Order Without Empire

Gideon Rachman notes that the American Empire fad of 2002-2003 now seems well behind us but he's got some worries:

Some worry that a world without a dominant “imperial” power will be more dangerous. Who will ensure order? Who will keep the shipping lanes open and set the rules for the global financial system? The idea that all these things will be peacefully settled at the United Nations does not seem realistic.

I think it's worth trying to draw a few distinctions here. Most of all, the idea of the United States acting in an "imperial" manner, shouldn't be conflated with the United States acting through military force. The United States can engage in imperial, but non-military conduct. We could, for example, do our best to strangle the the economy of Cuba unless it adopts a form of government we approve of and return the property of the previous dictatorship's elite. But we can also act in a way that's military, but not imperial; stationing troops in West Germany to deter a Soviet invasion. Or we might act in response to acts of direct aggression perpetrated against the United States, as when the Taliban was working hand-in-glove with al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda was blowing up America's largest office towers and so we worked to help anti-Taliban Afghans overthrow the Taliban government.

Similarly, the idea of things being settled at the United Nations isn't the same as them being settled peacefully. One thing the United Nations can do is authorize the use of military force to eliminate a threat to world peace. Another thing the United Nations Charter does is recognize the inherent right of nations to engage in individual or collective self-defense.

The specter of imperialism raises its head pretty specifically when the United States proposes that we ought to be able to launch unilateral military strikes against countries that aren't attacking anyone else. Since the United States obviously doesn't endorse a general right of countries to engage in that sort of war-fighting (if India, say, decided to take advantage of political problems in Pakistan to invade or if Syria mounted a preventive attack on Israel's WMD facilities), we're envisioning not a world of American leadership, but a world of American domination. And that's what's not working for us.

It's worth being clear about this, because I think the general trajectory Rachman's argument takes is basically right. America will soon be experiencing a period of war-weariness where there'll be a general desire to "do less" in the world. But if one defines the alternative to the Bush/Cheney brand of imperial domination purely in terms of "doing less" then inevitably the time will come once again when it seems necessary and appropriate to "do something" and, indeed, it often is a good idea to do something. But America playing an active role in the world doesn't mean America seeking to dominate the world, and avoiding a quest for domination doesn't mean eschewing the use of military force in all circumstances — it means working through legitimate institutional mechanisms.

Comments

Shorter Matthew: a hyperpower, not an empire.

Posted by Petey | November 25, 2007 11:39 PM

"Legitimate" seems like a characteristic that will be hard to define. I gather "Coalitions of teh Willing" aren't going to do it.

Posted by SomeCallMeTim | November 26, 2007 12:22 AM

Not really much to say, but one thing the article you referenced said was a doozy.

Four of the world's 10 largest companies by market capitalisation are now Chinese.

According to Fortune, the top 10 largest companies in 2007 are Wal-Mart Stores, Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, General Motors, Toyota Motor, Chevron, DaimlerChrysler, ConocoPhillips, and Total. None of them are Chinese, all of them are European or Japanese or American, and a plurality (4) of them are American. Perhaps his weasal word is largest by "market capitalisation", but I would like to know where he's getting his stats from.

Posted by Dan the Man | November 26, 2007 12:25 AM

Well, I did some extra digging and it turns out this just happened recently although it actually mentions five: China Life, PetroChina Co., China Mobile Ltd., Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd. and China Petroleum and Chemical Corp.

Posted by Dan the Man | November 26, 2007 12:52 AM

According to Fortune, the top 10 largest companies in 2007 are...

That list was the list of the largest companies, as ranked by revenues. MattY referred to the largest companies in terms of market capitalization, and he was probably thinking of this list, which puts PetroChina on top.

Posted by Tyro | November 26, 2007 12:54 AM

Once again, it's the old "zero-sum game" attitude.

China gets rich, that means we have to get poor - or vice versa.

The universe doesn't work like that - unless you try to make it so because you're a chimpanzee and can't think in any other productive way.

This sort of thinking immediately leads to war. This is why we're invading the ME - to seize the oil so China - or anybody else who needs a lot of it - won't get it.

It's pathetically stupid - which is why it goes over big with the US population, who are pathetically stupid.

