Resolved: The United States should remove nearly all of its military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf. April 2020 PF Brief* *Published by Victory Briefs, PO Box 803338 #40503, Chicago, IL 60680-3338. Edited by Lawrence Zhou. Wri en by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe, Pia Dovichi, Roshni Varma, and De- von Weis . Evidence cut by Lawrence Zhou. For customer support, please email help@ victorybriefs.com or call 330.333.2283. This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. Contents 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis 7 1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 1.2 Resolution Breakdown and Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 1.2.1 Nearly All . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 1.2.2 Military Presence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 1.2.3 Arab States of the Persian Gulf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 1.2.4 Summing Up the Resolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 1.3 Affirmative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 1.3.1 Preventing War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 1.3.2 Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 1.3.3 Alternatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 1.4 Negative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 1.4.1 Triggering War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 1.4.2 Military Presence Benefits the Region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 1.4.3 Undermining Security Guarantees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 1.4.4 Foreign Policy Realism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 1.4.5 Beyond Nearly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 1.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi 17 2.1 Introduction and Framing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 2.2 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 2.3 Affirmative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 2.4 Negative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 2.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma 26 3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 2 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. 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Contents 3.2 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 3.2.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 3.2.2 Uniqueness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 3.3 Framing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 3.4 Pro Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 3.4.1 Tensions Deescalate Without U.S. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 3.4.2 U.S. Diplomacy Won’t Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 3.5 Con Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 3.5.1 U.S. Military Presence Key to Diplomacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 3.5.2 Oil Interests Are Vital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe 36 4.1 Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 4.2 Affirmative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 4.2.1 Inflaming Tensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 4.3 Negative Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 4.3.1 Aggravating Saudi Arabia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 4.3.2 Protecting Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 4.3.3 ISIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 5 Background Evidence 45 5.1 Military Presence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 5.1.1 Troops and Assets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 5.1.2 Bases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 5.1.3 New Troops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 5.2 Topicality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 5.2.1 Military Presence = Bases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 5.2.2 Military Presence = More Than Bases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 5.2.3 Arab States of the Persian Gulf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 6 Pro Evidence 57 6.1 Presence Bad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 6.1.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 6.1.2 Solvency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 6.1.3 Zero Option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 6.1.4 Balancing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 6.1.5 Leverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 3 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. 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Contents 6.1.6 Democracy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 6.1.7 Russia Miscalculation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 6.1.8 Iraq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 6.1.9 Middle East Not Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 6.1.10 AT: Satloff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 6.1.11 AT: US Key for Stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 6.1.12 AT: Instability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 6.1.13 AT: Security Spiral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 6.1.14 AT: Regional Tensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 6.1.15 AT: China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 6.1.16 AT: Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 6.1.17 AT: Heg Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 6.1.18 AT: Retrenchment Now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 6.1.19 AT: Credibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 6.1.20 AT: Bases Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162 6.1.21 AT: Fifth Fleet Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 6.2 OSB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172 6.2.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172 6.2.2 History Proves . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 6.2.3 AT: OSB Failures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190 6.2.4 AT: Oil Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193 6.2.5 AT: Syria Withdrawal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195 6.2.6 AT: Trump Bad for OSB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198 6.2.7 AT: Brands and Feaver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 6.2.8 AT: Feaver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209 6.2.9 AT: Reassurance Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213 6.2.10 AT: Israel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 6.3 Iran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220 6.3.1 OSB Solves . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220 6.3.2 Pressure Bad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223 6.3.3 Deterrence Fails . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231 6.3.4 Security Dilemma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237 6.3.5 AT: Presence Deters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244 6.3.6 AT: Iran Bad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246 6.3.7 AT: Troops Solve . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249 6.3.8 AT: Mandelbaum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252 4 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. 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Contents 6.4 Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255 6.4.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255 6.4.2 AT: Link Turn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266 6.4.3 AT: ISIS Resurgence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269 6.4.4 AT: ISIS Threat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271 6.4.5 AT: Counterinsurgency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274 6.5 AT: Assurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277 6.5.1 Non-Unique . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277 6.5.2 Leverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283 6.5.3 AT: Lashout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287 6.6 AT: Saudi Arabia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288 6.6.1 AT: Saudi Assurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288 6.6.2 AT: Saudi Proliferation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291 6.6.3 AT: Lewis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294 6.6.4 AT: Prolif Impact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296 7 Con Evidence 303 7.1 Retrenchment Bad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303 7.1.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303 7.1.2 Power Vacuum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317 7.1.3 Assurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 324 7.1.4 Fill-In . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325 7.1.5 Russia Fill-In . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328 7.1.6 Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333 7.1.7 Fifth Fleet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342 7.1.8 Jordan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346 7.1.9 AT: Karlin and Wi es . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347 7.1.10 AT: Indyk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350 7.1.11 AT: GCC Moderates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352 7.2 AT: OSB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354 7.2.1 Military Presence Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354 7.2.2 Prolif . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 368 7.2.3 Withdrawal Fails . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371 7.2.4 Air and Navy Power Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381 7.2.5 Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385 7.2.6 AT: Mearsheimer and Walt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 388 5 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. 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Contents 7.2.7 AT: Alliances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405 7.2.8 AT: Entrapment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409 7.2.9 AT: Light Footprint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 410 7.3 Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413 7.3.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413 7.3.2 Syria Magnifier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418 7.3.3 AT: ISIS Defeated . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 419 7.4 Iran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422 7.4.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422 7.4.2 New Troops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426 7.4.3 Deterrence Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 428 7.5 Saudi Proliferation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431 7.5.1 Link . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431 7.5.2 Impact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 444 7.5.3 Yes Prolif . