I would like to thank Professor Gregory Gause for a very stimulating discussion. The ‘arc of weakness’ is his phrase, and his work is central to my understanding of the region’s security dynamics. Take a map of the MidEast and draw a line connecting the Persian Gulf to the Eastern Mediterranean. This is the battlefront in the rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Two hitherto-strong states of the region, Iraq and Syria, have gone from being ‘players’ in the regional game to ‘playing fields’ for regional and great powers. They join two others, Lebanon and Palestine, to form an ‘arc of weakness’ in the Middle East. Even Egypt, the bellwether of the Arab world, has become the site of regional jockeying for influence. What is the most useful way to think about these developments?
The Arc of Weakness
The Arc of Weakness
The Arc of Weakness
I would like to thank Professor Gregory Gause for a very stimulating discussion. The ‘arc of weakness’ is his phrase, and his work is central to my understanding of the region’s security dynamics. Take a map of the MidEast and draw a line connecting the Persian Gulf to the Eastern Mediterranean. This is the battlefront in the rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Two hitherto-strong states of the region, Iraq and Syria, have gone from being ‘players’ in the regional game to ‘playing fields’ for regional and great powers. They join two others, Lebanon and Palestine, to form an ‘arc of weakness’ in the Middle East. Even Egypt, the bellwether of the Arab world, has become the site of regional jockeying for influence. What is the most useful way to think about these developments?