U.S. Strategy after the Arab Uprisings: Toward Progressive Engagement

Abstract

Two years into the wave of upheaval sweeping the Arab world, new regional dynamics have become clearer, as have unresolved tensions in current U.S. policy toward the region. Given the scale and velocity of political turmoil associated with the Arab uprisings, the Obama administration has understandably adopted a largely reactive approach, attempting to adjust U.S. policies to a rapidly changing environment. It has been more successful in those efforts than is commonly recognized, maintaining effective pressure against Iran and al-Qaeda while helping to broker meaningful political transitions in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and Libya. But now there is a sense of drift overtaking American strategy for the region. The time has come for the Obama administration to articulate a more coherent, overarching, positive agenda for the new Middle East. The United States must frankly and carefully specify its vital national interests at stake in the Arab world, the resources it is able and willing to commit to pursue them, and the inherent contradictions among some of its objectives. We reject the popular argument that Washington must return to a more assertive and militarized regional grand strategy: the United States cannot afford deeper military involvement in regional conflicts or massive economic