Tag: turkey

Lessons from Israel’s attack on Qatar

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorizedLeave a Comment on Lessons from Israel’s attack on Qatar

Israel’s attack on Qatar was as outrageous as it was educational. Aside from showing, yet again, that Israel is a threat to the entire Muslim world, it revealed that America’s military presence in the region is not meant to protect its Arab allies, but to subjugate and control them. Most concerning of all, it underscored the enduring weakness of Muslim nations and their inability to adequately respond to Israel’s crimes. The implications of these revelations, once their import fully reverberates through the region, could be profound.

Lesson 1: Israel represents an existential threat to the entire Muslim world:

The strike on Doha was only the latest in a series of brazen Israeli attacks over the past two years. In addition to leveling Gaza and paving the way to annex the West Bank, Israeli forces have invaded and occupied parts of Syria and Lebanon while repeatedly attacking both hundreds of times. They have also launched several devastating attacks on Yemen and Iran. The recent attack on a flotilla of unarmed vessels near Tunisia and the attack against Qatar, brings the total number of countries it has struck to seven. 

Israeli leaders are reported to have contemplated similar strikes against Egypt and Turkey. These reports, when combined with the long list of countries it has already attacked, suggest Israel has intelligence cells collecting targeting data throughout the Muslim world and that no part of it is safe.

In addition to its military operations, Israel has been selling weapons to fuel conflicts across the region and beyond. It is arming the Druze and Kurds in Syria as part of its plan to partition the country. It is also supplying advanced weapons to Cyprus to counter Turkey and arming India in its confrontation with Pakistan. Many of the drones used to attack Pakistan during India’s ill-conceived Operation Sindoor this past May were purchased from Israel. The missile defense system sold to Cyprus is also designed to collect sensitive information about Turkey’s military and appears to be part of a broader effort to support Greek and Cypriot designs on northern Cyprus. 

These military strikes and weapons sales are all part of a long term plan to ensure no Muslim state has the capacity or desire to oppose Israel’s plans to ethnically cleanse and annex Gaza and the West Bank. The attack on Doha was intended to show that any Muslim state foolish enough to interfere with these goals, even through solely diplomatic channels, will be targeted. 

If Israel’s leaders are successful, the consequences for the Muslim world will be catastrophic. Aside from destroying what little remains of Palestine, the ethnic cleansing of Gaza and the West Bank will also flood Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon with millions of refugees, destabilizing all three nations in the process. This could very easily spell the end of both the Hashemite and Sisi dynasties while reigniting a civil war in Lebanon. 

Similarly, Israel’s plans to dismember Syria will destabilize much of the Levant, Anatolia, and Mesopotamia, while cruelly prolonging the suffering of the Syrian people who have already had to endure decades of dictatorship and civil war. Finally, its desire to topple Iran’s government will unleash anarchy in Pakistan, Turkey, Central Asia, the Caucasus, Iraq, and the Gulf.

In their quest to create a Jewish homeland where Palestinians truly do not exist, Israel’s messianic rulers are willing to plunge much of the region into chaos. Their plans amount to a declaration of war against nearly the entire Muslim world while their nuclear weapons and fanatical worldviews make this declaration an existential threat to all its nations. 

Lesson 2: America’s military posture in the region is not meant to protect its Arab allies but to assert control over them:

The attack on Qatar was particularly shocking because it is a key American ally and host to an important US military base. Over the years, the Qatari government has spent $26 billion on American weaponry, part of which was used to build an air defense system that is operated and controlled by America. This system was meant to protect it from the sort of attack Israel launched against it by integrating Qatar with America’s regional defense network. But instead of protecting its supposed ally, America stood by and allowed the attack to proceed. 

No American officials even bothered to warn Qatar’s leaders until the attack was already under way. The WSJ did its best to create a narrative that absolved America of its culpability. However, due to Washington’s control over the region’s air space, these claims strain credulity. The only logical conclusion, given its robust early warning capabilities, is that America approved of and facilitated Israel’s attack.

In the aftermath, the Trump administration sent Secretary of State Rubio to Israel to show solidarity with indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu by praying with him at the Western Wall. Meanwhile, Ambassador Mike Huckabee explained Israel is America’s only “true partner” in the region and can do as it pleases. These responses are just as revealing as the attack itself. 

They show America’s military “alliance” with Qatar is a mechanism meant to establish a form of neo-imperial military control over it, not protect it. America does not provide Qatar with security, but uses it to further its geopolitical interests. These include establishing military control over the Arab states, in part, to ensure Israel remains the region’s dominant military power and has the freedom to attack any of them. 

Israel’s attack exposed the absurd contradictions that govern the region’s American imposed security architecture. Israel can attack and endanger America’s Arab allies because it is a “true partner” in the crusade to subjugate the Muslim world. The leaders of those Arab states that have capitulated, on the other hand, are merely vassals from a vanquished enemy tribe. Their continued hold on power is contingent on submission, even in the face of direct attacks on their territory. 

Lesson 3: The Muslim world is too weak and divided to challenge Israel or its American backers: 

The Muslim world’s response, or lack thereof, showed exactly why Israel has been able to act with impunity for so long. Its leaders gathered in Doha to express their shock and indignation. Nearly all of them were justifiably concerned that by openly demonstrating their impotence to their own people, these developments threatened their grip on power. They had every right to be upset. Aside from those who rule Yemen and Iran, they had already done everything in their power to either facilitate or ignore Israel’s crimes. Nevertheless, their anger did not lead to action. 

There was a great deal of talk about creating a collective security organization similar to NATO. Egypt, sensing the threat to its Sinai region, proposed an Arab defense force. However, this effort failed to gather support due to a leadership dispute with Saudi Arabia. Qatar and the UAE also opposed the idea, preferring to rely on assurances from the Trump administration that it would restrain Israel. They also objected to any proposals involving coordinated action with Turkey or Iran. As a result, the summit did more to highlight the Muslim world’s divisions than bring it together. It produced nothing more than scathing press releases and empty statements about international law and the need for unity.

This inaction was an admission of weakness and a recognition of their total dependence on America to equip and operate their militaries. Every single member of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) features arsenals full of the latest American military hardware. Keeping this equipment operational requires a constant flow of spare parts and American technical expertise. As detailed by the Washington Post in the fall of 2022, the Saudi and Emirati militaries rely on hundreds of retired American military personnel to perform critical logistical and operational roles. Without this extensive support, their militaries would be crippled within days.

This dependence stems from a widespread lack of indigenous technical and industrial capabilities. Even countries with powerful militaries like Pakistan, Turkey, and Iran, still rely on external suppliers for their most advanced weapons. Thus, collective military action was never a serious option.

There were, however, a range of diplomatic and economic tools available to pressure Israel or its supporters in America, the UK, Germany, and India. They could have withdrawn their ambassadors, suspended trade, cut off intelligence sharing, halted arms purchases, or denied access to their airspace. Any one of these steps, if coordinated among a majority of the world’s 57 Islamic nations, could have imposed a meaningful cost and prompted Israel’s allies to reconsider their uncritical support. But none of these measures were taken.

While the lack of military action reflects their industrial and technical weaknesses, the refusal to take any diplomatic or economic steps reveals a lack of political will. This refusal to act, even in the face of mortal danger, is yet another symptom of the Muslim world’s authoritarian political systems. These are primarily designed to keep their rulers in power by repressing their own citizens, not protect their nations from outside threats. Unfortunately, their inaction was not the least bit surprising. It was merely a continuation of the same dynamics that allowed America to establish its dominance over the region in the first place.

During its war on “terror,” the US conquered Afghanistan and then Iraq with lightening speed, simultaneously occupied both for several years and waged a clandestine war throughout various Muslim nations like Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. America’s assault was characterized by a total lack of regard for borders, human rights, or the sanctity of life. According to Brown University, the chaos unleashed by its violence killed 4.5 million people. Despite these outrages, no Muslim states took any overt steps to stop these crimes either. 

Israel’s current offensive is, in many ways, a continuation of America’s previous assault. It shows that without serious changes, the pattern of violence will never end. The enhanced military pact announced by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan shortly after the summit hints at emerging strategic shifts, but the lack of immediate action ensures Israel’s crimes will go unchallenged for the foreseeable future. 

America’s assault helped trigger the Arab Spring and the collapse of regimes in Tunisia, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Egypt. It is too early to accurately forecast how Israel’s violence will reverberate. What is certain is that it is only a matter of time before the next massacre or sensational attack and that the cumulative toll of this violence will have lasting and unforeseen consequences. It is very likely that by refusing to take any action against Israel, many of the region’s leaders are unwittingly planting the seeds of their own demise. The leaders of the GCC survived the shocks of the Arab Spring. It is too early to tell if they can survive the far more violent storms that will inevitably follow Israel’s rampage. 

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America is Pakistan’s enemy, not its friend

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorizedLeave a Comment on America is Pakistan’s enemy, not its friend

On the surface, the world’s geopolitical sands always appear to be shifting, leading states to constantly realign their policies and alliances. However, due to the unchanging nature of geography and the slow, cumulative effects of cultural, idealogical, technological, and economic developments on political systems, states have core interests that rarely change. As a result, many geopolitical “shifts” are often more illusion than reality.

Pakistan’s fluctuating relationship with the United States exemplifies these dynamics perfectly. During the Cold War, the US was one of Pakistan’s closest allies and leading arms suppliers. Cracks in the relationship began to emerge during the late 1970s following General Zia-ul-Haq’s rise to power. These tensions did not result in a complete break, as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 forced a reconciliation that deepened bilateral ties for the next decade. The withdrawal of the Soviet Union and Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program soon led to another rupture that persisted until Pakistan became relevant again during America’s post 9/11 assault on the Muslim world. 

This rapprochement was characterized by glaring contradictions from the start due to the conflicting core interests guiding America’s and Pakistan’s policies. America’s plan for Afghanistan involved empowering Pakistan’s enemies from the Northern Alliance while marginalizing its traditional allies among the Pashtun tribes and allowing India to establish a presence on its western border. Faced with these developments, Pakistan had little choice but to clandestinely support the Taliban despite realigning itself with America. 

U.S.-Pakistan relations cooled again after the American withdrawal from Afghanistan. They remained tepid until recently when Pakistan’s leaders reminded America of their ability to hunt down its enemies while simultaneously enticing it with access to potentially valuable oil reserves and mineral deposits. This led to a flurry of high level meetings, including a visit by Pakistan’s Field Marshal Munir to the White House and talk of a “strategic reset.”

Much like their past realignments, this latest rapprochement is mostly illusory. The enduring mismatch between American and Pakistani core interests makes a true convergence unlikely. 

To understand why, one need only look to America’s relationship with India. Recent tensions aside, the United States is committed to building a strategic partnership with India, with the goal of transforming it into a major regional military power. This effort began in earnest with the 2008 U.S.-India Nuclear Agreement. Since then, the U.S. has sold India over  $20 billion in weapons and is currently investing billions more into its military-industrial base. 

India’s military actions against Pakistan in 2016, 2019, and May of this year are a direct result of these weapons sales, which have empowered India’s fanatical rulers to pursue their dreams of establishing Indian hegemony over the entire Subcontinent. Despite the growing extremism within its ruling elite, America remains committed to arming New Delhi and has no regard for the danger this poses to Pakistan. 

U.S. support for India is part of a broader strategic agenda aimed at ensuring American military dominance across key regions. This includes maintaining a form of neo-imperial military control over substantial portions of the Middle East and supporting apartheid Israel in its quest to destabilize and weaken Iran’s government. 

America’s policies against Iran have been particularly harmful to Pakistan. Its sanctions have prevented the completion of critical infrastructure projects and hindered the development of broader trade relations between the two neighbors, limiting Pakistan’s ability to enhance its energy security and regional connectivity. Attempts to topple Iran’s government also endanger Pakistan’s future by creating the potential for violence to spill over the border and further destabilize its restive western provinces.

America’s malign activities throughout the Muslim world have had a similarly negative impact. Violence in Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, or Libya may not impact Pakistan directly. But these countries represent Pakistan’s natural allies and trading partners. By destabilizing them, America is effectively depriving Pakistan of the regional partners it needs to develop its own economic networks and power, impoverishing and weakening it over the long run.  

America’s pattern of military interventions and coercive policies in the Muslim world is driven by an underlying strategy: to prevent the emergence of a Muslim state capable of challenging its regional dominance. This strategic calculus helps explain Washington’s persistent unease towards Pakistan. Despite their history of cooperation, the United States imposed sanctions targeting Pakistan’s nuclear and missile programs – clear signs of mistrust that reflect broader concerns about Pakistan’s strategic potential. With its large population, strategic geographic position, and powerful military, Pakistan is well-positioned to emerge as a leading power in the Muslim world – making it a long-term threat rather than a reliable partner in the eyes of American policy makers.

Pakistan’s leadership should carefully assess the historical record of U.S. foreign policy toward states it perceives as threats. Between its weapons sales, sanctions and direct military actions, America has killed millions. Its sanctions against Iraq killed an estimated 1.5 million people, including 576,000 children. The so called “war on terror” killed 4.5 million more and its wide ranging military support for Saudi Arabia’s war against Yemen killed another 377,000. Added together that’s almost 6.4 million people. America’s support for Israel’s ethnic cleansing campaign, which has already led to the slaughter of 60,000 Palestinians including 18,500 children, shows it learned nothing from these crimes and is perfectly capable of committing similar atrocities in the future.

Pakistan’s leaders have responded to the danger with appeasement. Successive governments have acquiesced to American demands by curtailing large scale trade with Iran, avoiding public criticism of U.S. regional policies, and failing to impose even symbolic diplomatic costs for Washington’s violent policies. 

