Helping or Hurting? : To What Extent Should the West Continue to Involve Itself in Middle Eastern Affairs?

The problems in the Middle East were not started by the west and doubtfully will ever be finished by them. Tensions dating back millennia to the Sunni- Shi’a split, have influenced the societies and territories of the Middle East to create when combined with external interests in Middle Eastern commodities such as oil, an extremely turbulent environment. However, despite not starting the problems, within the last couple decades the U.S. -along with many other western powers- has increasingly begun interfering with varying success and failure, with issues they felt posed threats to their allies, themselves or much of the world in general.  Thus, two questions arise: to what extent has the U.S./ western powers helped or hindered tense situations in the Middle East, and to what extent should it continue to involve itself in Middle Eastern problems? Neither question necessarily has a very straightforward answer. The U.S. and other western powers have interfered both positively and detrimentally on a relatively large scale, and are thus responsible at the minimum for defending themselves and aiding those whose home may become a stronghold for terrorism. Ideally the west would also be able to aid any other innocents suffering because of these tensions, however, as that often tends to lead to escalating tensions and further harm to innocents, perhaps the west should begin to shift to simply monitoring the rest of situation from afar as much as possible, intervening only when to help correct what it aided in damaging, and in other extremely necessary situations and doing so wisely, after calculating all possible risks and effects of their actions.

Many are aware of the extensive history of western interference in the Middle East, beginning with many European nations and their histories of colonialism, which often helped to create weakened/ failed states upon the removal of colonialism. Many of these states would later struggle with the rise of inter- (often over divisions in groups and the preference of certain groups by colonists, leading to anger and revolts after colonial exit: a problem also seen as far south as Rwanda during its civil war in the 1990's) and intra- state conflict as well as a rise in terrorism.

 Many also like to conceive of U.S. involvement in the Middle East as primarily beginning with President George H.W. Bush and his announcement of the ‘War on Terror’, with perhaps some inkling of involvement from the Carter and Reagan presidencies. In many ways this is a fair assessment, seeing as most of the tensions between the U.S. and the Middle East seem to have escalated to requiring military action during these eras. After all, it was Bush’s presidency that led to ‘Operation Restore Hope’ in Somalia, which failed to stop Mohamed Farah Aidid, and instead ended with several American soldiers and 1,000+ Somali's dead, in part due to Osama Bin Laden’s planning (a key figure in the escalation of terrorism, the creation of the ‘War on Terror’ and the birth of terrorist groups like ISIS), which solidified a more negative perception of the U.S. to Somalians. It was not the U.S.’s fault for Somalia becoming a failed state but interference that failed in Somalia to aid them may have helped to begin Somali piracy, through a possible general grouping of the U.S. with other western states who had exploited Somalia, leading to their struggles, and in many Somali mind’s ‘justifying’ their actions (before potential greed arose and continued the practice of piracy).

Other interference in Middle Eastern government structures from the west, further drew lines in the sand, with the U.S. -often an almost overactive participant in these interferences-  increasingly being placed on the side of enemy and target.  Decades before more modern, borderline overactive involvement, several presidents in the U.S. began -primarily through interference regarding Iran and Israel – meddling in the Middle East. At some point, this meddling began to become just a bit too much to further create positive results, such as the end of wars, and instead began to breed resentment towards the U.S., now grouped with either the rest of the west and their colonialist histories, or with groups in the Middle East who already had great tensions with other Middle Eastern groups (e.g. Sunni’s vs Shi’a's, Kurds, Israel vs Palestine, etc.). In many ways, this interference, the unseating of certain leaders and clear alignment with specific sides, helped to temporarily alleviate some problems, while creating others. Out of broken governments rose many terror groups who, without as many barriers to it, gained power more easily than they could have before, and who held a larger grudge against the U.S./ the west than ever before.

Overall, choices like the ‘War on Terror’ may have managed to create some good resolutions to some issues, but it also left many negative repercussions and helped to further paint dangerous targets on the U.S. Other western intervention, to some extent, helped repair some of the issues, but when paired with colonialist history, ultimately may have worsened others as well. At this point, the U.S. and much of the west needs to do its best to fix its mistakes, and if possible provide as much humanitarian aid/ security for innocents in the Middle East and abroad as possible. Unfortunately, however, the U.S. and the rest of the west also need to try and take as much of a step back as possible from overactive participation (especially in the case of the U.S.) to primarily monitoring for imminent, un-ignorable threats and acting then.

(Nick Danforth/Bipartisan Policy Center)
Map illustrating Middle Eastern states with a history of colonialism and major colonialization revolts. Many of the states with the strongest colonial control, had the strongest revolts against it, and have higher histories of terrorism, wars and violence.