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447 6 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis Devon is the Director of Public Forum at Victory Briefs. Devon graduated from New York University in the winter of 2017 as a Politics major with a double minor in Philosophy and History. At NYU he was a semifinalist of the Global Debate Competition, and served as the VP of the school’s American parliamentary debate team for two years. Devon has been involved with Public Forum Debate for about 10 years, competing at Suncoast High School in Florida, and coaching since then. In addition to working freelance with a number of teams around the country, Devon was the head Public Forum Debate Coach at Byram Hills High School for three years, coaching the school’s first ever TOC qualifiers. Most recently he coached the 2019 NSDA national champions. Throughout his career, teams he’s coached have made it to late outrounds at a variety of tournaments like CFL Nationals, TFA State, Princeton, Harvard, Penn, Lexington and the Sunvitational. 1.1 Introduction April is arguably the most intense month for debaters competing on the circuit, there are state and national championships galore. With few opportunities to compete this late in the season, many teams will only have one or two weekends of April to get in practice rounds at locals or diagnose the circuit meta. This means that preparation will be all the more essential this month. However, having a gameplan is more important than cu ing cards. Succeeding at high-level tournaments like the TOC necessitates more than a big blockfile, it requires having a strategy, trusting that strategy, and executing that strategy to the best of your ability every round. “Having a strategy” does not just entail a plan to collapse on the second link of the first contention, it’s more like a dogma, or a worldview that fits together all the relevant ideas of a topic. I encourage you to organize all your thoughts on the topic, maybe even literally map them out, before mindlessly downloading every article with the words Persian Gulf. I’d also like to note that because 7 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis Iran is a global flashpoint, many of the facts on the ground will be in flux, which makes April even more exciting for everyone! 1.2 Resolution Breakdown and Background “Resolved: The United States should remove nearly all of its military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf.” This resolution isn’t exactly run of the mill, so a clear understanding of its wording is going to be much more important this month than in months prior. While some of the phrases used may seem general and arbitrary, the terminology was chosen to imply a specific meaning. Let’s break down some of the trickier parts. 1.2.1 Nearly All It seems debaters are hesitant to debate a resolution with a shaky modifier like “nearly all.” While some debaters may a empt to craft positions contingent on an interpretation of nearly all as being “greater than 50%” of presence, past examples of “nearly all” in legal precedent define the term as being about 99%.¹ The phrasing “nearly all” was likely intended by the framers as a way of removing the viability of negative positions centered around minute benefits of troops like mine removal or supporting naval presence, to instead focus the debate on the benefits and harms of a near complete pullout. My issue with this component of the resolution is the leeway it gives affirmative teams in an event that is deathly afraid of “plans.” Affirmative teams may a empt to lazily get out of negative perception arguments by saying that there will still be “some” US military presence that nevertheless triggers their harms, denying the neg their solvency. I don’t think this will be of big concern so long as a definition of nearly all is established and agreed upon. 99% withdrawal of presence will likely generate some degree of solvency. However, if nearly all presence is removed, then what presence remains? This is the part of the resolution that is a tad annoying, but important to prepare for. Debaters should be ready to make arguments about which types of military presence are most likely to remain in a world where nearly all presence is removed. The question of what presence remains is essential for both sides. It will allow the affirmative to delink negative disads about specific forms of presence being good or bad (i.e. drones), by suggesting that kind ¹h p://www.onenation.org/article/ron-unz-gilroy-violates-prop-227/ 8 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis of military presence most likely would or would not be withdrawn. On the negative, proving which military presence is most likely to be withdrawn or stay is key to winning links into those disads. For example, the negative can’t just say drones are good, aff withdraws them so negate. The aff can get out of that argument pre y simply by just saying that it is most likely that everything other than our drones would get withdrawn instead. 1.2.2 Military Presence This is one of the more interesting parts of the debate in my opinion. Military presence can imply quite a bevy of subjects. The most obvious definition includes troops and military equipment like fighter jets and tanks. However, there are also definitions that label bases² a form of military presence which would be a strong link into arguments for either side. I also think there are arguments to be made about naval presence. For those of you that didn’t debate UNCLOS, the territorial waters of coastal states extend 12 nautical miles past the shoreline. This implies that the resolution would also remove US naval vessels within those waters. Since we have quite a few ships in the Persian Gulf,³ that could be an interesting subject to cover. I predict that one of the primary forms of trickiness on this resolution will come from alternative definitions of military presence, so cu ing topicality cards will be an important way to stay ahead of anything your opponents might throw at you. Keep an open mind and try to think outside the box. 1.2.3 Arab States of the Persian Gulf This is a term of art that refers to 7 particular countries: Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. There’s also an organization called the Gulf Cooperation Council, which is a political and economic alliance between all the “Arab States of the Persian Gulf” minus Iraq. The idea was to create a collective-defense capability, sort of like an Arab NATO.⁴ However, the Council is highly reliant on US security guarantees and military support. Argu- ²h ps://academic.oup.com/isq/article-abstract/38/1/121/1785193?redirectedFrom=fulltext ³h ps://www.americansecurityproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Ref-0213-US-Military-Bases- and-Facilities-Middle-East.pdf ⁴h ps://mepc.org/journal/security-assurances-gulf-states-bearable-burden 9 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis ments about fracturing or strengthening this coalition are another interesting realm of the topic to consider. 1.2.4 Summing Up the Resolution Before I go into pro and con arguments, it seems that the framers have intended for April to be a debate about general US foreign policy strategy in the Middle East, particularly with regards to Iran. The fiat of this resolution is quite powerful as the affirmative needs to defend an extremely substantial withdrawal of military presence, which will likely generate massive perception links on both sides about how US strategy should or should not change. While specific examples of military presence being beneficial or harmful will be useful, I think the larger debate to be had is about which foreign policy strategy is holistically preferable. 1.3 Affirmative Arguments 1.3.1 Preventing War As is the case with most every foreign policy topic, the resolution will most likely be dominated by arguments about which side can prove that war is more likely. Affirma- tive teams will likely want to read that we are right on the brink of war with Iran and our path of engagement in the status quo is making a military confrontation inevitable. Our military presence in the Persian Gulf is to encircle Iran militarily and to lend credi- bility to our deterrent forces in the region. This strategy is known as containment. The converse to containment is appeasement, which as its name suggests, involves giving important concessions to adversary states in hopes of defusing tensions. Our military presence is mostly aimed at strengthening containment, although there are also quite a few authors that describe our current deterrent as weak and ineffective. Regardless, re- moving nearly all military presence would signal a shift in Iranian engagement strategy towards appeasement. To make an argument about resolving Iranian instability (and thereby potential war scenarios) one can argue both A: that containment is failing, and that B: appeasement is good. For example, Bishara of Al Jazeera warns of the dangers of a pressure-dominated foreign policy strategy for Iran.⁵ ⁵h ps://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/arrogance-fanaticism-prospect-iranian-war- 190430085736682.html 10 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis Washington’s aggressive approach will likely weaken Iranian pragmatists like Rouhani, and empower hardliners. This will cause Iran to abandon diplomatic efforts to contain the crisis and seek to quit the nuclear deal and perhaps even the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty altogether, rile up its Gulf neighbours, and undermine the US presence in Iraq and Afghanistan. This would inevitably evoke a sharp reaction from Washington, which may lead to war or wars by proxy throughout much of the region. Moreover, arguing about the ineffectiveness of militarily deterrence on a nation that en- gages in conflicts through asymmetric means will also set the stage for arguments about how the only solution to instability in the Gulf is through diplomacy. It stands to rea- son that appeasing Iran would be the best method for re-opening diplomatic talks and re-integrating an agreement-ordered middle east, as opposed to infinitely deploying American troops as global policemen. In terms of big picture strategy, if the affirmative can find and win some really good uniqueness evidence about how the US is on the brink of conflict with Iran right now, then they can engage in the rhetorically compelling “try or die for the aff” style weighing because neg must defend the status quo. If a war is coming, I’m confident that majorly reducing our regional military presence will do more to avert that war than continually issuing “credible threats” will--especially if debaters argue those threats are the reason why we’re on the brink of war in the first place. 1.3.2 Terrorism Robert Pape is a fantastic author that I encourage you all to read. He famously authored a book called “Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.” His work is a data-driven project analyzing decades of data about suicide terrorism. While terror is often treated as a monolith in high school debate, Pape nuances our understanding of the concept. One of his most renowned conclusions is that suicide a acks are highly strategic and almost always aimed at foreign military occupiers--like the US.