Timothy Birdnow

He is right.

The goal of Western policy towards the Middle East was and should remain dividing the countries in the region. The British did that for a long time and it led to an era of relative stability and peace; the Islamic World are natural competitors as each sees it's version of Islam as the best and the one that should triumph. The British sowed the seeds of discord among the varying sheiks and Mullahs and whatnot to keep them splintered. This is the beginning of an alliance that could well cause us nothing but grief.

I would add the British nibbled on the edges of the Saudi peninsula but knew better than to put their troops in the heart of Arabia, something the U.S. has done. There is considerable anger at our presence on Saudi soil, as the author points out.

And who is in this budding alliance? Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan, that's who.

Pakistan has been moving to the Islamists for some time and they pose an ultimate existential threat to us. For years they sheltered Osama Bin Laden (they knew full well where he was) and while they have occasionally acquiesced to us it isn't because they love us. Pakistan in this agreement is a dangerous thing. What happens if they go to war with, say, India? They now have Saudi Arabia and Turkey on their side if that should happen. The Saudis could close the Red Sea if they so chose. And of course what was a two nation war could become global very quickly.

Turkey, you may remember, is in NATO. So if India and Pakistan go to war will NATO be dragged into it? And that may well mean the U.S. will have to choose between honoring our NATO commitments or breaking our treaty with the Turks.

We do NOT want to unify the Middle East.

I imagine it won't be long before Syria wants in, or Jordan, or Lebanon. And what of the Gulf States, like Kuwait or Oman or the UAE?

The author is right; Trump wants to get us out of the Middle East. If there was a responsible third party who would step in to take our place I would applaud, but it will likely be China who would do it. That would be very bad on any level one looks at it.

Who else? Logically the E.U. would step in since they are part of NATO and the Turks bring the NATO alliance into the game. But we've seen very little appetite among the NATO countries to do anything at all outside of their little borders.

Russia? Not who we want by any stretch.

That means we are stuck with this problem like it or not. There will be a blood-bath if we simply leave this region on autopilot. Muslims hate each-other as much as they hate Jews and Christians, just about, and the slaughter of the Muslims will begin as soon as all the Jews are wiped out in Israel and the Christians purged from every country in which they currently reside.

We could just pull out, Levant Interruptus, but the world economy will collapse when oil stops flowing from the region. And while the U.S. has plenty of oil the other nations of the world so blessed and outside of the Middle East simply refuse to get it, being in love with their global warming hysteria. So a blowup in the region will lead to a huge economic collapse and a depression which will make the Great Depression look like a blip on the world economic graph.

That's what sucks about being the only adult in the room; you have to keep all the unruly children under control all the time. No time to socialize and drink cocktails.

The author points out Pakistan was brought in for their nuclear arsenal, to act as a counter-balance to Israel's. Of course this could lead to a nuclear exchange between the two countries.

And he points out that Greece and Turkey have long been at odds over Cyprus and a skirmish there could bring in the rest of the alliance against the Greeks. What would NATO do in that case? EVERYONE would call in the U.S.

The Indo-Pakistani hostility goes back to the partitioning of the Subcontinent by the British just after WWII ended. They HATE each-other. Both have nuclear weapons too and it's always been a worry someone would push the button there. Then we get to test the nuclear winter hypothesis in real time.

Anyway, India won't be happy about this.

The author states:

The British were masters of the strategy of balance of power, playing off one nation against another to divide them and guaranteeing the security of others. In the Gulf States Britain made small kingdoms like Oman and Bahrain protectorates, and thus secured their control of India's eastern boundary.

Luckily India has long had bad relations with China (which is why they sought nukes in the first place) and are unlikely to try to make a treaty with the Chinese but you never know; if they think this changes the balance of power with Pakistan to a point dangerous for them they may well choke down their dislike of China and try to cut a deal with the Chicoms.

They may even try to cut a deal with the U.S. For a long time Indian has tried to maintain its "third way" by staying neutral in great power politics. But that may change if this succeeds. But the U.S. would be largely insane to get into a NATO like pact with India under such circumstances. We are already horribly entangled in foreign pacts. The U.S. is fairly in a Gordian Knot of foreign defense pacts. India would offer little to us, or at least not enough to us to make it worthwhile.

One final thought on this. The Bible speaks of the "King of the South" at Armageddon and it is generally assumed to be the Islamic World. A military alliance of this nature will have to exist for that to transpire. It also would create a reason for China to intervene if they would be brought in as a counterweight to the loss of American security. If Russia were to make a mutual defense pact with a member state of this alliance they would be obligated to come in. What happens if Israel is forced to go to war with, say, Syria (which is not yet a member but could be in the future) and Russia would have a treaty with Syria (which they already do to some degree) the Russians may come in, then if this agency had a treaty with the Chinese and THEY came in then we would see the End Time prophecy come true. 

Posted by: Mike at August 29, 2026 10:16 PM (8k65J)

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at August 30, 2026 09:48 AM (oflqW)

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