major league baseball is relocating its all star game from the us state of georgia to republican politicians there approved controversial new voting restrictions they include ideal requirements being made more stringent for absentee ballots and it's now a crime to offer food and water to people waiting in long voting lines critics including president joe biden see it as an effort to disenfranchise poor and minority groups which support democratic party candidates. part time for a quick check of the headlines here on al-jazeera a man has rammed a car into the police of a barricade surrounding the u.s. capitol complex before jumping out with a knife one officer was killed in the attack and named as 25 year old noah greene was shot dead particle and that's more than the suspect preliminary indications just from scrubbing social media seem to indicate a 25 year old man with potentially some pretty serious mental illness very

distraught apparently have lost his job recently looking for some sort of guidance and talking about some of the things we often hear when it involves mental illness and a violent crime that the government was trying to manipulate his brain that they were causing him ailments so beginning this flush out a picture of a very disturbed young man who thought that he needed to target the government for the longest serving officer in the minneapolis police department has testified that the level of force used on george floyd was totally unnecessary richard simmons said floyd was no longer a serious threat once he was hung out russian rights groups of issued a rare report condemning their country's involvement in syria's war it includes interviews with survivors and was released to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the conflict the report says most syrians view russia as a destructive foreign force. the u.s. has lifted sanctions on visa restrictions against employees of the international

criminal court which were imposed by the former trumpet ministration the i.c.c. chief prosecutor and another top official were among those targeted as the court began to investigate u.s. troops for potential war crimes in afghanistan the u.s. and iran will open in direct talks next week as the european union spearheads efforts to salvage the 2015 nuclear deal participants in the code including china france italy and britain will meet in vienna next week the u.s. won't take part directly but for the 1st time since donald trump withdrew from the deal in 2018 a u.s. delegation will be present at least 54 people have died in taiwan's worst rail disaster a truck rolled onto the tracks just as the train was approaching nearly 500 people on board and many survivors had to climb out of the wreckage. those are the headlines the news continues here now to 0 after inside story statement thanks so much.

u.s. president joe biden is with ported live with moving military assets from the gulf even as washington still considers what in the region is this a shift emitter strategy and what does it mean for security in this fall the time area this is inside story. hello welcome to the program. u.s. president joe biden has ordered the pentagon to remove some military forces from

the gulf that's according to a report by the wall street journal at least 3 apache batteries have reportedly been withdrawn including one from a base in saudi arabia biden has pledged to recalibrate u.s. ties since taking office in january including freezing the sale of some weapons to riyadh using the war in yemen but his administration also says it does not want to destroy the relationship it says it will still continue to help the kingdom defend itself against increasing attacks from yemen and iraq saudi officials have not commented on this while the americans say the decision was taken to meet military needs. we'll bring in our panel shortly to discuss this further but 1st let's take a closer look at the u.s. mr presence of the gulf as of late last year there were about 58000 american troops

across the region that's down from about 90000 of the height of the tensions between donald trump's administration and iran in 2019 in a tolbert that year the u.s. deployed nearly 3000 troops to assad's arabia but now with the possible removal of the pattern it anti-missile batteries and permanent aircraft carriers up to several 1000 military personnel could also leave soon. let's bring in our guest in washington d.c. douglas ollivant a retired army officer and senior fellow with the future of war project america in london andrea scrag assistant professor in the defense studies department at king's college london has also co-author of surrogate warfare the transformation of war in the 21st century also in washington has seen

a senior resident scholar of the arab gulf states institute in washington while come to you all douglas is the u.s. with thinking military positioning in the middle east or is it just a simple act of reorganizing military assets. so i think there are 3 different things going on here one is a simple matter of military necessity the number of patriots and to a lesser extent aircraft carriers that have been put in the gulf is simply unsustainable even if we wanted to retain that kind of presence it's simply not sustainable the surge that level of assets for about long think 2nd this is a message to the region that the united states is rethinking its military posture and that the region is no longer the united states priority and i think interestingly a more subtly internal to the u.s. government this is a message from the white house to the pentagon to central command to those who do middle east policy that the united states government is giving

a push back signal inside the government to those who do the military to those who do middle east policy that again this is no longer a priority all right under us for many this could be an indication that biden is delivering going to election campaign promise he made which is about the need to rethink the way the administration should be dealing with saudi arabia. well yes i mean it there is it's a very much a tight group walk there by the by elements in is doing here because on the one hand there was a promise that they would you know kind of rethink it recalibrate the relationship with the crown prince where i've been so man and trying to put some distance between the administration and the crown prince and obviously making it clear break from what happened previously between trump and n.b.s. especially with the report coming out but at the same time obviously the bottom instruction is that rightly said you know the united saudi arabia remains a very important strategic partner of the united states so you know you have to

