ABSTRACT
The United States must limit its military commitments to levels which match the strategic importance of each area and nation in the Middle East and must then find ways to use arms transfers, and its own military forces to reinforce its political and economic efforts to bring strategic stability to the area. Many Middle Eastern oil states have declining reserves or limited production capability. Although Middle East analysts can afford some myopia about the importance of their region, the United States obviously has other major national security concerns. The land forces the United States will be able to project rapidly into the Middle East without measures will be relatively lightly equipped with heavy weapons. The United States has built a wide range of regional basing and contingency arrangements for operations in the Middle East since the fall of the Shah of Iran in 1979.
