Sometimes there is a clustering of historical moments. Perhaps we are living through one of those, the past few days have brought renewed hope to Europe and the Middle East, not least because of US leadership on both fronts, writes Frederick Kemp, president and CEO of the Atlantic Council.
Let’s start with Saturday’s vote in the US House of Representatives passing a massive $95 billion package to help allies and partners — most importantly, I think, Ukraine. The vote demonstrates continued US leadership at a time when the world faces the greatest threats to global order since the 1930s.
Most decisive was the action of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson. The Senate will consider the measures early this week, and President Joe Biden is expected to sign the bill, but Johnson’s change is the most impressive.
“The speaker’s torturous path to accepting aid for Ukraine is the result of many factors,” the Washington Post’s Leigh Ann Caldwell and Mariana Sotomayor wrote in a fascinating Sunday report on “The Evolution of Mike Johnson on Ukraine.” They include “high-level intelligence briefings as House leader, his faith, the advice of three committee chairmen named Mike, and the realization that the GOP will never come together on Ukraine.”
One could disregard one’s faith in this list, but that would be a mistake. Johnson’s awareness of Russia’s widespread persecution of Protestants in occupied Ukraine must have had a profound effect. Ukrainian evangelical pastor Pavlo Unguryan met with the speaker recently, and as word of Russia’s actions spread, some American evangelicals urged the House to act.
Reporters continue to quote an emotional Johnson, responding last week to a question from the Washington Post at a press conference: “Look, history judges us for what we do. This is a critical moment, a critical moment on the world stage. I could have made a selfish decision and do something different, but I’m doing what I believe is right here.”
Johnson did do the right thing, and to do so he had to rely on unanimous Democratic support against opposition from just over half (112 to be exact) of his fellow Republicans. History will thank him. Some of his myopic colleagues will not. Somehow, he avoided what I warned last week could be a “geopolitical blunder.”
Now is the time for the United States to take the lead with its allies in ensuring Ukraine’s territorial integrity, democracy, and security, up to and including a concrete path to NATO membership.
As for the Middle East, it’s worth going back to the Inflection Points column on November 18 last year, less than six weeks after Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel. I wrote: “There is an immediate need for moderate, modernizing Arab countries and Israel to quietly begin laying the groundwork for a collective security organization similar to NATO and an economic body similar to the European Union. These institutions would unlock the region’s potential by oppose his relentless cycles of violence.
In that sense, the region moved one step closer last week, as you’ll learn from David Igne of the Washington Post’s brilliant analysis and reporting under the title “The Untold Story of Why Israel Didn’t Defeat Iran.”
Ignatius wrote: “In its measured response, Israel appeared to be weighing the interest of its allies in this coalition — Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan — who all provided quiet assistance in last weekend’s strike. It’s a long game, in other words.”
Here, the United States was crucial, using the leverage only it has to push for normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, a goal Hamas deliberately targeted with its October 7 attack. On Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Biden administration is now making a new push for a deal under which the Israelis would accept a new commitment to Palestinian statehood in exchange for normalization by Saudi Arabia.
What would Saudi Arabia get? A more robust defense and security relationship with the United States, aid for the acquisition of civilian nuclear power, and a new push for a Palestinian state, which again are things only Washington can provide. The package is “in the final stages of negotiations,” according to Wall Street Journal reporters.
This course of action recognizes that the best way to defeat Iran over time is to solidify the cooperation of countries that its extremism and proxies threaten, much as the Soviet Union was contained by a coalition of like-minded delivered better outcomes for their people.
A week of good news does not lead to strategic change, neither in Europe nor in the Middle East. Still, the last week presents a momentum-shifting opportunity in both theaters that the United States and its partners should seize.