⁶ He reaches this finding by tracking the targets, timelines and demographic profile of the terrorists that engage in suicide a acks. Terrorism, particularly suicide terrorism, is harmful for a number of reasons. Thus, I can easily picture affirmative teams suggesting that the root ⁶h ps://news.uchicago.edu/story/how-end-suicide-bombings-b-book-argues-problem-not-islam- lengthy-military-occupations 11 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis cause of terrorism in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf is foreign occupation, or at the very least, the perception of foreign domination of middle eastern politics and culture. The fiat of the resolution seems to imply that we would largely be ending the war on terror as our bases and troop presence tend to either engage in, or support counter- terrorism objectives in the regions they’re located. The thing is, as Pape seems to agree, counter terrorism tends to exacerbate and stoke the flames of terror more than it does to uproot it. This thesis manifests itself in the data surrounding our counter effective drone strike policy and in the enduring political instability following decades of interventions and consequent occupations. 1.3.3 Alternatives As I mentioned in the resolution breakdown section, debaters should be prepared to discuss what sort of military presence would be most likely to remain in an affirmative world. In light of this question, I think the aff can make arguments about how a near pullout of US troops in the Persian Gulf would encourage a greater use of small footprint or non-presence based forms of interaction. There are definitions of military presence that specifically exclude non-combat personnel or cyberspace engagement. Those of you that enjoyed extolling the virtues of offensive cyber operations or have a secret love of spec ops forces should be excited. One could argue that the fiat of the resolution pushes the US military into a more humanitarian role in the Persian Gulf, or instead refocuses our counterterrorism posture in a more covert, surgical way. I also think that teams could make arguments about encouraging regional military self-sufficiency. Much of our presence in the Persian Gulf is related to training local militaries. As I mentioned earlier, the GCC has strived for military independence for decades, so if the US stops “helicopter parenting” (snare drum) the region, perhaps such a signal will force Arab Gulf States to take their national security more seriously and expedite their plans for military modernization. Watch out for impact turns about oil state militarization though. Furthermore, there is quite a bit of academic literature regarding “Offshore balancing.” Put simply, offshore balancing is the idea that we should have fewer troops deployed abroad. Eugenio Lilli has wri en one of the most important pieces on this topic com- paring offshore balancing to deep engagement, specifically in the context of the Persian Gulf.⁷ ⁷h p://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_ar ext&pid=S0034-73292018000100204 12 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis On the other hand, advocates of a strategy of offshore balancing maintain that their own brand of grand strategy best serves the US national interest. Walt writes that ‘Offshore balancing is the ideal grand strategy for an era of American primacy. It husbands the power upon which this primacy rests and minimizes the fear that this power provokes’ (Walt 2005). Posen (2013) agrees and criticizes deep engagement by saying that “it makes enemies al- most as fast as it slays them, discourages allies from paying for their own defense, and convinces powerful states to band together and oppose Wash- ington’s plans, further raising the costs of carrying out its foreign policy” (2013, 2) 1.4 Negative Arguments 1.4.1 Triggering War This is the heart of the topic. Negative teams were meant to make narrowly tailored arguments as to why US military presence in the Persian Gulf is key to deterring Ira- nian aggression. I’m going to spend less time explaining this argument as it is simply the converse of the first argument from the affirmative side: containment is good and appeasement would be bad. Many authors contend that the Obama-era engagement with Iran was a form of ap- peasement, citing examples like the nuclear deal as evidence of the strategy. Much of this work is published around January because it was likely wri en to elevate Trump’s killing of General Soleimani as a strategy pivot towards containing Iran. Plenty of ex- perts believe that appeasing Iran would be bad, and the Lilli study cited earlier⁸ proves that containment has been pre y successful, finding that there was “an overall trend toward a reduction of the total number of armed conflicts,” as military presence in the Persian Gulf steadily rose. As I mentioned on the affirmative side, while the aff can say this round is try or die to avoid a war, the negative can play that game a bit as well. There is currently no war in the status quo, despite how high tensions with Iran are. If we were to conduct a radical policy shift like a near complete troop withdrawal from the region, one could argue that there’s a high probability that such an action could trigger feelings of opportunism on ⁸h p://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_ar ext&pid=S0034-73292018000100204 13 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis the part of Iran, or conversely anxiety on the part of our allies, resulting in a wide range of potential miscalculation scenarios. Because the resolution does so much to change the political and security landscape, both sides need to engage in a highly nuanced comparison of which world would be more stable. 1.4.2 Military Presence Benefits the Region While this is my least favorite potential negative strategy, there is undoubtedly good literature about the beneficial impact that US military presence can have on the area it occupies. This could range from humanitarian assistance and aid delivery to local military training. For example, in 1991, the US military engaged in Operation Provide Comfort where troops delivered humanitarian assistance to refugees and kickstarted a strong alliance with the Kurds.⁹ Military training also seems to go hand in hand with weapons sales and is a large part of our military strategy in the Persian Gulf as well.¹⁰ As I briefly alluded to earlier in the affirmative strategy section, I think encouraging GCC military self-sufficiency is a relevant area of impact. If removing nearly all of our troop presence significantly inhibits our ability to train local forces, then in the instance of a future conflict, the United States would have li le choice but to re-deploy troops to secure shipping routes, or instead take a massive hit to the legitimacy and confidence in American security guarantees. As such, I think the military training argument could be framed as the only way for the US to permanently get out of the Middle East, which would highly mitigate the timeframe of aff impact scenarios. Think, why would we remove all our military presence if we will just have to reinstate it later? 1.4.3 Undermining Security Guarantees While the topic is about the Persian Gulf and Iran, without a doubt, there will be ar- guments made about how withdrawing US troop presence from the Arab States of the Persian Gulf will threaten other countries’ confidence in the United States security um- brella, which could cause a whole host of unwanted outcomes. Elliot Silverberg of For- eign Policy magazine describes our waning alliance with South Korea and Japan as a “geopolitical recession.”¹¹ South Korea and others (like Taiwan, Israel and the Baltics) ⁹h ps://foreignpolicy.com/2017/02/06/operation-provide-comfort-a-forgo en-mission-with-possible- lessons-for-syria/ ¹⁰h ps://www.heritage.org/military-strength/assessing-the-global-operating-environment/middle-east ¹¹h ps://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/03/china-japan-korea-trump-comfort-women-east-asia-alliances- falling-apart/ 14 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis have been put on edge by Trump’s withdrawal of troops from Syria.¹² When the United States reneges on security guarantees, the damage to its legitimacy ripples across the global alliance system. Countries like Japan and South Korea are of particular impor- tance due to their economic power and political/security significance with regards to China and North Korea. Debaters could argue that removing military presence from the Persian Gulf pushes teetering alliances with East Asia over the edge, and leaves states with no choice but to pursue their own defense strategy. South Korea has con- templated acquiring its own nuclear warhead and Japan seems intent on remilitarizing. If allied states across the Asian continent view troop pullout as symptomatic of Trump’s appetite for isolationism, we could see global nuclear proliferation and cascading arms races on a massive scale for the next few years. 1.4.4 Foreign Policy Realism Under a realist foreign policy perspective, power is best understood in relative as op- posed to absolute terms. That is to say, one cannot understand how much power one has unless they understand how that power relates to another’s power. Thus, it is a zero sum game, where anyone’s increase or decrease in power translates to a converse reaction for the other. Realist foreign policy theorists don’t trust other states and posit that a state’s primary goal is to ensure its national security by maintaining power over all others. Given this realist foreign policy framing, negative teams need only win that removing “nearly all” military presence from the Arab States of the Persian Gulf consti- tutes a strategic misstep by diminishing our ability to power project or assert relational power over adversaries like Iran. If one can win that states should act according to a realist foreign policy mindset, then one will likely have an easier time ge ing the judge to negate I encourage debaters to delve into the different subsets and variations of realism as it will be a very helpful way to lend legitimacy to the case arguments you’re making. I also believe there is strategic value in focusing more round time to the theoretical un- derpinnings for military presence rather than fussing over particulars of what presence actually means or trying to predict future scenarios through a crystal ball. Debates about the superiority of particular views on foreign policy will be more sophisticated than line by line uniqueness debates that tend to err in favor of the second speaking team. ¹²h ps://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-south-korea-military-cost-dispute-and- trumps-moves-in-syria-fuel-doubts-over-us-commitment/2019/11/01/7048b030-fa30-11e9-9534- e0dbcc9f5683_story.html 15 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 1 Topic Analysis by Devon Weis 1.4.5 Beyond Nearly I have a bit of an anti-utilitarian bent so I figured I’d also go over a less traditional vein of argumentation as well. Negative teams can take a principled stance against leaving any military presence in the Persian Gulf. The way you make this argument is by proving that “nearly all” just isn’t enough. This is a good strategy for negative teams that want to agree with the aff, and collapse the debate to a very specific scope, very early on in the round. By saying that we should remove not just “nearly all” but “all” of our military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf, the negative can force aff teams into the relatively uncomfortable position of reversing their advocacy. If both aff and neg agree that almost all of our troops in the Persian Gulf should go, then aff now needs to win that whatever military presence will remain is more important than a marginally more ethical action. This shrinks the debate quite a bit and forces affs to defend small and specific troop presence, something they may not be prepared to do. However, it does also abdicate quite a bit of the negative’s ground, so weighing will be imperative. 