The Lebanon crisis

This post by Juan Cole provides a valuable summary of the political background of the currents political events in Lebanon: Lebanon Realignment and Syria 03/01/05.  Cole lived in Lebanon during the civil war there, and his post gives particular attention to the various religious factions and their role in Lebanese politics.

He reminds us of the origin of the current Syrian presence in Lebanon:

The Maronite [Christian] elite found the newly assertive Muslims of the south intolerable, and a war broke out between the Maronite party-militia, the Phalange (modeled on Franco's and Mussolini's Brown Shirts) and the PLO. The war raged through 1975 and into 1976 (I saw some of it with my own eyes). The PLO was supported by the Druze and the Sunnis. They began winning against the Maronites.

The prospect of a PLO-dominated Lebanon scared the Syrians. Yasser Arafat would have been able to provoke battles with Israel at will, into which Syria might be drawn. Hafez al-Asad determined to intervene to stop it. First he sought a green light from the Israelis through Kissinger. He got it.

In spring of 1976 the Syrians sent 40,000 troops into Lebanon and massacred the Palestinian fighters, saving the Maronites, with Israeli and US approval. Since the Baathists in Syria should theoretically have been allies of the Palestinians, it was the damnedest thing. But it was just Realpolitik on al-Asad's part. Syria felt that its national interests were threatened by developments in Lebanon and that it was in mortal danger if it did not occupy its neighbor.

He also reminds us there are a lot of players on the field, and that a Syrian withdrawal is not without its own risks to current American policies:

If Lebanese people power can force a Syrian withdrawal, the public relations implications may be ambiguous for Tel Aviv. After the US withdrawal from Iraq, Israeli dominance of the West Bank and Gaza will be the last military occupation of major territory in the Middle East. People in the region, in Europe, and in the US itself may begin asking why, if Syria had to leave Lebanon, Israel should not have to leave the West Bank and Gaza.

The more I learn about American policy in the Middle East, the more I think it chronically suffers from a lack of realistic long-term focus and a plain lack of knowledge.  Cole has previously pointed out on his blog that if a person has lived for any length of time in an Arab country, that normally disqualifies them from a high security clearance.  And yet, becoming fluent in Arabic for a non-native speaker would require just that, living in an Arabic-speaking country.  The lack of qualified Arabic speakers is a major problem in the State Department and intelligence agencies.  Given the current direction of American policy, it would also seem to be a prudent and necessary thing for the military to train and/or hire a drove of Arabic speakers to help us manage our liberated territories in the Arab world.