And this is why Matt - and everybody else - thinks "somebody has to be in charge."

That in itself is chimpanzee thinking.

And Matt is still wrong in thinking that we had to invade Afghanistan just to get bin Laden. And he adheres to the same broken "if only Bush hadn't screwed up" thinking that he complains about in Iraq by assuming that if we had bin Laden now, everything would be fine and the Afghanistan invasion would have been a success.

Wrong on all counts.

Matt: "avoiding a quest for domination doesn't mean eschewing the use of military force in all circumstances — it means working through legitimate institutional mechanisms."

If you mean only deploying US forces (absent a direct threat to the US) under UN control, that would be more or less correct - unless of course the UN is acting at the behest of the Western nations to screw over some Third World nation for the benefit of Western corporations. Otherwise, the US should eschew the use of military force in all circumstances other than a direct threat to the US itself.

The US in general should be cleaning up its own act at home with regard to civil rights, education, the economy, health care, etc., as well as developing the technology to help develop the rest of the world, and not be so concerned with "who's in charge here" - which is just a cover for imperialism and colonialism.

Lead by example. The best Chinese Emperor was once described as one who faced in a propitious direction and did absolutely nothing.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | November 26, 2007 1:00 AM

Yes, the shipping lanes must be kept open, and the dirty Huns with their U boats kept at bay!

Somehow, I feel like these foreign policy analysts get their rocks off seeing old movies about world war ii or i and then it all jumbles up in their mind as they lay down the eternal wisdom (before the martinis at lunch) for us lesser breeds within the law. But I am amazed that people are paid, and paid well, for dealing out such utter crap and banality. O to be on the think tank dole!

Posted by roger | November 26, 2007 1:04 AM

Now where is it exactly that shipping lanes are in danger of being closed down? It seems to me that in just about all of the many neighborhoods in this free-trading world, the locals are intensely interested in keeping up trade, and have both the resolve and collective local capacity to police their own nearby shipping lanes.

But if the world needs a truly international force to police global shipping lanes, then let us by all means create an international force to police global shipping lanes. If the world needs a transnational financial organ to set and enforce the rules for a global financial system, then let us create a transnational financial organ to set and enforce the rules for a global financial system. If the world needs a global currency that is not dependent on the sound policies and political whims of a single powerful nation, then let us begin to develop a plan of action and timetable for the creation of a global currency.

These are all tall orders, but they are achievable if we help build the international political will to accomplish them. And the tasks will be immensely easier if they begin to gain support for the internationalist cause from the most powerful state in the current world system.

The people who never tire of pointing out the indispensability of the Indispensable Nation, on account of the weaknesses of present international political and economic institutions, are the same people who do everything they can to stand in the way of the creation and development of potent international political and economic institutions.

Whenever you hear people from some powerful nation going on about the need for a dominant national power - their own, of course - to "keep shipping lanes open", you can bet that what many of the speakers really have in mind is the need to preserve the nation's power to close shipping lanes should the national self-interest demand it. If they talk about the need for a dominant nation to set the rules for the global financial system, you can bet they are mainly thinking about the purely national benefits that come with such a concentration of financial power in their own nation.

Posted by Dan Kervick | November 26, 2007 1:06 AM

The world will easily survive America's fall off its pedestal.

Not sure America will, though.

The Republicans are running on keeping the "We're Number One!" fantasy alive...a message that appeals to a lot of folks.

Posted by alphie | November 26, 2007 1:19 AM

The shipping lanes off the Horn of Africa and in the Straits of Malacca region are pretty pirate-infested.

And, given that the Somalian locals in the Horn of Africa don't have a government, it is actually pretty reasonable for someone with a navy to operate there.

And I'm pretty sure Yemen's got other priorities than policing that region -- by which I mean, I think you might overestimate (Dan Kervick) the operating resources and infrastructure of many Third-World, geopolitically crucial countries, like Yemen, Somalia, Djibouti, etc.

I'm not saying it has to be the United States Navy that picks up the slack -- the Dutch, French, British, Spanish, Indians, and other major navies could do it -- but I'd prefer one of the above to the Chinese.

