A Tail In The Dogs Of War

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Bypass US supremacy on matters political. Condemn and attack it on economic issues   Bibek Debroy On the Iraq war, the internet is much more interesting than the electronic and print media. Given embedded journalism and non-transparency about channel ownership, can you trust CNN or NBC’s reporting of collateral damage? Why do we have no official figures yet on civilian casualties during the first Gulf War or Afghanistan? The Net will give you figures.

On the Net, I discovered the following. Ignoring collateral damage, the Gulf War cost $40 billion then. Of that, 25 per cent or $10 bn was paid by US, 75 per cent or $30 bn was paid by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Oil prices rose from $15 a barrel before the war to $42. That’s extra revenue of $60 bn, of which 50 per cent went to Kuwaiti and Saudi governments and 50 per cent went to MNC oil companies. The governments in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia recouped their costs.

Of the $30 bn that went to oil companies, $21 bn accrued to the State and $9 bn to the private sector. The US, including the government, made a profit, even if $49 bn from armament sales is excluded. A trifle simplistic but there’s a grain of truth there. Afghanistan was also about building a 2,500 km US-owned oil pipeline through the country and Iraq is also about US desire to diversify oil sourcing away from Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Why else has squabbling already begun about post-war reconstruction? The French will be excluded. So might the British. Is it true that Dick Cheney’s former firm, Halliburton, has already been awarded contracts?

Some propositions should be self-evident.

Proposition 1 — The Iraq war is not about terrorism or 9/11. No evidence about links between Iraq and terrorism has been able to shock or awe us. Had this war been about terrorism, the US should have picked on Saudi Arabia. Even Pakistan.

Proposition 2 — The war is not about possessing weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Had possession been a crime, the UN Security Council should approve attacks on a large number of countries, including UK and US. If helping countries develop WMDs is a crime (as should be), smart bombs should be targeted at many countries other than Iraq. In the mid and late-1980s, many Iranians believed Saddam was an American agent.

Proposition 3 — The war is not about using WMDs against other countries. (The evidence is of use against Iraqis, not against Iran.) Hence, Article 42 of the UN Charter has doubtful applicability and Article 51 doesn’t in any case justify pre-emptive strikes. If Saddam gassed 60,000 Iraqis in 1986, isn’t this an internal affair? Or by failing to condemn US action, does the Indian government implicitly sanction such US intervention in Kashmir? The moral outrage at the loss of 60,000 Iraqi lives is justified, apart from the million Iraqi lives lost in Iran and Kuwait. However, other countries have also indulged in such misadventures. Why not pick on them? And why is moral outrage missing when Iraqi lives are lost because of sanctions?

Proposition 4 — The war is not about regime change on grounds of restoring democracy. Had that been the case, one could again have picked Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. There would have been no need for assassination attempts. And if democracy is important, one shouldn’t be so upset when a democratic Turkish Parliament refuses to offer required support.

Proposition 5 — Opposition to the Iraq war is less about supporting Saddam and more about opposing US unilateralism. As several people have argued, this opposition is not the dysfunctional Left-wing anti-American legacy of the Cold War. Fareed Zakaria argued in a recent issue of Newsweek, barring the US, opinion polls show little popular support for the war. As for US support, Hermann Goering’s quote (from Nuremberg trials) is floating around on the Net. “Why of course the people don’t want war. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.” That leaves support from governments that can be bought, bullied and cajoled. The State Department tells us 33 governments support the war. And another 15 want to offer anonymous support. If getting rid of a tyrant is so popular, why do these 15 countries wish to remain anonymous?

Proposition 6 — The US doesn’t care about multilateralism. Kyoto Protocol, International Criminal Court, Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty with Russia, World Trade Organisation — how many instances do you want? It’s not surprising the peace dividend from the end of the Cold War didn’t materialise. Hence the US spends $325 bn a year on defence expenditure and $15 bn a year on aid. And the US doesn’t even bother to pay what it owes the UN on time.

Proposition 7 — The US doesn’t need to care about multilateralism. How do you determine whether Don Bradman was superior to Tiger Woods? Across sports and across time-lines, there is an objective method. Map distance between No 1 and No 2. In global power structures, map distance between No 1 and No 2 as far back as you can go. Never has this gap been as wide as it is now. The issue is not mere uni-polarity, but its intensity.

We accept the validity of propositions 1 to 6, but proposition 7 over-rides the rest. So we can’t condemn. The Non Aligned Movement is dead. The UN, especially the Security Council, hasn’t done much for us. We shouldn’t shed tears if the Security Council disappears. There will be no axis of good with Russia, China, or even with Old Europe. Lump it until product life cycles spell the demise of present uni-polarity. Meanwhile, because distance between No 1 and No 2 is less for economic matters, condemn and attack the US on economic issues (such as protectionism), leaving aside the non-economic. The $75 bn direct costs of the Iraq War are significant, especially because this time, they are being borne alone. Bypassing the political is the best way to pass the foreign policy test.