In Geopolitics Today - Wednesday, July 14th
Tensions Remain Over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and One Approach for Getting Out of the Middle East
Tensions Remain Over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam
In March this year, Egypt and Sudan signed a military pact that will see deeper engagement on matters of security between the two countries. Perhaps the most significant factors behind this military engagement relates to each participants conflicts of interest with their neighbour Ethiopia. Ethiopia continues to fill the reservoir, but its neighbours feel compelled to act against the dam in the face of a potential catastrophe at home.
The three neighbouring countries have had longstanding disputes regarding the ownership and flow of the Blue Nile river. The latest manifestation of this dispute over water resources has been going on since 2011, when Ethiopia began the construction of its Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Egypt in particular is posturing to demonstrate a credible military threat against the dam — whether that presence is a show of strength in negotiations or as a springboard for a future military operation remains to be seen. But there has also been a significant Ethiopian military presence at the site of the dam since construction began, a presence that is likely to remain for the foreseeable future as a deterrent to Egypt and Sudan.
While there has been some marginal progress in working out a compromise diplomatically, the issue has ultimately not been resolved, with considerable disagreement on the amount of time in which the reservoir should be filled (a short time-frame in which the reservoir is filled would devastate the Egyptian economy). The continued flow of water from the Blue Nile — which meets the White Nile in Khartoum, Sudan — is a matter of life or death for the Egyptian government. Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry GERD said his country is facing an “existential threat posed by the construction of a giant entity on the artery that gives it life.”
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One Approach for Getting Out of the Middle East
As the United States is set to finally leave Afghanistan, there is plenty to speculate about what, if any, sort of American presence remains in Afghanistan following the withdrawal. Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, Doug Bandow, argues that the withdrawal from Afghanistan ought to be the beginning of a far broader move to encourage regional parties to tend to their own security structures.
Bandow seems to advocate for a future US posture in the Middle East to be based around a strategy of offshore balancing. He notes that Afghanistan should really be only the start of a wider withdrawal and the fact that because the US is fighting Iranian‐backed militias in Iraq “for no good reason.” He takes the view that sanctioning and occupying parts of Syria and continuing to aid Saudi Arabia in its war against Yemen was detrimental to US interests.
To Bandow, the experience of fighting in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan echoes the views of political scientist Eugene Gholz, who argues that US policy in the region has been particularly harmful because its presence of the US military undermines US interests by contributing to instability. As Gholz notes, the US presence has manifested over the decades into a “power imbalance” leading to a scenario where “states that align with the US feel they can rely on US military might, while those deemed hostile must fear the possibility of invasion and regime change.” The result is that the behaviour of both allies and adverseries changes: partners act with impunity, adversaries seek avenues of resistance.
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