US security threats, new and old

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A somewhat surprising aspect of Goss's public testimony was China's military modernization, which, according to him, is tilting the balance of power in the Taiwan Strait and is threatening US forces in the region. The timing of this statement is rather bizarre, since it comes when China is busy finding a way to influence North Korea to reinitiate the stalled six-nation talks (involving the US, North Korea, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia) on its reported possession of nuclear weapons. As much as the administration of US President George W Bush is attempting to pursue a diplomatic resolution of that issue, it is clear that it will not be able to push North Korea in that direction without China's active involvement.

Why antagonize China at this juncture, then? One possibility is that there might have been a mix-up among the CIA, the State Department and the National Security Council on the timing of public disclosure of this matter. After all, China's military modernization has been taking place ceaselessly for decades. In fact, it can be argued that China's military strategy in terms of a potential military solution of the Taiwan conflict is somewhat dated. Beijing has yet to take into consideration the US military campaign strategies during Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom to tweak - or radically alter - its own campaign plans against Taiwan. Thus any depiction of China's activities as "threatening" to the US forces in the region is definitely an overstatement.

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In the meantime, the murder of Lebanon's former prime minister Rafik Hariri has given the US an opportunity to influence events inside that country through the use of diplomacy. Even Iran might have been somewhat taken aback, if not by Hariri's murder, but certainly at the US's quick decision to put pressure on Syria to withdraw from Lebanon. Goss' remarks might also have been timed to put further pressure on Iran and Syria, since it accuses Iran of supporting terrorism, aiding Iraqi insurgents, and seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. Through the remarks, it is possible that the Bush administration has decided to add a few new wrinkles to its already established strategy of transforming the Middle East. The new wrinkles appear to be the decision to zoom in on both Iran and Syria.

Syria's role, like that of Iran's, in the Iraqi insurgency has also been a source of considerable irritation to the US now it has become clear to American diplomats that Syria would not go out of its way to control the flow of insurgents through its territory into Iraq. Thus a decision was made to increase pressure on Syria to get out of Lebanon, a move that might turn out to be too much of a high price for Syria's old-line autocrats who are really running the government in the name of Bashar Assad, its current president. Those autocrats are Ba'athists belonging to Hafez Assad's generation who have no intention of changing their way of governance of Syria and Lebanon. The speed with which events seem to be developing in Lebanon, it appears that the US might be able to see the withdrawal of Syria from that country before too long. Right now, Assad's emissaries are looking for some sort of a coalition-building in Iran, as if that coalition would withstand the mighty force of international pressure that is building up against Syria's continued occupation. The US seems to be very much in the forefront of such a move for a change.

Asia Times