President Trump's temporary ban on
immigrants from seven Muslim-majority
countries has been criticized as being
unAmerican.
One of the people who is detained over the weekend was a
five-year-old who is detained for hours
separated from his mother whose from Iran.
But the ban is also having an
effect on American military strategy in
the Middle East. Instead of protecting
the US, Republican Senators John McCain
and Lindsey Graham are warning that the
ban could be a self-inflicted wound in
the fight against terrorism.
It was obviously rushed out but no effort was
really made to consider what the
strategic impact was in any of these
seven countries.
This is Tony Cordesman. He writes and advises on military policy
not immigration.But Cordesman sees Trump's
executive order as more than an immigration policy.
It already has had a major effect on
ISIS propaganda. They picked up on it immediately.
Already some jihadist
groups are claiming victory over the
executive order. Saying that the policy
proves the United States is at war with
Islam.
They're calling President Trump's action the "Blessed ban".
The policy plays perfectly into ISIS's most vital
narrative, that the West persecutes Muslims
and that is a holy duty to fight back.
That message carries even more weight when
paired with the fact that Trump has
explicitly tailored the ban to make it
easier for Christians to immigrate to
the US.
As it related to persecuted Christians do you see them as kind of a
priority here? Yes. You do? Yes
The ban is also rattling relationships with key
partners in the Middle East and around
the world
It tends to alienate Muslims even if
they're not in the seven countries
and people outside those countries now
have no idea of what's going to happen
next.
Most of the world's Muslims are not in
the Middle East. A substantial number are
in Africa.
But others are strategic partners in
Asia, Indonesia. India is a country that
has very large number of Muslims.
Iraq is one strategic partner that
is bearing most of the burden in the fight
against ISIS. And has lost thousands of
soldiers along the way. It's a country
that the US needs on its side.
But Iraq is one of the countries included in
the ban and they're not happy.
It's humiliating, its like spitting in the
face of Iraqis. When you are essentially
fighting side-by-side with Iraqi troops
to ban all entry from Iraq.
Made no real sense at all was an almost perfect
way of alienating a partner.
In three other banned countries, Libya, Somalia, and
Yemen the US has a small military
presence to monitor terror groups and
conduct counter-terror operations.
And the impact the message you are sending
all of these countries is that
regardless of who they are, how much they
cooperate with the United States,
They're going to be excluded.
The US also counts on a broader coalition of
security allies for intelligence sharing
and other counterterrorism operations.
Every one of these countries are
Muslim-majority nations and many have
spoken out against the ban. And we heard
from Pakistan Foreign Minister the move
will not affect terrorists
however it will increase the miseries of
the victims of terrorism. So in many ways
you've taken a threat which gets an
immense amount of media attention but
actually produces almost no
casualties. And you've used it in ways which
threaten our strategic partnerships and
military relations with critical
largely Muslim states roughly from Morocco
to Malaysia.
The hasty release of the executive order is also creating rifts
within Trump days old national security
team. There is a secretary of defense has
a great deal of competence in this area and
is focused on the far broader issues of
security. Particularly in the countries
that were named and he was not consulted.
Secretary Mattis reportedly saw a draft of
the executive order just hours before it
was signed. Trump gave him no input.
This may be because six months earlier Mattis
said publicly that a Muslim immigration
ban would quote, "send shockwaves through
the entire international system." And he
was right.
Trump's ban didn't just affect the
people immigrating to the United States
from seven Muslim-majority countries.
It is having a much broader negative effect
on the security partnerships that the
US depends on in the Middle East and
Asia. A network of relationships that is
not easily repaired.