Things recently took a sycophantic turn when Pakistan’s leaders nominated Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace price and gave the US general in charge of helping apartheid Israel massacre tens of thousands of innocent women and children an award. Their plan to grant American companies access to Pakistan’s natural resources is equally servile. By pursuing what amounts to a neo-colonial arrangement, the country’s leadership risks surrendering the lion’s share of wealth from potentially transformative mineral and energy deposits to American corporations – undermining national sovereignty and forfeiting long-term economic benefits in the process. 

The desire to appease America is somewhat understandable given its powerful military and violent tendencies. But appeasement that prevents Pakistan from building the strength needed to protect itself is not a sustainable or strategic path forward. 

America’s irrational justifications for its violence against Iraq and Iran offer sobering lessons. The United States sold Saddam Hussein the chemical weapons his forces used during the Iran-Iraq War, only to later use those same weapons as an excuse for a full-scale invasion—despite evidence Iraq had already dismantled them. Similarly, it backed Israel’s actions against Iran under the pretext of halting a nuclear program that Iran had already shown a willingness to dismantle through negotiations, as it did in the 2015 JCPOA deal. These examples make it clear that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal could easily be used to justify violence against it one day. They also show neither appeasement nor even unilateral disarmament are reliable safeguards against U.S. hostility. 

The geopolitical landscape today is far less forgiving than it was during the Afghan conflict, when Pakistan was able to play a double game—supporting the U.S.-led invasion while simultaneously backing elements of the Taliban. The current circumstances do not lend themselves to such subterfuge. As such, Pakistan must chart a new path rooted in attaining strategic autonomy, rather than one shaped by the shifting goals of an external superpower. 

The foundation of such a policy must be the development of a robust regional alliance with Iran and Turkey centered on economic integration and security cooperation. By fostering such a partnership, Pakistan can assume a constructive role in revitalizing a significant portion of the Muslim world while simultaneously strengthening itself. Achieving this vision will require comprehensive political, legal, and fiscal reforms aimed at building the sort of technologically advanced, export-driven economy needed to support such an alliance. 

Until Pakistan’s leadership embraces these difficult but necessary steps, the country will remain vulnerable. While a few voices, such as Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Asad Durrani, have warned of the danger, most of the country’s elite appear committed to a strategy of accommodation. Their complacency ignores the simple fact that a “strategic reset” with the United States, absent any alignment of core interests that extends beyond resource extraction and counterterrorism cooperation, is illusory. Washington’s arms sales to India and its long-standing policy of trying to subjugate the Muslim world mean America is Pakistan’s enemy, not its friend. It is time Pakistan’s decision-makers recognize this reality and act accordingly.

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Israel’s attack on Iran highlights the desperate need for change 

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized1 Comment on Israel’s attack on Iran highlights the desperate need for change 

It is hard not to get a feeling of deja vu when one writes about the Muslim world. Nearly every geopolitical event of note involves a spectacular military defeat or failed state collapsing in on itself. Israel’s attack on Iran earlier this summer is no different. It is yet another episode that vividly illustrates the military dominance Western powers have had over Muslim states for centuries. 

On June 12th, Israel launched an unprovoked surprise attack against Iran. It has attacked Iran many times over the years but the scale and magnitude of this latest round of violence was far greater than any of those previous assaults or acts of sabotage. Over a period of twelve days, its forces launched hundreds of strikes on military, nuclear, energy, educational, residential and media sites across the country, causing widespread damage and mayhem. America joined in at the last minute too, using its stealth bombers to destroy three nuclear facilities. At least 639  Iranians were murdered, among them women, children, and several high ranking Iranian military officers and scientists. Many of these officials were killed alongside their families while sleeping in the dead of night. Israeli leaders and their partners in America argued their violence was necessary to eliminate the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear weapons program. As usual, they made no sense. 

For starters, Iran was not trying to build nuclear weapons. It has been on the threshold of weaponizing its uranium stockpile for years but has intentionally refrained from doing so in the hopes of negotiating a settlement with the US and its Western allies. In fact, it was preparing for a sixth round of negotiations to do exactly that when it was attacked. Perhaps most galling of all, America unilaterally withdrew from the JCPOA treaty Iran signed to give up its nuclear pursuits in 2015 and American intelligence officials recently issued a report indicating Iran was not trying to build nuclear weapons. Attacking Iran under the pretense of preventing it from building weapons it was not trying to build is a ridiculous and illogical argument. 

Even if Iran managed to build nuclear weapons, which it has every right to do, it would never use one against Israel because Israel has its own stockpile of nuclear bombs. Under the logic of mutually assured destruction or MAD, that makes using nuclear weapons against it an act of suicide and an impossibility. 

These attacks had nothing to do with ensuring Israel’s survival or protecting it from Iran. They were the culmination of Israel’s campaign to make sure no one within the Muslim world challenges its apartheid regime or tries to stop its ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. The only aim was to punctuate Israel’s rampages through Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, and Syria by critically weakening the only Muslim state willing to openly help the Palestinian and Lebanese people defend themselves. In doing so, Israel hoped to establish its hegemony over the entire Middle East while deliberately trying to destabilize large chunks of it at the same time. “Regime change” is, after all, merely an Orwellian term that in the post-Iraq context calls for fomenting civil war and chaos by destroying Iran’s government and leaving nothing to replace it. 

Much like their allies in the Pentagon, Israel’s military leaders simultaneously proved their tactical brilliance and strategic incompetence. They have all but guaranteed Iran will acquire nuclear weapons while unleashing a chain of events that could very easily come back to haunt them in the same way their invasion of Lebanon gave rise to Hezbollah and their attempts to fracture the Palestinians gave rise to Hamas. War always shifts societies to the right, creating space for extremists  and hardliners to thrive. Israel’s unjust war against Iran will be no different. The only difference, given Iran’s much larger size and resources, will be the amount of blowback. 

Israel’s leaders also showed, once again, that they are messianic radicals who represent an existential threat to the entire Muslim world. Though the Western media has done its best to ignore or downplay them, the evidence of apartheid Israel’s brutality and crimes is overwhelming. During its never ending assault on Gaza, Israel’s military has intentionally murdered tens of thousands of women and children by indiscriminately attacking densely populated civilian areas. Its forces frequently use thousand pound bombs to attack apartment buildings and residential neighborhoods. Its snipers and drones routinely murder children trying to flee to safety or search for food. There are also credible reports regarding the systemic use of Palestinians as human shields by Israeli forces. Most damning of all, the Israeli government has implemented a blockade that has led to widespread shortages of food, medicine, and the basic necessities of life.

Eliminating a few Iranian generals cannot mask these crimes. If anything, the latest assault against Iran is more proof Israel is a violent apartheid state with no interest in peace. Even if Israel managed to destroy the entire Axis of Resistance and topple the Iranian government, which were highly doubtful propositions, the conditions for war between it and the wider Muslim world would remain. Israel would still be a violent apartheid state ruled by baby killing sociopaths engaged in the violent repression of the Palestinians who believe sowing chaos and destruction throughout the Muslim world makes them safer. It is only a matter of time before their crimes lead to more violence. 

As such, we must critically examine why Iran fared so poorly against Israel’s assaults and what the entire Muslim world can learn from yet another stinging defeat of a Muslim state at the hands of the Western powers. 

To be fair, it is far too early to accurately gauge the true impact of these events and Iran’s ability to regroup. Adding to the difficulty is the fog of war and how information, even in the supposedly “free world” is so tightly controlled by governments. This makes accurately assessing the damage much harder. For example, Iranian missiles appear to have struck Israel’s military headquarters, however, aside from a brief report by Fox News, Western media outlets ignored this extremely important story. Nevertheless, most reports suggest Iran suffered significant damage while inflicting a minimal amount in return. The loss of so many high ranking military officers, by itself, represents a critical blow that justifies labeling it the loser. At a minimum, these developments show Iran’s strategy of establishing deterrence failed miserably. 

According to an essay published in Foreign Affairs, Iran “lost” because “its “hardliners overplayed their hand” when “they unleashed their proxies at Israeli targets” in the aftermath of its attack on Gaza. There is a lot wrong with this piece that we do not have time to explore in detail. It epitomizes the sort of biased and superficial analysis Western media outlets have always used to whitewash and normalize apartheid Israel’s crimes and mostly functions to remind us that propaganda comes in all shapes and sizes. 

Rather than discuss how Israel’s intentional targeting of civilians compelled both Hezbollah and the Houthis to get involved or how its apartheid policies and refusal to negotiate a lasting peace with the Palestinians made war inevitable, it predictably and quite erroneously paints Iran as the aggressor. However, it does adequately explain that Iran’s inability to effectively attack Israel or defend itself emboldened Israel’s leaders to escalate their violence. Iran lost, in other words, because of its weak military capabilities, particularly those related to its air forces, air defenses, and counter intelligence abilities. 

A comprehensive discussion of the historical, political, economic, social, and geographic factors that have conspired to prevent Iran from building a modern military force capable of defending its territory would take a book. As such, we will limit ourselves to the most relevant points.

As a preliminary matter, there is a plausible argument to be made that Iran lost because it hesitated and/or never fully committed to the fight. It became obvious within the first few weeks of Israel’s assault on Gaza that this war was going to be genocidally different than its previous rampages through the territory and would inevitably spread beyond Gaza. Rather than waiting and hoping for Israel’s leaders to satiate their bloodlust, they should have realized the danger they were in and launched a preemptive attack coordinated with regional allies while they were still at full strength. That may have been their only chance at overwhelming and neutralizing Israel’s air defenses during the early stages of the conflict. Which, in turn, might have been the only way to deter it from further violence. Instead, Iran’s leaders showed restraint and advised their allies to do the same. This merely allowed Israel to pick them off one by one, at a time of its choosing. This is certainly a plausible argument but not a very good one considering Israel’s arsenal of nuclear weapons and the trigger happy extremists who control it. 

Iran’s leaders were forced to show restraint, as they have had to many times before, because they knew they did not have weapons powerful enough to deter Israel should they fully expose its vulnerabilities. As such, their biggest mistake was not building a credible nuclear deterrent. North Korea shows Western nations will ostracize and sanction those nations that defy their attempts to monopolize the most destructive military technologies but they will not attack them. 

The need for such weapons should have been clear after America’s invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and the toppling of Libya’s government. Despite these warning signs, Iran’s leaders did not act with urgency to ensure they were properly armed. Instead, they sanguinely ignored the lessons gleaned from America’s violence against the Muslim world these past 35 years or the past 500 years of world history which shows Western nations only understand the language of violence. In the modern age, speaking this language requires nuclear weapons supported by technologically advanced conventional forces.

Iran’s reluctance to build nuclear weapons was somewhat understandable given the diplomatic and economic repercussions but its military planners inexplicably neglected their conventional forces too. They opted for a defensive posture centered around a robust air defense network full of the sort of targets Israel’s air force specializes in destroying. But they failed to build or acquire the advanced fighters needed to protect them. Instead, they built an arsenal of ballistic missiles and drones, many of which were distributed to its network of regional allies. Iran’s leaders hoped their asymmetric capabilities would dissuade Israel and America from attacking them. Clearly, their hope was misplaced.

Yet another critical factor handicapping Iran’s war fighting capabilities relates to its inability to build strong alliances with other states. Militias, even ones as powerful as Hezbollah, cannot generate the resources and power of a state. As the constant flow of munitions and money from its American and European allies show, Israel is part of a powerful alliance of Western states that work together by supplying each other with military hardware, ammunition, and intelligence. 

Aside from Libya, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon and Sudan every single Arab state is ruled by dictators who rely on Western arms to sustain their regimes. As a result, most of the Arab world is ruled by men who are too weak to stand up to Israel or its American backers. Several even quietly helped Israel. Jordan actually shot down Iranian missiles and drones under the pretense of protecting its air space while allowing Israeli missiles, drones, and jets unfettered access to this same air space.

Before Assad’s fall, Syria was the only Arab state allied to Iran but after years of civil war, it did not even meet the definition of a state since it did not control all its territory. It served as a necessary logistical hub but was more of a liability than an asset in projecting force since Syria’s military under Assad was incompetent and he was a duplicitous and unreliable ally. The means used to prop up his government backfired in the same way brutality and repression always backfire, eventually leaving both Iran and Hezbollah more isolated. 

Iran has managed to develop strong alliances with Russia and China but they are not the sort of alliances that would induce either country to overtly intervene on its behalf. As a result of its lack of close allies, Iran was forced to weather the storm alone, much like Iraq before it. 

In sum, the proximate causes of Iran’s defeat relate to its inability to build or acquire the advanced weapons needed to protect itself or build strong alliances with powerful states willing to help it. Now that a ceasefire has been put in place, Iran must start to rebuild by taking the short and long term steps needed to make sure its enemies never attack it again.

Its leaders must begin by enacting deep rooted reforms to liberalize and democratize their political and legal systems. Not as some PR gimmick to appease Western audiences but with the understanding that their survival depends on it. Iran has been ruled by its clerics, otherwise known as Ayatollahs, since they overthrew the Shah and subordinated their military elite in 1979. Religion and politics is one of the most toxic combinations known to man. The two should never mix. When they come into contact, they corrupt each other in ways that are exceptionally difficult to reverse. Clerics belong in a mosque or seminary, not a command center. 

The structure of Iran’s government makes it inherently weak in a variety of ways that primarily boil down to three things. The oppression of women. The lack of democracy. The lack of freedom of expression. These are the real reasons Iran lost just as they are the reason so many parts of the Muslim world are unstable and prone to conquest. When these toxic ingredients mix, it becomes much harder to build industrialized economies of the sort needed to field competent militaries or form enduring partnerships based on trade and mutual interests with other states.

