The Expanding Axis – Part II
Trump Needs to Move from Local Deals to Strategic Decisions
There needs to be a Trump foreign policy reset as the global reality is changing daily. The Witkoff, real-estate deal based foreign policy has failed miserably since the desire for a win-win deal is not in the “interests” of Hamas, Russia and Iran. Saudi Arabia, UAE and even Qatar happily signed deals but Hamas sees that the gates of hell have opened for the Gazans but not for them. The gates of hell meanwhile have also opened against israel diplomatically and Jews are being targeted with violence and with other means of intimidation while much of the West, led by France’s Macron is more eager to declare recognition of a Palestinian state than standing up to terrorism.
Iran is dragging its feet and daring the US and Israel to attack it. Contra Tucker Carlson, there is reams of evidence that Iran either has or is as close as can be to having a nuclear bomb. What is not clear is if it is too late for military attack to actually destroy it. Planners must assume that they have secret sites that neither Israel nor the US knows about and the ones that are known might be out of reach of even America’s best (non-nuclear) bunker busters. Iran, according to the WSJ has ordered from China tens of millions of dollars worth of equipment to build missiles and, as we reported, now has a direct train link with China. Iran in other words is acting as the regional hegemon it so desperately wants to be. It is preparing to subdue the Gulf states and to destroy Israel and perpetrate another attempt at genocide against the Jewish people.
Egypt too is moving closer to China as we have written recently. They have taken a further anti-Western turn by closing the Santa Katerina monastery on Jebel Musa – the place where many believe is the biblical Mount Sinai. This monastery has been in operation continuously for over 1,500 years, making it the oldest Christian monastery in the world. No reason was given for the closure, and it negates a promise that Egyptian president As-Sisi gave to the Greek prime minister in a recent visit. The closure can only be seen as a slap in the face to the Christian world (please note, Mr. Carlson) and as a gift to Egypt’s own Islamists, the notorious and illegal Moslem Brotherhood as it prepares itself to turn eastward. Egypt and Iran have renewed diplomatic talks and one can wonder if China is building a new middle eastern alliance.
Russia of course is continuing to attack Kyiv and other civilian targets and Ukraine’s destruction of an unknown percentage of Russia’s strategic bomber fleet will certainly not move Putin towards the peace deal Witkoff has been angling to get.
The Axis is in flux but is expanding and getting bolder. China is staying in the background but is most certainly “advising” its allies in its dealings. They have brilliantly maneuvered the United States to speaking with the secondary members of the Axis – Russia and Iran and even with allies of the secondary members like Hamas. Witkoff is looking for local deals while ignoring not only local culture just as the Western “nation-builders” did. Witkoff is also ignoring the greater strategic implications of using American prestige in failed attempts at “deals”.
The Trump foreign policy needs a reset. Victor Davis Hanson, one of the most prescient commentators on policy foreign and domestic has suggested putting Witkoff under Secretary of State Marco Rubio who has a more strategic outlook and has spent years helping to formulate foreign and defense policy from the Senate. Rubio is competent, smart and pragmatic and will be able to better manage a foreign policy that has gone too local and tactical.
Where should Rubio take this policy? As we stated, China is looking to expand its Axis by including countries with large and powerful armies such as Egypt. In the middle east, as we have stated many times, the most logical alliances center on Israel. In the Mediterranean, Israel, Greece and Cyprus all have common interests and a decade of cooperation. As a matter of fact, the Israel-Cyprus-Greece alliance is probably Netanyahu’s greatest foreign policy success – although even he doesn’t seem to realize it. The US could help to add Italy to this alliance, creating a strong democratic bloc in the eastern Mediterranean to counter Egypt/China and Turkey.
On the other side of the middle east, the countries that should be the center of a new US alliance are, again, Israel, UAE, Saudi Arabia as well as Kenya and Ethiopia. Ethiopia is the world’s largest landlocked country and the US could be instrumental in getting Ethiopia the Indian Ocean port it needs in Eritrea, Djibouti or Somalia. A joint deal that would create a civilian port controlled by Ethiopia and a US naval port would serve all countries well. After the UK betrayed the US by ceding the Chagos Islands (although not yet Diego Garcia) to Mauritius (another Chinese ally) the US will need another Indian Ocean presence. The other Indian Ocean country that ought to be part of this alliance of course is India.
The Indo-Pacific is where China will of course look to extend its hegemony but only after it secures alliances that will help it sustain American economic and military pressure in case of war. If the US along with Japan, Australia, South Korea, Philippines and Vietnam do in fact chose to help Taiwan defend itself the Chinese will be dependent upon locking down US forces in other parts of the world. Axis allies like Egypt and Iran (nuclear or not) along with Pakistan will stretch and threaten US capabilities.
In the meanwhile, a Rubio led Trump inspired foreign policy that puts America’s broad interests first and thinks strategically will push back against the expanding Axis – in the middle east and elsewhere. If the current administration continues the Witkoff based” local deal making” strategy and expends American power – soft and hard – in pursuit of pipe dreams it will be way behind where it needs to be if a confrontation with China becomes hot. The US must make sure that Israel, India, the Gulf States and other allies in Africa and the eastern Mediterranean and are armed and ready - militarily, diplomatically and logistically – to free up American forces for the larger and more strategic battle in the Pacific.
For the isolationists in the Trump camp who think Iran, China and Russia are interested only in their own “legitimate” spheres of influence in spite of their pronouncements and actions one has to look only as far as South America. In the Pacific coast of South America China is working hard to create naval assets. Iran is active in Venezuela, Brazil and other countries not in the American sphere. There is no running away from the world no matter how much people yell no more endless wars. The world is sadly one big endless war.
China will look to face as small an American force as possible and that will be possible if it locks down US forces in other parts of the world because America spent its energy on local deals. It is the job of the current administration to make sure that doesn’t happen.