Yes, President Trump has recently fired or forced out a number of highly respected retired four-star Marine generals from his administration. But the resignation of former four-star Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni on Tuesday is no obvious rebuke to Trump.
Instead, it appears to reflect Zinni’s frustration with the Sunni-Arab monarchies in regards to their diplomatic freeze. That freeze centers around an economic blockade of Qatar by a Saudi-led alliance of other Sunni monarchies. Those nations are infuriated by Qatar’s excessive support for Islamist revolutionary movements across the Middle East and Doha’s increasingly close relationship with Iran.
In comments to various news outlets, Zinni said he saw no further point in trying to push the monarchies to find a compromise. He believed they had no interest in compromise.
I believe Zinni. The underlying problem in this dispute is not that the parties haven’t yet found the right ingredients for a compromise but that neither side sees its interest in a compromise. The Saudi-and-UAE-led bloc opposing Qatar regards the country as a betrayer of the Gulf Cooperation Council. The anger that drives this policy cannot be discounted; it might better be described as pure rage.
At the same time, absent compelling pressure from the Trump administration, the Qataris have no interest in ending their support for the Muslim Brotherhood and other Salafi extremist organizations across the Middle East and North Africa. Doha certainly doesn’t want to end its economic relationship with Iran in that the Iranian angle gives it access to important economic- and energy-related interests.
In short, Zinni was trying to negotiate a peace deal between interests that had no interest in a deal. So, he did the only rational thing to do: He resigned.