China and Russia both prove authoritarian states are capable of building modern militaries, particularly if the state invests heavily in education and industrialization. But an often overlooked aspect of their modernization efforts was the degree to which women were liberated and empowered. Iran may be able to contrive an authoritarian political system that still allows for military modernization but it will never do so without first freeing Iranian women.

There have been countless studies that prove what common sense already tells us – there is a strong correlation between gender inequality and underdevelopment. Iran’s leaders have improved educational access for many Iranian women; however, they have also spent decades repressing and marginalizing them in a variety of ways that have limited their ability to contribute to Iran’s socio-economic development and, by inference, its ability to protect itself.

As the author argued several years ago, the repression meted out to Iran’s people, especially its women, and the denial of their democratic and human rights by their own government have forced Iran to fight its enemies with “one armed tied behind its back.” The destruction visited upon it this past June demonstrates the folly of this approach and the urgent need for reforms.

Once it has taken the long overdue steps to strengthen itself internally, Iran will need to build stronger alliances with other states. Lacking suitable partners in the Arab world, it must expand and strengthen its existing alliances with China and Russia by enhancing military cooperation to rebuild and plug the gaps in its defenses. 

Iran must also work with Turkey and Pakistan to build the sort of strategic partnership that can give it the power to protect itself over the long run. The need for a Muslim security organization similar to NATO between these three nations has been clear for many years. Combined, they represent the spine of the Muslim world and, if properly connected, would possess the power to stabilize much of it. To integrate properly, they must first bind themselves via joint infrastructure and free trade agreements designed to spur the sort of economic cooperation that can form the foundation for a long lasting alliance comparable to the EU. This foundation could then form the basis for a military alliance.

The idea that Turkey and Pakistan could create an alliance with Iran may seem implausible and there are certainly significant barriers standing in the way. But the inescapable truth is that all three desperately need each other. Joining together is the only way to protect themselves from the unhinged war mongers who rule Israel and America and their policy of weakening and destabilizing any Muslim state they view as a threat. Egypt was the first domino to fall. Then came Iraq, then Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Sudan. Iran appears to have narrowly escaped a similar fate, but only for now. 

Given the sheer number of Muslim nations Israel and America have attacked, destabilized, or subjugated over the years, the pattern and the malign intentions guiding it are painfully obvious to see. Neither will ever stop attacking the Muslim world until Muslim nations develop the strength to stop them. 

Learning to protect each other will play an important part in building this strength. It is not just a matter of pan-Islamic sentiments but self-interest and preservation. Due to the many ways Israel’s and America’s destructive activities can hurt them, it is in the interest of both Pakistan and Turkey to actively oppose them.

Turkey’s recent involvement in Syria has set it on a collision course with Israel. It is therefore only a matter of time before Israel turns on Turkey too. The current trajectory of Turkey’s relationship with the West as evidenced by the degree to which it is constantly demonized in Western publications and the sanctions that limit weapons and technology transfers suggest its Western allies will do little to help it when that day comes. Many of Turkey’s people have recently begun thinking along similar lines. The Turkish government even vowed to build a fully independent defense industry to ensure it has the means to protect itself. Building an alliance with Iran and Pakistan represents one of the most important steps towards ensuring it can do so effectively.

Israel and America have also been selling advanced weapons to India for years. Many of them, such as the Israeli made Heron drone, were used against Pakistan during India’s Operation Sindoor. Whether its leaders want to admit it or not, by virtue of their arms sales to India’s fanatical rulers, America and Israel are Pakistan’s enemies. 

Rather than confront the reality of its prolific weapons sales to India and what this says about its long term designs for the Subcontinent, Pakistan’s rulers are hoping for a “strategic reset” with America. Unless this reset involves halting arms shipments to India and ending its attempts to destabilize Iran, it will not satisfy Pakistan’s long term security needs in the way that forming a military alliance with Iran and Turkey would.

The centrifugal forces Israel hopes to unleash in Iran have the potential to flood both countries with refugees while inflaming or reigniting separatists movements in each. As Tucker Carlson pointed out so brilliantly, Iran has a population of roughly 92 million people. That’s more than three times Iraq’s population and almost five times Afghanistan’s when they were invaded. The potential chaos that will ensue if Israel ever manages to destroy Iran’s government will make the anarchy that followed these invasions look like a walk in the park. Which is saying something considering America’s invasion of Afghanistan set off a civil war in Pakistan that killed 80,000 people and has yet to fully resolve itself.

If Pakistan and Turkey are to have any chance at peaceful and prosperous futures, they will need to make sure Iran’s government remains capable of holding the country together. By protecting Iran, they are protecting themselves.

Despite the glaring need and obvious benefits, these countries have not come together because, to varying degrees, Pakistan and Turkey feature the same sort of inherently weak authoritarian political and social systems that govern Iran. Their political economies are dominated by military elites and patronage networks that are incapable of building strong partnerships with each other. EU style integration requires politically influential business and industrial elites and well-run courts and administrative agencies, not generals with vast business interests. 

Of the three, Turkey has the most inclusive and open political and social systems. It is the only democracy in the Middle East but still retains serious authoritarian features that de-incentivize investment and technological innovation. Despite its authoritarian characteristics, Turkey has built a strong industrial base that has translated to an increasingly independent and advanced military industrial complex. However, it still struggles to build its most sophisticated equipment like the engines and microchips that power its famous drones. Turkey still imports 20% of its military hardware from Western arms suppliers, which severely limits its geopolitical freedom of action and ability to enter into alliances that might upset its western partners. 

Pakistan has been ruled by its generals, either directly or via a hybrid system, for most of its history. Its courts and law enforcement agencies are awful and its government is authoritarian and non-responsive to the needs of its people, particularly when it comes to providing decent public education and reliable energy. Pakistan has built a powerful military but its socio-economic and industrial foundations are rotten and in need of serious investment and reform. Rather than implement the necessary changes, its elite prefer the comfort of neo-colonial relationships and the ease of taking cheap money from their Arab benefactors and international banking institutions. 

Iran and the entire Muslim world must respond to the last two years of Israeli and American outrages by finally admitting their way of doing things is not working. They must embrace democracy, gender equality, the rule of law and freedom of expression if they ever wish to end the cycle of violence that has consumed their societies for so long. Until they do, the pattern will continue unabated. The attack against Iran is but the latest iteration of this pattern and highlights the desperate need for serious and meaningful change, not just in Tehran but across the entire Muslim world.  

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What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized1 Comment on What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

Part IV: the “rules” based international system

This essay was first published here, by the Friday Times on July 16, 2024.

This discussion began by focusing on what the war in Gaza teaches us about America. It will now conclude with an examination of what it reveals about its “rules” based international system. Whereas the lessons gleaned from parts I, II, and III were relatively straight forward, using Gaza to understand the nature of the current international order is more complicated due to America’s contradictory behavior and blatant gaslighting.

For example, Jeffery Cimmino and Matthew Kroenig state the Pax Americana is designed to promote stability throughout the world by encouraging “peaceful, predictable, and cooperative behavior among states that is consistent with liberal values and principles” while placing “limits on the use of military force” and advancing “democratic values and human rights.” However, America’s unequivocal support for apartheid Israel and the massacre it unleashed on Gaza’s civilians suggests these lofty principles have no real connection to its actions. Given the disconnect between its stated ideals and actions, this discussion will focus on America’s behavior to determine three aspects of the international system it created, namely, when does it allow people to wage war, does it protect civilians during war, and whether it truly promotes democracy.

WHEN IS WAR JUSTIFIED?

Men have traditionally waged war for power, wealth, women, and territory. Every once and a while they build empires that pretend to aspire to greater things like God or democracy to justify their actions, but organized violence is rarely noble or moral. In the aftermath of WW2, the nations of the world tried to create a new international order based on the idea that war must only be waged as a last resort. The United Nations (UN) was founded to ensure states had peaceful ways of resolving their disputes to try and avoid future wars. Unfortunately, the five nations empowered to keep the peace were also some of the biggest arms dealers on the planet and each had its own imperial or neo-imperial ambitions. Thus, the system failed. It is mostly irrelevant now, but the UN charter is still meant to govern the conduct of nations, including when they are permitted to wage war.

Though some have tried to make nonsensical distinctions between “wars of choice” and “wars of necessity” to suggest otherwise, from a moral and legal perspective, war is only ever justified as a means of self-defense or coming to the defense of others in extreme situations. The right to self-defense is an almost universally acknowledged concept best characterized as a natural or innate right that is enshrined in most legal systems including Article 51 of the UN charter. In theory, the idea that violence is only ever justified as a defensive action should be easy to apply. Gaza, and by extension the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict, prove otherwise.

Despite what many in the West would like to believe, Oct. 7th did not happen in a vacuum. It happened within the context of Israel’s 16-year blockade of Gaza, its total rejection of diplomacy including several attempts by Hamas to negotiate a long-term peace, its apartheid system, 75 years of conquest and ethnic cleansing and its policy of occasionally “mowing the grass,” which is a disgusting euphemism popular in the West that refers to Israel’s policy of preemptively attacking and murdering Palestinians. During the two years preceding this attack, Israel’s extremist government did everything it could to provoke the Palestinians by desecrating their places of worship and murdering a record number of children. It even attacked Gaza five months before Oct. 7th in May of 2023, killing nine civilians, including 3 children.

In addition to brutalizing the Palestinians, Israel has spent years waging a relentless bombing and clandestine campaign against Iran and its allies because of their support for the Palestinians. It has bombed Lebanon and Syria hundreds of times. It is also responsible for murdering numerous high ranking Iranian government officials and conducting several acts of sabotage on its infrastructure. It even helped America murder General Soleimani, one of Iran’s highest-ranking officers who worked in a hybrid role roughly comparable to being the head of the CIA and America’s special forces command. As the recent strike on Iran’s consulate in Syria shows, Israel’s aggression has only grown over the past eight months. Inexplicably, Muslims are denied the right to defend themselves from this violence. They can neither respond to protect themselves nor intervene to save Palestine’s defenseless people.

On the other end of the spectrum, we are frequently reminded that Israel’s right to defend itself is absolute and expansive. Israel’s supporters have gone out of their way to frame its massacre as an act of self-defense meant to prevent future attacks. But the IDF regained control of the border within two days of the initial attack. It killed, captured, or expelled Hamas’ entire force, ending the threat they posed. Once Israel reinforced the border with its tanks and armored fighting vehicles, there was zero possibility of a repeat attack. That Hamas was able to inflict as much damage as it did, given its limited arsenal of light weapons, was shocking and mostly due to catching Israel off guard. But pretending it has the capabilities for a repeat performance is ridiculous. As such, nothing that has happened since that day can reasonably be described as self-defense. The slaughter Israel has carried out can only be classified as revenge and collective punishment.  

The current war in Gaza and the entire conquest of Palestine reveals a tiered international system in which a privileged few are allowed to wage war while others must never resort to violence, no matter the provocation. Americans and Israelis, as members of the West, can use violence whenever they deem it necessary and have no limits on who or how many they can kill. Whereas Muslims must meekly accept their fate when they are attacked, lest they be labeled “terrorists” and subjected to more violence.

Gaza is but one example of many that prove the point. When the countless other invasions and violent actions America has committed or enabled, like the invasions of Vietnam and Iraq or the insurgencies it supported in Central America are considered, the pattern shows America and its allies enjoy a monopoly on violence. They are allowed to do anything to feel safe, even if that means destroying another country for no reason at all or murdering entire families in their homes as they sleep.

Men still wage war for the same reasons they always have in the Pax Americana. The only difference is when they are armed with weapons made in America, their cause is automatically considered just. To oppose such men, even if they are stealing your land or bombing your family, is a crime.

ARE CIVILIANS PROTECTED DURING WAR?

Hamas’s attack killed over 1200 Israelis, 377 of whom were security personnel and 845 of whom were civilians. It also took over 250 hostages, including women and children. As such, its attack was condemned in the West because it intentionally targeted civilians. President Biden described it as “abhorrent” and “unadulterated evil” that caused harm to “innocent civilians.” The US House of Representatives passed a resolution denouncing it as “barbaric” while one Western commentator argued the violence Israel has inflicted on the Palestinians over the decades did not justify Oct 7th because, “no amount of context justifies killing babies.” These responses were largely due to the belief that Hamas broke the rules by targeting civilians, which is consistent with the idea that the Pax Americana limits the use of military force by protecting innocents during war.

The problem, of course, is that Israel’s response has killed or maimed tens of thousands of civilians. Not only has it killed a staggering number of innocents, but as we have discussed throughout this series, it did so intentionally. Its rules of engagement and targeting practices led it to launch missile strikes on the homes of Palestinian families at night while they were sleeping if its AI software decided one of them might be involved with Hamas. That they were full of children or that Hamas’ fighters were hiding underground was deemed irrelevant. 

Once again, Gaza reveals a double standard. Just as westerners are the only ones who have the right to protect themselves and can wage war under a definition of self-defense so broad it loses all meaning; their civilians are off limits too. Palestinian civilians, on the other hand, are fair game. They can be shot, beaten, carpet bombed, starved, arrested en masse, held without trial indefinitely, tortured or expelled from their homes. Similarly, their homes, hospitals, schools, and places of worship are legitimate targets too.  

In truth, this dynamic has been obvious since the end of WW2, which America concluded by firebombing residential neighborhoods in Tokyo and then dropping two atomic bombs on cities full of women and children. Charges related to the intentional bombing of civilians by German and Japanese officials were even dropped during the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials because the Allies were guilty of committing similar crimes. In fact, one of the few successful defenses available to these officials was pointing to similar conduct on the part of the Allies. Through these proceedings, the founders of the Pax Americana began their reign by giving themselves legal license to murder women and children.