Posted by Ben Cronin | November 26, 2007 1:40 AM

But we can also act in a way that's military, but not imperial; stationing troops in West Germany to deter a Soviet invasion.

Um, how in the world was this not imperialistic?

We invaded Germany, demolished its military, removed its government and replaced it with one more amenable to us, and then proceeded to leave our troops there in permanent base for the next 60+ years. That pure, unadulterated imperialism. Now, the fact that part of the reason we kept our troops in West Germany was to prevent our empire from being taken over by the Soviet empre doesn't obviate the fact that placing our troops in Germany was purely imperialistic.

I'm at a loss to understand how placing our troops in another country can be construed as non-imperialist. Every instance I can think of our use of military force has been imperialistic - from Kosovo on down.

Posted by Al | November 26, 2007 2:11 AM

Since Yglesias isn't stupid, and has access to pretty good information, I can only assume that his continuing distortion of important facts is a function of disingenuous partisanship. No one in the United States has, or will, propose "launch(ing) unilateral military strikes against countries that aren't attacking anyone else".

In terms of "keeping the shipping lanes open", Iraq caused a world recession by, among other things, rocketing supertankers in the Persian Gulf. This was followed by the invasion, rape, and annexation of charter member or the UN General Assembly and US ally, Kuwait. Then it torched the oilfields, and comprehensively violated the ceasefire of 1991, along with an additional sixteen Chapter VII Resolutions for good measure. I suppose it's being "imperial" to take action against such things, even when they're combined with genocide (against Kurds and Marsh Arabs), rocket attacks against allies Israel and Saudi Arabia, support of terrorism, and the development AND USE of wmd's to kill tens of thousands of people.

The UN DID authorize the use of military force, as Lord Goldsmith's finding for Parliament makes explicitly clear. No one should be commenting on this matter without reading it--it was published on the front page of The Guardian in mid-March, 2003 and is just a Google away. Virtually every important democracy in the world whose leaders weren't on Saddam's payroll agreed. Unilateral and pre-emptive, indeed.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 3:11 AM

The shipping lanes off the Horn of Africa and in the Straits of Malacca region are pretty pirate-infested.

The governments of the Straits of Malacca region (Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia) have explicitly rejected US Navy intervention to stop piracy, and are taking the problem on themselves. Obviously they have vastly greater motivation to finish the job than we do, and since what's required is frequent patrols by small frigates rather than infrequent interventions by aircraft carriers, they also have more capability to do the job than we do.

The Horn of Africa is less significant, but you can bet that if the shipping lifelines of the Gulf States were threatened, they would build militaries to take care of the job.

The "our Navy keeps the shipping lanes open" thing is a crock of hooey. Other countries are perfectly capable of keeping their own shipping lanes open. We don't have 14 carrier battle groups to take on a couple of pirates off of Somalia.

Posted by brooksfoe | November 26, 2007 5:15 AM

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/96754c52-9b7c-11dc-8aad-0000779fd2ac.html

>>One piece of statistical evidence – though certainly not conclusive – is the latest data on global flows of funds. The financial flows back into the US appear to have come to a sudden stop this summer. The US Treasury International Capital System (TIC) data show a massive drop in net foreign purchases of US long-term securities since the end of June.

More and more countries are taking their money out of the US, so the US government soon will be likely to run out power to support imperialist ideology. By the time monetary monopoly ends, the military monopoly also ends.

Posted by dude | November 26, 2007 5:32 AM

Robert Powell:

Insisting the first gulf war and the second aren't more or less discrete conflicts in the eyes of the world won't make it so. Sure there's ample and obvious continuity, but you can't just meld the two and expect everyone to go along. You think it was right to re-invade Iraq, which is fine. Many reasonable people think the need to expel Saddam from Kuwait needn't have led to an imperialist invasion and occupation. Stop pretending it isn't imperialism, and stop pretending that the entire world agreed with you in writing and is now lying about it. Obviously there's more than one way to interpret the term "unilateral." Since many of the world's democracies (namely their populations) came out vociferously against our invasion, it seems pretty pointless to dredge up some technicalities in a U.N. resolution, especially as they apparently did not reflect the majority opinion of the countries represented. If Jacques Chirac was secretly pleased that we invaded Iraq, well, that doesn't amount to a ringing moral justification for war, does it. Imperialism will always find numerous right-sounding justifications; that doesn't make it the only right way forward. There is such a person as thinks Saddam's threat to the world and America's occupation of Iraq are separate considerations.