strike a balance and i think that's what biden is trying to do the message that was sent or last week already that the u.s. ministration would only support offensive support for the saudi military to ensure that they cannot use them of any material support offensively in the war in yemen again is part of that but obviously now withdrawing what are essentially defensive weapons and weapons that are used for the terence against iran i think sends the wrong message at the wrong time saying is yemen one of the main reasons why the americans are rethinking their military presence and particular support for saddam radio because they have biden himself has been critical during the campaign of the of the war in yemen. yes but this is not a manifestation of that everything my colleagues have said is exactly right and the word iran finally came up at the very end of my colleagues last comment to me and i agree with everything douglas said about internal and external messages and all

of that's absolutely correct but i think the biggest aspect of that is reform u.s. policy is being reflected here is the desire to reduce tensions with iran yes there is an overall. intention to draw down from the middle east to redirect to great power conflict with china yes there was an unsustainable surged in 2019 of the last 6 months of 2019 and into 2020 against you know but why was there surge and that's being drawn donna what was precisely because of a rising tensions with iran that was the result of the clash between maximum pressure and maximum resistance from iran and i think the administration is pushing very hard to move away from that posture of confrontation with iran so i think other u.s. policy toward saudi arabia have reflected more the desire of buying and other

democrats to draw a new relationship with saudi arabia ok recalibrate based on yemen this i think ultimately has to do with posture towards iran douglas. spoke about the iranian angle in this particular move and this is a problem i think from a sound of perspective and from many leaders in this part of the wealth trunk came in and he said you know want obama messed up a big deal in the gulf region and that involved in the iranians i have to show them an aggressive push by then comes in and says i need to show some sense of towards the iranians the sound as well definitely say you know what this is the wrong message to send this particular time because it just ultimately would further embolden iran. certainly that's the saudi method i totally agree with what again both of my colleagues here on the program have said this is an iran and partially that's the internal messaging i was talking about

central command and again the pentagon officers that manage the middle east have been seen as the ironic hocks and so i think this is a message from the white house to the iran you know the central location of the hour on hocks inside the united states government that this is no longer the intention of the white house to keep up this level of tension although as we all know they're kind of struggling to find a politically acceptable way to downplay that andrea could it also be a realisation among the top strategists in the u.s. administration various about time to downsize the presence of the u.s. military in the middle east because realities on the ground have completely changed so why should we be bowed down in this part of the world for other. i think they're on this kind of path of there's some sort of path dependency that goes back to the obama administration where the u.s. has said you know we are now delegating the burden of conflict of the middle east

to our partners in the middle east and that also means help to self-help that also means that saudi arabia has to take care of its own security its own defense military aid will be provided to do that and we see the saudi military when there is one branch that is good in the saudi military actually operational and effective is actually the air defense of ballistic defense units of the saudi armed forces which have been trained and supported by the u.s. military and at the same time it's about you know burden sharing and meaning that the u.s. will no longer carry the burden for defense of the gulf and that's the message that's been sent to partners in the gulf all throughout the obama administration but also kind of through the trauma administration despite some rhetoric if you look at action on the ground it meant the united states no longer look at the middle east as strategically most as this duty the most important region of operations and that means local partners have to adopt more of that burden has same but this is the problem with the a strategic review of force placements around the world this is something that the

americans did in the past but they had to. backtrack and send even firm more troops into the region particular in 2019 with the bar with iran. you know that means that can easily happen again look the united states is a bit overstretched right globally and so there has been an intention i would argue going back to the 2nd george w. bush term to draw back from the middle east in every president obama in 2 terms and trump in one term and of biden wants to redirect from the middle east in general and the gulf in particular and pivot towards great power competition with china which is absolutely right in syria the problem is that the gulf region is the beating heart of the global economy and the south and east asian economies that are at the heart of great power competition so if you pivot to asia you pull the gulf with you in tow plane in a certain sense and you can always back away entirely and leave

a vacuum or open the door for further chinese encroachment but that carries its own costs the other thing is that there is a downside for the united states to burden sharing it's great except that yemen is kind of exhibit a in what burden sharing can look like you say well you guys take care of it and saudis go ahead and intervene in yemen and now the united states doesn't like the way that looks and i mean i think for very good reasons but the point is there is a mixed message here which is you do it no no don't do it your way do it our way but you do it ultimately doesn't fit together very well and i think a balance still has yet to be struck here ok douglas one of the key components of miniature positioning for decades was basically the presence of military bases that's where you would send troops equipment what pens bracing for what could happen next could that also become obsolete in

