The ropes are tearing
Europe, Russia, the USA: The rubble heap before the first shot
By Josef Joffe (Op-Ed in this-week Zeit)
The arguments have been exchanged, the veto sword is out of the sheath, and the world stands before a diplomatic rubble heap, which it has not experienced since the collapse of the league of nations. Maybe America goes alone into the war, maybe Bush pulls back in last second. Either way, the rubble heap will not grow smaller.
Let's take the scenario of the lonely war. Militarily Americans could win it fast - not with a fire roller that would destroy cities as in the Second World War, but with a precision bombardment, that would strike Saddam Hussein blind, deaf and mute n the first 48 hours. Whoever does not see the enemy any longer and cannot communicate with his troops any longer, can not fight anymore. For sure US will then also find the proofs, that escaped the UN supervisors. Later a regime may establish itself in in Baghdad, for instance similar to the one in Jordan: authoritarian, but neither despotic nor blood-thirsty. Also, a devilish dictatorship as a continuous threat of the region would be eliminated.
UN as an auxiliary troop of the USA
This bright scenario can naturally also flip into its opposite - into an endless war with innumerable victims and unending protractions. But whatever the scenario, that eventually will get the upper hand, the rubble heap is already a reality today. And nobody - neither Bush nor Blair, neither Schroeder nor Chirac - can now beat his chest and say, it's the others who have placed and detonated the explosive.
After 11 September the Bush government laid out its legitimate right to self-defense very broadly - all the way to Euphrates, in order to prevent Al-Qaida to hit next time with borrowed atomic and bio weapons. In order however to connect New York to Baghdad, Bush tumbled from one argument ito another, from disarmament over regime changes to the reorganization of the Middle East. One single reason argument has always been better than those three. Bush I. had it easier, because in 1990 it was a clear case of aggression and state robbery.
More serious however was subjecting the UN to the US military strategy: either you come with us, or we go with the coalition of the consenting. This was an inexcusable challenge at Russia, the great power of yesterday, and France, the would-like-to-be great power of today. No wonder, that these two veto powers, with Berlin pulling the rope as well, want to deflect the assault on their most prestigious badge of rank. Because: Turning the Security Council into a bare voting machine for America would be the end of their special status. Even worse the future outlook, in which Bushies leave the "irrelevant" UN completely aside, in order to make the world-wide order policy the American way using changing coalitions.
This, not the Iraq, is the true reason for the heap of rubble, that threatens to bury the UN, NATO and the German-American relationship. We experience an unparalleled struggle for power, with the goal of putting Gulliver, once constrained by the Soviet Union, back into chains. The historical date was 5th March, when France, Germany and Russia united themselves against the "Hyper power": "we will not permit" a war resolution. This was renversement des alliances, the turning upside-down of alliances - as in 1757, when the arch-enemies France and Austria suddenly against joined hands against Frederick's Prussia.
We thus actually experience the end of the post-war period, which began with the disembodiment of the Soviet Union on Christmas 1991. Old friends become embittered opponents, who unite themselves with old enemies against the last remaining superpower. The battle call is "one nation, one vote", and the goal is to outvote the Large one with the assistance of the many small ones, to buckle Gulliver onto the international institutions like the UN. The logic of this drama has to do only little with Saddam Hussein.
The outcome will show if the mechanisms of 18. Century still function in the 21st. Probably, however, both sides are wildly off-target - the Americans just like the new "axis powers" -. Of course Bush II. can win the Iraq war alone. But then what? The UN, if they don't decay to the league of nations, would then be just a global humanitarian bureaucracy. The anti-Gulliver reflexes would overcome ever more Lilliputians. The "Empire" would have to recognize that the most pressing problems of the 21st Century - from the protectionism to the terrorism, from the mass migrations to the climatic changes - can not be solved with precision ammunition, but only through cooperation.
And the Europeans? Basically they underestimate the value of the military as much as Americans overrate it - no wonder, because the former do not have firepower and the latter do. France and Co very probably know, that alone the American march-up forced the dictator to start showing inch by inch his arsenals. They very probably know that it is very easy to blow into the peace horn, if you can free-ride the American supremacy train. And they signal to Gulliver: "We will decide, if and when we let you off the chain."
Sterile confrontation
So there's no arrogance deficit in the transatlantic relationship. Still the war (as the internal-western Clash of Civilizations) could be prevented, if both sides stopped playing va banque. The unfinished departure, therefore the humiliation of the USA, - and by far not at all the resulting triumph of Saddam Hussein - really cannot be in the interest of Europe. That would be an absolutely wrong lesson for North Korea, Iran and Al-Qaida, as well as the end of the Security Council as a bulwark against the new world disorder. In addition, it can not be in the interest of USA to answer the European "No war, never!" with a "Oh yeah? Right now!"; that would just make the rubble heap bigger.
What else then? At least one consent prevails in the Security Council: Saddam Hussein's disarmament. Opponents of America know also that the march-up offers the only chance for a halfway peaceful disarmament by long-term inspections - if only the clock, which so far indicates only two bad options: Departure or attack, could be slowed down. That means: Paris, Moscow and Berlin would have to replace their pure blockade politics (that unfortunately works for Saddam Hussein) by conditional co-operation. In practical terms: France and Russia take part in the military threat backdrop, to achieve two goals. They rob Saddam Hussein of the Divide et Impera illusion and win a say in the matters of the American strategy. Somewhere down the road even Germans could follow - for instance by protecting Turkish air space. Others could take part by subsidizing the cost of the military presence.
Too late? If powers mean it serious with the disarmament, then this were at least a last-minute exit from a sterile confrontation. If however Paris/Berlin/Moscow are only concerned about paralyzing Gulliver - with him only concerned about the war, then everything would be not only too late, but also in vain. A cruel triumph for Saddam Hussein - whether he triumphs or goes down.
(C) THE ZEIT 12/2003 |