1.5 Conclusion Thanks for reading my topic analysis! I hope you’ve found it useful. I’m excited to see what ideas you all come up with for April. Just as a heads up, if you ever read “30 speaks theory” in front of me, you’ll get 25s but your opponents will get 30s. Best of luck on this topic, and as always, respect the game. 16 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi Pia is a freshman at the University of a Chicago. She debated for the College Prepara- tory School in Oakland for three years and was a captain for two. She qualified to the Tournament of Champions three times and received 10 career bids. She reached finals at Stanford and semifinals at both Alta and Minneapple, and made other out- round appearances at many national circuit tournaments. 2.1 Introduction and Framing Welcome to April! April is always a fun month to debate as most championship tour- naments fall in April, which means high levels of competition. Prepping for April tour- naments can be tough given spring breaks, AP tests, and other end of the semester ac- tivities so try to start as early as possible. This resolution is fairly straightforward in topic ma er, so I think (and hope!) debaters will spend the majority of their time in late round speeches weighing and interacting with the merits of each argument. April’s resolution is ‘Resolved: the United States should remove nearly all of its military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf.’ There are a few key words that need to be defined, many of which can be strategically defined to support the affirmative or negative advocacy. First, I think most teams will agree the United States refers to the United States federal government (hereon referred to as the USFG), for simplicity’s sake. All means of removing military presence would come from the USFG, so it’s unlikely teams could find literature to support a different actor. Military presence, however, offers more leeway in its definition. There’s no agreed upon definition of military pres- ence, so teams can choose to define military presence as physical troops, military bases, or (depending on strength of evidence) even intelligence operations. The definition of military presence heavily interacts with how teams choose to define nearly. Moving onto defining nearly; here is where I think many debates will spend a lot of time. There are two ways teams can look at framing ‘removing nearly’: either removing 17 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi almost all types of military presence save one or two, or scaling all military presence back but not entirely removing it. I think affirmatives need to make sure their advocacy meets the ‘brightline’ for their impacts—i.e. if an affirmative defines removing nearly all of its military presence to be complete removal of military presence except for in Kuwait and argues that as a result they will decrease all regional tensions, they need to ensure that their advocacy of removing all presence save Kuwait will be sufficient to trigger their impact. In reading this, you may think this sounds similar to a plan, which as we all know, plans are not allowed in public forum. That said, I think there is a key difference in how this argument differs from a plan. For novices, this discussion is likely unimportant and may cause more confusion. For varsity debaters, however, I think this is an important place to examine ground skew and fairness within debate. Public forum does not allow for plans, but that does not mean the affirmative cannot ad- vocate for specific advantages to the broader resolution. In fact, the affirmative should, in my opinion, advocate for specific aspects of the resolution to increase quality and education of the debate. For a resolution like this, advocating for ‘nearly removing all military presence’ is too broad as a whole. There is no way for either team to engage with the literature on the topic if taking a complete over-arching look at the resolution. (That said, this doesn’t exclude arguments about the morality of military presence as a whole—this pertains more to traditional utilitarian arguments.) The caveat here is that the negative constructive, and therefore advocacy, does not have to respond to the affir- mative constructive directly. As such, aff and neg don’t even necessarily have to agree upon the same definition of ‘nearly remove’ (although I certainly think it’s strategic in many cases.) While the negative rebu al should certainly be responsive to the affirma- tive constructive and vice versa, technically speaking, the affirmative is responsible for defending the resolution as a whole whereas the negative is only responsible for rebut- ting the affirmative case (although teams should certainly try to provide unique offense so as to not force presumption.) Okay, now that that’s done, I think teams should be sure to focus time on weighing. One strategy I found effective late in my career and wish I had found earlier is that of pre-writing—or at least pre-thinking—of weighing I could make. For a topic like this with larger international relations and geopolitical ramifications as well as strong moral arguments, strong teams will be sure to have prepared ways to weigh different impacts that are compelling for the judge. Beyond comparing impacts of different na- tures, teams should also be prepared for how to approach weighing similar impacts with different link chains. Various increasing tensions and/or war scenarios will appear 18 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi on both the aff and the neg this resolution (be sure to terminalize your impacts!), and teams should be comfortable taking a strength-of-link approach. Essentially, strength- of-link weighing is weighing each argument on the link level (technically by any means but for war scenarios I personally find probability to be the most compelling for the av- erage judge.) One strategy that has proved largely effective for many technical debaters have been prewri en weighing overviews or underviews regarding meta-weighing, or the way we should compare different weighing mechanisms such as probability, mag- nitude, and timeframe. When evaluating war scenarios (or many other scenarios that could result in extinction), many teams choose to read that we must prioritize magni- tude over probability for a variety of reasons. Often, judges find these arguments more compelling if they are carded (or at least warranted) and come earlier in round rather than later, but I think it’s strategic to read your judge to see if they would buy these arguments. 2.2 Background First and foremost, it’s key to know what the Arab States of the Persian Gulf are. I am confident everyone reading this is capable of looking this up themselves, but for ease, feel free to refer to the picture below: So, aff teams must restrict their advocacy to Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait to be topical. That said, it’s important to under- 19 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi stand greater regional trends to make well-articulated arguments. Largely considered one of the wealthiest regions in the world, many of these countries have found incredi- bly wealth in the oil reserves in the Persian Gulf, which coincidentally is responsible for much of the regional tension. Given the wealth of oil present, many countries fight for access to these oil reserves. Additionally, Qatar has a wealth of natural gas, as evident by them holding nearly 14% of the world’s natural gas reserves.¹ Let’s start by looking at historic US presence in these states. As ABC News writes in 2006, Many Americans know there has been a U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf since Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1991. But the reality is that U.S. forces have been stationed there much, much longer. The U.S. Navy first entered the Gulf in 1944 during World War II, after Italian bombers aligned with Axis forces a acked U.S.-owned oil installations in Saudi Arabia and the neighboring emirate of Bahrain. Their main purpose then, as it is now, was to guard the oil resources of the West and its communications lines with Europe and the Far East.² With various presidential administrations we’ve seen slight increases and decreases in military presence. Notably, there have been increases in the number of military bases we’ve seen in the Persian Gulf, but varying changes in the number of stationed troops. With Trump in office, Benaim of Foreign Affairs writes, In some countries, the U.S. military presence is expanding—as in Jordan, where the planned withdrawal from Syria and other uncertainties in the re- gion have driven a quiet but significant expansion of Jordanian facilities used by the U.S. military. Even amid the ongoing rift between Qatar and its Arab Gulf neighbors, the Department of Defense signed an agreement in January 2019 to further build out Al Udeid Air Base, the U.S. Central Command’s forward headquarters in the region. As one former senior Pentagon official recently told one of the authors, regional partners “are always trying to get us to pour more concrete.” Certain aspects of the bulked-up U.S. regional posture were an outgrowth of the Obama administration’s effort to ensure a credible military deterrent against Iran during negotiations for the Iran ¹GECF, Qatar, h ps://www.gecf.org/countries/qatar#:~:text= ²John Cooley, Jan 2006, ‘US Presence in Persian Gulf: A History,’ h ps://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=81402&page=1#:~:text= 20 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi nuclear deal. Now the breakdown of that same agreement has led military officials to advocate further increases.