influences Iranian foreign policy is that of the “martyr state,” a view that grants Mahdism a pure determinable influence over the country. If Iranian leaders believe the Mahdi is returning soon, Matthias Küntzel argues in the New Republic they have no reason to compromise and engage in pragmatic politics.In 2009, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Iran is poised to become “a messianic apocalyptic cult controlling atomic bombs.” A similar sentiment was echoed in the words of Raymond Tanter, president of the Washington-based Iran Policy Committee.“There is a link between Iran’s nuclear weapons program and its ideology of trying to facilitate a cataclysmic event to hasten the return of the Mahdi…” he said. 

However, there is another approach based on assumptions that Iran’s ayatollahs are more “rational” than the West has allowed and that their extreme rhetoric is due to Iran feeling threatened.Between these two extremes there is the position of the Supreme Leader Khomeini, and then that of Khamenei, which is the formal and dominant position.The Supreme Leader plays a balancing role by preventing deviations in actions based on messianic views. This Khomeinism view of “waiting” is characterized by cautiousness, avoidance of details and timing, and denial of claims about direct personal contact with the Mahdi. As Thomas Finger once wrote, “since Iran is the world’s leading Shia power, many Iranians expect that it will play a major role in preparing for the Mahdi and in his subsequent activity. This belief renders Iranian Mahdism enormously significant in global politics.”

Iranian leadership acts under the pressures of Mahdism, a role which is sacred and whose position in Shia identity makes it deserving of high sacrifices. Both main approaches – realism and Martyr state- are deficient, so, Since Mahdism prioritizes certain issues in Iranian foreign policy, it does not determine all policies, but rather shapes them. 

Hosam Matar is a Lebanese researcher of International Relations.

Mursi’s Foreign Policy: The Inverted Pyramid

 Hosam Matar, English Alakhbar, 25 October, 2012. 

 

An analysis of Egyptian foreign policy under Mursi’s presidency at this early moment aims to uncover its future and strategic direction, as this direction will influence the entire region, as every country is related to Egypt, the heart of the Arab world.In order to make the analysis it is necessary to determine the variables that hold priority and control this foreign policy, is it security, religion, economy, regional role, engagement with the West, or Arab-Israeli conflict?

Revolutionary systems usually tend toward revolutionary foreign policies as a result of many factors: the struggle for legitimacy between revolutionary groups, enthusiasm and lack of political experience, the need to commit to the revolutionary discourse which the revolutionaries claimed during the struggle against the old system, the power of extremists within revolutionary movements during the first period as they hold legitimacy of achieving the victory, the attempt to divert public attention from internal challenges by magnifying external threats, and finally the ideology of revolutionary groups, their world view and role conception , which motivate the other factors.

It is worth noting that the foreign policy of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is not revolutionary at all, except in its discourse. They are presenting a positive position toward the US and international institutions, engaging with Turkey and Gulf states, dealing cautiously with Hamas, ignoring Israeli violations and recognizing the Camp David peace treaty, adopting a “cold” policy toward Iran and an aggressive one toward the Syrian regime. This early pragmatism can be explained by many factors:

The Muslim Brotherhood separates its vision for internal policies from external ones; at the national level it uses ideological and religious discourse while using pragmatism in foreign policies. This separation is also at the organizational level after the formation of a political party – Freedom and Justice Party – which is separated from the religious institution of Muslim Brotherhood.

The Muslim Brotherhood is concerned primary with the challenges of the economy and development, as it considers that these issue will determine its legitimacy in public opinion which is crucial for the next elections.

It tends to methodologically address social and political challenges step by step and not in a revolutionary way. It believes first in founding the Muslim individual then the Muslim family, then the Muslim society, then Islamic government, and finally mastering the world. This way of thinking is expressed by talking about priorities, “jurisdiction of priorities” in a way that allows the group to ignore issues that it cannot deal with at a certain moment.

