It's more complicated than that, and Saddam does pose a threat to America's oil supply. A couple well placed nukes at Saudi oil facilities and poof $100 a barrel oil, or assisinations -- didn't the old Bush get one from Saddam....
9/11 ONE YEAR LATER: Force won't work, By Shlomo Ben-Ami
Sep. 5, 2002
... Let it be said immediately that Iraq certainly presents a vital threat to the West, and Saddam's reign of evil is certainly endangering the region, and beyond. ...IN IRAQ the situation threatens to be even more complex, for there, unlike in Afghanistan, there is no equivalent of the Northern Alliance; the Americans will be forced to impose direct rule there which will ultimately fail. This would be the blow of death to their prestige in the area. The secret of deterrence lies in not using it; Iraq has the ability to expose the weaknesses of American deterrence.
A US offensive against Iraq would deal a severe blow to the stability of pro-West countries in the region. Mubarak cannot allow himself to get on a collision course with rioters at mass demonstrations for fear of being condemned as an American puppet. Abdullah II's monarchy in Jordan risks fatal upheaval; for Israel, his fall would be a threat no less potent than that posed by Saddam.
Undermining Mubarak, or deposing the Hashemites in Jordan, pose an existential threat to Israel, one we would be wise to recognize even if we are dissatisfied with Mubarak's Israel policy. If it weren't for Mubarak's restraining leadership, the Arab world might have been tempted to enter the conflict, and perhaps even launch total war on Israel, in the early days of the intifada.
The blame for the lack in Iraq of a counterpart of the Afghan Northern Alliance's sort rests squarely with the US. During the Gulf War, the US refrained from nurturing a democratic alternative to Saddam. The US anticipated a change of regime by military coup which would raise a friendly tyrant to power, and - by its own action or inaction - it denied aid that could have saved the rebel movement in north and south Iraq, as Saddam was butchering them. In doing so, the US abandoned its allies, leaving behind the perception in the region of an American tendency to rely on dictators, while remaining equally impervious to their cruelty and to whether they are for or against the US. Any "son of a bitch" is legitimate, provided he's "our son of a bitch."
September 11 laid bare a major challenge: will the terrible trauma of the event spur the US and its allies to develop a broad consensus for introducing a new, better world order? This would have been the requisite response to September 11. But it has not yet been made - and it doesn't seem that the American leadership is rising to the challenge.
It all begins and ends with the war in Afghanistan - whose outcome, I repeat, is dubious - and the issue, whether to attack Iraq or not. The military, operational focus, as vital and important as it may be - is not the correct response to the challenge. The correct response must have a threefold foundation:
* Proactive, preventive military measures against terror, with heightened international cooperation.
* The development of joint international mechanisms for increased equality in the global economy.
* The development of international mechanisms for conflict-resolution in those cases where the parties have proved beyond doubt that they cannot reach a solution on their own, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict being a case in point.
THE US has yet to turn September 11 into a real lever for positive global change, since it is hesitant to adopt a broad strategy of this kind. Republican unilateralism of the pre-September 11 era remains unchanged; it has not turned into coherent multiculturalism. The US has even ignored NATO's call for the principle of collective defense when it went to war with Afghanistan.
American unilateralism prevents the US - truly the indispensable nation - from developing the proper tools for a better world order based on international cooperation. For in the grim deterioration in everything concerning our planet and the environment, it was the US which led the rebellion against the Kyoto Protocol for the prevention of pollution caused by the emission of poisonous gases; it is also the US, by the way, which is discouraging agreements concerning control and limitations of weapons stockpiling.
The US was the only country among the signatories of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty which refused to take part in a convention of the countries that signed and ratified the agreement. And the US blocked every multilateral effort to impose the convention against development and possession of biological weapons.
In fact, it may be said that the unilateral drive of the Bush administration has not changed in any essential way following September 11. Bush's chief concern continues to be shrugging off any limitations on America's short-term freedom of action, at the price of losing allies and partners in a better world order over the long term.
The US is a big nation; it has to be the pivot of a better world order.
The power and morals motivating the US, as the only country in history to be born out of, and for the idea of freedom, make it a sought-after potentate. The nation that has never known any threat to its existence checked the threat totally and absolutely when it reared its head against the USSR during the Cold War.
