America’s Policy on the Islamic World and Syria

It appeared that after Osama bin Laden’s last voice cassette was heard, which was published after his death, he considered the Arabic Spring one of the rare opportunities in history and believed the efforts of the uprisings should be supported to extend the movement to the entire Islamic World.

It is significant that President Obama also mentioned the Arabic Spring in a recent speech as an opportunity in the Middle East and North Africa and he appealed the extension of rebels, at least around the Sunni Islamic World by Yusuf al- Qaradawi, who considers the uprisings a revolution train. It was already assumed that the U.S. did not want to stop the train when Washington sanctioned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad himself.

Obama said the U.S. is going to help finance Egypt and Tunisia, where the transformation started, and speed up the revolution train, but will take some precautions to prevent derailing it, as occurred in Libya. We can compare the U.S. policy, which looks very “democratic” at first, with the Truman Doctrine, which aimed to stop the extension of the Soviets after World War II, and the Marshall Plan, which was applied according to the doctrine. There were some threats of the plan, which can be seen only when we look at it from a distance during the years when we perceived the world as a dichotomy of the Soviet and the West, which we really loved and embraced. We can see positive and negative effects that might be caused to our region by a possible Obama doctrine and a Clinton plan by comparing it to the Marshall Plan.

The Marshall Plan had been practiced against an expansionist enemy and extended to of America’s allies. Today, there are no expansionist enemies in the countries where the Arabic Spring has occurred. What have been spreading are the demands for the justice of sharing resources and for political inclusion, which have been restrained by the regimes of America’s allies for years. If America turns money faucets on to support one particular side of society, they would assist them by being against someone else according to American interests. What political movement or what person will replace the Soviet thread? I have concerns that it is not going to be through peaceful, political Islamic movements such as Ihvan-i Muslimin’s activities. Unfortunately, Obama’s failure to mention reconciliation when talking about Hamas and al-Fatah has proved my concerns.

The Marshall Plan reinforced the status quo in the region under different guises for more than 50 years. America did not just give money; they also generated Gladio-type underground organizations against the thread of the expansionist Soviets. These types of structures disabled governments. These organizations have created a beast, which is an unchangeable and inflexible so-called “regime,” with constitutions that are not even asked to change. Turkey and Greece were reshaped according to the Marshall Plan, and a will, which was expected to clear up the bad influence of the plan, has not been able to be applied without E.U. intervention. The Arabic Spring is about to turn into an autumn. Are the effects of the American intervention going to refresh the spring process or will they generate permanent underground structures? We’re all going to find out.

What we observe for now in America’s plan is the “a bull in a china shop” strategy, instead of building a constructive relationship with Turkey. America is still watching the world from the window of the political power of the Cold War. Years before, one of the soldiers I met in Israel quoted a saying that is very popular among Israeli soldiers: “What money can not do, force does. What force can not do, more force does.” This conclusion reduced in two sentences is an expression of power policy. The U.S. is going to send some money. It indicates what will be next if they can not achieve their goal with that. Punishing the regime in Syria, despite reforms that have been insufficient and reluctant, besides punishing Assad himself, who is the actual reformist of the regime, indicates our presumption.

I wish that Obama had surprised us. I wish that Obama had not spent most of his speech talking about how the U.S. guarantees Israel’s security. I wish that he had not implied the condition of existing means being on America’s side, rather than being democratic, without even pronouncing the names of some dictatorship regimes.