Posted by Bill | November 26, 2007 7:38 AM

Issuing various threats and warnings that one will authorize the use of force if certain conditions obtain is not the same thing as actually authorizing that use of force once those conditions do obtain, or are argued to obtain. The UN Security Council did the former, but never the latter.

Lord Goldsmith initially reported to the British government that a case could be made for the legality of military action in Iraq, and that a case could also be made for the illegality of the military action. He changed his position in a second report, prompting the resignation of his deputy legal advisor. In any case, one generally would not look to reports from the upper levels of government from one of the invading countries for the most objective account of whether a given invasion was justified.

It's convenient to think that all of the many people and countries in the world who opposed the invasion of Iraq were on Saddam's payroll. But the opponents were a diverse group. One might with more justice argue that he countries that supported the invasion were on the US payroll, or at least had various motives for pleasing and kowtowing to the US.

The opposition to the invasion was above all motivated by the clear perception that, whether or not the invasion was legally justified, it was neither smart or nor necessary, and was driven more by US and British frustration and vindictiveness than any pressing global need. Frustrated that they had failed to pry Saddam out of power after more than a decade of harsh sanctions, no-fly zomes etc., the US and UK were still trying to save face and achieve the final, total political victory that had been denied them, or that they had denied themselves, in the Gulf War. Most of the world was prepared by 2002 to bring the post-Gulf War era to a close, end the sanctions and move on, which would have left the US and UK, whose positions of Iraq had been characterized in the late 90's - in some political quarters at least - by increasing stridency and desperation, with a sever case of humiliation. This war was in good measure driven by national pride.

Posted by Dan Kervick | November 26, 2007 8:22 AM

Glib resort to "the eyes of the world", especially as interpreted by contemporary fringe ideologues, doesn't constitute historical analysis any more than drive-by public opinion polls and pontification by TV personalities.

Actual legislation by responsible elected leaders, like "some technicalities in a UN resolution", major Congressional and Parliamentary acts, Presidential findings expressed in official policy statements, etc. carry more weight than the consensus at the circle jerk in the echo chamber.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 8:42 AM

Mr. Kervick--
It's a big mistake to confuse the remarks in a generalized in-house discussion of policy options that was stolen and published as a misleading attempt to discredit the Blair government, with Lord Goldsmith's actual legal finding for Parliament.

Both the US and Britain, not to mention such obviously non-lackey countries as Japan, South Korea, Australia, Spain, Italy--in fact most of NATO and quite a few more besides--recognized that it would be a disaster to allow Ba'athist Iraq to get away with it's serial crimes against the international order. It's certainly possible to argue that invasion and occupation, especially the latter, wasn't the smartest way forward. Under the current circumstances that looks pretty reasonable. At the time, that wasn't how it looked to most responsible leaders in the key countries. In the wake of Somalia, Bosnia, Rwanda, and Kossovo, lots of people thought we had been perhaps a bit too "smart". In the long run, I think we've got an ongoing interest in a world order that can respond appropriately to states like Ba'athist Iraq. This has nothing in particular to do with national pride except to the extent that Vichy French and Quisling Norwegians probably aren't good examples of it.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 8:58 AM

Actual legislation by responsible elected leaders, like "some technicalities in a UN resolution", major Congressional and Parliamentary acts, Presidential findings expressed in official policy statements, etc. carry more weight than the consensus at the circle jerk in the echo chamber.

That certainly does carry weight in terms of policy. It carries zero weight in terms of truth.

The counter-example is far too easy. Suppose that for whatever reason the legislators and leaders of the nations you now quote had taken the opposite tack -- i.e., not just blocking the invasion and occupation of Iraq but returning to open support of Saddam Hussein.

Would this suddenly affect your argument, and demonstrate conclusively the immorality of an individual advocating the overthrow of Saddam Hussein? No.

