Focus

Regional Security in the Middle East
by Ahmed S. Hashim

The Middle East is one of the most heavily militarized regions in the world. According to The Military Balance 1999-2000, issued by the prestigious International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, the region is the world's leading importer of modern arms in absolute and relative terms. During the past 50 years, the Middle East has witnessed eight major wars and countless other smaller conflicts. Moreover, in the wake of the outbreak of violence between the Palestinian Authority and Israel in recent months, regional tensions have increased dramatically.

Traditionally, states in the Middle East have responded to threats by engaging in arms build-ups or entering into alliances with like-minded states. In this respect, regional states have followed the realpolitik approach to security adopted by much of the rest of the world, especially the major powers. The main drawback of these approaches is the action-reaction spiral they create; states will respond to their neighbors' arms build-up or alliance structures. This, in turn, engenders a reaction, and so on. The strategic analyst Robert Jervis has described this state of affairs as the 'security dilemma. In the final analysis, such a 'self-help approach makes all states worse off than before. Insecurity reigns and mutual suspicions continue unabated. Moreover, the political and financial costs become burdensome.

Such a situation exists in the Middle East where few region-wide security structures exist to mitigate the political, psychological and economic effects of arms races or alliances. Attempts to address arms races in the Middle East have been spectacular failures. In the 1950s, the major powers tried half-heartedly to institute arms control measures in the Middle East. However, the region got caught up in the Cold War, and the superpowers sought to woo regional states to their respective sides with arms exports.

For their part, alliances have often served to heighten regional tensions. For example, the Turkish-Israeli strategic relationship of recent years has been seen as a major threat by the Arab countries, Iran, and Greece.

Are there viable alternatives to the current 'self-help situation in which the states of the region find themselves? Indeed, there are. These include two concepts known as common security and cooperative security. However, whether either of these alternative approaches can be implemented in the Middle East in the short term is open to serious doubt.

The concept of common security was first presented in 1982 by the Palme Commission, which was convened to explore paths to global security that would be distinct from those associated with the Cold War era. The Commission worked from the assumption that the massive nuclear arsenals in the hands of the United States and the Soviet Union had created a level of strategic interdependence such that neither could achieve security at the expense of the other.(1) Security, argued the Commission, must be based on each side acknowledging the legitimate security interests of the other. Common security is attainable if states subscribe to the idea of non-provocative defense, such that neighboring states focus on developing purely defensive rather than offensive forces. Defensive forces would allow states to defend their territorial integrity and repel attacks by others; offensive forces allow states to engage in long-range attacks.

Unfortunately, the idea of common security in the Middle East faces two major obstacles. First, few states in the region have acknowledged the legitimate security concerns and fears of other regional states in a sustained and comprehensive manner. There have been some attempts over the years by Arabs and Israelis or Iranians and Arabs to explore these concerns through various publications and security conferences. However, these attempts have been undertaken by analysts and retired officials; they have not been translated into policy.

Secondly, most regional powers are wedded to the creation of offensive military capabilities. Most of the military build-up in the Middle East is characterized by the purchase of long-range strike aircraft or ballistic missiles, advanced tanks and long-range mobile artillery systems. Finally, some countries are convinced that their security can only be maintained if they adopt an offensive posture. For example, Israel has traditionally taken war to the territories of its foes. Its lack of strategic depth does not allow it to defend at the border or, indeed, within its own territory.

Cooperative security consists of several mutually interlocking concepts of which the most important is the quest to alter inter-state behavior from competition and rivalry to cooperation and collaboration in the area of security. Like common security, cooperative security argues that states should believe that their security is interdependent, that no one can be secure at the expense of another. This entails the construction of a system of mutual reassurance. To build reassurance in the region, states must reduce psychological barriers that limit their ability to engage in `transparent security behavior. Examples of `transparent security behavior include:

1. allowing military observers from a neighboring state to witness one's own military exercises


2. engaging in confidence-building measures (CBMs) such as joint exercises


3. exchanging of defense white papers that detail each sides military doctrine, threat perceptions, and long-range defense plans and weapons acquisitions


4. establishing a code of behavior such as informing one's neighbors of the testing or movement of major weapons systems such as ballistic missiles


5. promoting extensive military-to-military contacts as a normal occurrence between regional states to include visits to each others military academies and war colleges.

These are not unrealistic proposals. Moreover, their implementation acts to further reduce mutual suspicions and hostilities. In this context, cooperative security can be seen as a practical path leading to some form of common security in the distant future. Yet, in the Middle East there has been very little in the way of implementing the aforementioned proposals. The lack of trust among regional states has not allowed the promotion of any significant transparent security behavior. Indeed, unlike Pakistan and India where extensive military-to-military contacts have been the norm even in periods of great tension, the Middle East has seen very few military exchanges, either between the Arab states, the Gulf states and Iran, or between Israel and those Arab states with which it is at peace.

It will take a considerable amount of psychological adjustment and major structural changes in Middle East security behavior to make any of the alternatives work. However, the region cannot continue pursuing the path of unreasonable realpolitik behavior without inadvertent escalation to war or massive economic dislocation. The costs of either will be borne by all the peoples of the Middle East equally.

(1) The Independent Commission on Disarmament and Security Issues, Common Security: A Blueprint for Survival, New York, 1982, pp. 8-13.

Dr. Ahmed Hashim is the Director of the Regional Security Program at Search for Common Ground in the Middle East.

Bulletin of Regional Cooperation in the Middle East Spring 2001
Copyright 2004 Search for Common Ground