³ While the presence in the Middle East is dependent on the current Senate and President, there are larger foreign policy trends that shape our presence in the United States teams should be sure to understand. In September of 2019, Iran’s president publicly called for Western countries (including the United States) to leave the Persian Gulf in the wake of rising regional tensions. Crit- icizing the United States’ a empts to lead peace efforts in the region, Rouhani claimed that powers within the region should be left to interact independent of additional West- ern presence. There is literature on both sides of the spectrum as to whether US absence from the region will result in broader regional destabilization. That said, much of this literature remains biased and/or emotionally charged so make sure to be selective in screening the evidence you read and use; there tends to be a Western bias in much of the literature wri en. Finally, while Iran isn’t an Arab State, the late 2019 early 2020 tensions between the United States and Iran are incredibly relevant to this topic. After growing conflict in the summer and fall following multiple instances of a acks on merchant ships and drones, members of a militia force killed an American contractor in an Iraqi base and the United States retaliated by launching airstrikes. Tensions remained high before somewhat fiz- zling out over greater geopolitical tensions including COVID-19. 2.3 Affirmative Arguments There are two frameworks affirmative teams can take when looking at arguments: one that is centered on the United States and one that takes a more global approach. While teams may be more inclined to lean to the former given the USFG is the actor of the resolution, I challenge teams to instead try for the la er. Affirmative arguments that fall in support of the US are both limited in scope and in education. While our current military positioning is arguably not the best use of our resources, the impact to this is both relatively small and altogether not that educational to research. If teams do want to have a US-centered framing, I think they’re well advised to look at larger geopolitical ³Daniel Benaim, August 2019, ‘The Enduring US Presence in the Middle East,’ h ps://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/middle-east/2019-08-07/enduring-american-presence-middle- east 21 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi tensions and how a US withdrawal could shape our global positioning. In fact, I think there’s a really interesting argument about how a US withdrawal from the Persian Gulf be er positions the US, especially in regards to soft power. US presence in the region is (in most people’s eyes) anachronistic; there is no reason for military presence at this point in time. If the United States were to remove nearly or all of its military presence, this action would likely be well received and be er our overall interactions with a mul- titude of other countries. If teams choose to read arguments like this, they need to feel comfortable reading arguments that aren’t explicitly carded. Arguments like this tend to be relatively theory-based (although not-exclusively), but teams should feel comfort- able engaging with the warrants of whatever evidence they may choose to read. As a quick side note, it’s certainly advisable for all teams to be comfortable with the warrants of their argument. Beyond the soft power argument, stock affirmative arguments will likely revolve around potential war scenarios. While there are certainly many different approaches teams can take to war scenarios, the unifying factor is likely that 1) US presence in the region is aggravating tensions and 2) if we do not remove our presence we will reach the threshold of war. Affirmative teams have the option to terminalize these scenarios in either large-scale war and nuclear war/extinction. Often times, these impact scenarios (especially the la er) fall into the earlier category of large impact low(er) probability I discussed in the framing section. As such, if reading arguments of this type, make sure every step of your link chain is carded and you’re extending every part of your link chain when you extend the argument. Generally, you show make sure to do this, but while certain judges may grant you a chain to avoid voting on presumption the likelihood of this erodes as the probability of your arguments decreases. Finally, I think an interesting angle affirmative teams can make are about the ethics of our regional military occupation. Given there is no ‘active conflict’ in the Persian Gulf, there are many questions to pose about the reasons for our presence in the region. Ad- ditionally, as briefly mentioned before, why has America placed itself as a moderator in the region? Affirmative teams can make strong arguments here, but should take care to weigh arguments that aren’t strictly utilitarian against the classic public forum argu- ments. I don’t think this challenge should discourage interested teams from running aff arguments like this, but there will likely be extra work to fight against the utilitarian, ‘who saves the most lives?’ norm in the community. 22 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi 2.4 Negative Arguments I think the most obvious negative argument, which coincidentally was also mentioned above in affirmative arguments, is that of destabilization. Destabilization as a result of US military withdrawal is a heavily contested issue, so there’s certainly a berth of literature on either side. While this argument can be read in a variety of ways, the common sentiment is that were the US to leave the region, other major powers would step in and pose larger problems. Hal Brands writes in March of 2019, Second, however, it is a fantasy to think that the United States can disengage from the Middle East without consequence. This is because America still has pressing interests in that region—and because those interests are as unlikely to protect themselves today as they ever have been in the past. Growing Rus- sian influence, Iran’s hegemonic ambitions, the potential resurgence of key terrorist organizations, and the massive political instability and violence that plagues large swaths of the region are real problems that demand competent management. America’s partners in the region can do more to manage those problems than they have done to date, but they remain manifestly incapable of doing so without significant U.S. support.⁴ Interestingly, there are many articles that concede we should have never entered the region militarily in the first place, but now that we have, we cannot leave. For teams that feel that the US is acting unethically, arguments along this vein allow you to still take a negative stance without necessarily arguing the United States’ presence in the region is overall beneficial. Another interesting negative argument is that of preventing proliferation. Arguments regarding nuclearization in the region are especially prescient given the Persian Gulf’s incoming first nuclear power plant. Allinson writes in February, When UAE regulators said on Monday they had given the green light to start loading nuclear fuel at the Barakah power plant — the Arab world’s first — the announcement raised concerns. While Abu Dhabi Crown Prince hailed it as a ”new chapter in our journey for the development of peaceful nuclear energy,” tensions have been high in the Persian Gulf after the long- simmering issue of Iran’s nuclear program recently contributed to bringing ⁴Hal Brand, March 2019, Hoover Institution, ‘Why America Can’t Quit the Middle East,’ https://www. hoover.org/research/why-america-cant-quit-middle-east 23 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi it to the brink of open war with the US. In the wider region, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Turkey also have nuclear programs with varying ambi- tions … While the UAE has signed non-proliferation treaties and ratified International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) agreements, including a full in- spection regime, there is still the risk it could share its knowledge with others not bound by similar deals, Dorfman said. But Mark Hibbs, a senior asso- ciate at the Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program, said, that the UAE’s record of complete transparency and ratification of all IAEA recommendations meant ”there is no risk of proliferation.”⁵ I recommend reading further into the increase in nuclear energy in the Persian Gulf. The above article clearly details the debate as to whether the proliferation is for energy sources as well as the effect regional stability will have on this project. Generally, prolif- eration arguments have been more difficult to run in public forum given the difficulty to terminalize the argument. Extinction scenarios have traditionally been shunned but I think there is a growing trend in the community for tolerating them, so make sure to vet your judge before reading an argument terminalized in extinction. Beyond stock arguments, I think there’s interesting ground to advocate the United States remove its military presence in the Arab States entirely. While this argument is certainly topical, there is a question of affirmative ground. For this argument to be successful, I think negative teams should frame this argument in a non-utilitarian sense. I don’t think that negative arguments that revolve around the one military base or region where the affirmative advocates leaving troops present will be strategic, but I do think arguments taking a moral stance on our military positioning in the Persian Gulf are compelling. Even if teams choose not to read this in case (i.e. read this argument as a contention in their constructive speech), I think it’s a fantastic response to affirmative arguments who may argue we must affirm on moral grounds. How can the affirmative advocate we need to remove our military presence in the region due to ethical considerations but then (as the resolution mandates) not remove all of our military presence. I think debates along these lines will be collapsed and incredibly engaging, which, in my opinion, make the best debates. That said, if you are running these arguments, you must commit to your framing and not read other utilitarian impacts/collapse on utilitarian weighing. ⁵Tom Allinson, DW News, February 2020, ‘UAE: Arab world’s first nuclear power plant raises stakes in the Persian Gulf,’ h ps://www.dw.com/en/uae-arab-worlds-first-nuclear-power-plant-raises-stakes-in- the-persian-gulf/a-52411432 24 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 2 Topic Analysis by Pia Dovichi 2.5 Conclusion Ultimately, I think the biggest opportunity this topic presents is that of strategy. Given the relatively low barrier to entry on understanding the topic literature and narrow scope of potential arguments, I think teams will find the most success by investing much of their time prepping thinking about how debates will play out. More often than not, debates aren’t won by the strength of your evidence, but more so how you use that ev- idence. While avoiding cliché, I do think the strongest teams stop in round and look at the debate as a whole, not just at the contention level. Strategic framing, weighing, concessions, and in-round analysis will all prove incredibly beneficial. I challenge you all to spend even a quarter of the amount of time you spend cu ing cards on prewriting framing or preparing analytical responses and see how your rounds change. I hope everyone has a great April! 25 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma Roshni Varma competed in Public Forum for four years at Archbishop Mi�y High School in San Jose, California and is currently a freshman at UCLA. She reached late out rounds and received a total of seven bids at various competitive national tour- naments, including the Stanford, Berkeley, and Glenbrooks Invitationals, receiving speaker awards at several of these tournaments. She has championed the Voices in- vitational and the Berkeley Round Robin, as well as advanced to elimination rounds at the Tournament of Champions, receiving a top five speaker award. 