Whether an argument is endorsed by a global chorus of tough-talking English speaking politicians and their legislatures or opposed by them equally makes no difference, not the slightest, on whether an argument is convincing or not.

Those who actually appreciated the Western values they swear to defend will understand that.

Posted by El Cid | November 26, 2007 9:36 AM

If the subject of imperialism and militarism in the United States are of interest I highly recommend "The New American Militarism" by Andrew J. Bacevich. Bacevich is a graduate of West Point and a Vietnam vet and has a doctorate in history. I am a heavy reader and this book is well worth reading.

Posted by chowderhead | November 26, 2007 9:37 AM

Glib resort to "the eyes of the world", especially as interpreted by contemporary fringe ideologues, doesn't constitute historical analysis any more than drive-by public opinion polls and pontification by TV personalities.

Actual legislation by responsible elected leaders, like "some technicalities in a UN resolution", major Congressional and Parliamentary acts, Presidential findings expressed in official policy statements, etc. carry more weight than the consensus at the circle jerk in the echo chamber.

Mhm, so the United Nations is "responsible." Except when they don't follow through on their resolutions. Which of course says nothing about the responsible intent of the resolution, apparently.

Contemporary fringe ideologues? Could you sound like more of a pompous jackass?

Presidential findings expressed in official policy statements? I'd rather be a part of the circle jerk majority in this case, than beating off over self-interested "official findings." What a gas bag you are.

Posted by Bill | November 26, 2007 9:50 AM

Robert Powell,

In two of the five countries you mention, the voters have since turned out their governments, in good part because those governments were indeed perceived by voters as lackeys of the United States.

Iraq had hardly "gotten away with" its crimes against the international order. It had already been reduced from a potent military power and economically advancing country to an economic basket case and impotent military has-been. If the world needed an object lesson on what happens when one defies international norms, the lesson had already been well delivered. The remaining US and UK obsessions were overkill.

People in other countries can read. They knew that a number of influential figures in America had been prattling on about the "unipolar moment", "benevolent hegemony", "perpetual primacy", "full spectrum dominance" and other neo-imperial conceits, and viewed the Iraq adventure as part of a broader agenda to achieve these ends. They knew many of these same figures had reached positions of significant influence in the US government. They read about Pentagon decision makers listening to crackpot briefings about toppling the government of Iran, "pivoting" through a similar overthrow of Saudi Arabia and moving on to Egypt. It's not surprising that many countries, stung by these kinds of imperialist eruptions in the past, concluded that US ambitions were in need of a sharp check.

Posted by Dan Kervick | November 26, 2007 9:56 AM

It's certainly possible to argue that invasion and occupation, especially the latter, wasn't the smartest way forward. Under the current circumstances that looks pretty reasonable. At the time, that wasn't how it looked to most responsible leaders in the key countries.

Clearly, you are high.

Leaving aside the words "most" and "key", anyone who was for the invasion was, a priori, "responsible." Wrong -- but responsible. World public opinion, at the time, of course, was overwhelmingly against what was rightly seen as an overwhelmingly American invasion and occupation, and that the "coalition of willing, responsible, right-thinking, key nations" was a stupid farce. But they were just being irresponsible. They were right, sure, as responsible denizens like Robert Powell have the magnanimity to acknowledge today. But going forward, these people should not be listened to; instead, we should resort yet again to the "responsible" crowd, who "understand" that the best way to respond to crimes against the international order is by perpetrating a series of counter-crimes.

Posted by Bill | November 26, 2007 10:02 AM

We find truth by looking at facts, Cid.

"...suppose the leaders had taken the opposite tack"--or suppose they'd all agreed that the problem was Space Aliens in Iraq? Or voted in unison to name the Ghost of Elvis Secretary General? Your hypothetical doesn't make any sense. They did what they did, and for reasons that are transparently obvious to all not lost in a cloud of partisan ideology.

It's clear that a significant minority "wasn't convinced". That's fine, but they lost the argument when it counted. Trying to re-write history in order to keep arguing after the subject has evolved into something else is a fool's errand.

