Before the Persian Gulf crisis erupted last summer, one of the most characteristic words in George Bush’s vocabulary was “prudent.” But when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, the president threw prudence to the winds. He took the lead against Iraq’s aggression, pulling together an international coalition and finally launching an air-land blitzkrieg that knocked Saddam silly in six weeks. Now the question is how he should exploit his triumph. Some supporters think it is time to impose a Pax Americana on the Middle East, settling the Palestinian problem and other disputes that make the region a chronic threat to world peace. But as Secretary of State James Baker slogs through an 11-day, seven-nation trip to the Middle East and the Soviet Union, prudence appears to be making a comeback.
Baker’s mission is an attempt to prod the Arabs and Israelis into new directions. The war has shuffled the deck in the Middle East, creating at least the possibility that stalemates might be broken. Baker is offering no grand design, because he thinks an American peace plan would only give the warring parties something to snipe at. He believes that the adversaries themselves must come up with new ideas for solving old problems. Yet many Arabs seem to want ready-made American solutions. When the secretary arrived in Riyadh last week, an English-language Saudi newspaper, the Arab News, greeted him with a banner headline: BUSH PLEDGES TO SOLVE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM. One of Baker’s aides winced at the sight of it. “Great expectations,” the official said with a wry smile. The danger, of course, was that Arab hopes could end up unfulfilled.
Israel already had a chip on its shoulder. The hard-line government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, more united than it has been in years, had no intention of trading land for peace with the Palestinians, as Bush suggested again last week. Many Israelis were prepared to dislike Baker, who will make his first official visit to their country early this week, after two years in office and two trips to Israel’s archenemy, Syria. Newspaper biographies portrayed him as a pro-Arab hatchet man, while dinner tables buzzed with speculation that Baker was unsympathetic to Israel.
The secretary’s assignment was to pursue four regional objectives: a new security arrangement, arms control, a settlement of Israel’s disputes with the Palestinians and other Arabs, and economic development. After the secretary had a long meeting with King Fahd and his foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, U.S. officials said the Saudis had promised they would not retreat into their prewar shell but would instead play a “very active” role in all four areas.
Later, Baker traveled to the Saudi resort city of Taif, where the reclusive Emir of Kuwait, Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah, still lived in splendid exile, to the conspicuous annoyance of U.S. officials. The emir seemed grateful and cooperative. He planned to return to Kuwait soon, and he gave vague assurances about democratizing his country. But Crown Prince Saad al-Abdullah al-Sabah, who met with Baker later in Kuwait City, declined to tell reporters when parliamentary elections would be held. The emir and crown prince listened politely to Baker’s four-point agenda, but sources said that all they really seemed to care about was the question of how to assure Kuwait’s long-term security.
Some progress was being made on gulf security. Early last week, eight Arab countries met in Damascus and approved in principle a plan for Egypt and Syria to furnish most of the troops for an Arab peacekeeping force; the gulf states would chip in the money and the Americans would provide air and naval support, plus prepositioned equipment in case U.S. ground forces are ever needed again. The plan did not include Iran, a key player in the gulf. In return for his neutrality during the war, President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani wants to play a central role in postwar arrangements. Unlike Washington’s Arab allies, Rafsanjani wants U.S. forces to leave the region, however unlikely that may be. And although Iran supports its fellow Shiites in Iraq, many of whom are in rebellion against Saddam (page 25), it also has an interest in maintaining stability there. “Who wants to have a second Lebanon on its border?” asks Hossein Nosrat, a senior editor at the Islamic Republic News Agency.
Meanwhile, the prospects for conventional arms control are fading as the main weapons suppliers, including all five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, try to get back into business. The Bush administration reportedly wants to sell $18 billion worth of arms to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt and Turkey. And Baker’s plan for a regional development bank to reduce disparities between rich and poor Arabs seems to be foundering, partly because wealthy gulf states still want to use their money to reward friends and punish enemies.
Baker is using a two-track approach on the Palestinian problem, trying to encourage dialogue between Israel and the Arab states and, at the same time, between the Israelis and the Palestinians. The secretary wants the Saudis to take the lead in approaching Israel on the first track and Israel to make the first move with the Palestinians on the second track. But according to senior Arab and Israeli diplomats, each side believes that progress will depend on what concessions Baker can extract from the other side. Although the administration wants Israel to trade land for peace, it agrees that the time has not yet come for an international conference on the subject. That would “force everyone to lock into their old positions,” says a Bush adviser, who adds with a chuckle: “Our position on a conference is both clear and ambiguous.”
Bush’s victory in the gulf preserved the prewar status quo in Israel and the conservative Arab states. Two of the big losers, Saddam and the Palestine Liberation Organization, had threatened both sides. Now, the Arabs and Israelis seem to think Washington owes them something for the privilege of having saved them from their enemies. The Arabs want pressure on Israel. The Israelis, who absorbed the punishment from Saddam’s Scud missiles, feel they have earned the right to hang onto occupied territory–and they want more money from the Americans. One of Baker’s tasks, this week and later on, will be to remind both sides, ever so prudently, that they also owe a debt to George Bush.