3.1 Introduction Greetings. Welcome to the April topic! This is a very important topic for debaters around the country as this is the one used for the TOC, one of the community’s favorite tournaments, as well as state tournaments around the country. Thus, it is important that debaters be well prepared and extremely knowledgeable when it comes to the ar- gument being discussed this month. Fortunately, this month’s topic (Resolved: The United States should remove nearly all of its military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf.) is easy to understand and has a wide base of literature surrounding it. Thus, it should be easy for debaters to dive into the intricacies and nuances of the actors and incentives at play when it comes to this topic. As always, have fun! 3.2 Background 3.2.1 General The U.S. has long had a military presence in the Persian Gulf, largely for the stated purpose of protecting allies in the oil-producing region and securing access to a stable supply of oil to satisfy U.S. domestic demand. The troops discussed below are spread 26 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma across bases in Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates. Lisa Barrington. Reuters. 8 January 2020. “Factbox: U.S. forces in Gulf region and Iraq.” Factbox: U.S. forces in Gulf region and Iraq DUBAI (Reuters) - The United States and some other Western powers de- ploy weaponry and other military equipment in the Gulf to provide secu- rity to its allies in the oil-producing region. For years there have been be- tween 60,000 and 80,000 troops deployed to the U.S. military’s Central Com- mand area of operations, a vast area stretching from Egypt to Afghanistan. As U.S.-Iranian conflict has brewed in recent weeks - Iranian missiles hit bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq in the latest incident - the Pentagon has been moving thousands of additional forces into the Middle East. 3.2.2 Uniqueness When debating topics where the resolution proposes a policy change, it is always impor- tant to consider why this question is being asked. In other words, what are the unique factors taking place right now (the “uniqueness”) that make our policy near the Persian Gulf important? Strategic uniqueness for both sides may be to read evidence that argues (and warrants) how tensions have been rising in the Persian Gulf region in recent month. Once this is es- tablished, the pro can argue that a military presence is necessary for deescalate tensions via deterrence, while the con can argue that the U.S. military presence is responsible for creating the tensions in the first place. The first piece of evidence places rising tensions in a global context, while the second focuses specifically on how certain U.S. actions have contributed to increasing tensions. Elias Yousif, Program and Research Associate with the Security Assistance Moni- tor Program at the Center for International Policy. Ink Stick Media. 8 November 2019. “AMIDST RISING TENSIONS, AN OPPORTUNITY IN THE ARAB GULF.” h ps://inkstickmedia.com/amidst-rising-tensions-an-opportunity-in-the-arab-gulf/ The very real threat of open conflict between the United States and Iran still looms large in the wake of September’s a acks on Saudi Arabia’s oil installations. What remains of the Iran nuclear deal is quickly crum- bling, and we’ve arrived at the logical conclusion of several years of 27 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma escalating hostility between the United States, its Gulf allies, and Iran. Fortunately, staring down the barrel of war has had a sobering effect on Saudi, Emirati, Iranian, and American policymakers, who have all sent limited but noteworthy signals of their desire to reduce tensions. The Trump administration, already mired in more crises than it can manage, should not miss the opportunity these signals present to walk the region back from the brink. Since stepping away from the Iran nuclear deal, President Trump has presided over a rapid deterioration of security and stability in the Persian Gulf. But the problem is not unique to this President. Successive administrations have struggled to manage a growing rivalry between Saudi led Gulf monarchies and Iran that has helped spawn an arc of crises stretching from Baghdad to Beirut, where the mixing of geopolitical competition and identity-politics has proven to be a particularly violent alchemy. The past few months have proven especially volatile, as a financially-squeezed and economically-suffocated Iranian leadership lashes out, downing an American spy plane, supporting a acks on US allies and disrupting the flow of Middle East oil. In June of this year, the United States came within minutes of overt military action against Tehran that would almost certainly have plunged the region into even deeper levels of violence and chaos. Nevertheless, glimmers of restraint that have broken through the cycles of escalation suggest that all sides fear they may have bi en off more then they can chew, and provide an opportunity for the United States to lead efforts towards de-escalation. In July, the UAE broke with Saudi Arabia and began withdrawing its ground troops from Yemen. Recent developments suggest that the Saudis and Houthis are also looking for exit ramps, including the unilateral declaration of a ceasefire by the Houthis, which was reciprocated by Saudi Arabia. Mohammed Bin Salman, the deputy crown prince of Saudi Arabia, perhaps sensing his growing isolation, has explicitly stated his desire for a political se lement to the conflict that has been at the heart of regional proxy conflict since 2015. The administration has already sought to initiate direct talks between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia, an encouraging development after 5 years of war. Amanda Macias. CNBC. 17 February 2020. “Iran’s foreign minister blames US and Saudi Arabia for rising tensions in the Gulf.” h ps://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/17/iran- blames-us-and-saudi-arabia-for-tensions-in-gulf.html 28 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma “Our message to Iran is to change its behavior first before anything is to be discussed,” the Saudi prince said during a discussion at the conference. “Until we can talk about the real sources of that instability, talk is going to be unproductive,” he added. Tensions in the Gulf took an anxious turn last month when the U.S. conducted a deadly strike on Iran’s top military leader. The Jan. 2 strike that killed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, a key military figure of Iranian and Middle East politics, followed a string of a acks on locations that hosted U.S. and coalition forces, including the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. Of course, it is important to note that “tensions” in the Persian Gulf cannot simply be a ributed to any one thing. The dynamics of the Arab States have historical, cultural, and political roots that operate independently of Western meddling, although Western hegemony has begun to have a disproportionate effect. It is important to acknowledge the sovereignty of these countries, and instead of arguing that the U.S. is capable of pulling every string, to look to each countries incentives and allies in the region. Do not oversimplify–acknowledge that the U.S. can only control parts of the story. 3.3 Framing I would suggest debaters not waste time debating the exact definition of “nearly all.” While the wording is unfortunate at best, winning the debate based on an absurd, non- sensical definition of “nearly all” benefits no one–nobody becomes smarter about the world around them, more skilled at debate, nor do we get any closer to useful policy- making. I would encourage debaters to simply adhere to the intention of the resolution: that the U.S. removes excess military presence in a way that would notably affect the actual and/or perceived military strength of the U.S. in the region. I think it is reason- able to assume that there would be first-response-like resources close in the case of an emergency. I would also encourage teams to look into perception-based links. It may be hard to prove hypothetical scenarios of what would happen if certain U.S. assets were missing– it could be easier to prove how certain allies or enemies would react to a perceived U.S. pullout. It also lowers the probability threshold one needs to meet to win offense. 29 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma 3.4 Pro Arguments 3.4.1 Tensions Deescalate Without U.S. A common argument will likely be that the U.S. is simply escalating tensions in the region–such as within Saudi Arabia and with Iran (as explained in the uniqueness ev- idence). It can be argued that absent the U.S., such instability would not exist. The evidence below argues that the Arab States are in a state of defense dominance, where no state is powerful or internally secured enough to expand beyond its borders, but the larger states are capable of deterring smaller states from a empting to do so, creating a reluctant state of stability. John Glaser. The CATO Institute. 9 January 2017. “Does the U.S. Military Actually Protect Middle East Oil?” h ps://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/does-us- military-actually-protect-middle-east-oil In addition, the balance of power globally and in the region today is favor- able for energy security. First, an external power gaining a stranglehold over the Persian Gulf region is implausible. The Soviet Union is long gone and today’s Russia suffers from systemic economic problems that hinder its po- tential to project power in the Middle East. China, while increasingly pow- erful in its own sphere, lacks the political will to dominate the Gulf. The regional balance of power is also favorable. According to Joshua Rovner, “the chance that a regional hegemon will emerge in the Persian Gulf dur- ing the next twenty years is slim to none. This is true even if the United States withdraws completely.” No state in the region possesses the capa- bilities necessary to conquer neighboring territories or gain a controlling influence over oil resources, and most are bogged down and distracted by internal problems. Overall the region is in a state of defense dominance: while too weak to project power beyond their borders, the major states do have the capability to deter their neighbors, making the costs of offen- sive action prohibitively high. So, three of the major scenarios that have traditionally justified a forward deployed military presence in the Persian Gulf—the entrance of a hostile external power, the rise of a regional hege- mon and a military clash among the major states—are exceedingly unlikely even absent the U.S. military presence. 30 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma 3.4.2 U.S. Diplomacy Won’t Work The card below explains that only where both sides have leverage can diplomacy occur; the U.S. upsets this balance by creating a massive power discrepancy. Ibrahim Fraihat, professor in international conflict resolution at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies. Foreign Policy. 