During the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, when the world teetered on the brink of nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union, US President John F. Kennedy reportedly often referred to Barbara Tuchman's book "The Guns of August" during crisis management meetings. The recently published book, which resonated widely, delved into the lead-up to World War I, particularly its first month, when the world seemed far removed from the horrific four-year massacre that would ensue. Tuchman, the renowned Pulitzer-winning historian, argued that at that time, nobody wanted war, although everyone was gnashing their teeth and sharpening their swords in preparation for it. It only needed a miscalculation by one party for the constant, muted escalation of years to turn into an all-out war. The situation was akin to sleepwalking into war.
The situation in the Middle East is not dissimilar to what Tuchman described of the European power struggle before the Great War. While all parties involved in the regional escalation declare their unwillingness to engage in a full-scale war, their desire for revenge or retaliation against their adversaries to restore prestige or rebuild deterrence is evident. This means that the region is awaiting the ill-calculated escalation step that could lead it to an all-out declared war. However, the situation has already gone beyond these steps, with the outbreak of the Gaza war on October 7 and the subsequent expansion of the confrontation between Israel, with its Western support, and the Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah on both sides of the northern borders, and the Houthis across the Red Sea. This is in addition to the unprecedented exchange of drones and missiles between Iran and Israel in decades.
At the time of writing, the region is still holding its breath as a result of a series of incidents that took place between Majdal Shams in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, followed by the assassination of political and military leaders of the Hamas movement and Hezbollah in Tehran and Beirut. These events have undermined the chances of de-escalation or the already faltering ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel due to the latter's intransigence and the procrastination of the Netanyahu government, which is waiting to know the identity of the new occupant of the White House, be it Mrs. Harris or Mr. Trump. With that, another of the region's dilemmas emerges; its fate is often determined from outside its borders, and it was often decided in war and aggression.
Perhaps everyone is waiting for a spark to ignite an all-out war, but reality indicates that the region has already entered a state of undeclared war, at least if we understand a state of war to mean an absence of opportunities for stability and peace. Like sleepwalking into World War I, all parties involved in the multifaceted conflict will find themselves compelled to escalate, which may necessitate opening other dormant or suppressed fronts, and there are many of them across the region between its countries and within them. However, it will be a war without major battles and without political strategies; if revenge alone is what drives the cycle of violence. If there is one lesson that the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip teaches us, it is that revenge cannot be a successful strategy for waging war, let alone winning it, and it often leads to failure. Even if Israel succeeds in its revenge against Hamas leaders through assassination, and against the civilian population of the Gaza Strip through killing, displacement, and expulsion, it has failed completely in achieving its goal of integrating into the region forever. There is no decisive or final victory for anyone in a state of all-against-all war. The American strategist Edward Luttwak notes that any strategy should begin with understanding the enemy, comprehending their motives, and ending with the realization that military power, no matter how great, is incapable of guaranteeing a "final victory" or a "final solution" or a "historic decision."
The dilemma that governs the future of the region seems to be that its history has been shaped over the past five centuries through regional wars, some of which were extensions of larger wars from outside its borders, such as those that shaped the region in the aftermath of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and its defeat in World War I. Let us look at the reshaping of the region in the wake of the 1967 wars and then the Gulf War in 1991 and the invasion of Iraq in 2003 through this lens. These wars reflected a mixture of miscalculations by some actors and the destructive impact of Western intervention in the region. In fact, the Middle East is no different from any other region in the world in terms of the impact of war on its formation. However, war, as a natural force, may have positive effects in establishing balance, as much as it generates destructive effects. Maximizing the constructive effects of conflicts is linked to the warring powers realizing the futility of violence in achieving security; and thus striving to reshape relations on the basis of mutual security at best or finding rules for competition at worst.
This does not mean that war, at least in its epic and traditional form, in the region is inevitable, but it has become, as it always has been, a bitter reality that everyone must deal with. The Roman proverb says, "If you want peace, prepare for war." This does not necessarily mean engaging in war; rather, it means preparing the societies most affected by conflicts for more difficult situations, mitigating risks, and perhaps seeking to avoid the expansion of conflicts or containing it at the lowest cost. Most importantly, regional powers that genuinely desire peace in the region should address the root causes of instability. Recognizing this reality would be much better than dealing with the chronic crisis as mere "escalation" and better than sleepwalking towards the abyss.
The talk of "the day after" is no longer limited to the Gaza Strip alone, but to the entire region. Perhaps no one is currently preoccupied with this question at this most deteriorating stage in the history of the Middle East security system since its formation. Therefore, we will have to think about where the current confrontations will lead and whether they will lead to a precarious stability, as the massacres of World War I led to the Paris Peace, which was a prelude to a more terrifying world war, or whether they will actually lead to the establishment of a new security structure agreed upon by all parties, making the fate of the region in the hands of its own forces.
Certainly, looking at historical lessons, whether drawn from the region's history or outside it, will greatly help in seeing what its future paths may lead to. However, learning from them has become questionable, with the repetition of past mistakes and persistence in them by all. And certainly, the human cost of these mistakes will increase, especially with the excessive use of the tools of killing and destruction provided by digital technologies. However, historical experiences, as much as they contain ironclad rules closer to inevitability, also present paths that could have been taken if insightful decision-makers were available or if they had overcome the complex of political ambition, national extremism, the arrogance of power, and the mere desire for revenge. Realizing this will be costly, but it is imperative to avoid a future for the region that is no different from what is currently happening in its present.
The piece was originally published in Arabic as an editor's note for FARAS periodical Itijahat AlAhadath, issue 37 summer 2024.