Gaza is just one more example that proves when America, or those it empowers, wage war, they are allowed to murder women and children with impunity. Even an attack on a purely military target like Pearl Harbor will be deemed an offense worthy of burning 100,000 civilians to death. But any attempt to target civilians who deserve protection according to Western eyes, like Ukrainians, Israelis, or Americans, will be met with passionate condemnation and a massive escalation in violence.

DOES THE PAX AMERICANA REALLY PROMOTE DEMOCRACY?

To answer this question, we must look beyond Gaza since the current war does not directly touch on this issue. Thankfully, America’s support for apartheid Israel does. There are over 2.8 million Palestinians in the West Bank who have been forced to live under a brutal military occupation and apartheid system since 1967. None of these people have any say over the government that controls their lives and America has actively supported Israel in denying them their right to self-determination for decades. America’s unequivocal support for apartheid Israel unequivocally shows it does not promote democratic values or human rights.

As usual, Palestine is merely part of a broader pattern. In addition to supporting apartheid Israel in its quest to oppress the Palestinians, America has a long history of supporting dictators and juntas across the world. Since listing all the dictators America has armed and supported over the years would take entirely too much space, we will limit ourselves to just a few examples. It is currently the primary arms dealer to the tyrants who rule Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Bahrain, Qatar, and nearly every other Arab country. Without America’s support, the iron grip these dictators have on their societies would be considerably looser.

America’s support for the region’s despots is just the tip of the iceberg. It has also quietly helped undermine or topple the few democratic movements in the region. According to Shadi Hamid, the Obama Administration effectively gave Egypt’s generals the “greenlight” to overthrow their nation’s first democratically elected government. This assertion is supported by its remarkably muted condemnation of their coup and the haste with which it restored ties once the junta was in power, even after it mercilessly slaughtered over 1,000 demonstrators on the streets of Cairo. Mr. Hamid’s work has shed light on the extent to which America actively helped overthrow Egyptian democracy, though its leaders have done their best to obscure these facts.

Given the degree to which Egypt’s military depends on America for many of its weapons, like the F16s it flies or the M1 Abram tanks that form a substantial part of its armored units, it should be obvious, as a matter of simple logic, that Egypt’s generals would never do anything to jeopardize their access to these weapons. As such, it is highly unlikely they would overthrow their government without first getting permission from their favorite arms dealer.    

America played a similar role in toppling Tunisia’s democratic government too, going so far as to deny a coup had even taken place, and has spent decades undermining Pakistan’s civilian rulers while empowering its generals. But nothing illustrates its hostility to democracy in the Muslim world better than its relationship with Turkey. Even with its restrictions on free speech, Turkey’s claim to the title of the only democracy in the Middle East is superior to Israel’s since it has not violently disenfranchised millions of people under its control based solely on their ethnicity. Despite being the only democracy in the Middle East and the frequent proclamations America’s leaders make regarding their preference for working with other democracies, Turkey’s relationship with America has come under increased strain over the past few decades.

Many analysts like to pretend the souring in relations between these two once stalwart allies is due to Turkey’s “democratic back sliding” or disproportionately blame Turkish President Erdogan’s personal ambitions. Nothing could be further from the truth. The primary catalyst for Turkey’s growing rift with the West was its rejection by the E.U, which unmoored and set it adrift from the Western bloc. A secondary driver of this shift is the fact that Turkey’s government has become more responsive to the desires of its people, which is a function of the growing inclusivity of its political system particularly as it relates to the growth of Turkish civil society. Though it is still flawed in serious ways, Turkey’s democracy is getting stronger. As its democratic system has entrenched itself and grown from the shadow of the generals who so frequently tried to control it, Turkey’s leaders have been forced to act according to the wishes of their constituents. The tensions between Turkey and the West are therefore partially due to the fact that its government now gives expression to the Pan-Islamic sentiments of its people. President Erdogan’s passionate denunciations of Israel and embrace of Hamas are just two examples that show how these sentiments impact his rhetoric and policies.

Taken together, these facts show America is actively opposed to the spread of democracy in the Muslim world. Which makes sense considering its goal is to subjugate the region to its interests. Democratic Muslim governments are harder to control and more likely to enact policies that challenge America’s hegemonic policies. A democratic Egypt, for example, would never have worked with Israel to blockade Gaza, just as a democratic Turkey has become more willing to condemn Israeli excesses.

TYING IT ALL TOGETHER

Gaza reveals the true nature of the Pax Americana by showing it is a system that treats Muslim children as legitimate targets during war and denies their parents the rights to defend or govern themselves. As a system predicated on war and domination, it is not based on a set of definable rules but force and coercion. It is designed to violently maintain America’s control over the Muslim world and its resources. Which finally brings us to Gaza’s most important lesson.

America and Israel represent an immediate and existential threat to the peace and prosperity of not just the Palestinians, but the entire Muslim world. They have chosen the path of war and have no interest in real peace. Instead of recognizing that the choice to build Israel on Arab land means they must learn to live as equals with Palestinians, they have chosen apartheid and slaughter. Both believe they have the right to attack any part of the Muslim world they deem fit and have proven capable of mercilessly massacring children in pursuit of their goals.

By any sane measure, meaning one that values all human life equally regardless of the faith or identity of the victims, America has been an agent of chaos, violence, and repression throughout the region. One can only hope those responsible for its crimes live long enough to see justice. There is no statute of limitations on mass murder, after all. Just as Israel’s spies famously tracked down Nazi officials decades after WW2, there must come a day when its soldiers and politicians are dragged before tribunals to face justice for their transgressions alongside their American accomplices.

Before that can happen, Muslims must take the steps needed to protect themselves. Given the unhinged people Israelis and Americans keep choosing to lead them, their racist world views, lethal arsenals, and history of using chemical or nuclear weapons against defenseless women and children, Muslims should be very frightened of the type of violence they are capable of unleashing. The only way to put an end to the threat they pose is by finally taking the long overdue steps needed to build strong states that can defend them and work together.

The key to doing that is building inclusive and democratic political and social systems and institutions that can lead to the economic and technological growth they so desperately need. Muslim nations do not need more guns but more factories, start-ups, universities, research institutes, laboratories, political parties, and independent and honest judges, prosecutors, and journalists. Societies that do not possess such ingredients are incapable of building prosperous economies driven by innovation and technological growth which means they are incapable of building powerful militaries armed with the most advanced weapons.   

These ingredients will also help bring Muslims together, which is the only way to counter the Western coalition’s far greater strength. There is no single Muslim state powerful enough to stand up to America and its friends. The Arab, Central Asian, and African parts of the Muslim world are too weak or servile to be of any use in this regard while those in Southeast Asia are too remote. As such, the burden must fall to Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan. It is only by creating a deep-rooted alliance between these nations that Muslims have any chance at finally ending the neo-colonial dynamics that have ensnared them and regaining sovereignty over their lands in both name and fact.

America realized the possibilities of such an alliance decades ago when it created CENTO. The logic that compelled it to do so is still sound. Combining the power of these three nations would give them the strength to protect the Muslim world while stabilizing a large chunk of it. Turkish and Pakistani leaders may not wish to openly break with America, but any fool can see this is inevitable and necessary. America has denied both nations its most advanced weapons while offering them to their archrivals in Greece and India. It is investing in India’s defense industry while sanctioning Pakistan’s and it has an unstated policy of ensuring no Muslim state can ever develop enough power to threaten Israel or its control of the region. Whether they realize it or not, Pakistan and Turkey have no choice but to create an alliance with Iran. All three desperately need each other.

Effectively combining their powers will require linking them on multiple levels. They must create free trade zones reinforced by infrastructure designed to increase the flow of people, goods, and ideas between them. Encouraging tourism by creating international organizations designed to increase people to people contact like sports leagues and professional, civil, trade, and academic associations would also be wise. Even something as simple as starting a soccer league featuring teams from each country would go a long way towards building the sort of ties that can bind these nations. Most importantly, they must create fair and transparent ways for their people to trade with each other on a large scale. The best way to do that is by creating democratic systems based on the rule of law. Which highlights, yet again, the desperate need to build such systems. Bringing these nations together represents the Muslim world’s best hope for finally ending the pattern of conquests and massacres that have plagued it for centuries.

As explained in Part III, it is only a matter of time before America implodes. Its decline will add to the chaos over the short term but may bring some reprieve over the long run. The problem is that at some point, another nation will step in and the same dynamics that prevented Muslims from protecting themselves from the West will still exist. Due to its unique geographic position as a bridge that connects Western Europe, Sub-Saharan Africa, India, and China, there will always be powerful states with an interest in controlling the Muslim world. As a result, Muslims nations must remain vigilant about safeguarding their freedoms.  As Palestine shows, the price for failing in this vigilance is paid in blood. If Muslims ever want the bloodshed to stop, they will need to make some serious changes to their societies consistent with the ideas discussed above. Until they do, they will be forced to obey the ridiculous “rules” others impose on them.

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What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized3 Comments on What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

Part III: Muslims in America

This essay was first published here, by the Friday Times on July 10th, 2024.

We will now focus on what lessons the carnage in Gaza holds for America’s Muslims. To appreciate the full impact of this war, one must first understand how it fits within the context of America’s relationship with the wider Muslim world, which has largely been shaped by its desire to control the Middle East’s energy resources and make sure no Muslim state can threaten apartheid Israel.

In pursuit of these goals, it established de facto military control over much of the Middle East. It has had bases in Turkey since the advent of the Cold War, but once that conflict ended it used Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait as a pretext to establish a permanent military presence in the Gulf. As the recent attacks on its forces in Jordan, Iraq, and Syria show, it has troops scattered throughout the region. It maintains several air squadrons composed of advanced fighters, bombers, and drones and a permanent naval presence in the region that includes constantly rotating at least one aircraft carrier battle group into either the eastern Mediterranean Sea or Persian Gulf. In total, America has roughly 60-80k troops in the region on any given day. 

In addition to its substantial military presence, it has managed to ensure every Arab state, except Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and Sudan, is governed by dictators who must comply with its wishes. To make sure Muslim states are ruled by compliant rulers, it has employed the full spectrum of violence from assassinations and coups to all out invasions. It has also used special forces, drone strikes, and the occasional missile volley to quiet those opposed to its agenda. However, its preferred method of control is selling weapons to Muslim states, thereby making them dependent on America to maintain and equip their militaries. Through these various mechanisms, it has established a form of neo-imperial military control over much of the region and fittingly given it a neo-colonial façade.

It has achieved this power by inflicting unspeakable pain and suffering throughout the region. Gaza is but the latest in a long line of massacres America has committed or enabled against Muslims. An estimated 576,000 Iraqi children died because of the sanctions it imposed before the 2003 invasion, another 4.5 million died because of the War on Terror, and its support and weapons allowed Saudi Arabia to kill 377,000 Yemenis and Egypt to jail 60,000 non-violent political prisoners. Due to these actions, as well as many others we simply do not have the space to list, America has the blood of millions of innocents on its hands.

In sum, at the same time America was inviting Muslims from all over the world to its shores via immigration policies that made it easy for educated professionals to settle there, it was also violently attacking their homelands or supporting the brutal regimes that may have prompted some of them to seek new homes. Given this history and its long-standing support for apartheid Israel, being Muslim in America has always been complicated. By virtue of its decades long attempt to subjugate and control the Muslim world, America’s Muslims have often been in the uneasy position of being viewed and treated as a fifth column who cannot be fully trusted. As a result, dealing with bigotry and Islamophobia is an implicit part of the Muslim American experience.

Despite everything, America’s Muslims have thrived as a community. The Economist went so far as to call the twenty year period after 9/11 a “golden age” for us in which our population doubled and our influence grew. Until eight months ago, we were fully integrated into the fabric of American life and enmeshed in the pursuit of our American dreams.

Gaza has shattered those dreams. The images of mutilated and lifeless Palestinian children have reminded us that America is still perfectly capable of massacring Muslims while hiding behind vile, racist justifications to obscure its crimes. Watching Gaza’s poor people brutally murdered from afar and living in and paying taxes to the country enabling these crimes has been excruciatingly painful.

It has also led to action. As a community, America’s Muslims have spoken out loudly in defense of Gaza’s children. We have marched, petitioned our leaders, and even blocked traffic to bring attention to their plight. Despite our desperate pleas and the overwhelming evidence of Israel’s crimes, most have demonized, dismissed or ignored us. Instead of listening, many accused us of being terrorist sympathizers, pro-Hamas, or antisemitic. Congressman Mike Rollins went so far as to praise blatantly racist counter protesters in Mississippi, one of whom was mimicking an ape and gesturing towards a Pro-Palestinian African American protester. But Mr. Collins is hardly the only bigot in Congress. Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian-American member of Congress, was censured by 234 of her colleagues for daring to object to the slaughter of her people and call for their freedom. On the other hand, Brian Mast faced no consequences for justifying the murder of Palestinian babies by comparing them to Nazis.

These officials are merely a reflection of the society that elected them. America has always tolerated violence and discrimination towards Muslims. Since the start of this war, our children have been stabbed and shot. We have been fired from our jobs, arrested, expelled from our schools, sued, and even barred from speaking at our graduations. All because we refuse to be silent when Israel’s military murders children or ignore that it is a brutal apartheid state guilty of denying millions of Palestinians their basic human rights for nearly 60 years.

