US keeps Middle East enemies too close

[unhappycamper]

http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID01-030314.html



US keeps Middle East enemies too close
By Walid Phares
Feb 28, '14

The Barack Obama administration has committed strategic mistakes in the Middle East that will likely undermine US national and security interests for subsequent administrations after 2016.

The damage done is severe, and a remedy seems out of reach unless earth shattering changes are applied to Washington's foreign policy. The common core of strategic mistakes made by the Obama administration has been its misperceptions of partners in the region.

While the Bush administration's narrative on backing pro-democracy forces was consistent, it efforts to achieve anything was undermined by the Washington bureaucracy. By the time the Obama administration installed itself on Pennsylvania Avenue in 2009, little had been accomplished in regards to identifying these pro-democracy forces and supporting them.

As the current administration replaced Bush, civil society groups in the Middle East were systematically abandoned. Aid to liberal forces was cut off and engagement with the radicals became a priority. The mistakes of the Bush-era bureaucracy became the official policy of the Obama administration.