Finally, all Islamic actors in the region are testing a “political adaptation” process. They are becoming more realistic and aware of the limits of ideology in politics.

However, even with this pragmatism, the Muslim Brotherhood needs to preserve its religious image, which is necessary in order to legitimatize its leadership role, nationally and regionally. For that, it is aiming to build Egypt’s regional role by claiming leadership of the Sunni Arabs, as was apparent in Mursi’s speech in Tehran, the emotional position about the Syrian Crisis, delaying the normalization of relations with Iran, and claiming that it represents moderate Islam.

• What about the Gaza seize?

• What about its relations with Saudi Arabia and its sectarian role?

• What about Turkey and its strategic partnership with NATO and the US?

• What about its position toward Israel?

• Will Mursi ask for certain measures in these cases as he did for the Syrian crisis? 

Religion and defending Sunnis, for the Muslim Brotherhood, stop at the Palestinian borders.

The Muslim Brotherhood is claiming its intention to regain Egypt’s regional leadership after years of retreat under Mubarak’s rule. But is this possible through begging for loans, donations and investments from states that do not have an interest in an independent Egyptian regional role? These states – such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and the US – will offer some economic benefits, but that will be the price for reproducing Mubarak’s foreign policy with a religious cover. Does the Muslim Brotherhood think it can achieve political independence by economic dependence?

On the contrary, Egypt’s economic opportunities must be dependent on its political vision, and this vision must be based on Egypt’s ability to be the core of a regional integration process. Egypt can play a neutral and balanced role between Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Turkey in order to enhance this regional integration process. Also, the Muslim Brotherhood must realize that the solution for Egypt’s economic problems is based primarily on an independent national decision and internal policies such as a stable and legitimate political system, efficiency of government, quality of the educational system and public facilities. For example, the reformation of Suez Channel could increase its profits by tens of billions of dollars.

Egyptian foreign policy should be based on a clear definition of national security and interests, and not the interests of the Muslim Brotherhood’s regime, as Mubarak used to do. This is not to underestimate the economic challenges in Egypt, especially as a country that lacks natural resources (in contrast to Saudi Arabia and Iran) and is governed by an Islamic group, but it is wrong to give primacy to economy over politics, it is like putting an Egyptian pyramid upside down. All the countries in the Middle East need a multi-layered regional integration process, especially Egypt as a non–oil state.  The Muslim Brotherhood has to realize that emotional discourse and Islamic symbols without clear and productive actions and a clear position toward Israel and US regional role, will lose their power and influence soon, especially with the end of the Syrian crisis. May be it is appropriate to finish with a famous quote from Imam Khomeini: “This revolution is not about the price of watermelon.”

Hosam Matar is a Lebanese researcher of International Relations.

Turkish Regional Test: Rhetoric and Actions

Turkish soldiers in a military vehicle patrol on the Turkish-Syrian border near the village of Hacipasa in Hatay province, southern Turkey 11 October 2012. (Photo: Reuters - Osman Orsal)

 

By: Hosam Matar

Published Thursday, Alakhbar Englsih, October 11, 2012

 

The Turkish government is daily repeating aggressive statements and threats to the Syrian regime, such as demanding the Syrian president to resign and even military threats – as happened lately after a Syrian mortar killed three Turks near the border inside Turkey.However, Turkey is still not able to intervene in a direct and more powerful way and this is not the first time Turkey faces such a contradiction between its rhetoric and actions, as happened in 2010 when Israeli forces killed 11 Turks during the “Gaza flotilla attack.”

This dilemma appears because the Justice and Development Party (AKP) exists under the following factors: Ottoman’s historical glory, rejection from the Europeans, the geo-strategic visions of Ahmet Davutoğlu (Minister of Foreign Affairs), and, most importantly, the AKP’s need for a religious–revolutionary rhetoric to mobilize the Turkish people in order to control power away from military elites’ restrictions and national parties’ influence. This means that the AKP ignored for a period the structural elements, especially the regional balance of power, and that has made the party lose its credibility over time.

