AMMONNEWS - By kamal Alzghoul When Jordan feared the establishment of Shiite crescent that supposed to be extending from Iraq to Lebanon, Jordan was right and precautions were taken against the expected crescent.
Jordan adopted a very strong foreign policy to prevent any militia’s presence on its border .When the preliminary results of the Syrian’s revolution has become against Jordanian vision and it serves the interests of Russia and Iran, Jordan tried with the U.S to avoid the circumstances resulted from the collapse of the Syrian opposition, thus, the American foreign policy towards the Middle East began to be very clear in the region. As a strong competitor to the U.S, Russia wants to play a big role in Syria to pave the road to an economical gate to Europe and to find foothold along the Mediterranean coast.
In order to study American foreign policy in the Middle East, I would like to introduce the priorities of U.S policy:
Israel’s security: whether the Syrian opposition won the war or not, it doesn't make a sense to Israel, the most important Israeli priority in the region is to restrain Iranian nuclear plant and to disrupt Hezbollah's operations that affiliated to Iran functioning on Syrian soil, therefore, the bombardment of Hezballah’s positions by Israeli warplanes reflects Israel's concern over Iran's nuclear program, and it is important to realize that Israel has bombed weapons and ammunition sites belong to Hezbollah’s militia and it didn’t bomb one single site belongs to Syrian regime. As has been noted, Americans try to adopt a long-term political program to secure Israel as a very strong ally in the region.
Iran: When talking about the US strategy, then the Iranian nuclear file and its repercussions on Israel should be mentioned. For me personally, the Iranian nuclear file is the most active factor that shapes American strategy in Syria as well as the presence of Russian forces in the Middle East. Some analysts do not pay attentions to this file and link America's procrastination policy towards Syrian crises to Russian intervention in the region, although this linkage has its political value, but the Iranian nuclear program factor was present and strongly has calculations in the US strategic plan on the long-term, overwhelmingly, U.S supported the Syrian opposition tactically and logistically to see what will be the next step in the future.
Turkey: Turkey has been an active player in NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and has made a big contribution in shaping its forces, but America hasn’t been satisfied with the current Turkey's ruling regime.
As far as possible, Turkey accused the U.S in supporting the failed military coup, so Turkey has been surprised when America has hand in that military coup. Therefore, to avoid the establishment of Kurdish state, Turkish forces has been very active on the Syrian soil in Aleppo, in the rural of Idlib and in the Turkmen regions of the northern part of Syria, where Turkey has become a partner in Geneva and Astana negotiations.
America has changed its tactics in Syria to form a comprehensive strategy in the region to keep up with the status quo. As a result of that, U.S established the Syrian Democratic Forces in the north of Syria close to the Turkish border which escalated the diplomatic tension between the two countries. Absolutely, this has a big reflection on the preliminary results of the Syrian revolution.
Russia: Russia has not been in the Middle East since 1946 when it contributed to the establishment of the Republic of Mahabad (Kurdish ethnic state) in the northern part of Iran, and at that time, Mullah Mustafa( the father of Massoud Barzani : The current President of Kurdistan region in Iraq )- was the chief of staff in that state and Mahabad state was established upon the allegation of Russia which said that Hitler’s army was in the region, and Russia wanted to protect the region from him. Then U.S practiced pressures to let Russia leave Iran after the Second World War because many Russian companies also started petroleum exploration process in the northern counties of Iran. So for the time being, it was very surprising that America allowed a heavy Russian presence in the Middle East. According to the analytical indications on the ground, U.S adopts an attrition war to drain Russian and Iranian economic resources in order to won the war.
The features of the US strategy have become clear, with two major factors, firstly, the oil because U.S considers the Middle East as a gas station for its allies in Central Asia. Secondly , Dismantling Iranian nuclear program, so it created a fragile nuclear agreement with Iran to buy time side by side with its diplomacy during the Arab Spring, and by the way, Israel appeared to be the first supporter of this strategy, and it has been recently supported the Kurdish referendum to merge four countries into war: Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria. On the other hand, Israel supported the Kurds’ referendum in order to limit Iranian role in the region as well as having an ally very close to Iran to make its policy more bridgeable over the Iranian territories. In this sense, the energies of the Arab-Spring participants have been consumed for the interest of Israel. In addition, America hesitated to support the Kurdish referendum to achieve three priorities: suspending Iranian nuclear program, blocking Turkish policy in Syria, and get Russians out of the region.
By and large, America will accomplish its political and military objectives in the region by establishing a Kurdish star between the two crescents (safety areas), first one, extends from Iraq to Israel on the Jordanian border, and the other one, from northern Iraq to the Mediterranean close to the Turkish border, so that, it can limit Russian presence and Syrian regime role only inside Damascus and in the middle of Syrian territory. Definitely U.S intends to practice pressure over Russia to leave gradually from the Middle East and the game of political brinksmanship is expected in the future to come between U.S, and Russia .In conclusion and after studying the expected course of actions in the U.S strategy, America will continue to play by all cards in order to deplete all players in an attrition war which may extend to the depth of Iran with a long-term plan, and that is why the American support for the Kurdish independence was postponed for the purpose of building a post-ISIS strategy.
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