While all of this has been going on, most Americans have proven they simply do not care. About the mass murder their government is enabling in Gaza, or the blatant discrimination Muslim Americans face. Aside from a small, vocal minority, most have done their best to ignore Israel’s crimes and their nation’s role in aiding them.

The cumulative weight of this data reveals some very harsh truths. The most obvious: America’s Muslims are second class citizens who do not have the same right to express ourselves as our neighbors. Even when our government actively helps slaughter thousands of children, we must accept its actions without dissent or suffer the consequences. Despite our increased numbers and influence, neither our lives nor our voices matter. Not only do they not matter, but those who insist on expressing them will be silenced.

In many ways, Gaza reinforces what we have known the whole time. Muslims in America will always be viewed with suspicion and hostility. Even when we fully embrace the American ethos and fight for universal concepts like defending children from mass murder, we will be vilified, then ignored.

Gaza has reminded us how precarious it is to be Muslim in America. Nothing proves the point better than the upcoming presidential election. Our choices are Genocide Joe Biden, a self-described Zionist guilty of enabling the worst massacre of Palestinians since 1948 or Donald Trump, another self-described Zionist who believes his opponent has shown too much restraint in trying to limit Israel’s massacre. The only difference between these men is that one gaslights and lies to deflect criticism of his crimes while the other openly embraces and celebrates them. But when it comes to valuing Muslim lives or protecting children from slaughter, they are the same.  

Which leads us to another even harsher truth: Muslims do not belong in America. We are not wanted, and will not be safe if we stay here. As referenced in Part I, America is not on a sound trajectory. Over the next few decades, several seemingly unrelated factors will come together to cause economic and political upheaval of the sort that often leads to violence.

The starting point for such a discussion must begin with the massive debt America has accumulated to pay for its hegemonic ambitions and the exponential rate at which the interest payments required to service it are growing. This expense will cost $12.4 trillion over the next decade, making it the largest item in the budget and creating an unsustainable situation in which America will be printing and borrowing money to pay interest on the money it has already printed and borrowed. In an ironic twist, the debt Ronald Reagan first took on to pay for the arms race that bankrupted the Soviets now threatens to do the same to America. It is no longer difficult to imagine a day when it reaches $70-80 trillion, and the interest payments alone consume more than the federal government collects in tax receipts.  

Aside from printing the dollar into oblivion, America’s leaders have also been entering into free trade agreements that incentivized their companies to shift their manufacturing operations overseas. These agreements have caused millions of once high paying factory jobs to disappear. What was once described as the world’s workshop now consistently imports far more than it exports and has had an incredibly weak balance of payments for over thirty years in a row. This has had wide ranging political, social, and economic effects, the most obvious of which is the MAGA movement. As America’s leaders continue to debase their currency, paying for the massive quantity of goods and inputs their economy no longer produces will become prohibitively expensive. The destabilizing impact of dismantling its manufacturing base will only grow over the next few decades.

The root cause of America’s financial distress is its insistence on maintaining a military that can simultaneously control Western Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia. America’s military is not built to protect the homeland but to project power throughout nearly the entire world. Due to its hegemonic ambitions, it has spent an obscene amount of money on national security over the years and continues to do so. It spent $21 trillion on its military between just 9/11 and 2021 and another $1.7 trillion in 2022 and 2023, which accounts for most of its $34 trillion debt. In its quest to dominate the world, America maxed out its credit cards and the bills are starting to come due.

Alas, its corporate military interests now have such a strangle hold on its political economy that having an honest conversation about the desperate need to stand down and re-adjust the country’s spending and national security priorities is impossible. Instead of being honest about its dire finances, America’s elite wax on about silly ideas like modern monetary theory. Its rival political factions can only agree on massive spending packages that further add to its debt and their desire to dominate the world.  Due to their refusal to accept simple truths, America’s leaders have overextended themselves.

Having dismantled the factories that were the true source of their nation’s power, they no longer have the resources to control Eurasia from end to end. Not only have they overextended themselves, but they have gone against decades of very sensible policies that sought to prevent China and Russia from coming to together by doing everything in their power to unite these giants and their interior lines of communication. If Eurasia is the world island, America is firmly on the outside, looking in, and trying to dominate from the perimeter.

From both a financial and geopolitical perspective, America’s leaders are doing everything possible to accelerate their own demise. When historians look back at their fall, they will probably describe it as the greatest own goal in history. America is arguably the most geographically blessed political entity that has ever existed. It possesses formidable natural defenses that could have allowed it to spend a minimal amount on its military. Rather than use these blessings to strengthen themselves by educating their people and building world class infrastructure to maintain their considerable economic advantages, its leaders spent the past eighty years investing in war and hegemony. In doing so, they have neglected the true source of civilizational power, namely, economic, scientific, and industrial infrastructure and capabilities.

The only thing propping up this house of cards is the dollar, which is the currency of choice for people and governments throughout the globe. In their drive to control the world, America’s leaders are doing their best to change this. They have turned their control of the dollar and the international trading system that relies on it into a cudgel to punish their enemies and coerce any who might disobey their wishes. In doing so, they are incentivizing the rest of the world to find a substitute currency that cannot be controlled from Washington DC. The long-term economic consequences of using the dollar as a geopolitical weapon will ultimately be reduced demand that lessens its value.

Combined these factors will lead to a variety of woes like hyperinflation, exorbitant taxes, high interest rates, higher input costs, reduced investment, diminished public services, and insolvency. These will, in turn, lead to spiraling social and political chaos. By themselves, these developments would be enough to cause violence, but they are not the only trends to consider. At the same time its finances are collapsing, America will also be undergoing significant demographic changes that will only add to the tumult. By 2045, white people will no longer form the majority in America.  

Western societies have frequently featured overtly racist ideologies and discriminatory policies that violently oppressed people based on their faith, race, or ethnicity. The Inquisition, the various progroms against Jews culminating in the Holocaust, the Atlantic slave trade, the genocide perpetrated against Native Americans, America’s and South Africa’s histories as apartheid states, the internment of Japanese Americans during WW2, and Israeli apartheid all have their origins in the Western world’s bigoted and violently xenophobic cultures. These values have been an important component of the Western ethos for centuries and, as Gaza shows, still shape the perspectives of many Americans. Considering this history, it is not unfair to wonder how white people will react to having to share power as a minority, particularly since their declining numbers and power will be accompanied by significant economic upheaval.

As January 6th showed, there are already large swathes of white America who feel alienated and marginalized by the way their country is changing. As their share of the population shrinks, these feelings will only grow. That awful day may have marked the first violent coup attempt in America’s history, but it will not be the last.

Over the decades, America has trained millions of its men in the arts of subverting governments and organized violence. It has also made it easy for them to arm themselves. As the world’s preeminent merchant of death, America is flooded with weapons. There are over 400 million personal firearms floating around the country. According to the Washington Post, 20 million of them are AR15 style assault rifles. In addition to personal firearms, America is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of jet fighters, tanks, armored fighting vehicles, large caliber machine guns, rocket launchers, drones, and literally anything else needed to kill or maim human beings en masse. It features warehouses, factories, military bases, storage depots, and armories full of the tools needed to level places like Gaza. Each of its fifty states even has its own military.

Climate change will only make things worse. The increasing severity and frequency of large-scale natural disasters like wildfires, flooding, and exceptionally strong hurricanes and storms has already caused some insurance companies to abandon several particularly vulnerable states like Florida and Iowa. As the scale of these disasters grows, the costs and impact will too. The burden to rebuild and make the victims whole will ultimately fall to a federal government drowning in debt and therefore unable to adequately cope.

Predicting the exact fallout when these trends collide is obviously impossible. Nevertheless, it is possible to analyze this data, compare it to additional data from the historical record, and use this information to make logical inferences and extrapolations. A reasonable analysis of the macro-trends suggests large scale violence is a very real possibility within the next few decades and that America will soon find itself in serious trouble. Of course, “soon” is a relative term in the historical scheme of things. The Abbasid, Roman, and Ottoman Empires took centuries to fully collapse and be reborn. America seems poised to follow a similar path.  

It is certainly possible its leaders react to the collapse of the dollar by peacefully dismantling the security state they have built, thereby managing a soft landing for the end of Pax Americana. However, given the number of resources they have invested into war and death and the degree to which this has warped their minds, this is not a likely scenario. A society that empowers men like Congressman Thomas Massie, who sends holiday greeting cards showing his family armed with assault rifles, is unlikely to react rationally.

The more likely scenario is that the same people who stormed the Capitol blame this collapse on a “woke” Federal government and react by launching an insurgency that eventually grows into a civil war. They may not even wait for the dollar to collapse and could easily resort to violence if Donald Trump is imprisoned or the next time they refuse to admit they lost an election.  

These possibilities present America’s Muslims with impossible choices. Do we stay where we are not wanted and may not be safe, or do we return to the Muslim world and the hyenas and jackals who rule it?  We will not fare well in an America experiencing economic collapse and social unrest. As a visible minority that has always been viewed with hostility, we would be particularly vulnerable to violence and systemic abuse if the situation devolves into lawlessness or civil war. But for the reasons addressed in Part II, returning to our homelands is fraught with danger too. It will be up to each of us to consider our unique situations when deciding what path to take. Both are full of peril and risks.  

When making this choice, the author can only suggest that the skills and capital we have acquired during our stay in the West might be put to good use in those few Muslim countries like Turkey, Bosnia, Malaysia, or Indonesia that have more inclusive political, social, and economic systems. If we were to move to these countries in sufficient numbers, it is entirely possible we could have a positive impact like the one Crusaders returning from the Holy Land had on Europe so long ago. Their experiences in the more developed Muslim world changed their tastes and perspectives, sparking changes that eventually led to Europe’s Renaissance. There may come a day when America’s Muslims have no choice but to try and spark a similar transformation in their former homelands. Those Muslims who would prefer to avoid the anarchy and upheaval that is sure to accompany America’s looming implosion would do well to start planning for that day now.   

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What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorizedLeave a Comment on What has the war in Gaza revealed about the world?

Part II: the Muslim world

This essay was first published here, by the Friday Times on July 6th, 2024.

Having discussed what truths the war in Gaza reveals about America, it is now time to consider what it has shown us about the Muslim world. Here, the lesson is simple and has been painfully obvious for a long time. The Muslim world is incredibly weak.

Not one of its 57 nations had the power to stop Israel from murdering Gaza’s defenseless people. Over 14,000 Palestinian children have died so far. Many were just babies or toddlers who were intentionally murdered in their homes as they slept because Israeli soldiers decided it was more cost effective to kill their fathers while they were asleep among their loved ones. Instead of trying to protect these children, nearly the entire Muslim world impotently watched as they were torn apart by Israeli and American bombs and missiles.

The Arab world’s reaction was particularly muted and cowardly. But the Arabs were hardly alone in standing aside while the IDF was busy massacring children. Muslim leaders across the world busied themselves issuing scathing press releases denouncing Israel’s crimes. Turkey, to its credit, even cut off trade ties. But most of them took no real action.

Those few who tried, like Iran and its allies, were immediately labeled “terrorists” and attacked. Since Oct. 7th, Israel and America have worked hard to prevent this conflict from “escalating” by bombing Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran. Hundreds have been killed and the message sent: anyone who tries to help the Palestinians will suffer.  

Aside from the Houthis and Hezbollah, the entire Muslim world has been cowed into submission. Though the willingness of Yemen’s and Lebanon’s fighters to engage Israel’s far more powerful forces is certainly commendable, the sad truth is their arsenals are inferior in every way. They do not possess air defenses that can protect them from Israel’s deadly fleet of F35s and F15s. Nor do they possess fighter aircraft that can match them. As such, they are forced to cede control of the skies to their adversaries and suffer immensely as a result.

Their supporters in Iran possess a more potent arsenal; however, it is still qualitatively inferior to Israel’s in every way. Iran has a few 3rd and 4th generation fighters it purchased from Russia and China and has even managed to keep some of its vintage American gear working. But on their best days, none of them can match the lethality of Israel’s and America’s fighters. Similarly, its air defenses would quickly be overwhelmed by a determined Western led bombing campaign. Perhaps most consequential of all, Iran is highly vulnerable to cyber-attacks that could disable large chunks of its infrastructure in the event of a war.

Iran and its proxies suffer from the same weakness as every other Muslim nation. They cannot build the same sort of advanced weapons as their adversaries. Their economies and industrial bases are too backwards and underdeveloped. Many, like Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey have worked hard to close the gap in manufacturing and technological abilities. None have fully succeeded.

Iran has come a long way since the days it was forced to use human wave tactics to defend itself against Iraq’s forces. It has built an industrial base that can supply its military with moderately capable weapons like ballistic missiles and drones; however, its technological and manufacturing capabilities are still primitive in many ways. This has prevented it from building aircraft or air defense systems that can protect it. Even its vaunted drones are built from mostly imported parts. Its economy suffers from numerous structural defects, some imposed by the West, most self-inflicted and related to its corrupt and repressive government.  

Pakistan, as a nuclear power, is considered to have the most powerful military in the Muslim world but lacks the means to project power far beyond its borders. Its economy is hopelessly inefficient and most of its “factories” are used to assemble imported parts rather than build goods they can sell to the world. As a result, Pakistan developed neo-colonial relationships with America and then China to supply it with the arms it cannot build itself. Its forces still use several American made weapons, like the F16 fighter jet. Since Pakistan is dependent on America for the spare parts needed to maintain these aircraft, it could never take a strong stance against Israel for fear of being cut off from them. In fact, it is so wary of angering America it cannot even build a gas pipeline with Iran without first asking for permission.