12 June 2018. “Russia Doesn’t Solve Conflicts, It Silences Them.” h ps://foreignpolicy.com/2018/06/12/russia-doesnt-solve-conflicts-it- silences-them/ In theory, Russia’s mediation should help resolve the Middle East’s con- flicts. Russia’s involvement could potentially end the monopoly of unilat- eral American mediation that has traditionally failed to resolve regional dis- putes — such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — and instead exacerbated them. However, Russia’s approach to conflict resolution is be er at freezing conflicts than ending them. This dynamic is evident in several conflicts that Russia has a empted to tackle, namely in Crimea, Ukraine, Georgia, and Chechnya. By using force, Moscow was able to impose unilateral solutions to these conflicts but failed to address their underlying causes. Unless the root causes of these conflicts are addressed, the most this approach will ever achieve is a fragile peace, or what Johan Galtung calls a “negative peace.” In fact, what Russian military intervention achieved in these conflicts was to structurally transform them by creating a severe imbalance of power be- tween the parties which, in turn, left no room for resolution. Russia has done the same in Syria, where it enabled the Assad regime to achieve a de- cisive victory in the Ba le of Aleppo, thereby leaving no incentives for the government to engage in talks and no hope for the opposition to achieve some of their demands through negotiated solutions. It’s no wonder that most of the Syrian opposition refused to participate in the Russian-brokered Sochi peace talks. Solutions achieved under a severe power imbalance, es- pecially those achieved through massive military might, are difficult to sustain. Conflicts can be suppressed for a while but will likely erupt again once those power relations change. Since the beginning of Russia’s military presence in Syria, Moscow has managed to reduce the scope of the conflict. Nonetheless, the Russian presence in Syria has failed to improve the lives of Syrians so that they can be partners in achieving a lasting resolution to their civil war. Rather, it has prevented them from holding a national dialogue 31 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma and seeking some form of reconciliation. 3.5 Con Arguments 3.5.1 U.S. Military Presence Key to Diplomacy The cards below argue that U.S. pressure in the region is the only reason that diplomatic space for peace talks has been created in the past. The second piece of evidence furthers that diplomacy absent military leverage doesn’t work; the two go hand-in-hand to pres- sure for successful solutions. Raf Sanchez. Telegraph. 13 February 2019. “Jeremy Hunt optimistic Yemen is on ’path to peace’ if warring sides follow through on UN deal.” h ps://www.telegraph.co.uk/ news/2019/02/13/jeremy-hunt-optimistic-yemen-path-peace-warring-sides-follow/ Mr Hunt defended Britain’s decision to sell arms to Saudi Arabia and the UAE despite the high levels of civilian casualties caused by coalition airstrikes and reports that the Arab states have given weapons to terrorist groups in Yemen. “The fact we have a strategic relationship and a military relationship with both Saudi Arabia and the UAE is one of the reasons the US and UK have significant influence and are able to be a force for peace in terms of this very difficult conflict,” he said. “Any suggestion that we change the basis of that relationship would reduce our influence and make peace less likely.” While Britain and the US are able to speak directly to the Yemeni government it has relied on intermediaries like Oman to pass messages onto the Houthis, who receive support from Iran. Michael Rubin. American Enterprise Institute. “Why Was John Kerry Such a Bad Secre- tary of State?” December 29, 2016. h p://www.aei.org/publication/john - kerry - such - a - bad - secretary - of - state/ Contrast that with Kerry on Iran: Prior to the start of negotiations, Iran’s economy had declined 5.4% according to Iranian statistics. Rather than ex- ploit Iran’s desperation, Kerry worked to alleviate it: The Obama admin- istration offered Iran billions of dollars just to come to the table. Nor did Kerry (or Obama) once enunciate what the best alternative to a negotiated agreement was, leading his Iranian counterparts to conclude correctly that 32 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma they had the upper hand in talks. After all, if Obama and Kerry castigated their critics as warmongers, then how likely were they to join their critics if they believed war the only alternate? Can Kerry alone be blamed? No: US strategy has been incoherent across administrations. Secretaries of State might opine but if there is no unity of effort to ensure that their diplomacy is set up to succeed, then it won’t be successful. The State Department cannot alone build leverage — that is the job of the Pentagon and perhaps Central Intelligence Agency and should be coordinated by the National Security Council. Kerry’s problem was ego: Perhaps it was his decades im- mersed in the culture of the Senate, but he seems to have come to believe that his own good faith and rhetoric could substitute for the hard work of crafting coherent strategy. Essentially, his tenure was one giant short-cut. He worked hard, but not effectively. Staff and close advisors who might have offered him a reality check instead recognized that their path to recog- nition and promotion was to affirm whatever Kerry thought, no ma er how destructive or, in some case, factually challenged it could be. Kerry, himself, has always been handicapped by his credulity: He believes what he is told. His adversaries understand that personal charm can lead Kerry to dismiss the accumulated wisdom of those more experienced or knowledgeable than he. Diplomacy that diverges from reality is seldom successful. Kerry did not live in the real world. Nor does diplomacy absent leverage ever work with adversaries or rogue regimes. It is a lesson Kerry never learned, and history will condemn him for it. He has left the United States and its allies in a far worse position than had he done nothing. 3.5.2 Oil Interests Are Vital Much of the literature base, as well as most U.S. officials, argue that the reason the U.S. maintains such a large presence in the Arab States is to protect our oil interests. If con teams can prove that the removal of U.S. troops–or even the perception of removal– could trigger instability in the oil market, they have an easy link into recession and conflict scenarios. It may be smart to run this as a perception link. Even if the actual re- moval of U.S. troops won’t make oil resources insecure, the perception of a U.S. pullout may cause investors to pull money out of the oil market, creating instability. Roger Fouquet. The London School of Economics and Political Science. 9 December 33 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma 2016. “Historical energy price shocks and their changing effects on the economy.” h ps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140988316303553 A continuing globalization of energy markets, spurred by developments in the natural gas may further decrease the probability of large energy price shocks. However, this development increases the vulnerability of every in- dividual economy to non-domestic macroeconomic events such as the eco- nomic boom in 2002–2008 that caused energy prices to increase to levels unprecedented in the last century (see Fig. 1). On the other hand, a tran- sition towards renewable energy may reverse this trend, and care should be taken to learn from the lessons from earlier periods – in particular, that inte- grating individual national markets can dampen volatility, ensure a mix of energy sources and avoid overheating the economy. An important conclu- sion that can be drawn from the results - that vulnerability and resilience to energy price shocks are related to energy markets rather than economic de- velopment - is that developing countries that depend on globally traded energy resources should not expect to become more resilient to energy price shocks over time. Instead, the highest resilience against energy price shocks was observed between 1850 and 1880 when the British economy depended on a diversified mix of domestically produced energy sources (coal, provender and wood). Such an energy mix implies that the impact of supply shocks was limited due to high substitutability between energy sources, whereas the negative impacts of aggregate demand shocks were off- set by the positive impacts of a growing economy (that caused the shock). If this conclusion can be applied to the future, then, particularly during a tran- sition to renewable energy sources, economies will become less vulnerable and more resilient to energy price shocks. Future research should investi- gate in more detail the changing vulnerabilities and resiliences associated with the transitions to low carbon economies to confirm this hypothesis. Tim Mullaney. CNBC. 23 July 2018. “Risks are rising that oil prices will cause next recession.” h ps://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/13/risks-rising-that-oil-prices-will-cause- next-recession.html In July 2008, even when the Federal Reserve was still be ing that it had a handle on the economy, Warren Buffe warned that “exploding” inflation — whether in the price of oil or steel — was the biggest risk to the U.S. econ- omy. “Quickly rising oil prices have been a contributing factor to every 34 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 3 Topic Analysis by Roshni Varma recession since World War II,” said Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi. Odds of a 2020 U.S. recession have risen to 34 percent, from 28 percent before this year’s spike in crude oil, Moody’s stated in a report. President Donald Trump’s tax cut, a deal on Capitol Hill to boost government spending, and a fla ening of the difference between short- and long-term interest rates also are contributing to the elevated recession risk. “My recession odds for 2020 have significantly increased since late last year,” Zandi said. 35 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe Ilana Cuello-Wolffe debated for The Dalton School for three years. She qualified to the Tournament of Champions her junior and senior year, and the NSDA National Tournament her senior year. She reached elimination rounds at many national cir- cuit tournaments, including the New York Invitational, Princeton, Harvard, Ridge, and many others. She received many speaker awards including third speaker at Princeton, Ridge, Villiger, and top speaker at the Byram Hills Invitational and the Westridge Round Robin. She was an instructor at VBI this summer. Welcome to the April topic! It goes without saying that this month is probably one of, if not the most, competitive month in the year. While the tournaments this month are difficult, there’s no need to panic. As long as you go in with a solid understanding of the topic and trust in yourself and the abilities that got you this far, you will be fine. No ma