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OPINION:
Israel’s stunningly successful strike against Iran’s nuclear and missile programs may be the best example yet of the “burden sharing” approach to foreign policy favored by President Trump. A militarily and economically advanced regional power whose interests often align with the United States, Israel acted against an imminent Iranian nuclear threat with skill and apparently limited reliance on direct American support. Washington would be wise to pocket Israel’s win for the collective West, avoid America’s time-honored tradition of Middle Eastern overreach and redirect strategic bandwidth to the Indo-Pacific.
The temptation for American policymakers after any moment of perceived opportunity in the Middle East has been to invest significant resources and attention in seeking deeper change across the region. Cooler heads prevailed after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, persuading President George H.W. Bush to avoid toppling the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq. However, American presidents have acted hubristically and with damaging strategic consequences after similar moments of Middle Eastern upheaval. These include President George W. Bush’s post-9/11 invasion of Iraq and the ensuing “Freedom Agenda” and President Obama’s misbegotten intervention in Libya and ignored “red line” declaration in Syria. These moments of strategic confusion have damaged American interests in the Middle East and, more significantly, have distracted Washington from the growing threat of the Chinese Communist Party.
Mr. Trump, in his first term, showed no such illusions about the reality of Middle Eastern politics and where America’s long-term strategic interests lay. His 2017 National Security Strategy rejected the overstretch of his immediate predecessors and directed American attention to the long-term economic and military rivalry with China. Through a combination of deft diplomacy, economic pressure, shrewd alliance management and military deterrence, Mr. Trump in four years destroyed the Islamic State group caliphate, hobbled Iran’s economy and military, checked Beijing’s ambitions in the region by strengthening ties to the Gulf Arab monarchies and brokered the historic Abraham Accords between Israel and its Islamic neighbors. This record showed an understanding of the limits of American power to reshape the region in our image, as well as an appreciation for the Middle East’s relative weight in Washington’s strategic ledger.
With the theocracy in Tehran on the ropes and Israel seemingly pressing its advantage, voices in Washington will argue that Mr. Trump should actively aid Israel’s campaign against the Islamic republic and perhaps seek to overthrow the regime. This approach would be a strategic misstep and contradictory to Mr. Trump’s long-standing policy of American restraint in theaters of secondary importance to core national interests. Israel has so far succeeded militarily in the shared goal of damaging, if not destroying, Iran’s nuclear program and undermining the ability of the Iranian regime to wage proxy warfare against allied interests.
Israel’s success offers the U.S. an opportunity to reset in the region, delegating responsibility for containing future Iranian ambitions to Israel while using the threat of future strikes, backed by American intelligence and enablers, to compel comprehensive negotiations with Tehran from a position of unquestioned U.S. strength. Such an arrangement is in keeping with Mr. Trump’s negotiating preferences and desire for strategic humility in a world of scarce resources.
As the fog of war recedes in the Middle East, the Trump administration can look ahead to its greatest challenge: resetting the economic relationship and military balance with China. Beijing’s aggression against American partners and allies such as Taiwan and the Philippines is increasing, and China’s military and industrial capacity grows apace. Mr. Trump’s core foreign policy tenets of burden sharing and strategic restraint can be vindicated in the Middle East while permitting him to focus on the China challenge that will define his presidency and this century.
• Mr. Gray, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, served as deputy assistant to the president and as chief of staff of the White House National Security Council from 2019 to 2021.
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