Turkey is also one of the Muslim world’s most powerful states. It has a well-developed manufacturing base and a strong military. However, it must still import its most advanced weapons like the S-400 air defense system it purchased from Russia or the F35 fighters it was supposed to buy from America before being cut off due to the S-400 purchase. Despite years of trying, Turkey has been unable to build a jet with capabilities like the F35. Due to these constraints and the fact that many of its weapons require spare parts imported or licensed from America, Turkey also suffers from critical vulnerabilities that prevent it from meaningfully helping the Palestinians.

In addition to suffering from similar industrial and technological deficiencies, the conventional military forces of the Arab world are incompetent on the battlefield. Saudi Arabia, for example, is the fifth largest military spender in the world and possesses an array of deadly American weapons. Despite spending hundreds of billions to arm itself, the Saudi military is useless. It is entirely dependent on American and Pakistani mercenaries to function on a day-to-day basis and its officers have proven incapable of properly using their sophisticated American weaponry.

Saudi Arabia is, in many ways, representative of the rest of the Arab world, which has become a bastion of incompetence, cowardice, repression and regressive thought. Arab leaders, particularly those in the Gulf, are an anchor keeping the Muslim world stuck in place while slowly pulling it under the waves. Though some have implemented superficial social reforms, none have embraced the sort of political changes that could truly free their people. Instead, those who rule the Gulf have worked hard to destroy any trace of democracy in the region as evidenced by the significant roles they played in the coups that toppled Egypt’s and Tunisia’s democratic governments and even Sudan’s recent descent into civil war.  

Iran, Pakistan, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia are some of the most powerful Muslim nations and yet each suffers from similar weaknesses, to varying degrees, that have prevented them from developing the industrial and technological capabilities needed to build militaries that are not dependent on outside powers for support. Aside from Saudi Arabia, they have managed to build decent military industrial complexes capable of producing heavy weapons like tanks and artillery, but they are still incapable of building the most advanced weapons they need. For example, outside of Malaysia, no Muslim nations have the foundries needed to make the weapon most vital for modern warfare: microchips. Due to their technical deficiencies, Muslim societies are still hopelessly outgunned by the Western and Russian armies that have been invading them and massacring their people for centuries. As a result, they simply do not have the power to protect Gaza’s children. Which raises the question of why. Why have Muslims been so weak, for so long?

Like America, the Muslim world’s dysfunction can be traced to its relationship with the truth. In the Muslim world, the truth is forbidden. The tyrants who have ruled it for centuries refuse to allow their people to speak their minds about anything that might threaten their power, under penalty of death or jail. Even democratic Turkey features a stifling intellectual climate in which saying or tweeting something critical of its leaders can lead to jail time. By suppressing the truth, Muslim leaders have crippled the ability of their societies to evolve or have honest conversations about complicated issues.  A society that forbids people from expressing themselves will always be weak because it will always be ruled by dictators who rely on force instead of persuasion to sustain their power. When a society is ruled through force, its leaders’ only preoccupation will be doing whatever it takes to hold onto their power and the privileges and impunity that comes with it. As the Muslim world shows, this is the path to weakness, servitude, and slaughter.  

Muslims have been ruled by dictators for so long, they have lost sight of some fundamental truths. The first and most obvious: they will remain weak until they build governments designed to empower and educate their people, not oppress and control them. To do so, they must establish democratic and inclusive political systems based on the rule of law that guarantee freedom of expression. That is the surest path to nurturing the economic and technological development needed to build powerful militaries.

Inexplicably, some Muslims have argued democracy is not compatible with Islamic values. Scholars working for Iran’s Qajar dynasty went so far as to proclaim monarchies are the only type of government sanctioned by Islamic law. However, as discussed in more detail here, even an elementary understanding of Islamic history shows hereditary monarchies, like the one that rules Saudi Arabia today, are patently un-Islamic and that democracy is the only form of governance consistent with Islamic values.

The early Islamic period is referred to as the Rashidun era and corresponds to the reigns of the first four Caliphs to rule the Islamic world. Many Muslims believe the precedents established during this period represent the ideal towards which they should aspire, and that contemporary governments should be modeled after their example. Groups such as ISIS have even waged war to try and re-establish their own version of the Caliphate, while the Taliban claim to model their government after it. But they do not understand the defining characteristics of the government they idealize or the lessons they should learn from its example.

Though some of the details surrounding the appointment of the Rashidun are unclear, certain facts are not in dispute. Not one of Islam’s first four Caliphs used violence or the threat of violence to secure their reigns. They were chosen by building a consensus through dialogue between members of the community, including its women. Not one of them tried to pass power onto their son either. Instead, each left the choice of successor to the community or engaged it in the selection process when circumstances allowed.

The Caliphate may not have been a democratic system by modern standards, but it was a far cry from the dictatorships that dominate the Muslim world today. Caliphs were chosen after getting input from the community in Medina and they ruled by engaging with this same community to get its opinion regarding policy debates.

The only real question is how to apply these principles to modern-day realities considering the vast cultural, technological, and demographic changes that have taken place over the past fourteen centuries. The Muslim world is no longer comprised of a small elite ruling over masses of non-Muslims in distant lands. Instead, it has been separated into independent nations like Turkey and Iran populated by millions. Pakistan has over 240 million people, 97% of whom are Muslim but separated through myriad linguistic, ethnic, regional, and doctrinal differences. Engaging in dialogue or achieving consensus is a lot harder today than it was in the much smaller and homogenous community of Medina.

Groups like ISIS, the Taliban, and their friends in the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) believe the answer is simple: nothing changes. Not only do they believe nothing changes, but they have violently tried to stop their societies from making some necessary changes. They even blame the changes various Muslim societies tried to make for Europe’s conquest of the Muslim world, which is a laughable and completely insane argument that highlights the irrational nature of their ideas. It was the Muslim world’s inability to change that led to its conquest. And its continuing refusal to do so makes it incredibly weak today.

Despite the incoherence of these literalists, it should be obvious that it is the broad values and ideals of this era that must guide Muslims, not the minutiae of how they were implemented. The only practical way to emulate the values of the Rashidun era today, given the much larger populations and advances in communications technology, is to create democratic systems that give citizens the ability to choose their rulers and freely voice their opinions.

Muslims have bathed themselves in conservative ideologies that deny simple truths for too long. As a political philosophy, conservatism makes no sense because it is opposed to one of the most basic natural laws. As humans learn through the simple process of aging, change is an intrinsic part of life. Philosophies that deny this truth are incapable of forming coherent or moral ideologies because they are inherently illogical and, as a result, must resort to authoritarian methods to maintain power. Hence, the violent oppression instigated by men using religion and tradition as an excuse to stop their societies from evolving.

This religious repression is based on the political absurdities created by the dictators who have taken over the region. Enforcing religious orthodoxy goes hand in hand with suppressing political speech. The two reinforce each other and help to buttress the region’s dictators who have spent centuries obscuring the fact that the ideal Islamic government is, and always has been, a democratic one based on consent rather than force. Until Muslims accept these truths, they will remain too weak to prevent massacres like the one consuming Gaza. 

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When it comes to trading with Iran, Pakistan must tell America to go to hell

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized1 Comment on When it comes to trading with Iran, Pakistan must tell America to go to hell

This essay was first published here, by the Friday Times on April 3rd, 2024.

Pakistan’s government recently announced its intention to seek a waiver from the sanctions America imposes on nations that trade with Iran so it can finally complete the long-delayed Peace Pipeline between both countries. Which is a fancy way of saying it is asking America for permission. Sadly, the US has signaled it will not agree, dashing the government’s hopes.

This project is designed to supply Pakistan with 750 million cubic feet of natural gas a day. This would allow it to generate 5,000 megawatts of power for Pakistan’s energy starved cities and factories. Not only would completing this pipeline significantly enhance Pakistan’s energy security, it would also further improve connectivity with Iran, which is vital to Pakistan’s interests for a variety of reasons.

As the author has argued many times, creating a free trade zone and security organization similar to NATO between Pakistan, Iran, and Turkey represents the best long term plan to improve each nation’s geopolitical and economic positions. Doing so would create a large internal market comprised of over 400 million people while significantly improving their national security situations. At the least, connecting to Iran is an important prerequisite if Pakistan ever hopes to substantially increase trade with Turkey, a key ally. As such, for both economic and military reasons, building infrastructure with Iran is vital to Pakistan’s long term national interests.

The fact that Pakistan’s leaders must beg America for permission or, as Pakistani President Asif Zardari suggested in the face of America’s opposition, resort to medieval forms of barter trade to pursue policies that are so important to its interests is both embarrassing and infuriating. It also provides yet another example of how incredibly weak and subservient Pakistan still is to the Western powers. Instead of taking orders from colonial rulers in London, Pakistan’s leaders must now obey neo-colonial masters in Washington DC.

Despite what America’s imperial overlords may think, they have no right to decide who Pakistan can trade with just as Pakistan has no right to decide which nations America can trade with. Unfortunately, despite gaining its independence nearly 80 years ago, Pakistan is still too weak to be the master of its own fate.

Pakistan’s servility is a by-product of its authoritarian political institutions and lack of democracy. This has led to the creation of a political economy designed to serve the narrow interests of its elite rather than empower the masses. As a result, Pakistan’s government has proven incapable of building an economy and technological base that would allow it to act as a truly independent nation.

Of course, Pakistan is a microcosm of the wider Muslim world, which is also incredibly weak for much the same reasons. Nearly every Muslim nation is ruled by tyrants who secure their power through violence instead of the consent of their people. This has made them too weak and unstable to effectively challenge America’s domination of their lands.

Instead of seeking America’s approval, Pakistan and the entire Muslim world should be working together to oppose its hegemonic policies. Between its unequivocal support for apartheid Israel, the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and its massive weapons sales to the region’s many dictators, America has the blood of millions of Muslims on its hands. The massacre it is currently enabling in Gaza is only its most recent crime and pales in comparison to the 576,000 children it starved to death in Iraq, the estimated 4.5 million souls who died because of its supposed “War on Terror,” or the 377,000 Yemeni civilians it helped Saudi Arabia murder.

This pattern of violence and domination will never end until Muslims take the steps needed to end it. Part of that process must entail building stronger connections to each other. By obeying America’s orders and refusing to develop close ties with Iran, Pakistan’s leaders are helping to perpetuate its control of the region.

America will not allow Pakistan to trade with Iran because it refuses to accept America’s violent control and subjugation of the Muslim world. Due to its anti-imperial policies, Iran is the only country that has meaningfully tried to help the Palestinians by giving them the means to defend themselves against Israel’s genocidal violence. It also refuses to allow the West to control its natural resources. For these “crimes,” it has been isolated and attacked.

Unity between Muslims, by itself, will not be enough to end America’s dominance. But it is an important facet of the multi-pronged approach Muslims must take if they wish to destroy the neo-colonial power structures that have ensnared them since the end of the colonial era. The most important step towards that end would be creating democratic political institutions based on the rule of law that guarantee freedom of expression and religion for all citizens.

That is the most logical way to stimulate the sort of economic and technological development that could finally free the Muslim world. But building infrastructure and new economic institutions that do not depend on the US dollar to facilitate trade between Muslim nations would also be vitally important. Which is why, when it comes to completing the Peace Pipeline, the best thing Pakistan’s leaders can do is tell America and its imperial pretensions to go to hell.

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Rather than help Gaza, Iran and Pakistan prefer to attack each other

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized4 Comments on Rather than help Gaza, Iran and Pakistan prefer to attack each other

This essay was first published here, by the Friday Times on Jan. 23, 2024.

Israel’s rampage through Gaza has left an unprecedented swath of destruction in its wake. Its military has now murdered at least 24,762 Palestinians, including 9,600 children. 85% of Gaza’s people have been displaced while a third of its buildings have been destroyed, leaving roughly half a million Palestinians homeless. Due to this destruction and Israel’s continuing blockade, 576,000 Gazans face the very real prospect of starving to death this winter. In the words of one analyst, Israel is waging a war of “extermination” against the Palestinians, one its leaders have promised to continue without mercy or reprieve regardless of the international outcry.

It was obvious at the outset of this war that the Muslim world is too weak to help the Palestinians and would therefore be forced to impotently watch this massacre unfold. The recent hostilities between Pakistan and Iran show exactly why. In fact, it is hard to conceive of a better example to illustrate the dysfunction that has gripped Muslim societies for centuries. Instead of working together to stop Israel’s brutal assault, these two Muslim nations reacted to its outrages by attacking each other.  

Iran’s decision to attack Pakistan had little to do with animosity towards its neighbor and everything to do with the war in Gaza and its long confrontation with America and the West. It has been locked in conflict with the Western alliance since its religious elite deposed the Shah and took power in 1979. Since that time, it has adopted an anti-imperial agenda predicated on challenging Western domination of the Muslim world. To that end, its leaders have invested in improving their technological abilities so they can design and build the weapons needed to protect themselves. They have also provided money, training, weapons and diplomatic support to the Palestinians as well as like-minded allies throughout the region. As a result, Iran is the only Muslim nation to openly defy the West.

For these crimes, it has been forced to endure brutal economic sanctions, its government officials are routinely assassinated, and even the ceremonies commemorating these fallen leaders are subject to attack. The Western bloc has also used its coercive powers to prevent other Muslim states from developing close relations with it, which is why it has been forced to develop alliances with mostly non-state actors.

Given these dynamics, Iran’s desire to defend itself is understandable. Its decision to target other Muslim nations is not. Iran’s volley was part of a three-pronged attack that also targeted Iraq and Syria. These targets and the means used to attack them were intended to deter Israel by showing off its robust missile capabilities. While its attacks certainly showed what its missiles are capable of, they are best viewed as an admission that, despite having ample justification, Iran does not possess the power to directly attack its enemies. Iran’s leaders were forced to vent their frustrations on their Muslim neighbors precisely because they knew an attack on Israeli or American targets would lead to a violent and unpredictable reprisal.

