We need to keep our thinking caps on as America is once again drawn into Middle Eastern chaos. We frequently either charge in with guns blazing, or else shrug the whole thing off. Neither will do.
The latest threat is the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant -- an outgrowth of al-Qaeda, of our invasion of Iraq and of the war in Syria. ISIL's aim is to establish an Islamic state throughout Iraq and the Levant (Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and including Israel--which ISIL does include in their plans), led by a supreme "caliph" -- a successor to the Islamic prophet Muhammad. ISIL members are Sunni Muslims, and are militantly opposed to non-Islamic beliefs as well as to other Islamic factions such as Shia Muslims. Sunnis and Shias disagree about who inherited Muhammad's power. A succession of four religious leaders followed his death in 632 A.D., of whom Sunnis accept only the first three while Shias accept only the fourth. Fourteen centuries later, in grim testimony to the power of fundamentalist religion to create havoc, the carnage continues.
Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Republic, Turkey, all of northern Africa, and part of Iraq, are primarily Sunni. Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, Azerbaijan, and Yemen are primarily Shia. Both Shias and Sunnis have strong representations in Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. Over 90 percent of these people are Muslims who believe in the literal truth of their primary religious documents (the Koran) -- a common definition of "fundamentalism."
America, bless her heart, tries to push democracy on these nations. But democracy is not consistent with fundamentalist religion, because fundamentalists tend to be irrationally picky about, for example, a religious prophet's successor 14 centuries ago. It's about eternity, after all, and true believers suffer from the fatal delusion of absolute certainty. Witness nearly every nation of the Middle East; indeed, witness the United States, where a near-majority still believes literally in Adam and Eve and other stories.
Syria is central to the latest pandemonium. ISIL's virulence (al-Qaeda once rejected the group as too terroristic) and strength derives from the Syrian war. The most effective way to de-fang this bunch is by ending that war. As you might recall from my previous columns, I have argued that the only way this miserable conflict can end is with Assad's defeat of the rebels. The rebellion failed long ago, both militarily as Assad occupied all the major cities, and morally as rebellion turned into jihad. Assad is a brutal dictator, but he's not as brutal as this war itself which has become a nightmare for Syrians, killed 160,000, made refugees of nine million, and destabilized Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, and Iraq. Assad's rule is less vicious than any likely government by ISIL or other jihadists. We should withdraw all non-humanitarian support for the rebels, and pressure such rebel supporters as Qatar and Saudi Arabia to do the same. This would go further toward defeating ISIL than anything our troops or air strikes can accomplish in Iraq.
Looking at the bigger picture, much of the ironically-named "Arab Spring" has turned into a bloody fiasco. The rebellions in Libya, Syria, and Egypt made things worse and have achieved neither stability nor democracy.
It's clear by now that Iraq, Syria, America and the world would have been better off had we never invaded Iraq. It's sad but probably true that Iraq and other Middle Eastern nations cannot govern democratically until they get over their religious fundamentalism. America's over-developed military muscle, and its under-developed capacity for reaching democratic decisions based on evidence, are responsible for the huge mistake of attacking Iraq. We must take far greater care in assessing the current situation.
There are plenty of questions for U.S. policy: Do we want to put more U.S. boots on Iraqi ground, as Arkansas Democrat-Gazette editorial page editor Paul Greenberg called for last Sunday? "Mission creep" is under way, with 600 U.S. troops already deployed. To what extent should we support Iraq's pro-Shia pro-Iranian government? How should we regard an impending division of Iraq into Sunni, Kurdish and Shia regions? A functioning new Kurdistan already exists in the north, with an effective army, a working government and a populace that's not entirely blinded by ideology.
Short of direct attacks on the homeland, most Americans regard foreign affairs with provincial apathy. This won't do. We must be thoughtfully involved, but appropriately skeptical of military force because it usually does more harm than good. We cannot afford to ignore this discussion.
ART HOBSON IS A PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF PHYSICS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS.
Commentary on 06/29/2014