April 21, 2003
Bush and the neo-conservative ideologues that pushed the country into an unjust and unnecessary war are reveling in the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime and the displays of euphoria that always greet the fall of tyrannical oppression. They have transformed the justification of a war supposedly aimed at destroying weapons of mass destruction and breaking supposed ties with Al Queda into a war for human rights. While multilateral interventions against genocidal regimes may be justified, to ensure that individual rogue states -- such as the United States -- not use brute force to reshape the world in their own narrow interest, such interventions cannot be unilateral. Certainly in the peace movement there are no mourners for Saddam’s brutish regime. But contrary to what the warmongers believe, the success of the military campaign does not meet the criteria set out beforehand to justify the intervention: where are the weapons of mass destruction that threatened the US, and where are the ties to external terrorist organizations that currently pose a threat to world peace?
The outcome of the military campaign was never in doubt; rather, it is the outcome of the occupation of Iraq that remains in doubt. The Iraqi people certainly deserve a shot at building a democratic society, but it is unlikely that this will be achieved under the occupying aegis of a mistrusted, even despised, imperial occupying power. No matter how we dress up our occupation as a blow for democracy, any domestic forces that appear to be pliant to US interests will inevitably be rejected by any truly democratic Iraqi voice. Witness the disdain for Ahmad Chalabi, a corrupt exiled businessman, shown by the Iraqi public. It is not even clear if a US and British military presence can establish legitimate order, yet alone indigenous democracy. Afghanistan, happily no longer ruled by the Taliban, has yet to see stability, yet alone democracy, spread beyond Kabul, and Afghani women have yet to see their aspirations met.
Already there has been assassinations and political infighting among the Iraqis chosen by the United States Defense Department (!) to assist in the “civilian” administration. The occupiers are unlikely to escape being tarnished by the tribal disputes, score settling, and looting that have already characterized the initial occupation. Nor is it likely that any American-anointed Iraqi leadership can escape the label of puppets, particularly if American corporations are gaining the lion’s share of the profits from a reconstruction paid for by Iraqi oil. Iraqi oil has been nationally owned since 1970. Yet, the US government proposes to sell these national assets to foreign—i.e., US—transnational oil companies. So much for oil being the patrimony of the Iraqi people.
The United Nations and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)—particularly from the Arab and Islamic world—must play a more significant role than that planned by the US and Britain if we are to have any expectation of a truly democratic outcome in Iraq. And the United States public must be prepared that the likely outcome of democratic elections in Iraq will be a nationalist or Islamic government hostile to the US government. Democracy in the developing world, as we have seen in Algeria, Turkey, and South Africa, rarely yields regimes that kowtow to American foreign policy. Iraq has a tradition of fierce nationalism that predates Saddam Hussein. We ignore it at our peril.
Those of us opposed to this unilateral United States military campaign made three main arguments. The first was that Iraq posed no immediate military or security threat to the US or its neighbors, particularly after inspectors were in place. Nothing that has been “discovered” counters this basic fact, nor is it likely that such a smoking gun will be discovered. They will no doubt discover some chemical or biological weapons but these were never a threat to us or even to theater powers such as Iran or Syria (which also have chemical weapons that cannot be delivered outside the Persian Gulf). We will never know the true number of Iraqi casualties, but US media sources counted up to one thousand civilian deaths and close to ten thousand military casualties before the US government told them to stop trying to count!
Second, we argued that the war would provide a gold mine of new cadre to terrorist organizations. We have already seen, according to the news, thousands of non-Iraqis volunteer for certain death or capture by crossing the border to fight against our troops. Once the battlefield quiets we can expect these new recruits to the war on terror (courtesy of the US intervention) to begin to seek new targets. And if the Iraqi occupation goes badly and the economy is not rebuilt where will all those ex-soldiers walking back to everyday life end up?
Third, we argued that the damage to relations with historical allies and international institutions would render the world less safe. The Bush administration has articulated a dangerous doctrine of preemption, asserting that the US has the right to instigate war, at will, against states that it perceives as long-term, eventual threats. It is the doctrine of an empire, not the leader of the community of nations. Furthermore, it is a doctrine that dangerously promotes nuclear proliferation. Would we have invaded Iraq if we really thought that Saddam had the bomb? Every state on Rumsfeld’s hit list can be expected to accelerate its efforts to acquire nuclear weapons.
The doctrine of “pre-emptive” war is a misnomer, as it moves well beyond the “just war” doctrine of a “pre-emptive” military strike being justified, if and only if, an about-to-be-attacked nation can only defend itself successfully if it attacks first. Obviously, Iraq was neither about to attack the United States nor could it do so successfully, even if the United States did not take “pre-emptive” action. Rather, the Bush’s National Security Doctrine says the United States can “preventively” attack any nation that it conceives to be even a distant, eventual threat to United States interests anywhere around the globe. It is a doctrine that threatens to negate the very principle of national sovereignty that has provided a modicum of global stability since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1644. If Iraq is first, will Iran or Syria be next? What of North Korea? Pakistan? Columbia? Venezuela? Brazil? South Africa? And how can a United States that has violated numerous international treaties (the Kyoto Accords; the International Criminal Court; the ABM treaty) caution a Pakistan or India (or an Egypt or Israel) not to engage in “pre-emptive” strikes against one another?
The ideologues from the Project for the New American Century (William Kristol, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, and co.) do the “strategic” (if disastrous scenarios can be called strategy) thinking for the Bush administration. They are deeply opposed to a world in which there is any counter to the hegemonic power of the United State, be it the United Nations, the European Union, or simply world public opinion. People associated with that group are arguing for military intervention in Syria and Iran, which is why Rumsfeld’s recent threats against those regimes are so disturbing. James Woolsey, the former director of the CIA, who has stated that we are in the midst of World War IV with Arab and Islamic nationalism, is currently being considered for a top post in the American occupation administration.
So what should the peace movement do? First and foremost, we must continue to organize and to demand that the United Nations and NGOs work with the Iraqi people towards an independent, non-aligned transition to indigenous Iraqi democracy. We have every reason to fear that this administration will undertake another military adventure in the near future —that is what empires do. But we must focus the nation’s attention on the dangerous and insecure world that Bush’s broader National Security Doctrine of pre-emptive wars will bring to the world scene. Second, we must link Bush’s international agenda with his war on workers and the poor at home. They seek to make the world safe for transnational corporations; we seek to make it safe for ordinary people. Finally, as we look toward the 2004 elections, we can have one broad, unifying goal, as we chanted on the streets: “hey hey, ho ho, Bush and Cheney have got to go!” Only by defeating Bush—and electing many anti-war Democrats and independents—can we force the imperial adventurers to pay a price that even they will recognize: their own electoral defeat.
(This was written with Joseph Schwartz. It will run in the next issue of Democratic Left.)