This episode also shows that talk of an axis of resistance is mostly bluster. Israel and America are happy to exaggerate the threat posed by Iran and its allies since it provides a convenient excuse for their aggressive policies. But despite their tough talk and impressive arsenal of rockets and missiles, they were powerless to stop the massacre in Gaza. Hezbollah and the Houthis have done their best to dissuade Israel from its current course, but their efforts have done little to lower the body count. Neither Iran nor its allies have been willing to fully commit to the fight because they do not have the means to protect themselves from the combined might of Israel and its Western backers. Thus, they have been unwilling to escalate their attacks beyond a limited threshold.

Iran’s leaders deserve praise for their willingness to stand up to the genocidal policies and racist hypocrisy of the West, but they also deserve a great deal of criticism. Their inability to effectively help the Palestinians is rooted in the authoritarian political system they have built to oppress their people. As explained previously, democratic systems are the best at allowing a nation to develop the technological and economic abilities needed to build powerful militaries in the modern age. By refusing to acknowledge this obvious truth, Iran has been fighting America and Israel with one hand tied behind its back. The ease with which Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency operates inside Iran and the massive protests that have rocked it since 2009 are the natural result of this oppression. One does not need to be Sun Tzu to realize that alienating your own people while locked in a confrontation with foes as powerful and ruthless as America and Israel is not a smart strategy. But that is the path its rulers have chosen.

Iran’s leaders have clearly made mistakes in their quest to help the Palestinians, but at least they are doing something. The same cannot be said for the rest of the Muslim world. The leaders of Pakistan and Turkey, for example, have repeatedly expressed their outrage at Israel’s atrocities but taken no actions to stop them. Despite possessing stronger militaries than Iran’s in many ways, both are fundamentally more constrained in their freedom of action because of their dependence on America for some of their most advanced weapons and their desire to remain part of an international trading system that runs on the US dollar. Neither can defy America’s wishes out of fear it may cut off their supply of weapons or torpedo their economies with the same sort of sanctions it has levied against Iran.

Based on these factors and their unwillingness to upset their Arab patrons, Pakistan’s leaders have refused to build closer relations with Iran. As usual, they are prioritizing short-term needs while ignoring the bigger picture. America’s history of violence in the Muslim world, its unequivocal support for apartheid Israel and its growing relationship with India’s extremist government show it is a threat to Muslims everywhere. This threat will only grow during the next few decades.

America’s political system is broken but its leaders are too busy printing money to pay for their massive military to notice. This has led to $34 trillion in sovereign debt. The interest payments required to service this debt are growing by the day. It spent $659 billion on interest payments this past year and this figure is expected to grow to $2 trillion by the end of the decade. When the financial house of cards America built to pay for its imperial ambitions finally implodes, the dollar will be worthless. Those nations that have tied their economies and currencies to it will find themselves impoverished and their central banks filled with piles of worthless green paper. The sooner Muslims build an economic system that is no longer ruled by the dollar, the better off they will be.

The simple truth is that Pakistan and Iran need each other. Both will need to protect themselves from the chaos that is sure to accompany America’s decline. Both have a moral obligation to help the Palestinians, and of course, there is the need to secure the sparsely populated and lawless border areas that sparked this controversy. These have often been used as a base for those opposed to being ruled by elites in Tehran or Islamabad. It is in the interest of both nations to secure this area. The most logical way to do that is to work together. Instead of using missiles or airstrikes, the camps that prompted these attacks should have been destroyed via a joint operation involving troops from both militaries. The fact that these neighbors have not developed the means to conduct such operations is an indictment of both their leaders. This entire fiasco could have served as the perfect springboard to further enhance Pakistan’s and Iran’s ability to cooperate with each other. Instead, it proved why Gaza has been forced to suffer on its own and why Muslims have been so weak for so long.  

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Why do some nations conquer, while others get conquered?

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized1 Comment on Why do some nations conquer, while others get conquered?

This article was first published here by the Friday Times on April 24, 2023.

Even though it was nearly twenty-five years ago, I still vividly remember what it was like to step aboard the USS George Washington for the first time. For those who are not familiar, the G.W. is one of ten Nimitz class aircraft carriers in America’s navy. It is a massive warship made from 60,000 tons of steel that is over 330 meters long and functions as a floating airbase. When fully loaded with its complement of 90 aircraft, it displaces nearly 97,000 tons.

Building one takes 2,500 hundred workers about five years and costs $5 billion, but that is a relative bargain compared to the new Ford class of carriers which cost $4.7 billion in research and development on top of the $12.8 billion price tag to build. These ships are miracles of engineering that highlight America’s industrial might, wealth, and determination to remain the world’s dominant military power.

I would often stand on the GW’s monstrous 4.5-acre (36 kanals) flight deck and marvel at the resources that went into designing, building, and deploying it. Once built, carriers are manned by a crew of 5,000 sailors and airmen and cost another $1.18 billion a year. Which means that simply operating and maintaining these ten ships costs more than Pakistan’s entire annual military budget. And that does not even account for the cost of their aircraft or the cruisers, destroyers, and fast attack submarines that escort them whenever they deploy which brings the total cost to $21 billion a year.

These ships allow America to control the world’s oceans and the 40% of its population that lives within reach of them. They represent a huge investment in its military, but they are just one part of the military power that America has built and sustained since WW2.

Serving aboard America’s gigantic warships was a surreal experience, one that fed an obsession with trying to understand the factors that allowed it to build such a powerful military. But this was merely part of a larger obsession – trying to understand why the Muslim world has been so militarily weak for so long as evidenced by the repeated pattern of conquests it has been subjected to over the past few centuries. Solving the riddle of America’s power therefore holds the key to helping Muslims prevent more violence like the sort that has consumed Kashmir, Chechnya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and far too many other places.

America’s military is the result of several factors working together. It is a large country, well endowed with fertile land and abundant natural resources. Its borders are protected by the Canadian Shield to its north and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Some might argue that geography, by itself, is enough to explain America’s power. But a comparison with Russia and Israel suggests otherwise.

Russia has also been blessed geographically, though not to the same extent as America. Its western and southern borders have always been vulnerable to attack and its lands are not nearly as fertile. But it is still a large nation, with lots of natural resources and protected on its northern and eastern borders. It also fields a powerful military, but one that pales in comparison to America’s. Russia’s military is large and moderately well-equipped but mostly used to secure its “near abroad.”

America’s military, on the other hand, extends its reach to the entire world. The easiest way to illustrate this point is to compare the number of carriers deployed by each nation. Between its Ford, Nimitz, America, and Wasp classes, America currently deploys a total of twenty-one aircraft carriers of various shapes and sizes. Russia, even during the height of its Soviet era power, struggled to deploy seven such vessels, most of which were incapable of launching fixed wing aircraft or deploying far from its shores. Of these seven, only one remains in service and it is currently in drydock. When it comes to projecting military power, the ultimate tool is the aircraft carrier. Russia’s inability to build more than a fraction of the carrier fleet built by America is one of many examples that highlight the limits of its power.

On the other end of the geographic spectrum is Israel, a tiny nation bereft of natural resources. Despite its diminutive stature, Israel fields the most powerful military in the Middle East and was able to establish its dominance over the Arabs long before America became its ardent supporter. Israel may not have aircraft carriers, but it does have a sophisticated nuclear triad, advanced tanks and fighter jets, and cutting-edge electronic warfare, signals intelligence, and missile defense capabilities. It also has a proven track record of dominating its enemies on the battlefield.

These examples are important because they show that geography, by itself, does not provide an entirely satisfying explanation. If geography were the only determinant of military power, America and Russia would field roughly equal forces and Israel would have ceased to exist long ago. Geography has certainly played a part in allowing Russia and America to build their large militaries, but the contrasts between them and Israel’s example show it is not the most important factor in explaining why. Instead, we must look to the type of political institutions that govern these nations.

Russia has a long history of being ruled by authoritarian and absolutist political institutions and their negative impact largely explains its relatively weak military abilities. America, on the other hand, features an inclusive, democratic system. Israel does too, for its Jewish citizens, at least. These are the keys to their military power.

Combined, the seminal works Why Nations Fail and The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers show how democracy leads to military power. In the latter, Prof. Kennedy explains that modern wars will typically be won by the side with the greater industrial and technological capabilities. According to Kennedy, military power is based on factors ranging from “geography and national morale to generalship and tactical competence” but primarily rests upon “adequate supplies of wealth, which in turn derive from a flourishing productive base, from healthy finances, and from superior technology.”  In Why Nations Fail, the authors show how democratic systems lead to the wealth, industrial capabilities, and technology highlighted by Kennedy.

As Saudi Arabia’s military incompetence shows, by itself, wealth is not enough. It is the ability to design, build, maintain, repair, and use the weapons required to wage modern war that matters. Paying for them is just one step of many in the convoluted process required to master and incorporate them into an effective military force.

The most fundamental step in that process is creating democratic political systems. To be clear, democracy is about far more than elections. It is about devising a political system that uses institutional mechanisms to create pluralistic power structures and ensure governments are responsive to the needs of their people. Voting is just one of several methods used to achieve this. A true democracy establishes the rule of law and the primacy of the individual by creating independent and efficient courts that settle disputes fairly and protect the lives and property of citizens against government excess and each other. They also feature competent law enforcement, administrative, and regulatory agencies, and ensure freedom of speech and association. In doing so, they create an environment conducive to strong economic growth and technological development which can then be used to create strong militaries.

Aside from generating the wealth and technology needed to build powerful weapons, democracies also provide significant advantages with respect to training the soldiers who will use them, which impacts the other factors listed by Kennedy relating to generalship and tactical competence. Wealth and strong free speech guarantees are vital ingredients needed to build vibrant schools that can educate future soldiers and give them the critical thinking skills necessary to thrive in combat. Once they enter military service, these soldiers will typically find themselves promoted based on their professional abilities and merit rather than their perceived loyalty to a particular regime due the ability of democracies to create apolitical militaries.

Taken together, these factors allow democracies to design and build sophisticated weapons, buy lots of them, and staff their militaries with professional and highly trained soldiers, sailors, and airmen who can use them with lethal effect. By inference, these ideas also show why the Muslim world’s lack of democracy has made its nations so weak and vulnerable to conquest. As a result, those who wish to understand the roots of the Muslim world’s weakness must focus on the prevalence of authoritarian and absolutist political systems throughout it and the ways these have stunted its economic and intellectual development, making it impossible to build militaries capable of protecting them from conquest.

At first glance, China’s military modernization would seem to contradict these arguments. However, its well documented issues developing adequate jet engines or advanced semiconductors as well as the intellectual property theft that has fueled much of its progress indicates its authoritarian system has also limited its technological development. In fact, its economy is already showing weaknesses that are directly attributable to its repressive political system as illustrated by its ghost cities, capital flight, and the efforts to control or silence many of its prominent entrepreneurs and their companies. Just as the Soviet Union did during the 1960’s, authoritarian systems may generate growth for a time, but in addition to negatively impacting technological innovation, they are inherently unstable and will inevitably retrench or collapse in on themselves.

Though it still suffers from certain authoritarian tendencies, Turkey’s example also supports these arguments. It has the most extensive experience with democracy in the Muslim world and is, consequently, one of its most advanced and powerful states.

Despite the obvious benefits and the data provided by the different examples offered above, most Muslim states have not embraced democracy due to their unique historical experiences, the entrenched power of their military elites, and the toxic influence of their social institutions. This has led some to argue that Islam is incompatible with democracy. But as argued here in more detail, the history of the Rashidun era shows that not only are democracy and Islam compatible, but that democracy is the form of government closest to the Islamic ideal.

In addition to being the most logical way to strengthen individual Muslim states, creating democratic political systems is also the only way to overcome their geographic weaknesses. The Muslim world is divided into over 50 nations, none of which can compete with the Great Powers alone. As such, Muslims must come together the same way Europe did after WW2 to create new political and economic entities that can allow them to work together to prosper and protect each other through free trade and security alliances. Europe’s democratic political systems were a key factor in allowing it to unite and creating similar systems will be necessary if Muslims ever wish to do the same.

The Muslim world’s authoritarian political systems have prevented such unity because they typically rely on patronage networks glued together by corruption and nepotism. These have made it impossible to build the sort of neutral courts and administrative agencies that can meaningfully connect Muslim states by creating fair and transparent ways for them to trade with each other on a large scale. This has, in turn, made it impossible to build the sort of relationships that can lead to a security alliance.  

Pan-Islamic sentiments may seem antiquated in the age of the nation-state, but the inescapable truth is that humanity’s history is a violent one and most of our conflicts have a tribal dimension. As Sam Huntington explains in his work The Clash of Civilizations, the world can be broadly divided into civilizational groups that share historical and cultural commonalities. According to Huntington, the Islamic and Western worlds constitute two such civilizations. These tribal dynamics explain why the West unequivocally backs Israel’s violence against the Arabs as it desperately tries to stop Iran from acquiring the same weapons it helped Israel develop. They also help explain Hindu India’s conflict with Muslim Pakistan. Even Europe’s rejection of Turkey is best understood in reference to their civilizational differences.

The conflict between Russia and Ukraine is intra-civilizational. But it has taken on inter-civilizational dimensions as Western nations side with Ukraine in their bid to box in their civilizational rival in Slavic Russia. There are certainly other contributing factors such as geo-politics and resource competition driving these conflicts but there is no denying their tribal nature.