Turkey is a regional power with wide national interests in Eurasia and clear ambition for regional leadership and for that it seeks to cooperate, coordinate and integrate with Western polices in the Middle East.

Theoretically there are two main approaches, the first emphasizes the priority of the structure and objective conditions which determine the behavior of the agent, as the balance of power and the nature of regional system. For example, Soli Özel (Istanbul Kadir Has University) argues that “Undoubtedly, the actors do shape their environment, but not at will. They are circumscribed by their capacities, by other actors’ relative power, and the conditions created by major shifts in that environment.” The second approach gives priority to the agent who influences the structure and shapes it; the structure is not more than the sum of the actions of the agents. For that, the most important aspect of the agent’s behavior is its identity, internal system, strategic culture, values and ambitions.

This structure-agent debate can contribute to understanding the current crisis in Turkish foreign policy, as it faces many restrictions and obstacles – as is evident in the tensions with Syria and Israel. In the Israeli case, it was interesting to notice that as Turkey became more aggressive towards Israel it becomes closer to the US and NATO, which makes it rhetoric against Israel suspicious. This not to say that Turkey is just a “Western proxy,” it differs in this aspect from some Arab regimes, but rather that Turkey is a regional power with wide national interests in Eurasia and clear ambition for regional leadership and for that it seeks to cooperate, coordinate and integrate with Western polices in the Middle East. 

However, some Western powers demand Turkey, as a regional power, to engage more and hold more responsibility in the Syrian crisis. Anne-Marie Slaughter (former director of policy planning in the US State Department) criticized Turkey when it called for an international conference titled “Friends of Syria”, because of its weak and reactive and rhetorical policy that is based merely on diplomacy and words without actions. States that are eager to enjoy the trappings of great-power status – with the assumption that they must be consulted on major events or crises in their regions – must accept the burdens that go with it. They must be prepared not just to talk, but to act, she concluded.

 

States that are eager to enjoy the trappings of great-power status – with the assumption that they must be consulted on major events or crises in their regions – must accept the burdens that go with it.

After controlling the internal political game and testing the balance of regional power, especially with the rise of the Russian and Chinese regional roles and the growing tensions with Israel, Greece, Cyprus, Iran, Kurds and Iraq, AKP’s government is now more concerned with focusing on structural elements – mainly strategic calculations for the power game in the Middle East. This development led analysts such as Asli Aydintasbas (columnist for the Turkish daily Milliyet) to argue that “Turkey’s Syria policy will remain rhetoric in the absence of a clear international consensus regarding further action.”

Furthermore, Turkey within such a regional environment will seek for strategic partnership with new Arab regimes as Egypt, and with the NATO.This harmony between Turkey and NATO contradicts Israeli’s predictions at the beginning of their crisis with Ankara that Turkey is shifting away from the West. Efraim Inbar (Director of Begin-Sadat Center, BESA) warned in series of articles after the “Gaza flotilla attack,” that Turkish understandings with Islamic powers such as Iran, Syria and “resistance” movements, will change the balance of power within the Middle East, reduce the Western influence in the region, weaken NATO, and threaten oil routes to the West. This Israeli campaign was aiming to mobilize the West against the AKP and to isolate Ankara, because the Israelis were confused and concerned about the Turkish shift and US withdrawal from Iraq.

In conclusion, Turkey is using mainly its soft power and not its hard power in order to extend its influence and leadership in the region, and for that Turkey is using growing Islamic discourse which is deviating gradually toward sectarianism. As for the Syrian crisis, Turkey is and will continue to focus on diplomacy, statements and covert actions. Though this will not lead to defeating the Syrian regime, it will enhance Turkey’s legitimacy and attract more followers and supporters in the region. The current Turkish role is a reflection of the US decline in the region and the Western need to form a regional Sunni coalition to balance against Iran. It seems that the Middle East contains more than one “Israel.”