a way or another in the near future because when you say that you are putting out withdrawing one of the questions they how to bear in mind what shall i do with bases. well you bring up a very good point we've all been talking about the obsolescence of our strategic assumptions you know all these you know conventional forces are really good at deterring conventional threats but there really aren't any in the middle east anymore it's hard to think of 2 armies internal the middle east that might clash with each other you know the threats that come from iran are nonconventional it's their proxy forces it's their missiles and potentially their nuclear forces none of which respond very well to an aircraft carrier so it's time to have some serious rethinking about both managing our presence in the gulf and our competition in the gall i mean and we just saw in the last week that china is moving very forcefully into the gulf but they're not doing it with a military presence you can't counter

a china iran on trade agreement with another aircraft carrier we're going to have to have a lot more creative thought as to how the united states manages its presence and conducts its strategy in the middle east region. the problem here is that's when you with joe or when you every calibrate you give the people the impression that you're living a weld in order and moving to another look to weld but you know look at this bottom of the well it's still the same set of challenges and problems isis is still very serious still having problems yemen is still a nother issue libya is to another if you're talking about a world that needs to be put into order be full of it forward. well to be honest the middle east is of probably a greater state of instability than it has been over the last 2 or 3 decades but beyond that i think the us has already gone into a new phase of engagement in the region and that's one of what i call sorry wolf in

my book which you know this is how the iranians do it delegate to local sorry gets let them fight on your behalf and the u.s. responds by saying we delegate to local partners and local non-state actors to fight on our behalf and rightly at douglas said an aircraft carrier doesn't have anything any kind of weight in that sort of sargon confrontation but then at the same time as the americans are saying you know they want to push back against china and part of that great power game the issue is as they're going already at the grocery touchable the issue is the chinese actually struck some very strategic deals with partners in the region 1st and foremost the the deal with the iranians which is a 25 year strategic relationship based on up to 400000000000 dollars dollars of investment from china to into iran they struck a deal with the with saudi arabia where it's about investments into agenda 2030 again billions of dollars of investment and they struck a deal with the u.a.e. which is about you know creating a vaccine within within the u.a.e. that again you know it increases the foothold of china but the fall of the chinese

in creasing building in the region is not one that's based on the military domain it's a whole of government approach and again that's where i think the americans aleck and the americans don't understand how to do a whole of government approach in the same way that the chinese do if you suddenly decide that this is about time for me to consider for example china to be the long term security challenge for the united states of america this is something that will definitely have to have some implications on the way the americas have to really reorganize themselves and build up their presence in different parts of the worlds. i mean no question and everything that my 2 colleagues have said is exactly right but there is one exception. to the asymmetrical threat pattern that douglas's described which is maritime security in the gulf there's a big dispute among american strategic thinkers right now about whether the 5th fleet and the permanent stationing of large naval forces based in behind in the waters of the gulf is necessary to maintain maritime security in the gulf waters

itself the incredibly crucial economically crucial waters of the gulf and to keep the strait of hormuz open whether you think you need that kind of presence or not somebody is going to have to create a security structure that ensures the free flow of commerce through the strait of hormones and an orderly system in the maritime waters of the gulf right now it's a combination of ad hoc understanding's backed up by the presence of the 5th fleet if you want to shift away from the traditional model you will have to figure out a sustainable long term modus vivendi to ensure maritime security in the in the gulf waters. otherwise the u.s. i think is naval presence going to be necessary to continue douglas if we are to shift away of the americas out to shift away from that model that has been prevented for quite some time in this part of the world could it be an indication

that perhaps the arctic the pacific and the could be the next battle fields where the americas would have to fight for the supremacy. i don't think battlefield is quite the right word but certainly the united states is going to be competing all kinds of places with the chinese and again my colleagues have more of us on this correctly you know we don't the united states is not configured for this every chinese aid and development worker sees him or herself as the vanguard for marker chinese business i don't think anybody in u.s. aid thinks that way but they need to start thinking that way up we're serious about this whole of government approach and they differ slightly with inhibition on the presence of the great i think the united states are still thinking as a energy consumer and not as an energy producer look texas is competing with markets in asia which is competing with saudi arabia for markets in asia to export oil and in some ways the 5th leaders underwriting the geopolitical risk buying

