A Dangerous Power Vacuum
Two great events, the fall of the Soviet Union and the Arab Spring, have, over the past 25 years, left what is increasingly becoming a power vacuum in the Middle East and Central Asia. Now, the world’s pre-eminent power, the United States, is gradually reducing its presence in this region, accelerating the development of the power vacuum that has been forming in this region in recent years. Moreover, no other power is capable of replacing the United States in the role of the chief balancer of power in the region, and none of the local powers in the region are strong enough to dominate this vast region on their own. Add to this volatile mix the fact that many of the states of the region are artificial creations that are collapsing under the weight of their internal contradictions, and it is clear that centralized power is waning across much of the Middle East and Central Asia.
In the Middle East, a number of states (Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and possibly Lebanon) are already what can be described as failed states, and the warfare and unrest inside these countries’ borders is threatening the stability of the wider region. To the east, Afghanistan and Pakistan remain chaotic countries in which their central governments have struggled to extend their control over vast areas of each country. Meanwhile, the authoritarian governments of the former Soviet Central Asia are threatened by deep internal divisions in those countries, as well as questions over the health of the region’s aged leaders. Add to this mix the region’s fast-growing youth population and low levels of job creation, and the region was clearly a powder keg ready to explode.
This is not the first presence of a power vacuum in the Middle East and Central Asia, as there are a number of historical examples of power vacuums in the region. Given the strategic location of this region, it is little surprise that previous power vacuums here have had major global repercussions. For example, plagues and constant warfare in the 5th and 6th centuries significantly weakened the Byzantine (eastern Roman) and Persian empires that had dominated the Middle East and Central Asia for centuries. This allowed the previously minor Arab tribes of the western Arabian Peninsula to dramatically fill this power vacuum in the 7th century bringing their new religion, Islam, to the region, where it dominates to this day. Another power vacuum in this region developed in the 19th and early 20th centuries as the Ottoman Empire collapsed and Persia fell into backwater status. This power vacuum was filled by Europe’s imperial powers (Britain, France and Russia), which colonized much of the region and created the borders that today are causing so many of the problems in the region.
These historical examples show why a power vacuum in the Middle East and Central Asia is so dangerous. So far, it does not appear that any of the region’s leading local powers (Turkey, Iran or Saudi Arabia), are capable of filling this vacuum on its own, but then again, no one in the early 7th century would have predicted that the Arabs would overrun the former great powers of Byzantium and Persia. Likewise, the only external power with the capability to play a dominant role in the region is the United States, and the US’ military focus on East Asia and its development of its domestic oil and gas industry means that the US is unlikely to seek to continue to play this leading role in the region. The only other power that will have the potential to play such a role in the region in the future is China, given its interest in the resources of Central Asia and the Middle East, but it will be a long time before China’s power capabilities will allow it to play such a role. As a result, the threat of a full-blown power vacuum in the Middle East and Central Asia remains great, and history has shown us that this can lead to dramatic and unforeseen geopolitical changes that have the potential to change the world.