Hosam Matar is a Lebanese researcher of International Relations.

Iranian Foreign Policy: Religion and Interests

 Hosam Matar, Al-akhbar English, Published Friday, September 28, 2012

 

A major dilemma faces all ideological powers about how to resolve the tensions between their material-based interests and value-based interests; it is the choice between realism and idealism. In this regional moment known as “The Arab Spring,” almost all regional powers are facing this challenge, including Iran - as an ideological Islamic actor. 

The “political interpretation” of religious identity views culture and religion as one of many variables defining the behavior of international actors; as opposed to the “anthropological conception” of religious identity which presupposes it to have an essentialist and determinant nature without considering the material factors. The second approach fails to give powerful explanations in the case of Iran. It is usually used to argue that Iran is a “Martyr State” or “Mad State” that is motivated by messianic ideology and controlled by extremist Ayatollahs. 

This notion of a “Martyr State” is usually used to deny the possibility to deter or contain nuclear Iran, making the best option military action against Iranian “military” nuclear facilities. This view of Iran’s “Irrational Fanaticism” is influenced by focus on Iranian discourse and rhetoric more than on its behavior, but as Ray Takeyh (senior fellow for Middle East Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations) says, “Iran is a country whose rhetoric is always worse than its conduct.” Moreover, Iran perceives its relation with the US as a “Chicken Game,” where the best strategy is “claiming insanity” and "brinkmanship," which Iran repeatedly uses. This approach lacks credibility and empirical evidences, and is mainly used for political reasons.

Iran is a country whose rhetoric is always worse than its conduct pure Islam will protect the “Republic” and the Republic’s independence will keep Islam pure.

 

So, the influence of Iran’s religious identity over foreign policy cannot be perfectly understood without understanding its interactive relation with material factors, where the relative weight of these variables is flexible and subject to evolution according to time and national and international contexts. Ayatollah Rafsanjani in an interview 2003 insisted that the relative weight of ideology [Islam] and national interest in foreign policy decision making depends on the circumstances of a particular case at a given point of time.

In spite of its ideological character, Iran considers strategic calculations about material factors, like: economy, balance of power, and security. The Iranian regime is deeply aware of the need to save its revolutionary Islamic character while balancing it with material conditions; this is because pure Islam will protect the “Republic” and the Republic’s independence will keep Islam pure. The Iranian leadership is aware that some of its declared Islamic interests cannot be saved at certain moments due to limits in material conditions; from here, the leadership realized the need to rank these interests according to their importance, in order to direct the material capabilities to save the most important when needed. In this way, culture, mainly religion, informs and in many ways determines the priorities of foreign policy.

This ranking of religious-based interests is based on the interaction of the following variables. First, how much these religious interests simultaneously reinforce Iran’s national interests? Second, how much these interests have a strong symbolism and sacred power in Muslims’ minds and hearts, and their centrality in the ideological discourse of the Islamic Republic and their relation to “Mahdism.” Third, is how much impact these religious interests have on the legitimacy of Iran’s Islamic role at the national, Shia and Islamic levels.

The outcome of this interaction of material-religious variables is, however, affected by many elements that have significant meaning for the Iranian leadership, including: survival, rationality, and political interpretation of religious texts. 

The state’s survival, according to realism, is the ultimate interest; nevertheless, survival-seeking behavior in the international system depends on the actors’ theories of what it takes to survive, and religion can affect this in diverse and significant ways, as Snyder argues. Snyder criticizes Waltz, who writes as if it can be taken for granted that the national interest of a state is its survival in its existing form, but empirically “we know that the nation-state is not an unproblematic billiard ball. The interest of the state is often in a vexed relationship with the interest of the nation as a religious-cultural unit.” 

