The U.S. military can't quit the Middle East
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Photo illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Mahmud Hams/AFP via Getty Images
If you're in the defense business, you've seen this meme in one form or another.
- "Born too late to deploy to the Middle East," it reads.
- "Born too early to deploy to the Middle East," it continues.
- "Born just in time to deploy to the Middle East," it concludes.
Why it matters: Flippant? Yes. Compelling? Also yes, as the image's virality today reflects just how entangled the U.S. is in the troubled region, even as it promises to pivot more fully to the Chinese and Russian threat.
- This is geopolitical tug of war, spiked with public cynicism.
Driving the news: Surprise strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities using B-2 Spirit bombers and 100-plus other aircraft marked Washington's latest foray into the Middle East, where for decades it's expended taxpayer dollars and lives. (Think Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.)
- Meanwhile, the Pentagon frets over Beijing and Moscow and their global ambitions. But the resources needed for that competition — including heavy-duty, traditional military hardware like aircraft carriers — are in high demand elsewhere.
Friction point: "There is a disconnect between what we, the United States, say in our national defense strategies and those sorts of products and what actually happens on the ground," Brian Carter, a Middle East expert at the American Enterprise Institute, told Axios.
- "The problem is: We episodically prioritize the Middle East over China," he said. "We haven't been good about ensuring that we put enough effort into the Middle East to make sure that things don't spiral out of control."
- "When we have to surge all this stuff in, we're always reactive."
Between the lines: Pentagon officials and military leaders have been hinting at this dynamic.
- Elbridge Colby, the undersecretary of defense for policy, has long lobbied for prioritizing China over Europe and the Middle East. During his March confirmation hearing, Colby told senators the U.S. lacks "a multi-war military."
- Indo-Pacific Command boss Adm. Samuel Paparo in November said support provided to Israel and Ukraine was "eating into" some of the most precious U.S. weapons stockpiles. In April, he revealed it took at least 73 flights to move a Patriot air-defense battalion out of China's backyard and into Central Command.
- And most recently — just days ago — Acting Chief of Naval Operations Adm. James Kilby told lawmakers the Navy is chewing through Standard Missile-3s at "an alarming rate." The service has used more than $1 billion in munitions fighting Houthi rebels near the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and the USS Harry S. Truman has lost three Super Hornet aircraft, including one to friendly fire.
Zoom out: "The Middle East is the space where four things come together," Daryl Press, the faculty director at the Davidson Institute for Global Security, said in an interview.
- "It's terrorism and terrorist groups."
- "It's nuclear weapons and potential for proliferation."
- "It's the world's most important exportable energy supplies."
- "And then it's a bunch of countries which have, I would say, somewhat weak control over their borders and airspace."
The bottom line: "This is the part of the world that continually draws the United States into conflict," Press said. "And it's not an accident."
Go deeper: The American war too few talk about