The leadership of this great nation is as indispensable today as it was during the three world wars - World War I, World War II, and the Cold War - when it saved the free world. But the US must understand that the amorphous issue known as "international terror" and the threat of Muslim fundamentalism are not a military challenge, and certainly cannot be neutralized solely by an arms race, as with the USSR.
A world war cannot, and should not, be conducted against an invisible enemy whose frustration is fueled by quintessentially cultural and religious issues. The available means for confronting such an enemy lie in improving the global economy, developing cooperation, and nurturing the division of wealth by something along the lines of a social-democratic globalization.
It is necessary to attend to cultural nuances, to the malaise of civilizations. What is needed is the Clintonian readiness and commitment not only to peacekeeping, but to peacemaking as well. A move towards peacemaking of this kind is called for in the Middle East.
THERE is no need to adopt the fallacy according to which international terror is the answer to the supposedly one-sided American policy in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, to agree that this conflict is a major cause of instability in the region, and a convenient platform for mass hysteria throughout the Arab and Muslim world.
It is equally clear by this time that a peace agreement to be arrived at by open negotiations between the parties is an impossibility. The solution must therefore be international, albeit led by the US - or not be at all. The Palestinian issue thus becomes a central test-case of the stability of a new world order founded on international cooperation, not just for fighting terror but for constructing agreed-upon mechanisms for conflict-solving.
Clearly, an Israeli-Palestinian agreement driven by the US is but a single, vital element in the proper world order.
There are other vital needs: The international community must ensure that Saddam's regime is overthrown, without entering a military adventure with possibly destructive consequences. This can be done by increasing pressure; by restoring international supervision; by openly encouraging and fostering the opposition, and by tantalizing the Iraqi people with the advantages of the post-Saddam era. Overthrowing the tyrant on the Tigris can unloose processes of vital depth-change in the region which will also increase the international community's leverage against the nuclearization and terror coming from Teheran.
Likewise, an understanding with President Vladimir Putin must provide for Russia's inclusion in any principles of international discipline and stability. The US, along with the international community, must make it clear to Russia that the war on terror is not a green light for the cruel oppression of minorities. The Russians must also be required to stop seeking friends among the world's pariahs, be it the Myanmar military sect or the ayatollahs in Iran.
International order means that Russia must cooperate in checking Iran's nuclear plans and its involvement, up to its neck, in international terror. Too many leaders - Putin, for example, and Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf - benefit from that superficial concept which was strengthened after September 11, namely, "my enemy's enemy is my friend." Nor would it be right to turn a blind eye to China's human-rights infringements, or, as I have already pointed out, to Russia's heavy-handed tactics in Chechnya.
ONE MAJOR task still remains, namely clearing the air between Europe and the US, with the rift between them deepening after September 11 due to the Bush administration's brash unilateralism. The essence of the rift is the following: Europe is currently on a journey toward a quasi-federal pan-Europe, and is positing its security and the new world order on international law; international cooperation; increased weight for central international agencies such as the Hague Criminal Court; international frameworks for environmental action, etc. It is the US, which, unlike European countries, lacks the history of a classic nation-state, which is stressing, after September 11, America's claim for national sovereignty and freedom to make independent decisions, versus Europe's aspiration for a world order founded on international cooperation and binding rules for all.
If the US and its European allies fail to decide in favor of a fair compromise between European internationalism, on the one hand - frequently a sign of weakness, even of appalling incompetence - and over-energetic American proaction, a one-sidedness that might turn into the clumsy, destructive movements of a bull in a china shop, on the other, the internal split within the West will become an additional element in world chaos, instead of what it should be: a pivotal, vital force in new world order following the trauma of September 11.
In this world order, I have claimed here, there must be a threefold foundation: a joint, coordinated fight against world terror; coordinated mobilization of international energies for conflict-solving with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a case in point; and globalization notched up towards a more equal, more sensitive approach to cultural nuances, with an end to mitigating the opposition of various civilizations to the threat perceived in the cultural monolith that is such a central - and such an objectionable - element in globalization as we know it.
The writer, a modern-era historian, served as foreign minister in the Ehud Barak administration
Translated by Sara Friedman |