The key to understanding these conflicts, and who ultimately wins them, is understanding how all the variables referenced throughout this discussion work together and shape each other. To do so properly, one must first recognize the primacy of political systems in shaping and impacting them all. As such, Muslim nations must build genuinely democratic and inclusive political systems if they ever hope to end the cycle of violence that has consumed so many of them. Doing so is the only way to overcome the many political, social, economic, technological, tactical, and geographic factors that have made it so weak for so long. Until that happens, Muslim nations will remain among the ranks of the conquered.

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Lessons from the war in Ukraine

by Mirrors For The PrinceUncategorized6 Comments on Lessons from the war in Ukraine

I typically write about the underlying causes of the Muslim world’s military weakness and how to end it. But, for obvious reasons, violence in Ukraine has captured my attention recently. As someone who has spent his entire life watching people suffer in war zones in Palestine, Kashmir, Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, and countless other places it has been painful watching similar scenes unfold in Ukraine. The vivid images of destruction visited upon the Ukrainian people who wanted nothing more than to live freely under leaders of their own choosing have brought back horrible memories of images of children playing on the beach in Gaza who were murdered by Israeli shells. Or images of American bombs destroying entire neighborhoods in the infamous Sunni triangle in Iraq. War brings nothing but death and despair. Those who unleash it carelessly are evil people indeed.

As such, I shall endeavor to advise Mr. Putin and Ukraine’s leadership as to the most prudent course of action just as I often advise the rulers of the Muslim world in a desperate attempt to get them to enact policies that can end the violence that has consumed so much of it. Inexplicably, they have yet to follow my very sensible advice.

For example, I have long counseled the leaders of Palestine to lay down their arms and for all Palestinians to adopt widespread acts of peaceful civil disobedience while performing symbolic acts of surrender in recognition of Israel’s overwhelming miliary superiority and willingness to slaughter women and children the same way Russian forces have been slaughtering innocent Ukrainians. Given the barbaric violence Israel has inflicted upon the Palestinians and their continuing inability to protect themselves from its exceptionally powerful military, their best option has long been peaceful civil disobedience. I always strive to give the best advice I can by making sure it is based on a realistic assessment of the available evidence and common sense (as a lawyer, that’s what I’m trained to do). 

PUTIN’S BEST OPTION IS TO RETREAT IMMEDIATELY

In a nutshell, I advise Mr. Putin to retreat and sue for peace immediately. He can no longer prevent Ukraine from joining the EU since his actions have made that inevitable, but he can still threaten enough violence to prevent it from joining NATO. Every day he delays his withdrawal he puts that limited goal in jeopardy. I have already explained the most logical solution to end this conflict here. I stand by the suggestions contained therein but since I offered this advice before the invasion, I would like to elaborate due to recent events. Russia’s invasion has created a range of plausible scenarios that will all lead to the same end – its defeat. The only real question is how long it will take and how many will die before Putin comes to his senses.

The ideal scenario for Russia is that its forces eventually subdue Ukraine’s government and military, conquer significant portions of its territory, and establish a government that takes the Kremlin’s orders. To achieve these goals, it will need to inflict heavy damage that will kill thousands of civilians and lead to significant casualties for its fighting forces. As I explained in a comment to a recent Foreign Policy article here, Putin will unleash the sort of barbaric violence he unleashed against the people of Chechnya and Syria, but it is unclear if he can achieve similar results. Even if it uses similarly brutal tactics, there is a reasonable probability that Russia only captures pockets of Ukrainian territory and fails to establish full military control.

The best-case scenario is still horrible for Russia because its forces will face a well-organized and supplied insurgency. Failed counterinsurgency (COIN) campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq show what happens when insurgents have access to bases and supplies from areas outside the conflict zone while successful ones in Palestine and Malaysia show that COIN operations can only succeed if these are cut off. Ukraine’s geography and proximity to friends willing to supply it with arms places it in the former category. These dynamics mean that Russia’s defeat is inevitable even if it conquers the entire country. The more devastation Russia’s military inflicts and the longer it stays in Ukraine, the greater the likelihood that it will fully integrate with the West once his forces eventually leave. And that eventuality is a certainty. Again, it only a question of when.

Admittedly, it is hard to predict an accurate timeline. Russia occupied Afghanistan for ten years despite absorbing increasingly greater losses. Given the ferocious defense Ukraine has mounted thus far, it will probably be forced to withdraw much faster than it withdrew from Afghanistan (my guess – Russian forces will get kicked out of most of Ukraine within 6 months – two years but will try to annex portions along its periphery permanently).

Its campaign is going so poorly that it is already ratcheting up the nuclear rhetoric. This is a bluff and a foreshadow of the brinkmanship Putin is likely to employ in the coming months as he tries to save face. But the end is obvious. Putin has lost. A smart chess player would retreat and regroup immediately. If Putin retreats quickly, he will survive. The longer he waits and the more he digs in, the worse it will be. Some might think it is too early to make such predictions, but we have seen similar misadventures unfold so many times that the results seem inevitable. Hopefully, instead of going through the motions of this predictable and unnecessary drama, we can just move to the part where Putin’s forces go home, and we learn some valuable lessons.

LESSONS AND ADVICE FOR UKRAINE

For Ukraine, the lesson is simple. The West cannot protect you. It can help you, but that’s it. I know the US, UK and Russia all made promises but relying on their word was not very smart, and that is not hindsight. The advice contained in the article linked above still makes sense. Turn yourself into a porcupine that not even a bear would touch and channel your inner Switzerland/Israel.

I know this does not make up for the loss of life, but you will be given all the Western aid you need to rebuild. Please use it wisely. You have shown your bravery but as you rebuild, I truly hope you create institutional mechanisms to ensure the money is used to develop local industry in the same way Germany and Japan used American aid to rebuild after WWII. Please do not use it to make Western NGOs and defense contractors rich while allowing your elites and warlords (there will be warlords if Russia goes all in and sticks it out for years) to siphon off the rest. Do not compound tragedy with short-sighted greed like the leaders of Afghanistan and Iraq did. Make sure this aid is designed to give you the means to protect yourselves without outside help and with the idea that it will eventually end.

Dictators like Putin come and go but Russia will have thousands of nuclear weapons and conventional military advantages that Ukraine will not be able to match for the foreseeable future and beyond. The causes of conflict between Russia and Ukraine as a gateway for invaders and source of food supplies will always drive conflict with your large neighbor. As such, once Russia withdraws, you must begin the task of dissuading the next Russian despot who will try to control you.

LESSONS FOR THE REST OF US

What is happening in Ukraine provides important lessons for all students of international relations and war that are often ignored out of short-sighted political self-interest. To expect that the West would stand with Ukraine against Russia’s nuclear arsenal was a lapse in judgement. One that will take a long time to rebuild from and shows a nation must be self-reliant in matters of national security and that having friends really helps too. That might seem contradictory but it’s not. History has shown that powerful nations have an easier time developing close alliances. One naturally leads to the other.

It would take a true ally indeed to fight against a nuclear armed bear. That kind of alliance takes years to develop and requires a high degree of commonality and overlapping interests sufficient to compel nations to come to each other’s aid against such violent foes. NATO constitutes such an alliance. For those nations like Ukraine that do not have powerful friends willing to take up the fight, self-reliance is the key. As such, let’s take a step back and think about what it takes to build real military power.

As America’s military dominance shows, democratic and inclusive political and social systems that adhere to the rule of law and allow for freedom of expression are key to supporting the technological and economic growth required to create powerful militaries. If Ukraine (or any other nation) is to ensure its freedom it must aspire to make itself independently powerful by learning from these basic principles.

The easiest way to explain how democratic political systems lead to military power is by using a mathematical equation (sort of). Democracy equals wealth which equals power. Power equals victory and all these factors added together equals impunity. The reasons America and Russia face such different reactions to their imperial wars of conquest are simple.

One, racism and bigotry are real. And two, America is too powerful and violent to be held to the same standards it holds others to. It had no legitimate reasons to invade Vietnam or Iraq. But few were willing to challenge its barbaric rampages of killing and destruction even though they destroyed millions of lives. No one will ever call America out because it has the power of an 800-pound gorilla. Even with all its nuclear weapons, Russia’s power pales in comparison to America’s.

When it comes to modern warfare, the nation or coalition of nations with the best resources and the ability to work as a team on multiple levels to use those resources effectively will usually win. The top level being the political, legal, and economic institutions of the state and the bottom being an infantry platoon and the soldiers in it. There is a direct, though complicated, and layered correlation between the effectiveness of the levels at the bottom and those at the top.

America may have lost its wars over the long run but that was due to self-inflicted wounds from the corrupting influences its hyper-militarization (which, believe it or not, can be counter-productive to sustaining military power) has had on its political and economic systems and how this rendered it unable to develop an effective set of military, political, and economic policies that could consolidate its victories. America may not have been able to devise an effective COIN strategy, but it was able to assert military control over both Iraq and Afghanistan with lightning speed and then maintain that control simultaneously for many years.

Both invasions showed once again how its vast wealth and advanced technological base have allowed it to arm its soldiers with large quantities of advanced weapons. Putting these in the hands of soldiers with the education and social/unit cohesion to use them with such devastating effect allowed it to assert control over much of the Islamic world starting from the first Gulf War until its withdrawal from Afghanistan roughly thirty years later. Its strength and wealth also shielded it from the wrath of the rest of the world and has allowed it to maintain much of its military presence in the region even after its defeats in Iraq and Afghanistan. The foundation for its power and the impunity with which it is used are its democratic and inclusive political and social systems.

I’m not suggesting Ukraine should aspire to similar strength but offering an example of the big picture dynamics required to build a powerful military. It starts with creating inclusive social, cultural, and political systems and institutions that give as many citizens as possible a fair shot at pursuing their dreams. Nations that create political and social systems that allow for that type of freedom tend to prosper and nations that prosper have the resources to build powerful militaries. America has not always been perfect in this regard, but it has been better than most and has been working hard to improve for many decades.

Inclusive social and political systems go hand in hand. For example, before Pakistan built its nuclear weapons it decided to make the job infinitely harder by chasing a brilliant scientist away due to his religious beliefs. But part of the reason it did so was because its political and legal systems reinforced the authoritarian tendencies of its social and cultural systems. America, on the other hand, used to wholeheartedly welcome scientists from all over the world, regardless of their religious beliefs. Its willingness to do so greatly contributed to its power and wealth.

Welcoming minorities with differing beliefs and putting them to work based on their talents and passions is just one part of building powerful nations and militaries. The most important part is building genuinely democratic political institutions that give people a say in who rules them and the laws that govern them, but inclusive political and social systems are mutually dependent. They work together to allow people to use the political process to negotiate peacefully to manage and share resources, create fair and neutral mechanisms to settle disputes, and make sure no one feels so marginalized that they take up arms to pursue their political goals. Inclusive and well-run governments based on the rule of law lead to stability, social cohesion, economic and technological growth, and these factors lead to military power.   

To build a scientific and industrial base that would allow Ukraine to generate the sort of military power that can protect it against more violence it will need to ensure its political and social systems/institutions are designed to support the necessary economic and technological development. It has already proven it has the social cohesion and critical thinking soldiers to defend itself, now it must create the conditions that can give them the resources to do so independently in the future.

Russia’s military blunders in Ukraine support these arguments. It is weak for the same reasons as many of the Arab states, though to a considerably lesser degree. Its autocratic and repressive political system has stifled both economic and technological development in a way that has prevented it from building the sort of military America used to conquer Iraq so quickly. This has made its military weak in many ways. Russia will always be a second-tier power while it is governed by dictators.

TYING IT BACK TO THE MUSLIM WORLD AND WRAPPING IT UP

I have been giving the rulers of the Muslim world similar advice for a long time. I am certain Putin will ignore me too but, anyone who has practiced law for any length of time is used to seeing their good advice get ignored. Nevertheless, I feel obligated to continue my futile attempt to insert common sense into matters of politics and war despite the refusal of so many to listen. The logic of my arguments is not only intuitively self-evident but supported by the ideas of the smarter people than myself whose opinions are summarized and synthesized here who have discussed these matters in more detailed and scholarly settings. Anyone who has read Ibn Khaldun’s Muqqadeema, Machiavelli’s the Prince, Kennedy’s Rise and fall of the great powers and Why nations fail by Acemoglu and Robinson should agree with my analysis.

A lot of Muslims have been complaining about the double standards this conflict has brought to the forefront. These complaints are justified but will fall on deaf ears in the West. Instead of raging against the unfairness of the world, Muslims must learn some important lessons as well. I write about those on my blog www.mirrorsfortheprince.com so I will not get into the details. To summarize, Muslim societies must undergo serious and deep-rooted reforms to their political, economic, social, and cultural systems and institutions if they ever wish to end the cycle of violence that has consumed so many of their nations.

Over the past several CENTURIES Muslim communities have repeatedly been subject to the exact type of violence destroying Ukraine right now. Just as Ukrainians deserve to live free, so do Muslims. It is time to end the cycle by taking substantive measures to make sure this kind of violence can never touch the Muslim world again. The alternative is more death and destruction. If not from America than from one of the other great powers. Ukraine is not the first country Russia has violently attacked in recent memory. It’s just the first white one. The pattern will continue until Muslims take the necessary measures to protect themselves by listening to the advice offered above. For example, the West clearly has no plans to help Chechnya free itself from Putin. That will only happen once Muslims learn the right lessons from conflicts like the one consuming Ukraine and the many that have consumed the Muslim world. Thankfully those lessons are relatively simple: self-reliance is the key to freedom but having good friends really helps.

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