Listen Closely: Donald Trump Proposes Big Mideast Strategy Shift
In a separate passage, one in which Mr. Trump clearly was following a script rather than freelancing, he said: “We will stop looking to topple regimes and overthrow governments, folks.”
.. On their face, these statements suggest:
— An end to the effort to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, for the effort to throw out Mr. Assad is nothing if not an effort to topple a regime.
.. — A warmer relationship with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, a strongman who has demonstrated an unmistakable ferocity in his own fight against Islamic extremism
.. — A policy toward Iran that doubtless will be hostile and include an attempt to dissolve the Obama-negotiated deal on nuclear arms, but one that won’t include regime change in Tehran as an explicit goal.
.. Aaron David Miller, a longtime U.S. Middle East envoy and now vice president of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, says this Trump approach will be “transactional.” By that he means it will use whatever means are necessary to transact the specific deal on the table, whether that deal is ending the Islamic State threat or retreating from the Iranian nuclear agreement without provoking a war.
.. The Trump formula also suggests an approach unburdened by the need for consistency or adherence to any ideological framework. One problem with that approach, though, is that it is full of inherent contradictions and potential unintended consequences.
.. So teaming up with Russia and tolerating Mr. Assad in Syria to defeat Islamic State could have the unintended consequence of further empowering Iran—much as the war to topple Saddam Hussein in Iraq had the unintended consequence of clearing the path for expanded Iranian influence in the region.
.. That won’t please America’s Persian Gulf allies, who abhor Iran’s leadership, and surely isn’t the goal of Mr. Mattis and incoming national security adviser, retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, whose antipathy toward Iran’s clerical regime is well documented.
.. “If you end the Iran deal you’re going to end up with a lot of awkwardness and unpleasantness with Mr. Putin,” says Mr. Miller.