BUILDING BRIDGES BETWEEN AMERICA AND ARABIA
The National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations: 1996-2001
A Report
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PUBLIC SECTOR
CONGRESS
Since 1986, the National Council has taken nearly 200 Congressional leaders to the Arab world. These include Members of Congress and their chiefs of staff, defense and foreign policy advisers, and communications and legislative affairs directors. They also include staff assigned to such committees as Foreign Relations, Armed Services, Energy and Commerce, Intelligence, International Affairs, Agriculture, Finance, Ways and Means, and the offices of both the Majority and Minority Leaderships.
In every instance, these leaders have returned to the United States better informed about Arab and Islamic culture than they were before. As a direct result of their having been placed in the middle of the U.S.-Arab relationship inside the region, they have returned with firsthand knowledge of the ways in which the Arab world is of far greater importance to the United States and the American people than they had previously imagined. All of these leaders have also become convinced of the need to do whatever is possible to strengthen U.S. relations with the region as a whole and with specific countries.
THE ADMINISTRATION
The National Council, from its inception, has sought to contribute to the national dialogue on U.S. interests and involvement in the Arab countries, the Mideast, and the Islamic world. It does this through participation in innumerable meetings and briefings with Administration officials both in the United States and in individual Arab countries. In so doing, the Council exercises its civic duty and moral obligation to share what, in many instances, is privileged and hard-to-come by information and insight into the multifaceted challenges and opportunities facing U.S. policymakers and decision-makers. Among the beneficiaries are those responsible for the formulation and implementation of American policies and positions toward a range of issues affecting the United States and its global as well as regional Arab allies.
In addition to its contributions to the knowledge and professional development of specific branches of the Administration, the National Council, on request, has also frequently administered tailor-made programs for high-ranking U.S. diplomatic, defense, and administrative personnel involved with the Arab world. Among these are those that have been either assigned to, or are scheduled to visit, the region on a specific mission.
Examples include the pre-departure briefings provided the media, staff, and related entourage accompanying the First Lady, Hillary Clinton, on her maiden tour of Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia, and the ambassadors as well as heads of specific U.S. military training missions and other command posts related to each of the Arabian Peninsula and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates – as well as Morocco, Yemen, and other Arab countries.
Department of Commerce
From the mid-1980s onwards, the National Council and the U.S.-GCC Corporate Cooperation Committee have participated in one or more aspects of the U.S.-GCC Economic and Business Dialogues. These biannual meetings have brought together the leading public and private sector leaders from the United States and its counterparts in the six GCC countries to discuss ways of placing their commercial and economic relationships on a firmer foundation.
Indeed, when these dialogues began, it was the National Council, in cooperation with the then newly formed U.S.-GCC Corporate Cooperation Committee and the National U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce, that submitted the first “White Paper” on the issues most pressing at the time. The White Paper was presented to the U.S. Departments of Commerce and State, which, in turn, used it as the stimulus for launching the dialogues.
Department of Defense
The National Council is pleased with the frequency with which it is asked by the U.S. Department of Defense to provide input and comment on the nature and orientation of America’s defense relationships with the Arab world as a whole and, in particular, with regard to specific U.S. defense assistance responsibilities with individual countries. These have included the six GCC countries, in addition to Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Yemen, where the U.S. has close and longstanding defense ties. The Council has taken to these Arab countries Members and staff from Congressional committees dealing with armed services issues, representatives of individual U.S. service commands, and faculty as well as Cadets and Midshipmen at leading service academies.
In addition, the National Council has provided year-round briefings and lectures for defense personnel in post-graduate courses conducted at United States services academies, at specialized training institutes, and at symposia administered by specific armed forces commands. It has also included in numerous academic study abroad delegations defense leaders who have had little or no previous exposure to Arab and Islamic culture.
For nearly a decade and a half, the National Council has been privileged to host and provide a platform from which America’s highest defense leaders with responsibilities for U.S. defense interests in the Arab world have been able to interface with the Congress, with corporate leaders from the defense and aerospace sectors, and with leading writers and analysts of military strategy and defense issues in prominent public policy institutes.
A further National Council contribution to the preparation of America’s military leaders of tomorrow is the provision of opportunities to Cadets and Midshipmen, as well as professors, from leading United States service academies to participate in work-study internships through the Council both in Washington and abroad, inclusive of Arabic language training and area as well as specific country studies within the region.
Department of State
The Department of State has been a consistent “consumer” of the National Council’s educational and information services since the Council’s formation. The Council and the U.S.-GCC Corporate Cooperation Committee have conducted numerous meetings with Department personnel in which the participants have shared analyses and perspectives on ways in which the United States might more effectively pursue its policy objectives in the region.
On at least 50 occasions during the period under review, U.S. Embassy diplomatic, economic, and other personnel in select Arab countries have met with members of National Council delegations visiting these countries. In numerous instances, these personnel have spent portions of up to two days in meetings and briefings with the Council’s delegations for the purpose of enhancing the delegates’ overall awareness and understanding of American needs, concerns, and interests in a specific Arab country.
In addition, the National Council has participated in numerous specially prepared briefing programs for American ambassadors newly appointed to a specific Arab country. It has done the same for U.S. defense commanders assigned to head specific country training missions and regional commands in the Arab world.
Not least among the Council’s contributions to those preparing for a career in national public service is its having enabled numerous outstanding representatives of today’s youth, America’s leaders of tomorrow, through participation in one or more of the Council’s internships, study abroad programs, or Model Arab Leagues, to get a head start in their careers as U.S. Foreign Service Officers or as staff on Congressional committees dealing with international affairs.
Policymakers Conferences
Since 1991, the National Council, as a public service, has been the prime organizer of a one-of-a-kind forum for U.S. policymakers dealing with the Arab countries. The first nine conferences were held annually in Lexington, Virginia, at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI).
The choice of VMI as the venue was deliberate. The Institute is the alma mater of General George C. Marshall, former U.S. Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State, Ambassador to China, author of the Marshall Plan, architect of the Allied victory in World War Two, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Peace.
Components of the Institute’s burgeoning International Studies Program are oriented to the Arab countries, the Mideast, and the Islamic world. VMI Cadets also participate in the Institute’s Arabic Language Study Program and in the Passage to Morocco Summer Arabic and Islamic Studies Program, a joint offering between the National Council and the Institute.
The Policymaker Conferences’ corporate sponsors have included, in addition to the National Council and the U.S.-GCC Corporate Cooperation Committee, numerous Committee corporate members, including the Boeing Corporation, ExxonMobil, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, the Parsons Corporation, Chevron, Conoco, and the Saudi American Bank (Citicorp). Each year’s keynote addresses, plenary sessions, and panels have become a primary vehicle for America’s top-ranking defense, diplomatic, economic, and commercial leaders to address some of the more pressing U.S.-Arab relations policy issues from their respective perspectives.
Joining the Conference participants for the two-day sessions are a mixture of public and private sector leaders with major responsibilities for the analysis, formulation, and implementation of U.S. policies towards the Arab world as a whole. Of these, roughly one third are officials from the Departments of Commerce, Defense, State, Treasury, the intelligence communities, and the Office of the United States Trade Representative.
Another third are corporate executives responsible for recommending and deciding policy on matters related to strategic marketing, distribution, and investment issues. And another third is comprised of specialists from policy research institutes, select representatives from Allied country governments, and prominent academics.