Even though Iran is not suicidal, the cult of martyrdom in Iranian politico-religious discourse cannot be ignored, as Shiism is so sensitive to this concept. So, Iranian leadership is ready to take risks and high costs in order to save certain Islamic interests according to their importance, so the cost–benefit analysis is based on material and religious scale. At this point, it is necessary to examine Iranian leadership rationality.

It is useful to refer to G. Hossein Razi’s (Professor of Political Science at the University of Houston) work, An Alternative Paradigm to State Rationality in Foreign Policy: The Iran-Iraq War. Razi argues that the assumption of equal rationality of states promoted by rational theories ignores both domestic policies and the elite’s role in foreign policy. The individuals who make up foreign-policy elites are “neither exclusively creatures of reason, nor solely a bundle of subconscious impulses and nonintellectual drives, but a combination of both, the mix of which is not constant in time, even for the same elite, or across space.” And since foreign-policy elites vary in their beliefs, images, motivation and propensity toward rationality, a set of identical objective internal and external constraints do not automatically convert into identical decisions. So, Razi emphasizes the need to understand foreign policy also through cognitive empathy which is based on knowing a leader’s beliefs, images, and motivations. This paradigm is crucial for understanding Iranian foreign policy, where religion’s role is extremely active, having a dominant position for religious leadership and informal structures headed by pro-regime elites. 

Iran as a strategic ideological actor may sometimes choose religious interests even when they contradict deeply with its material interests.

So Iran as a strategic ideological actor may sometimes choose religious interests even when they contradict deeply with its material interests, for example:

- First, when the religious interests are directly related to both “Mahdism” and the legitimacy of the Islamic role of Iran, internally and externally according to these interests’ high sacred power and their persistence in Iranian religious discourse.

- Second, when the Supreme Leader holds a world view and religious understanding that rejects compromise and prefers revolutionary actions, especially when he has a president in power sharing the same visions.

- Third, in the moments of high internal tensions that may threaten the legitimacy of the Islamic regime, such interests may prevail in order to cover the loss of popular legitimacy with that of Islamic legitimacy.

- Fourth, when policy-makers fail to recognize or undermine the material costs of promoting religious interest according to lack of information or “irrational” calculations, as metaphysical power. Brenda Shaffer concludes that cultural interests may be promoted when the material trade-offs are unknown to the decision-makers; for that, the amount of information impacts the degree that culture can influence foreign policy. 

In conclusion, Iran’s experience in balancing religious and material interests has evolved through time, and, as Dehshiri and Majidi argue – in Iran’s Foreign Policy in Post-Revolution Era: A Holistic Approach – Iran’s foreign policy has succeeded in balancing its religious ideals and pragmatism, as well as the national and transnational interests of the Islamic “Ummah” by taking into account the constraints of the international and regional systems while preserving its identity and principles. Thus, they conclude, the Islamic Republic of Iran becomes a model to be emulated on the world stage. This balancing process can explain many ambiguities in Iranian foreign policy since 1979 up until the “Arab Spring,” including the Syrian crisis. 

Hosam Matar is a Lebanese researcher of International Relations.

Syrian Crisis: Soft Balancing Against US

By: Hosam Matar

Published  at english Al-akhbar, Monday, September 17, 2012

 

Within the ongoing Syrian crisis there is a central debate concerning the involvement of international and regional powers, mainly Russia and China. Since the beginning of the crisis, many analysts and politicians predicted that both Russia and China would abandon the Syrian regime and accept to support the “Yemen Model” as a solution for the conflict in Syria. However, it is now more than a year on and the two powers seem more committed than ever to the Syrian regime. To understand the position of the two powers a broader approach is needed, an approach that includes the changes in international dynamics and balances of power, the strategic calculations against the US role, the reflections of the Arab uprisings and regional politics.

