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CounterPunch
October
1, 2002
An International
Block on Bush
Collective Security is Working
by
JEREMY BRECHER
As an American, I would like to thank all those
people and countries around the world who are helping to pull
my country back from the brink of war. And I want to assure you
that your efforts are having a big impact in the United States.
Unfortunately, the claim that the Bush
Administration is determined to make a pre-emptive attack on
Iraq has been validated over and over--most recently by Colin
Powell's assertion on the BBC that Washington might pursue "regime
change" in Iraq even if the Iraqi leader complies fully
with weapons inspections.
Softening up bombing, the classic first
phase of an invasion, has already begun. So has the transport
of war personnel and materiel to the Persian Gulf region. The
war marketing campaign is in full gear. To paraphrase Bertolt
Brecht, "When the leaders speak of peace, the mobilization
orders have already been given."
The Bush team's meticulous planning had
presumed UN and Congressional votes authorizing US attacks on
Iraq by now, laying the groundwork for permission to use Saudi
Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, Jordan, and other countries as bases
for attack. After President Bush's address to the UN, the US
Congress was poised to overwhelmingly pass a bi-partisan resolution
giving the President a blank check for war.
But a funny thing happened on the way
to the battlefield. For months people around the world have been
expressing their outrage. Overwhelming majorities in almost every
country except Britain and Israel opposed US plans. Politicians
and national elites, while loathe to court the wrath of their
patrons and protectors in Washington, have been even more terrified
of the forces likely to be unleashed by the Bush Administration's
irrational obsession.
The effects of this global opposition
on the US have been greatly underestimated. There is broad support
here for international efforts to deal with Iraq's alleged weapons
of mass destruction. But there is virtually no sector of American
society that supports a unilateral preemptive attack against
Iraq without international support except the President's immediate
clique, a few members of Congress in both parties, and the Air
Force.
The top uniformed military, except for
the Air Force, have been widely reported to be extremely skeptical
of such an effort. This summer they aroused the wrath of the
pro-war clique by submitting estimates of troop requirements
and casualties so high as to make the war seem too costly to
pursue. While the military brass haven't spoken against a unilateral
attack on the record, their retired colleagues have done so forcefully.
Top Republican military experts like Brent Scowcroft, many of
them cronies of former President George Bush and formerly high
officials in his Administration, spoke out against a unilateral
attack.
This summer, popular and Congressional
support for the Bush war plans seemed overwhelming. But as members
of Congress visited their districts in August they were met both
by organized delegations opposing the war and by profound worry
among their ordinary constituents. Democratic leaders announced
hearings and no "rush to judgment" on war policy. As
the Administration launched its war marketing campaign in September,
floods of phone calls and e-mails to members of Congress led
former Democratic Presidential candidate Al Gore and the leadership
of the Democratic Party in Congress to end silence or reverse
explicit support for Bush's policies.
Most of the popular and elite opposition
is not opposition to any attack on Iraq, but rather to an attack
on Iraq without allies. Little of this opposition would have
arisen had the rest of the world caved in to Bush Administration
demands for support. But the global united front against a US
war is transforming the balance of forces within this country.
While panicky Democrats in Congress may pass a watered-down resolution
authorizing war, US opinion is now clearly divided, and policy
elite, especially the Vietnam-burned military, is strongly averse
to going to war without broad popular support. If the international
front holds, there is a real chance that a US attack can be averted.
If the Security Council refuses to authorize
US military action and the UN inspectors go to Iraq, Bush Administration
war promoters will have at least two big problems. Neither public
nor elite opinion in the US is likely to support a unilateral,
unprovoked attack. Neighboring states are more likely to be firm
in their resolve not to let their countries be used as bases
for US attacks on Iraq. (Bush's friend Ariel Sharon is also making
it easier for them to just say no to US demands.)
If a full-scale attack on Iraq becomes
untenable, the Bush Administration will probably follow three
tactics. First, it will try its best to undermine and discredit
the UN inspection process; the faintest hint of Iraqi non-cooperation
will be met with fresh attempts to initiate war. Second, it will
expand the bombing it is conducting already. Third, it will look
for new openings to bully or bribe other countries back into
line.
This indicates the probable next steps
needed to contain US aggression. The tacit coalition of people
and states opposing the US war on Iraq, acting through the UN,
should demand that the US stop bombing Iraq while the inspection
process goes forward. Of course the US will veto such a resolution,
but the demonstrated international opposition will strengthen
both popular and elite opposition in the US. "State-supported
nonviolence" -- for example placement of foreign volunteers
in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities with the support of their national
governments -- might also provide a deterrent to US bombing.
It is also essential that the inspection
process go forward successfully. While it is impossible to know
exactly what led Iraq to readmit inspectors, there was clearly
at least a tacit quid pro quo that other countries would attempt
to stave off an American attack. Iraq must be made to feel that
it is safest if the inspection process proceeds successfully.