I second chowderhead's plug for Bacevich. He's someone who "wasn't convinced", but didn't go off the deep end as a result. He's still making useful comments.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 10:17 AM

In terms of "keeping the shipping lanes open", Iraq caused a world recession by, among other things, rocketing supertankers in the Persian Gulf. This was followed by the invasion, rape, and annexation of charter member or the UN General Assembly and US ally, Kuwait. Then it torched the oilfields, and comprehensively violated the ceasefire of 1991, along with an additional sixteen Chapter VII Resolutions for good measure. I suppose it's being "imperial" to take action against such things, even when they're combined with genocide (against Kurds and Marsh Arabs), rocket attacks against allies Israel and Saudi Arabia, support of terrorism, and the development AND USE of wmd's to kill tens of thousands of people.

Everything highlighted in bold is a either a justification for the first gulf war or occurred during or in the aftermath of the conflict. It is worth keeping in mind that the idea of invading Iraq (for all the reasons listed above and more) and toppling Hussein was considered, and rejected, as a separate issue during the course of that war. If these things were not enough to justify an invasion of Iraq when we were already at war with them, it follows logically that they are inadequate justifications to launch an invasion 12 years later.

No one in the United States has, or will, propose "launch(ing) unilateral military strikes against countries that aren't attacking anyone else". Iraq was not, in fact, attacking anyone else. Violations of UN resolutions are not the same thing as attacking someone else. Please note the use of the present tense in the phrase "countries that aren't attacking anyone else".

Glib resort to "the eyes of the world", especially as interpreted by contemporary fringe ideologues, doesn't constitute historical analysis any more than drive-by public opinion polls and pontification by TV personalities. Your glib conflation of the different situations facing the US in 1991 and 2003 fatally undermines any claims of historical analysis skills that you might have.

Shorter me: your BS is weak.

Posted by DMonteith | November 26, 2007 10:31 AM

The UN DID authorize the use of military force, as Lord Goldsmith's finding for Parliament makes explicitly clear. No one should be commenting on this matter without reading it--it was published on the front page of The Guardian in mid-March, 2003 and is just a Google away. Virtually every important democracy in the world whose leaders weren't on Saddam's payroll agreed. Unilateral and pre-emptive, indeed

Wrong.

Resolution 687 was to be revived contingent upon the particulars of 1441 being met; as such, material breach by Iraq was grounds for a meeting of the Security Council to discuss whether military force was necessary. Goldsmith's faulty reasoning was concluding, in his own words, "that provided there is a Council discussion, if it does not reach a conclusion, there remains an authorisation to use force." He admits that this is not the only viable reading of 1441, yet oh-so-delicately glosses over this in his decision. The other interpretation, you ask? --

"that nothing short of a further Council decision will be a legitimate basis for the use of force."

Goldsmith's interpretation relies upon the UNSC seeing itself as a motley troupe of Alfred E. Neuman-cum-Neville Chamberlain's; while this view may dovetail nicely with conservative dismissal of UN authority, its not really grounded in reality.

Posted by EpicureanQuaker | November 26, 2007 10:41 AM

Great Post Matt.

Posted by Northern Observer | November 26, 2007 10:58 AM

Mr. Monteith--the idea that we can just put 2003 under a microscope and forget about everything else is poor analysis of any type. "Those things were not considered justification enough" in 1991 exactly because we had not yet had the experience of twelve years of massive, largely counterproductive, efforts to achieve the necessary results without regime change.

For better or worse, we bore significant responsibility for the massacres visited upon Kurds and Shiites AFTER Desert Storm because we didn't want to deal with the complications of regime change. Ditto for the sanctions regime which the UN Undersecretary General Hans von Sponeck described in his resignation as "meeting the legal definition of genocide". By 1998 Congress and the Clinton White House agreed that regime change was required, and we launched a severe, if insufficient, bombing campaign as a result. That also failed. It was a quite large consensus view in non-partisan security circles in a wide variety of nations by 2003 that regime change was the only practical option left, and that invasion was the only sure way to get it.

It is a common mistake to imagine historical events in the light of what we know now rather than what people knew then, but in policy terms this is like trying to drive down the highway while looking in the rearview mirror.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 10:59 AM

EQ-your reading of the Charter, if used, would mean the end of the UN as anything more than a talking shop. This may in fact already be the case, but I hope not.

