Shadow Wars: The Secret Struggle for the Middle East

612 Pages·2016·4.13 MB·English

by  Christopher M. Davidson

For more than a century, Western powers have been using covert strategies to
exercise control over the Middle East.
In this unparalleled investigation, Dr Christopher Davidson traces the long
history of the West’s obsession with the region’s vast resources, and explains the
turbulent current events in a context rarely explored before. Based on hundreds
of leaked and declassified documents, and interviews with former officials,
academics, journalists and activists, Shadow Wars exposes the shocking extent
of Western interference in the Middle East.
From the Cold War to the so-called ‘War on Terror’ that sent thousands of
Western troops into Afghanistan and Iraq, Davidson shows how the region’s
most powerful actors have been manipulated by foreign players in a game that
has given rise to dictators, sectarian wars, bloody counter-revolutions and now
the most brutal incarnation of Islamic extremism ever seen.
Also by Christopher Davidson
After the Sheikhs: The Coming Collapse of the Gulf Monarchies
Power and Politics in the Persian Gulf Monarchies (as Editor)
The Persian Gulf and Pacific Asia: From Indifference to Interdependence
Abu Dhabi: Oil and Beyond
Higher Education in the Gulf: Shaping Economies, Politics and Culture (as Editor)
Dubai: The Vulnerability of Success
The United Arab Emirates: A Study in Survival