er how it goes, these tournaments are unique times to be more technical than you usually get to be, or simply to engage in higher leveled argumentation, which is really special! Regardless of what your records are at the end of the month, the postseason is an excellent time to fine tune your own sense of your debating style and to have a good time being engaged on a different level. The topic for this special time is Resolved: The United States should remove nearly all of its military presence in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf. 4.1 Definitions Let’s define some words! The first thing to define in this resolution is the phrase ‘nearly all’, which going by the online response to this topic, has caused nearly all debaters to be concerned. However, after doing some research, I don’t think this phrase is as vague as people are worried about. The legal definition of ‘nearly all’, according to this¹ case, is “some percentage ¹h ps://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/610/1505/1469385/ 36 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe which is very near 100%”. Most importantly, this² study by the military uses the phrase ‘nearly all’ (with regards to troop presence) to be synonymous with around 89%. All of these definitions are around 90% or up, which isn’t that vague. The reason why I don’t think that the resolution is asking us to evaluate removing all troops is that this would require the removal of ‘essential’ intelligence gathering operations and/or other ‘mandatory’ small groups of forces. The removal of 90% of troops sends the signal that the United States isn’t ready to go in the region, while still maintaining the baseline of security that the United States believes is necessary for its self-preservation, meaning perception-based arguments are up for grabs. The second thing that’s important to define is military presence. James in July, 2014³ writes “Our working definition of US overseas military presence is that it consists of all the US military assets in overseas areas that are engaged in relatively routine, regular, non-combat activities or functions. By this definition, forces that are located overseas may or may not be engaging in presence activities. If they are engaging in combat (such as Operation Enduring Freedom) or are involved in a one-time non-combat action (such as an unscheduled carrier ba le group deployment from the United States aimed at calming or stabi- lizing an emerging crisis situation), then they are not engaging in presence activities. Thus, an asset that is located (or present) overseas may or may not be”engaged in presence activities,” may or may not be “doing presence.” We have thus far defined presence activities chiefly in “negative” terms— what they are not. In more positive terms, what exactly are presence activi- ties, i.e., what do presence activities actually entail doing? Overseas military presence activities are generally viewed as a subset of the overall class of activities that the US government uses in its efforts to pro- mote important military/security objectives [Dismuke’s, 1994]. A variety of recurrent, overseas military activities are normally placed under the “um- brella” concept of military presence. These include but are not limited to US military efforts overseas to train foreign militaries; to improve interop- erability of US and friendly forces; to peacefully and visibly demonstrate A commitment and/or ability to defend US interests; to gain intelligence and ²h ps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK220068/ ³h p://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.122.1144&rep=rep1&type=pdf 37 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe familiarity with a locale; to conduct peacekeeping activities; and to position relevant, capable US military assets such that they are likely to be available sooner rather than later in case an evolving security operation or contin- gency should call for them. Robert⁴ in 2002 furthers, “The use of the term”overseas presence ”is intended to refer to those units and personnel that are permanently based overseas- or- in the case of some assets (e.g., naval forces) - are deployed to a particular region on a regular, rotational basis. (For example, U.S. forces currently fighting terrorism in Afghanistan would note considered part of U.S. overseas presence by this definition. Any Residual forces remaining after cessation of hostilities might be considered permanent presence.)” In my opinion, this definition is intended to only include the permanently based troops in the region and doesn’t extend to troops that the government would send over in the case of some kind of provocation. I think this simply implies that there is a substan- tial permanent reduction in troops. I think this definition could be potentially read to include non-troop presence such as physical weaponry, but I think it would be hard to prove that amongst the ~90% of easily-removable and deemed non-critical presence, that it would likely include the dismantling of missile defense technology (for example). The final thing to define here is the Arab States of the Persian Gulf. This is the seven Arab states which border the Persian Gulf, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). These countries fall into a group called the Gulf Cooperation Council, also known as the GCC. The countries of the GCC are located close to the Arab–Persian fault line and are therefore strategically important to the U.S., primarily because of oil located in the region. Heritage in 2019⁵ says the following concerning this part of the region: ”The root of Arab–Iranian tensions in the Gulf is Tehran’s ideological drive to export its Islamist revolution and overthrow the traditional rulers of the Arab kingdoms. This ideological clash has further amplified long-standing sectarian tensions between Shia Islam and Sunni Islam. Tehran has sought to radicalize Shia Arab minority groups to undermine Sunni Arab regimes ⁴h p://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA404187&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf ⁵h ps://www.heritage.org/military-strength/assessing-the-global-operating-environment/middle-east 38 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain. It also sought to incite revolts by the Shia majorities in Iraq against Saddam Hussein’s regime and in Bahrain against the Sunni al-Khalifa dynasty. Culturally, many Iranians look down on the Gulf States, many of which they see as artificial entities carved out of the former Persian Empire and propped up by Western powers. The GCC’s member countries often have difficulty agreeing on a common policy with respect to ma ers of security. This reflects both the organiza- tion’s intergovernmental nature and its members’ desire to place national interests above those of the GCC. The recent dispute regarding Qatar illus- trates this difficulty. Another source of disagreement involves the question of how best to deal with Iran. On one end of the spectrum, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the UAE take a hawkish view of the threat from Iran. Oman and Qatar, the former of which prides itself on its regional neutrality and the la er of which shares natural gas fields with Iran, view Iran’s activities in the region as less of a threat and maintain cordial relations with Tehran. Kuwait tends to fall somewhere in the middle. Intra-GCC relations also can be problematic.” While parts of the analysis in the above quote are overly simplistic, it gives a good overall understanding of the general ‘coalitions’ that the included in the resolution fall into. With all of that being said, let’s get into some arguments. 4.2 Affirmative Arguments 4.2.1 Inflaming Tensions The argument here falls along two lines. The first part of this is that Saudi Arabia feels emboldened by having US backing in the form of troop presence which encourages it to start proxy wars primarily against Iran and/or states and groups which align with Iran. A lot of the other GCC states which also have US troop presence are part of a coalition that Saudi Arabia has led which has been engaging in these proxy wars as well. The second part of this argument is that a large reason why Iran is engaging with Saudi Arabia and other GCC nations (both proactively and reactively) is because they feel threatened by the presence of American troops in the region. 39 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected]. 4 Topic Analysis by Ilana Cuello-Wolffe Jones of the Atlantic in 2011⁶ writes: ”In spite of claims to the contrary by the Saudi and Bahraini governments, Iran’s revolutionary imperative is a relic of the past. Israel expresses a sim- ilar anxiety about Iran as a security threat. And Iran’s leaders have played their part in fostering Israeli uncertainty. Iran’s potential acquisition of nu- clear weapons is a source of concern, of course, as is its support for Hezbollah and Syria. The challenge of how best to deal with Iranian ambition, however, is mainly a political problem, one that has for too long been treated almost entirely through the lens of security and militarism. The presence of the American military in the Gulf has not only done li le to deter Iran’s ambitions, it has emboldened them. Surrounding Iran militar- ily and pu ing it under the constant threat of American or Israeli military action has failed to deter the country. Instead this approach has strength- ened hardliners within Tehran and convinced them that the best path to self- preservation is through defiance, militarism, and the pursuit of dangerous ties across the Middle East. The rivalry between Iran, the U.S., and its re- gional partners has turned into a political and military arms race, one that could easily spin out of control. … Less obvious, the United States’ military posture has also emboldened its al- lies, sometimes to act in counterproductive ways. Saudi Arabia and Bahrain justify their brutal crackdown of Bahrain’s pro-democracy movement by falsely claiming Iranian meddling. While American policymakers support democratic transitions in the Middle East rhetorically, their unwillingness to confront long-time allies in the Gulf during the Arab Spring is partly the product of the continued belief that the U.S. needs to keep its military in the Gulf, something that requires staying on good terms with Gulf monarchies. The result is that Saudi Arabia and its allies have considerable political cover to behave badly, both at home and abroad.” Crucially, this argument assumes that the United States presence in the region is be- lieved by both Saudi Arabia and Iran to be poised to a ack, but this may or may not still be the case. ⁶h ps://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/12/dont-stop-at-iraq-why-the-us-should- withdraw-from-the-entire-persian-gulf/250389/ 40 This product is licensed to [email protected] by Victory Briefs. Any distribution or modification of this file not explicitly allowed by the terms of purchase (including removing or obscuring this text or sending to anyone outside Devon Weis's school) is a violation of copyright. Please report illicit distribution of this file to [email protected].
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