Myths
Of Mideast Arms Sales
By William D. Hartung
12 August, 2007
Countercurrents.org
The
Bush administration’s proposal to send $20 billion worth of arms
and $43 billion in military aid to U.S. allies in the Middle East has
been promoted by repeating a series of time-worn myths that should have
long since been abandoned. With a shooting war in Iraq and a war of
words with Iran well under way, the last thing the region needs is a
new influx of high tech weaponry.
The suggestions of Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates that
this flood of armaments will be “stabilizing” in the short
term while underscoring the U.S. commitment to “moderates”
in the region over the longer term is a prime example of this historical
amnesia.
Take Saudi Arabia, which
continues to pursue policies that are moderate in name only. Not only
is Riyadh one of the most undemocratic regimes in the world, but it
has more often than not used its financial resources to promote extremism
and repression elsewhere. From financing fundamentalist madrassahs in
Pakistan to supporting Sunni insurgents in Iraq, the regime has a long
track record of opposing the values of democracy and moderation that
the Bush administration claims are the overarching principles of its
foreign policy. It’s hard to see how selling Saudi Arabia more
military equipment will change this pattern, any more than arming the
Shah of Iran in the 1970s and the Afghan rebels in the 1980s promoted
stability in those countries.
Some elements of the proposed
package are particularly disturbing. Satellite guided bombs are not
“defensive weapons”,” as the administration claims.
Using them would be ill-advised, if not disastrous.
This raises the question
of who exactly would Riyadh use these weapons against. Iran? Iraq? Israel?
Internal opponents?
Iran has no intention of
invading Saudi Arabia; if it wants to undermine Saudi security it is
far more likely to work via proxy, a tactic that the Saudis are well-equipped
to counter in kind.
An attack on Iraq in the
context of a civil war would only exacerbate tensions and help savage
any remnants of stability that remain there.
Attacking Israel would be
a suicide mission, given Tel Aviv’s substantial military superiority.
The only plausible scenarios - and the ones most feared by Israeli officials
- would be if a rogue pilot attempted to strike without authorization
or an even more extremist regime were to overthrow the current Saudi
government.
Last but not least, using satellite guided bombs against armed extremists
within Saudi Arabia would be the wrong tool for the job, like trying
to kill a swarm of mosquitoes with a sledge hammer. Good intelligence
would be a far more effective tool. What if the Bush administration
tried to foster greater intelligence cooperation instead of casting
its two top cabinet officials in the role of second-rate arms brokers?
In the short-term, these
scenarios may not be high probability events, but as the U.S. experiences
with arming the Shah of Iran and the Afghan rebels demonstrate, weapons
supplied now can be used against U.S . interests down the road as political
conditions change.
If a symbol of U.S. commitment
to Saudi Arabia is needed, there are plenty of other tools at Washington’s
disposal, in the realms of diplomacy, economic cooperation, and coordinated
law enforcement efforts, among others. Not to mention the fact that
the funds the Saudis expend for this proposed deal would be far more
productive - and stabilizing - if they were invested in economic and
social programs within the kingdom.
For all of these reasons,
the U.S. Congress must take preemptive action to try to derail or reshape
the Middle East arms package. Since Congress was granted the right to
stop major arms deals via a joint resolution of disapproval under the
Arms Export Control Act of 1976, it has never successfully done so via
a formal vote. But there have been instances where the threat of Congressional
action has led to the restructuring or delaying of specific deals.
A successful effort to block
or reshape the Mideast arms package must begin with detailed hearings
as soon as Congress starts its fall term. Waiting for a formal notification
from the executive branch, as skeptics like Senate Foreign Relations
Committee chair Joseph Biden and House Foreign Affairs Committee chair
Tom Lantos have pledged to do, will be too little too late. Given the
inherent problems with this arms package, it is unlikely to withstand
public scrutiny. It is up to Congress to take the lead in promoting
a real debate on this critical issue.
William D. Hartung
is the director of the Arms and Security Project at the
New America Foundation.
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