Middle East: The conflict that could define our destiny

We’re a month into another war in West Asia. As visions of Iraq and weapons of mass destruction fabrications waft in the air like political farts, I’m pondering if this might be the crisis that brings forth WW III or the moment that forces a wide-scale global recalibration?

For so many of us, the bombs and drones dropping in the so-called Middle East are simply life props, a crisis you’ve left on mute because it’s yet to fully land on your doorstep, mere background noise that mostly concerns others, elsewhere – if that sounds like your reaction, I urge you to pay closer order to the different machinations and potential outcomes.

Don’t get me wrong, taking a deep dive into the rapidly escalating events will leave you with palpitations as you consider the global implications. Remember, when America and its allies catch a cold the rest of us will truly sneeze. This is what is playing out in real time as munitions pound the region and the fear of a wider conflagration grows ever stronger.

In case you missed the highlights; on February 28th America and Israel launched attacks on Iranian positions taking out the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei killing several of his top aides and family members. A similar attack obliterated a girls’ school in Minab, taking the lives of over 165 pupils age seven to 12 years old. The retaliatory strikes against targets in the region have been swift. As the death toll mounts and the cost being paid by all sides in both blood and treasure escalates, the global community is urging all parties to find an off-ramp and soon. The region can’t withstand this and neither can the global economy.

So far this conflict has seen tens of billions of dollars go up in flames and those costs will rise and the people who will ultimately pick up the tab are you and I – in everything from innocents dying to the material cost of food, travel, financial products and everything in between. Whether we’re living in the Caribbean, Africa or Europe there is now a global connectivity that means a conflict of this size in one part of the world has a profound impact everywhere else.

This is not a political piece. Believe it or not this is not an article where we can dissect the last 50 years of international relations and form an opinion one way or the other. The moment simply is and the next question is, how do we move forward in a way that can teach us real lessons about the cost of conflict and the consequences of uni-polarity.

After World War II, the different global systems that were put in place to ensure that events that placed the security of the entire world at risk were no longer possible due to international laws, global institutions and a reinforced sense that attacking your enemies will only ensure mutual destruction. These systems have failed us.

What we’ve ended up getting however, is a supercharged version of ‘might is right.’ White House advisor Stephen Miller said it publicly (and with some obvious pride). America is allowed to do as it pleases because it’s bigger and more powerful than everyone else. That may well be the case as things stands but all evidence points to a reworking of the old political script.

Countries outside of the established Western sphere of influence are recognising that in a period where the whims and fancy of global superpowers can lead to your people becoming targets or your entire economies being reduced to ash, a sense of self-sufficiency and forging new alliances is the only way forward.

One has only to look around at the speed at which old relationships are being redefined. Take the case of Caribbean countries, including Jamaica, being pressured to expel Cuban medical personnel. When a much-needed resource becomes a bargaining tool or a blackmail chip, it’s clear your claim of independence is merely a façade. Your leaders have no control over your country’s destiny. They are merely political placeholder, compliant in the face of even a hint of adversary.

The tightening energy embargo that is currently crippling Cuba is another example of this. President Trump has said quite clearly it will be an ‘honour for him to take Cuba’ as he is taken Venezuela as he hopes to take Iran and the list goes on. These new conflicts have exposed systems that cannot be allowed to be the default positions going forward. There has to be a new sense that we all have too much to lose by allowing the global bully to simply have its way, whether it is in West Asia, Africa or the Caribbean.

STRENGTHEN ALTERNATIVE ALLIANCES

The conflict continuing in West Asia has so far cost the US alone around $200 billion and that is a price the American people will soon refuse to pay. With all the death and destruction that I’m sure will continue either with this war or another conflict under a different guise, the best thing that can happen for the global community is if America focuses inward. This may well be a tipping point where people who can’t afford groceries, escalating energy cost, childcare and life’s very basics will say no more. Let’s look after our own first before funding further international excursions.

Maybe, just maybe, the global community can take that opportunity to further strengthen alternative alliances that are currently in their embryonic stages. Some concrete signs so far that this may well be the case are an increase in countries doing business in the Chinese Yuan and wealthier nations thus far refusing to be drawn further into this military quagmire as they know ultimately it is their citizens who will pay a high price.

This era of uni-polarity has not benefited the wider global community. Perhaps we are now at this defining stage because what has been for the last five decades or so cannot be allowed to continue unchallenged moving forward. In the end, everyone returns the negotiating table. In the end, it is not the overwhelming sounds of death and carnage that lead to change, its dialogue and a fundamental understanding that our mutual destruction is too high a price to pay, even for us.

Perhaps the one positive to emerge from this new conflict is another way has to be possible. We’re staring far too closely into the abyss to accept anything else.

Amina Taylor is a journalist and broadcaster. She is the former editor of Pride magazine and works as producer, presenter and correspondent with Press TV in London.