A General’s Retirement is a Chance to Reflect by David Ignatius

Political crossfire A General’s Retirement is a Chance to Reflect on America’s Standing in the Middle East

by David Ignatius

When Marine Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie Jr. became head of U.S. Central Command in 2019, his chief worry was Iran. Now, as he ends his tour on April 1, Iran is still the priority. The abiding lesson for the region, says McKenzie, is that “Iran is not going to go away.”

America’s power waxed and waned in the Middle East over the three years of McKenzie’s command of U.S. forces in the region. The United States quit its longest war in Afghanistan, and traditional partners such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates began to hedge their bets. But Iranian power remained a constant.

McKenzie has been among the Pentagon’s hawks on Iran, and he carried out the order to kill Iranian Quds Force leader Qasem Soleimani in January 2020. But he told me last week that as he hands over military responsibility for the region, he’s convinced that “we need to find an accommodation with Iran going forward.” Tehran’s centrality is likely to increase even more as the Biden administration moves toward a renewal of the Iran nuclear agreement soon.

McKenzie’s retirement this week offers a chance to reflect on where America stands in the Middle East after spending so much blood and treasure there for decades as the region’s chief policeman. The honest answer is that the United States has been treading water much of the time, trying to maintain a status quo that was inherently unstable.

McKenzie’s assignment was sometimes a thankless task. Even the countries that benefited most from America’s military umbrella, such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE, are now flirting with China. But the Gulf Arabs are also turning in secret to Israel to coordinate regional air defense against Iran. Facilitating that covert partnership might be the most important achievement on McKenzie’s watch.

I made several trips to the region with McKenzie and talked with him often during his time as Centcom commander. Those conversations mapped the arc of American power. The two presidents he served wanted U.S. troops out of Afghanistan, against the recommendations of McKenzie and other military commanders. His job was to oversee that chaotic retreat last August – and deter Iran and other adversaries without starting any new wars.

My first trip with McKenzie was in July 2019. We visited Saudi Arabia as the United States was installing new Patriot missile batteries to protect the kingdom. We saw startling modernization of Saudi society – I could never have imagined street musicians and unveiled women promenading in Jiddah. But the repressive face of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman lurked in the background. For example, we shared a lavish lunch with Gen. Fahd bin Turki, then the commander of Saudi forces in Yemen and a rising star in the Saudi military. A year later, MBS, as the crown prince is known, had him arrested.

Iran flexed its muscles during our visit, seizing oil tankers in the Persian Gulf, and I flew with McKenzie to a U.S. warship in the gulf that had just foiled an Iranian drone attack. His message was to keep cool and avoid a direct military confrontation. Iran was “trying to gauge our intent and our commitment,” McKenzie told me and another journalist traveling with him. He preferred to show force but to try not to use it.

The following January, with Iranian threats continuing, McKenzie recommended what was probably the most potent display of U.S. power against Iran since the revolution of 1979 – the drone attack that killed Soleimani. McKenzie told me in a recent interview that the United States had intelligence that Soleimani was planning new attacks that could have killed Americans in Iraq.

The attack drew a harsh Iranian response: a pinpoint missile attack on Iraq’s al-Asad air base that was meant to kill Americans and would have if U.S. intelligence hadn’t obtained early warning that allowed U.S. troops to seek shelter. The retaliation demonstrated the precision of Iranian missiles – and the threat they pose to the region. But McKenzie argues that the net effect of the Soleimani tit-for-tat was that it reinforced American deterrence.

Another military success during McKenzie’s tour was the battle against the Islamic State in Syria. We traveled in 2019 to Kobane to meet the United States’ partner in that fight, Syrian Kurdish Gen. Mazloum Abdi. The Kurds provided crucial intelligence that allowed McKenzie’s forces to target and kill Islamic State leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi in February, another key operation during his tour.

America’s chaotic retreat from Afghanistan seemed to mark the eclipse of U.S. power in the Middle East. That’s certainly the way the Saudis and Emiratis perceived it. But as McKenzie leaves his command, U.S. military forces remain in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Bahrain and Kuwait – not to mention Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. The Middle East remains a codependent habit that neither the United States nor its fickle friends seem able to quit.