U.S. Interests in the Middle East

1. U.S. Interests in the Middle East

2. Regional Stability • U.S. policy in the Middle East from the 1940s through the 1960s was a defensive measure to protect its own interests in the area and prevent countries from becoming hostile to the U.S. • “Twin Pillar” Strategy: U.S. maintained close relationships with Saudi Arabia and Iran, fell apart when Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan

3. Collapse of “Twin Pillar” • 1. Carter Doctrine: attempt by any outside force to control Persian Gulf will be seen as an assault on the US and repelled by military force • 2. the U.S. improved its military forces • 3. U.S. sided with Iraq when war broke out with Iran (who was extremely anti-American)

4. U.S. and Israel • 1. Supporter of a Jewish state and sympathy for the Holocaust victims • 2. Israel was seen as a US ally during the Cold War • 3. Israel has often been a Middle Eastern ally of the U.S. historically being the only democratic country • 4. American Jewish community has supported Israel

5. Disagreements with Israel • 1. U.S. refusal to see Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as legitimate • 2. encouragement of Israeli citizens and Jewish immigrants to move into the West Bank • 3. Israel’s treatment of Palestinian and Arab people

6. Dependency on Oil • Middle East Reserves make up 80% of world’s known reserves • U.S. dependency on the Middle East make up about 8-12% • Western Europe imports about 33% of its oil from the Middle East • Japan imports about 50% of its oil from the Middle East

7. Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait • Role of oil: If Saddam Hussein was completely successful, he would have control of about 54% of the world’s oil reserves

8. Weapons of Mass Destruction • A. Nuclear Weapons: Israel, Iran, Iraq, Libya have the ability or have already developed nuclear weapons • B. After the Persian Gulf War, the U.S. was amazed to discover just how advanced the Iraqi nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons programs were

9. Human Rights • 1. Defining human rights among different regions in the world (for example: if a religion teaches that women should be subservient to men, are their rights being violated?) • 2. Deciding what policies the U.S. should implement (for example: should the U.S. apply political or economic pressure on a country to change its human rights practices?)

10. Human Rights Issues • Difficult to resolve in the Middle East? Why? • Because of: • long standing religious and political conflicts that have occurred in this region of the world • Complicated relationships between the U.S. and Middle Eastern countries • The world’s need for oil