CONTENTS
Introduction
1 Counter-revolution – A Pattern Emerges
Lessons from the past – nothing is new
Lessons from the past – the preventive counter-revolutions
Britain’s hungry empire
The threat from Arab nationalism
Trouble on the Arabian Peninsula – revolution reaches Yemen
The contagion spreads – the Sultanate of Oman
The smaller sheikhdoms – preventive measures
2 Cold War, Oil War – America Takes Over
America’s even hungrier empire
America’s global counter-revolution
America’s Middle East – special treatment for a special case
Removing the rivals – Iranian democracy
Removing the rivals – taking on the Arabs
Strengthening the status quo – the arms trade
Strengthening the status quo – military bases
Strengthening the status quo – mercenaries
3 The Road to al-Qaeda – The CIA’s Baby
Searching for an Islamic state – Britain’s caliphate
Searching for an Islamic state – Wahhabism and the Muslim Brotherhood
Mobilizing jihad – the case of Afghanistan
Operation Cyclone – Anglo-American jihad
Foreign fighters, foreign cash
The Islamic Republic of Iran – a secret relationship
4 Allied to Jihad – Useful Idiots
The Taliban – America’s new ally
Keeping bin Laden on board
The war against Serbia – Bosnian jihad
The war against Serbia – Kosovan jihad
The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group – Britain’s new ally
The road to 9/11 – managing blowback
9/11 – saving Saudi Arabia
9/11 – protecting the funding networks
The fake ‘War on Terror’ – Afghanistan
The fake ‘War on Terror’ – Iraq
5 The Arab Spring – A System Threatened
A new challenge, a new hope
The road to 2011 – regimes in decay
Tunisia – the Jasmine Revolution
Egypt – the Republic of Tahrir
Yemen – revolution in Arabia
Breaking the fear barrier – a chance for cosmopolitanism
The economic storm – enter neoliberalism
The economic storm – the rise of crony capitalism
The economic storm – the rise of Gulf capitalism
From modernizing Arabs to revolutionary Arabs
Cosmopolitan communications – from satellites to social media
6 Plan ‘A’ – Islamists Versus the Deep State
The need for counter-revolution
Egypt – back to the Brotherhood
Egypt – an uneasy alliance
Egypt – military dictatorship
Egypt – ‘Sisi mania’
Egypt – the Qatar connection
Egypt – Saudi Arabia takes on the Brotherhood
Tunisia – under pressure
Tunisia – sleepwalking to counter-revolution
Yemen – outmanoeuvring the Arab Spring
Bahrain – the forgotten revolution
7 Plan ‘B’ – A Fake Arab Spring
Containable protests
Axis against axis – faking the Arab Spring
Libya – Gaddafi’s strange regime
Libya – flirting with neoliberalism
Libya – not so supplicant
Libya – the uprising
Libya – subverting the National Transitional Council
Libya – NATO takes action
Libya – an international crime
Libya – the scramble for assets
Libya – a role for al-Qaeda
Libya – searching for a Sisi
Syria – parallel plans
Syria – the uprising begins
Syria – preparing for intervention
Syria – enter the proxies
Syria – arming the rebels
Syria – searching for the ‘red line’
Syria – back to the battlefield
Syria – the media war
Yemen – a painful intervention
Yemen – bringing back al-Qaeda
8 Enter the Islamic State – A Phantom Menace
Al-Qaeda’s limits
The need for ‘national jihadists’
Iraq – the incubation chamber
Iraq – the emerging Islamic State
Iraq – the proto-caliphate
The Islamic State – mysterious new leadership
The Islamic State – a persuasive ideology
Opportunities in Syria
Expansion in Iraq
The caliphate restored
The resurrection of Saddam Hussein
‘Remaining and expanding’ – services and recruitment
‘Remaining and expanding’ – masters of propaganda
9 The Islamic State – A Strategic Asset
Qui bono – to whose profit?
The manufacturing of evil – the new bogeyman
The business of evil – a history of cashing in
The business of evil – the arms industry bonanza
Surprise, surprise – the Islamic State came from nowhere
The strangest road to war
A campaign of contradictions
Explaining failure – the official line
Suspicions mount – challenging the narrative
Follow the money – the self-funding narrative
Follow the money – the Islamic State’s funders
Funders need facilitators – the role of Turkey
10 The Islamic State – A Gift That Keeps Giving
The return of the ‘War on Terror’
The Islamic State in Libya
The Islamic State in Yemen
The fight for Mali
Boko Haram – Nigeria under attack
Boko Haram – the shift to the Islamic State
Boko Haram – generous sponsors
Boko Haram – delivering results
Beyond Panetta – other pledges to the Islamic State
Russia and China – superpower implications
Epilogue – Keeping the Wheel Turning
Getting business back to usual
The exploitation of Egypt
Wild card number one – opening up Iran
A new Iran, a new sectarian war
Wild card number two – American oil
A new Saudi Arabia, a new chapter
Notes
Index
INTRODUCTION
S
wept along on a tidal wave of euphoria, many people had cautiously begun to
believe that the Arab uprisings of 2011 heralded the dawn of a new era in which
more progressive, secular, and perhaps even democratic states could finally be
built from the ruins of tyranny. But hopes were dashed almost as soon as they
were raised, and any remaining optimism quickly gave way to shock and dismay
as resurgent religious politics, bloody counter-revolutions, and sectarian wars
began to take hold. To make matters worse, not only were the ideals of the so-
called ‘Arab Spring’ left lying in tatters, but its failures somehow seemed
responsible for the rise of ever more repressive dictatorships, along with some of
the most brutal incarnations of Islamic extremism the world has ever seen.
Forlorn, dispirited, and resigned to an Arab world doomed to fail, activists and
scholars inevitably began to ask, ‘What went wrong?’ After all, if parts of
Europe, Latin America, and even Africa once managed to cut the shackles of
authoritarianism, then why not the Arabs? Moreover, and more urgently, many
have asked why the region’s predominant and essentially peace-promoting
Islamic faith had once again proven so vulnerable to cooption and subversion by
powerful fanatics, even in the twenty-first century. All are important questions
demanding a response and explanations, not only because an honest and
thorough postmortem of the Arab Spring is needed, but because those who
aspire to a brighter future for the region must be better prepared to identify the
real root causes behind its perennial afflictions.
Beginning at the beginning, the answers put forward in this book first require
a little time travel, not only to establish the causes of the Arab Spring, but also to
help understand how it sits in history. Demonstrating that the events of 2011 and
the subsequent counter-revolutions were in many ways nothing new, it shows
how important elements of each have frequently surfaced in what is best
understood as a centuries-old and worldwide pattern of popular challenges and
autocratic reactions. Importantly, these struggles were rarely limited to just one
country or a region’s elites and their opponents, but instead were often a function
of the inextricably interlinked interests of influential foreign powers and their