Many countries around the world are trying to build their most favorable policy with the Middle East, especially the Gulf. This is also true for the United States, which relations with these countries under President Barack Obama had left much to be desired. That is why virtually the entire region followed the ups and downs of the US presidential election closely, hoping for better times and the end of regional wars. What is the result?
After Donald Trump’s victory, the biased Arab press began to write anxiously about the scenarios that might be realized in the Middle East. Many agree, if the newly elected president really begins to implement his program, the region as a whole will see a sufficiently rapid onset of “peace,” but only after a radical break with the old established balance of forces. And the main victims, apart from the doomed “Islamic State” thanks to Russia’s active actions, will be Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Oddly enough, Donald Trump has serious complaints targeted at these regimes. And in this case, the huge purchases of US weapons and equipment are unlikely to help these Arab regimes. Anticipating any negative change in US policy, Qatar hurried to buy 72 F-15QA fighter jets, as well as related equipment and weapons worth nearly $20 billion. However, the Qatari emir will hardly be able to build new friendly relations with the United States, and for that matter, with Russia. Qatar, a small country lost in the waters of the Persian Gulf, should have built a more balanced, prudent and rational policy in the past.
As for Iran, the statement of the new President of the United States to withdraw from the agreement on the nuclear program is a threat. After all, it was the supreme religious leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, himself who had rejected the possibility of extending the Iran-US talks beyond nuclear issues.
Trump’s promise to reduce military presence in the region and expenses for maintaining the defense of US allies caused a panic among the Arab leaders. After all, these costs will inevitably have to be shouldered by the Arabs themselves, and they are not yet ready to do so due to a sharp drop in oil prices, in which case they do not understand the point of such an ally as the United States. As a whole, the Middle East itself does not look at all ready for the recycling of chaos on its own territory just to form a new order, which no one understands. According to Arab media, the main “recycler” will be the United Kingdom, which, having exited the European Union has thus given itself free reign to adopt self-serving solutions in the region. There is also talk about possible initiatives in China, which is literally gaining strength day by day and trying to strike up a close relationship with the Arab countries for the constant influx of cheap oil to China.
Another beneficiary in the region will be Turkey – getting the first real chance and sufficient amount of energy to attempt the revival of the Ottoman Empire. Moreover, neither the US nor Russia will interfere in this, since the development of Turkish aspirations will be directed towards the elimination of the main rival – Saudi Arabia, which has no defenders left in the world. And even the country’s capital in the United States will move easily into the category of arrested funds. Fortunately, the law to this effect has already been adopted, and Donald Trump’s desire to take revenge against Clinton’s main Arab sponsors is virtually guaranteed.
Return of the new US policy to the idea of self-isolation should not be taken literally, and of course, not only in geographical terms. The active American involvement in world affairs and problems will not go away. But the vector and the meaning of this participation will change dramatically. Donald Trump will perceive the United States, as he has been accustomed, as a corporation, which he heads. And so, all his impact on the world will be from a businessman’s standpoint rather than from the position of geopolitics. In this regard, it is enough to read his business books, such as “Art of the Deal,” “Think Like a Billionaire,” “Great Again: How to Fix Our Crippled America.”
Donald Trump’s vision of the modern world, as a President-businessman, is the following: whatever brings real profits, reduces debt, is advantageous and right for both the President of the USA and the American people. Whatever is expensive in the name of something ephemeral or the future is rejected or postponed indefinitely. The new president is not interested in supporting numerous satellites and sycophants in financial or political terms, for their loyalty to the United States and especially their seeming loyalty. Apparently, he took heed of the bitter experience of the Soviet Union financing numerous countries whose rulers demagogically and falsely claimed that with the help of Moscow they had taken the path of socialist orientation. Donald Trump believes that the policy should be to obtain real resources for American industry and real markets for American products. But clearly, everything is not limited to politics and economics. It is realistic to expect a general failure to uphold all forms of perversions so popular nowadays in the so-called democratic world, promoted by the globalists, and a return to traditional, time-tested moral values. Here, the new American President, can expect support, primarily from the royal Muslim regimes in the Gulf region. Oddly enough, the terrorist “Islamic state” may confer its blessing in this regard, and there may be strange possibilities for joint action.
It seems, several conclusions can be drawn from the Presidential election campaign. Firstly, the US media and their aggressive propaganda are false through and through, not in the least corresponding to reality, and completely designed to indoctrinate their readers in the interest of the American establishment. Secondly, now the Middle East has to rely only on their own strength and to look for new viable, real allies, able to protect them, as did Russia in Syria. And thirdly, there is not much time left to check and understand Donald Trump’s policy. Hopefully, Moscow will be not only ready for the initiatives of the new American president, but also take the lead, promoting its own initiatives and plans.
Viktor Mikhin, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.“
