by Hollis Wormsby, Jr.
There is No Easy Answer to Mideast Conflicts
When I was in college I had a friend who was from Iran that I used to play chess with a lot. He loved playing chess and he thought of himself as somewhat of a historian, especially when it came to Middle East history. He told me way back in the late seventies, in response to whatever the crisis of the moment was, that the reason that the United States and European countries always failed in their military efforts in the Mideast is that they fail to understand the history of the region.
My friend noted at that time that people like him did not recognize the territorial boundaries set up primarily by Europe after World War II. To him there was no Iran, even though that was his home. There was no Iraq. There was no Turkey. To him and to countless like him the entire region was still Persia, as united under Alexander the Great and conflict in the region would continue until the land was united as Persia again.
Those conversations were more than thirty years ago, and I haven’t seen or spoken with my old friend since those days. But I think of some of the ideas he shared with me as I watch contemporary stories on the current Mideast crisis and flawed solutions proposed to address them.
Right now our immediate threat is supposed to be with the new Islamic State, which pledges to unite all of the Mideast in a caliphate. This is my friend’s Persia idea, just with the added evil of driving out anyone who does not accept the beliefs of the latest bully in the region. The trouble, as an outsider in getting into these fights, is the ever shifting alliances. The Islamic State is attacking Syria where Bashar al-Assad is President. The United States has quietly held a position that we want Assad overthrown. So do we let the Islamic State overthrow him and then go after them, or if we go after the Islamic State are we helping to keep Assad in power?
Another interesting problem in the region that the former Soviet Republic also experienced when they got stuck in a war in Afghanistan before us, is that the rebels don’t buy or build weapons – they steal them from what they would call the imperialists who invade their country. Right now the Islamic State is using weapons we provided to Iraq as they now try to conquer the region.
Western involvement in the fight against terrorism began rising with the advent of 911 and has continued through several never ending wars since. In my opinion there is no military solution to the crisis in the Mideast and at some point we need to think about bringing our troops home and letting those who live in the region figure this mess out on their own. As my old friend said many years ago, “The fight for control of the land here goes back to Alexander the Great and will probably go forward to the end of time.” I am not an expert on Mideast affairs but even after all of these years his opinion seems to make more since than a lot of the talking heads I see on tv. Bring our boys home and spend a fraction of what we are spending waging war, providing humanitarian aid. That would seem to make since to me, or at least that’s the way I see it.
(Do you have a question or comment on this column? Look me up on Facebook/HollisWormsby or email me at hjwormsby@aol.com.)
