Middle East insurance policy
The Bush administration has not yet reached its first 100 days and can hardly be expected to have all its diplomatic ducks in a row. After early missteps regarding Iraq and North Korea, the administration rose to the challenge in securing the release of 24 members of a reconnaissance plane that made an emergency landing in Chinese territory.
How, we wonder, could an administration that showed almost impeccable instincts in dealing with China move so quickly toward making a potentially disastrous move in the Middle East?
For nearly 20 years, U.S. forces have been part of the Multinational Force and Observers stationed in the Sinai Peninsula. At present, 865 U.S. troops are part of the 1,900-person force. They are there as part of the Camp David agreement that brought peace between Egypt and Israel.
That agreement stands as a symbol of U.S. success as an honest broker in Middle East politics.
Why then, just three months into the administration of President George W. Bush would Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld propose pulling the American troops out of the Sinai?
We understand that President Bush is on record as saying that the U.S. military is overextended and that all peacekeeping commitments should be reviewed to see if they can be reduced or eliminated. But the Sinai force provides an important buffer between two nations that only have a history of peace dating to 1982.
Importance beyond numbers: There is a symbolism to having U.S. troops as part of that multinational force that is far more important than their small numbers.
While it is true that the United States cannot be the world's policeman, it is also true that it is at present the world's only remaining superpower. If it wants to remain so, it must sometimes act the part. Pulling out of the Sinai would send a message to a restive part of the globe that the United States is not reassessing its role but is in full retreat already.
The Middle East is a tinderbox. The United States has to do more than have Secretary of State Colin Powell criticize the Palestinians one day and the Israelis the next.
Thursday, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat took the occasion of a meeting with a U.S. congressional delegation to propose that he and the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, simultaneously call for an end to violence. Obviously the United States has a role to play in the Middle East and it must accept the responsibility that falls to it.
False economy: Pulling our troops out of the Sinai would be a penny wise, pound foolish maneuver.
It would embolden Israel's enemies -- those within established governments and those in guerrilla movements -- who would interpret the pullout as a sign of weakness.
As an insurance policy against such an interpretation, the continuing presence of less than 1,000 troops in the Sinai is a small price to pay.