Egypt, S.Arabia step up trade ties through coordination council talks    Egypt reviews progress on $200m World Bank-funded waste management hub    Egypt urges Israel to accept Gaza deal amid intensifying fighting    SCZONE showcases investment opportunities to eight Japanese companies    Egypt, ADIB explore strategic partnership in digital healthcare, investment    SCZONE, Tokyo Metropolitan Government sign MoU on green hydrogen cooperation    Egypt welcomes international efforts for peace in Ukraine    Al-Sisi, Macron reaffirm strategic partnership, coordinate on Gaza crisis    Contact Reports Strong 1H-2025 on Financing, Insurance Gains    Egypt, India's BDR Group in talks to establish biologics, cancer drug facility    AUC graduates first cohort of film industry business certificate    Egyptian pound down vs. US dollar at Monday's close – CBE    Egypt's FM, Palestinian PM visit Rafah crossing to review Gaza aid    Egypt prepares unified stance ahead of COP30 in Brazil    Egypt recovers collection of ancient artefacts from Netherlands    Egypt harvests 315,000 cubic metres of rainwater in Sinai as part of flash flood protection measures    Egypt, Namibia explore closer pharmaceutical cooperation    Fitch Ratings: ASEAN Islamic finance set to surpass $1t by 2026-end    Renowned Egyptian novelist Sonallah Ibrahim dies at 88    Egyptian, Ugandan Presidents open business forum to boost trade    Al-Sisi says any party thinking Egypt will neglect water rights is 'completely mistaken'    Egypt's Sisi warns against unilateral Nile measures, reaffirms Egypt's water security stance    Egypt's Sisi, Uganda's Museveni discuss boosting ties    Egypt, Huawei explore healthcare digital transformation cooperation    Egypt's Sisi, Sudan's Idris discuss strategic ties, stability    Egypt to inaugurate Grand Egyptian Museum on 1 November    Greco-Roman rock-cut tombs unearthed in Egypt's Aswan    Egypt reveals heritage e-training portal    Sisi launches new support initiative for families of war, terrorism victims    Egypt expands e-ticketing to 110 heritage sites, adds self-service kiosks at Saqqara    Palm Hills Squash Open debuts with 48 international stars, $250,000 prize pool    On Sport to broadcast Pan Arab Golf Championship for Juniors and Ladies in Egypt    Golf Festival in Cairo to mark Arab Golf Federation's 50th anniversary    Germany among EU's priciest labour markets – official data    Paris Olympic gold '24 medals hit record value    A minute of silence for Egyptian sports    Russia says it's in sync with US, China, Pakistan on Taliban    It's a bit frustrating to draw at home: Real Madrid keeper after Villarreal game    Shoukry reviews with Guterres Egypt's efforts to achieve SDGs, promote human rights    Sudan says countries must cooperate on vaccines    Johnson & Johnson: Second shot boosts antibodies and protection against COVID-19    Egypt to tax bloggers, YouTubers    Egypt's FM asserts importance of stability in Libya, holding elections as scheduled    We mustn't lose touch: Muller after Bayern win in Bundesliga    Egypt records 36 new deaths from Covid-19, highest since mid June    Egypt sells $3 bln US-dollar dominated eurobonds    Gamal Hanafy's ceramic exhibition at Gezira Arts Centre is a must go    Italian Institute Director Davide Scalmani presents activities of the Cairo Institute for ITALIANA.IT platform    







Thank you for reporting!
This image will be automatically disabled when it gets reported by several people.



The US in Baghdad: surge or scourge?
Published in Daily News Egypt on 14 - 01 - 2007

US President George W. Bush is working hard to achieve a wholesale transformation of Iraq and the Middle East into something more stable, productive and democratic, or so American officials tell us.
Bush enjoys reading American history, but he would do well to check out some historical narratives from our own region, especially if he is sending over 20,000 more Americans to Iraq. He would especially benefit from reading about another Western leader who towered over the world and similarly tried to rearrange the Middle East - the Roman Emperor Diocletian. Bush, like Diocletian, who ruled from 245 to 312, speaks in the sweeping vocabulary of those who think in terms of fundamental rearrangements, describing his challenges as the defining battle of a generation. He acts with equal boldness, on the same grand scale. In the late 4th Century, Diocletian ordered a major military and administrative reorganization of Rome's eastern frontier provinces, centered - not coincidentally - on Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq. Diocletian undertook a major program of building forts and highways throughout the Arabian provinces, after he had imposed a humiliating treaty on his defeated Sassanian, or Persian, foes. Around the same time the Sassanians also launched a significant fortifications program, in order - no surprise - to protect themselves against their militarily powerful Roman neighbors.
For three centuries to follow, Rome and Persia fought intermittent wars separated by brief periods of uneasy peace, temporary conquest and subjugation, and occasional mutual exhaustion. By the early 7th Century, Rome and Persia were both battered by their perpetual wars, domestic civil strife and border clashes with third parties, and were unable to resist the militant Arabs who emerged from Arabia under the banner of the new religion called Islam.
In 636, at Yarmouq in Jordan and Qadisiyya in modern Iraq, the Arabs defeated both the Byzantine Romans and the Persians. The Middle Eastern lands of eastern Rome and Persia were eventually conquered and united in the new Islamic realm. The Roman and Persian forts of can still be seen today, tourist sites mainly attesting to the futility of military conquest. The new strategy for Iraq announced by Bush on Wednesday night will continue to generate great debate for some time to come. We will soon see if his is a feasible, rational approach to the dilemmas that Washington has largely created for itself in this region, or if it proves to be a new form of imperial self-assertion. It would only add to the already rich debate on this issue a cautionary note on imperial tendencies and dangers. One of the historic developments during Diocletian's rule was the expanded role and status of the imperial court, and the explicit linking of the emperor's rule with the realm of the gods. Diocletian even declared himself the son of Jupiter - becoming increasingly detached from the day-to-day affairs of ordinary people and more focused on implementing the divine will on earth, including in Mesopotamia.
People in his presence had to prostrate themselves. Diocletian emasculated the republican institutions of Rome, turning the fabled Senate into little more than a local council, thus removing most political checks and balances and opening the way to autocratic governance.
His persecution of Christians almost certainly prompted the faith to spread more rapidly. Some of this may be relevant to events today, or it may just be intrinsically fascinating, as stories of tragic mortals usually are. George W. Bush speaks of Iraq and the Arab world in the language of imperial disdain, and acts with an exaggerated sense of divine proximity, emboldened by a fearlessness anchored in military might and certitude of the nobility of his mission.
Yet he makes repeated mistakes - as he admitted this week while changing policy - and the consequences of his policy in the Middle East appear to bring about the opposite of his stated intentions: more terrorism, less stable states, the spread of Islamism, weaker central governments, and more intense anti-Americanism. This is a very unusual combination of confidence and confusion that we do not normally find, say, in domestic politics or local neighborhood relationships. This is the unique manifestation of the deadly allure of imperium - the sense that one has the absolute power to rule over distant, foreign lands and people who are considered vital for the well-being of one's nation or state. What Bush sees as a sensible surge seems to many in the Middle East as a more familiar scourge of imperial history.
Rami G. Khouri writes a regular commentary for THE DAILY STAR


Clic here to read the story from its source.