After all, Iraq can reasonably feel that, by allowing inspection
of its real or imagined weapons of mass destruction, it is giving
up a significant deterrent to US attack. The containment coalition
needs to indicate that it will try to protect Iraq from US attack
as long as the inspection process goes forward, but that it will
be much less able to do so if Iraq's cooperation is less than
complete.
Finally, it is necessary to block US
efforts to bribe or bully other countries back into line. The
Bush Administration's snub of German Prime Minister Schroeder
in the aftermath of his reelection is only the publicly visible
tip of the iceberg of Bush Administration bullying. There have
been many journalistic references to other countries being offered
a share of the spoils of war -- Iraq's oil, for example, or the
contracts for post-war reconstruction--as a quid pro quo for
joining the US in the kill.
Russia has indicated an interest in US
acquiescence in a Russian attack on Georgia, justified as a means
to root out Chechen rebels. Apparently this is a price the Bush
Administration is not yet willing to pay. No doubt they would
see it as giving the green light to restoration of the Russian
empire--establishing Russia's right to ignore the new national
boundaries that divide its once-and-future empire. But there
is no telling what bribes they will be willing to offer if they
find their way to war successfully blocked.
The Bush people tend to think of the
world as a football game, and their strategy is to knock off
those who get in their way one at a time. In the long run, containing
them will require not just opposition by individual nations,
but rather some more conscious form of collective security. There
needs to be a global understanding that containing US power is
a collective responsibility. This might be expressed, for example,
in providing financial and other support for countries like Jordan
that are being threatened with US reprisals if they refuse to
serve as bases for war against Iraq.
Another step could be to forcefully stigmatize
any country selling out to the Bush Administration for such a
"mess of pottage" as a share of the spoils of war,
some supposed geopolitical concession, or (for poorer countries)
cold cash. For a historical analogy, we might recall that the
Western powers tried to keep Russia in World War I by means of
scandalous secret treaties offering them other country's territory
when the war was won. The exposure of those secret treaties may
have done more than any other single act to destroy the legitimacy
of the Russian regime.
Most important of all is to continue
the popular pressure on governments around the world. Movement
pressure in Britain has already forced Tony Blair to publicly
split with Bush over "regime change" and if it continues
to grow will make British participation in a unilateral attack
untenable; withdrawal of British support might well be the final
nail in the coffin for US war plans. German popular opposition
swung the election; it is leading American policy elites to fear
that Bush policies are undermining European acquiescence in US
global dominance. The fact that not one country in the world
beside Britain has offered to help the US attack Iraq has a major
impact on US opinion. Please, keep up the good work!
One of the central tasks for the tacit
coalition of people and states opposing the US war on Iraq is
to win the hearts and minds of the American people. Americans
are still hurt and terrified by the 9/11 attacks and easily led
to support absurd policies sold as "anti-terrorism."
Nonetheless their views are volatile and conflicted. In a September
24 CBS News poll, 57 percent wanted the US to give the UN more
time to get inspectors back into Iraq and 52 percent thought
the US should follow the recommendations of the UN when it comes
to taking action against Iraq, instead of taking action on its
own.
National leaders and ordinary people
around the world need to reach out to Americans and help them
bring their government to its senses. An example: A delegation
of British anti-war religious leaders is coming to the US to
share with American religious communities their concerns about
US threats against Iraq. Containment of Bush Administration aggression
is--and should present itself--as pro-, not anti-, American.
Ultimately, the issue here is far larger
than the conflict between the US and Iraq. Bush's new policy
document, "The National Security Strategy of the United
States," which codifies previous pronouncements, indicates
the megalomaniacal scope of the Administration's ambitions. The
document notes, "The United States possesses unprecedented--and
unequaled--strength." It proclaims that "we will not
hesitate to act alone, if necessary, to exercise our right of
self-defense by acting preemptively." The US will use its
power for "convincing or compelling states" to accept
what it calls "their sovereign responsibilities."
This strategy for global domination is
not limited to military matters, but proposes to shape the whole
of global society and political economy. Indeed, the document
goes so far as to declare that there is only "a single sustainable
model for national success."
Blocking the US attack on Iraq is a crucial
step but only the first step in the containment of these awesome
aspirations for global domination. It represents the emergence
of a tacit but nonetheless real policy of collective security
to contain US aggressiveness. If such collective security can
be maintained, it bodes well for the containment of "pre-emptive
aggression" in the future. And perhaps it will lay a foundation
for addressing such other threats to collective security as global
warming, poverty, economic crisis, AIDS, and weapons of mass
destruction.
Nothing could be more in the genuine
interest of the American people.
Jeremy Brecher
is a historian and the author of twelve books including STRIKE!
and GLOBALIZATION
FROM BELOW.
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September
21 / 22, 2002
Alexander
Cockburn
An Entire
Class
of Thieves
Tom Gorman
The Press & Sabra
and Shatila
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Susan Martinez
By the Hand
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From Above:
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Doing as the
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Why Bush
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20 Questions
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How Congress
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Rep. Cynthia
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Goodbye
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Clair
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