Joanna B.
_______________________________________
10/02/01: As US-Russian Force Prepares to
go into Afghanistan, Mid East is Temporarily
Sidelined
The most significant feature of
the imminent US assault against
Afghanistan is the major role
to be played by Russian
military might, following the
new and far-reaching
understanding reached
between President George W.
Bush and President Vladimir
Putin.
DEBKAfile’s military sources reveal that the
Tadjikistan based Russian 201st Motorized Rifle
Division was beefed up Tuesday with staff
commando units, Pashtun speakers and
interpreters. Its members also received
American-made anti-terrorist equipment and
weapons flown in especially.
DEBKAfile adds: The anti-terror alliance has split
its task into two parts. The Americans and
Russians will go for Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda
force in the Pamir Mountains, while the UK and
Western allies will take on the Taliban in south
Afghanistan.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is taking a back seat
to events about to explode in Afghanistan. But
Israel could find itself in the diplomatic hot seat
again once the smoke clears from the initial stages
of the U.S. military campaign against terrorism.
A hint of what could be in store appeared on the
front pages of the New York Times and
Washington Post on Tuesday. The newspapers
reported, in very careful language, that several
days before the September 11 terror attacks in New
York and Washington, U.S. secretary of state Colin
Powell planned to announce in a speech to the
U.N. General Assembly the Bush administration’s
support for the establishment of a Palestinian
state.
The speech, which was never delivered in the
aftermath of the suicide hijack-bombings that led
to the cancellation of much of the General
Assembly session, was to have paved the way for
a meeting in New York between President George
W. Bush and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Now, the reports said, State Department officials
are again trying to find the right time to revive the
new U.S. peace initiative.
The officials argue that the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict is hampering U.S. efforts to unite Arab
states behind Washington’s global coalition
against terror.
The Israeli media rushed to report – ad nauseum --
this new U.S. peace initiative, even as several
hundred U.S. and British bombers prepare to blast
Afghanistan. However, as both U.S. newspapers
noted, U.S. policy is set in the White House, not in
the State Department.
The real decisions in Washington are made by five
people: Bush, vice president Dick Cheney, defense
secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- whose position has
grown stronger since the attacks in New York in
Washington -- deputy defense secretary Paul
Wolfowitz and national security adviser
Condoleezza Rice.
The group of five, which is spearheading the U.S.
war effort, has given Powell and senior State
Department officials a free hand in forging a global
anti-terror alliance. The coalition’s sole importance,
the decision-makers believe, is to serve as a screen
or window dressing for military action in the war.
So for now, at least, the sound of the explosions
will drown out talk of the U.S. diplomatic move on
the Israeli-Palestinian front, but they will not be
able to silence completely the murmurs of peace.
DEBKAfile’ s American and Palestinian experts
say the real test for Israel will come after the first
stages of the war in Afghanistan.
It is possible, our experts say, that State
Department officials will eventually try to turn the
spotlight back on what they see as the strategic
importance of the Middle East and the
Israeli-Palestinian dispute.
The first stage of this State Department campaign
to portray Israel as the sole obstacle to a world
anti-terror coalition failed, primarily because of a
dramatic change in the global strategic picture.
The change was rooted in a new U.S. awareness of
who its real friends are.
DEBKAfile’s sources in Washington say that as
late as the second week of September, U.S. leaders
still harbored the belief that a world coalition could
play an important role against terrorism. But a
quarter-century of State Department policy
effectively collapsed after Saudi Arabia, and in its
wake the entire Arab world including Egypt,
denied the United States the use of military bases
on their soil to strike at Muslim Afghanistan.
Adding insult to injury, the facilities were built
with U.S. know-how, technology and military
expertise.
The Americans, a practical people, instead of
complaining publicly about the snub, acted swiftly,
effectively and cleverly.
On Sunday, September 23, Bush telephoned
Russian president Vladimir Putin and spoke to him
for 70 minutes.
The moment both men hung up, the world we live
in had changed and the strategic situation in all its
regions, including the Middle East, had shifted
radically.
The United States and Russia, two old foes who
faced off against each other for half a century,
became allies in a move that will influence history
for the next 25 years.
Both predominantly Christian countries joined in a
military, economic and political alliance to defeat
Muslim international terror.
In one telephone call, Bush restored Moscow to
the position of power it enjoyed between the 1950s
and 1980s.
Pakistan and Turkey will provide window dressing
for this superpower alliance – the former because it
has no choice, and the latter, out of choice. Central
Asian countries, such as Tajikistan, Kazakhstan,
Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Christian Georgia are
falling in line behind them.
The strategic epicenter has now moved from the
Middle East and Arabian Peninsula to Russia and
Central Asia.
This new world alignment sidelines anything Saudi
crown prince Abdullah, Egyptian president Hosni
Mubarak and Syrian president Bashar Assad have
to say. The same applies to the words and actions
of Yasser Arafat, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon
and foreign minister. Now It’s war-war, not
jaw-jaw.
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman put it
best in an excellent article on Friday, September 28,
headlined “Talk Laterâ€, in which he wrote: “We
need to be really focused, really serious, and just a
little bit crazy.â€
In Friedman’s words: “For everything there is a
season. There will be a season later on for talking.
There will be a season for dealing with other states
that have supported terrorism. And there will be a
season for promoting Arab-Israeli peace or
economic development. But right now — right now
is the season of hunting down people who want to
destroy our country.â€
Even Friedman, the New York Times’ High Priest of
Israeli-Palestinian issues, says they are not
currently on the U.S. agenda.
A practical example: In the midst of all this
strategic upheaval, Jordan’s King Abdullah
showed up in Washington. Bush greeted him
warmly and the United States finally agreed to sign
a free trade zone treaty with Hashemite kingdom, to
bolster its tottering economy.
But the king, still living in the past, remains blind
like the rest of the leaders in the Middle East to the
strategic shift in the balance of world power. He
therefore stated that he had received a promise
from Bush to refrain from attacking any Muslim
country but Afghanistan, including Iraq.
Secretary of State Colin Powell was quickly sent to
publicly deny any presidential commitment to
refrain from attacking Iraq. He went so far as to say
that Washington might consider it after its first
moves against Afghanistan. Powell, who with his
departmental staff has labored long and hard to
build an Arab-Muslim wing into the global
anti-terror alliance, made no mention of the
possibility of American attacks on terrorist targets
in Lebanon and later in Iran.
Despite the strategic shift, the New York Times
and Washington Post reports on Powell’s plans
for a Palestinian state should not be dismissed.
Israel might be relegated to the sidelines at this
stage of the war, but it find itself a scapegoat
should the Bush anti-terror campaign go badl