saudi arabian oil i'm not sure we really start thinking strategically that that's going to make sense particularly for texans under if that's the argument as i was referring to go ahead go ahead. and no i'm just saying that's precisely the argument that i was referring to that many people are making under arrest biden made it quite clear that he will definitely need to be build ties with nato and we're talking about nato we're talking about russia the same time because that's where the what's the thinking has been focusing for quite some time which is the need to contain the russian buildup could this be an indication that in the near future i would be seeing the americas dealing with 2 key players here wash on the one hand china and the other. i don't see any of that engagement happening when it comes to when it comes to russia quite in the country i think it's one of confrontation but again russia doesn't feature i mean when we speak in europe

obviously europeans and nato partners in europe constantly talk about russia not so much about china i think there's a huge divergence there between how this prep reception of china and europe is a different one than the united states when it comes to russia there's a different set in in the united states then there is in europe so i think it's europe is more confrontation towards russia us more competition when it comes to china and i think there's a huge divergence within nato of how to deal with china and this. during this period you know because there are a lot of european partners need to partners as well we're opening up towards china becoming part of the one route one build initiative selling out very strategic assets to china and there is very little that the united states can do about it so the competition is about an alternatives are not saying that you know china is a substitute in the u.s. but it's supplementing and that in itself could be a long term threat has sent this is one of the problems with shifting the burden of defending territories particularly overseas you have 2 options here either you start training those troops like in the case of saudi arabia or selling them war

advanced weapons to be able to defend their own territory the carving out here is some of those weapons could and being used the wrong way and this is the dollar. yeah and in fact the yemen war already shows an example in used necessarily in the wrong way but from the point of view of many americans in in in the wrong way not necessarily for the wrong purpose but in a in a way that's counterproductive and ineffective and even and at times morally indefensible ride so at the same time if you're really going to shift the burden sharing you're going to have to accept more of that then you want striking the balance is very difficult i do think it's important to say that the biden administration is working on the got this tiger team going this ad hoc group of defense experts to look into more sales training and technology transfer to help the saudis defend themselves that the line between offensive and defensive in the military is very very blurry. douglas we keep talking about armies of as if they

were into it is disconnected from this part of the world when you look at our modern life challenges pandemics and climate change are perhaps the biggest challenges that we are facing don't you see that this could be the moment to rethink the very notion of armies in their substance in the form in their identity and in their mission. well certainly and i think in some ways we already see that you know as i looted 2 earlier it's really hard to picture a conventional war in the middle east today you know it's it's very hard to imagine iraq picking up invading kuwait again it's almost impossible to imagine syria or egypt trying to launch a ground attack to invade israel those are just not things that are very thinkable 'd 'd in the region for a host of reasons peace accords lack of capability the instability inside the

country but nonetheless it's more or less on thinkable and so the security challenges are very very different the one thing i do want to respond to is that you know as we build up saudi and other gulf states saudi amorality etc military capabilities we have to reason that the we have to realize that ironic sees its unconventional capabilities its missiles its support of proxy forces as it's counter to those capabilities so as we move into a place where we start to imagine negotiating with the iranians about their missile program about their support for proxies what are the gulf states going to be willing to come to the table and negotiate with to give up indeed and one thing we know about states is they don't unilaterally disarm under asked if it ought to move forward into the future it seems that with difficile intelligence we won't be needing hundreds of thousands of troops and cost carriers in a more in the near future it will depend on the extent and what kind of smart

weapons you would have. absolutely yes so that's my whole point about if you look at gray zone operations that are taking place everything any sort of competition at the moment in the middle east as everywhere else is in the gray zone and you know the synergies that china is building are not just in the domain of trade and economy but also 'd in information technology share sharing and synergies particular between you even china the integration is around information technology so already china has kind of proof or is providing the u.a.e. with capability that you know the americans are not sharing with you a you and these kind of synergies will be more important moving forward against you in a time when the u.s. is entirely focused on on conventional military german will how to live in the douglas ollivant under ask anybody i really appreciate your contribution and your time thank you and thank you to for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting our website dot com for further discussion go to our facebook page

that's facebook dot com forward slash a.j. inside story you can also join the conversation on twitter our handle is a j inside story from a hashemite about the entire team here in doha like ana. that seems a promising paul thought of the pandemic but implementing the greatest inoculation in history is testing the global community around the world already a clear gap as the match between rich nations and poor ones when it comes to vaccinating their populations from the geopolitics to the pure economics the

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a witness documentary on al-jazeera understand the differences and similarities of cultures across the wound so no matter when you. use in current affairs that matter to you. hello i'm down in jordan in doha with the top stories on al-jazeera a man has run the car into offices that are barricades around in the u.s. capitol before jumping out with a knife one of the officers was killed in the attack i was shot dead while not thought to be terrorism related it shaken washington which is still on edge after approach from mob stormed the capitol building back in january particle hane reports. it's happened again. another attack on the u.s. capitol on the suspect.