Since the end of the Cold War, realists have faced many challenges to their theoretical arguments concerning the “balance of power.” The early 1990s did not witness serious attempts from major powers to balance the American hegemony as realists used to claim. Second-tier major powers such as China and Russia have mostly abandoned traditional "hard balancing" based on countervailing alliances and arms buildups-at the systemic level. Many theories were presented to explain this absence of “balancing” against the US, such as the incompatible US primacy, many major powers preferred to “bandwagon” the US rather than to balance it, economic interdependence between the US and these powers, and most importantly, the absence of concern about territorial security for major powers. According to Professor of International Relations at McGill University, T.V. Paul, the US was perceived as a defender of the international status quo and an opponent of forced territorial revisions.

Soft balancing can be described as actions that do not aim to challenge the American military primacy directly, but to delay, hinder, and postpone US unilateral policies by using non-military methods.

However, since the US invasion of Iraq 2003, major powers began to feel threatened by the US, which was perceived as attempting to reinforce its hegemony with total neglect of the interests of other major powers. This “neo-imperial grand strategy" as recognized by John Ikenberry in the Foreign Affairs magazine, provoked China and Russia – and even some European powers – as they thought the US victory in Iraq would encourage the Americans to practice unlimited imperialism, intensive military interventions and total unilateralism in international affairs. The Bush administration aimed to completely change international law as Noam Chomsky argues, because it considered international law as a system of principles modified continuously by international practice, which means only by American practice. A powerful state has the capacity to create what is called a new norm and the Iraq war was an attempt to create a the doctrine of “preventive war”.

Both Russia and China are losing their strategic spots in the region, they lost the Iraqi regime in 2003, and then Libyan regime in 2011 by a limited military Western intervention under the cover of the “Arab Spring.” The two powers are adopting an increasingly “soft balance” strategy against the US, this is clearly revealed in their handling of the Syrian crisis. Soft balancing can be described as actions that do not aim to challenge the American military primacy directly, but to delay, hinder, and postpone US unilateral policies by using non-military methods such as coalitions in international organizations, economic tools and diplomatic initiatives.

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Even this “balance” will not prevent the US from achieving some of its interests and goals, but it will make such achievements more expensive, will bring more damage to US legitimacy and deeper tensions with major powers and allies, and even may cause an economic power shift against the US, according to political scientist Robert Pape. US policy toward the Syrian crisis indicated that Obama is still ignoring Russian and Chinese vital interests in the Middle East.China and Russia had no choice but to strengthen their strategic spots on the Middle Eastern chess board, namely in Syria and Iran.

The American decline led the US to transfer many regional responsibilities to its regional allies, mainly the Gulf States and Turkey, in order to enhance regional balance of power against Iran through regional tools. China and Russia even cooperated with Obama by approving sanctions against Tehran in the Security Council (2010), however, they concluded that the US was pushing its regional allies to take a lead in the Syrian conflict without considering their vital interests. Both powers had no choice but to strengthen their strategic spots on the Middle Eastern chess board, namely in Syria and Iran.

 

The Chinese and Russian policy toward the Syrian crisis can be described as a “soft balancing” strategy against US, that includes their coalition within the Security Council, using vetoes, building wide agreement about the crisis within the BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization, offering logistical military support to the Syrian army, and presenting economic aids and technical support with which to face the international sanctions. The political position declared by both countries is constant, a refusal of military intervention and regime change by force and sanctions, while supporting the option of a political process that includes a national dialogue and international guarantees toward a new regime as the Syrian people want it. These are the guidelines for both countries which they will commit to whilst engaging in the regional and international efforts to find a solution to the crisis.

There is the possibility that soft balancing will evolve into hard balancing. Both Pape and Paul argue that the mechanisms of soft balancing become “harder” when American unilateralism increases, and it may change to hard balancing, especially with the US decline at the international level. How and when Russia and China may seek hard balance against the US in the Middle East depends partly on how the Syrian Crisis will end, but what is obvious is that both countries do not have the option of retreating now.

Hosam Matar is a Lebanese researcher of International Relations