UNSC Chapter VII Resolutions don't have sunset clauses. The idea that an authorization for the use of force would just melt away on its own is unpersuasive. That it would do so with only half of its stated goals met (ejection of Iraq from Kuwait, AND the return of the area to peace and stability), in the presence of ongoing military deployments, combat operations, and a murderous embargo that was itself an act of war, is absurd.

UNSCR 1441 clearly offered Iraq "a final opportunity". Hans Blix made it unmistakably plain that Iraq had not taken it. At the point that Chirac ruled that "serious consequences" meant to him "one more chance ad infinitum", the jig was up. With an army already sitting on the edge of the Arabian desert and summer on the way, the choice was invasion, or surrender. The latter would have meant the conclusive end of the UN as a means of acting effectively against wars of aggression, genocide, support for terrorism, and the proliferation and use of wmd's. This result may be inevitable in any case, but I would hope not, and further hope that responsible nations continue to work at making UNSC Resolutions mean what they say.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 11:12 AM

Iraq war illegal, says Annan.

Posted by croatoan | November 26, 2007 11:25 AM

For better or worse, we bore significant responsibility for the massacres visited upon Kurds and Shiites AFTER Desert Storm because we didn't want to deal with the complications of regime change.

Anfal occurred in 1988, chum. Post-DS, the UN security zone, dominated by battle-hardened Kurdish warriors, was never subject to anything resembling a 'massacre.' According to your logic, we should have invaded Turkey a decade ago.

It was a quite large consensus view in non-partisan security circles in a wide variety of nations by 2003 that regime change was the only practical option left, and that invasion was the only sure way to get it.

I've not heard of these 'non-partisan security circles' -- sounds like militarism posturing as centrism, but what do I know?

Also, if you've not found a single group willing to consider any methods other than invasion to incite regime change, well...let's just say your echo chamber needs a skylight.

It is a common mistake to imagine historical events in the light of what we know now rather than what people knew then, but in policy terms this is like trying to drive down the highway while looking in the rearview mirror.

We expect leaders to have foresight...any leader unwilling to evaluate his decisions in light of their effects shouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt. As it is, just because your 'overwhelming majority' was too ideologically driven to listen to dissenting voices doesn't mean they didn't exist. That well is dry, brother.

Also, that analogy is nonce. But to get some use out of it: policy is not a solitary labor, and I fully expect our leaders to be capable of delegating folks to look in the rearview mirror while making decisions. Just because your (ex) fair-weather philosopher proclaimed 'the end of history' doesn't mean we should discredit historical precedent.

Posted by EpicureanQuaker | November 26, 2007 11:33 AM

So, let me get this straight, you vain little striding pinhead: the rightness or wrongness of an argument is decided by political action?

We find truth by looking at facts, Cid.

"...suppose the leaders had taken the opposite tack"--or suppose they'd all agreed that the problem was Space Aliens in Iraq? Or voted in unison to name the Ghost of Elvis Secretary General? Your hypothetical doesn't make any sense. They did what they did, and for reasons that are transparently obvious to all not lost in a cloud of partisan ideology.

It's clear that a significant minority "wasn't convinced". That's fine, but they lost the argument when it counted. Trying to re-write history in order to keep arguing after the subject has evolved into something else is a fool's errand.

Posted by Robert Powell

You're also a lying coward. My hypothetical made perfect sense. That is why in the very next sentence you declared that 'they did what they did'.

Therefore you both understand the principle of a hypothetical situation and you immediately clarify this by pointing out that the counterfactual was, in fact, counterfactual.

A "fools' errand" is to proclaim to all those presumedly morally inferior to you that you and those you cheer arrive at conclusions in logical, fact based manners while simultaneously proclaiming in effect that no one may in any way assess your manner of arriving at conclusions because those conclusions have already been arrived at, and thus you are immune from anyone who points out the gaping flaws in your logic.

Simultaneously, the argument is right because legislators voted in a certain way, yet it cannot be wrong by the same logic because it so happens that they did not vote that way.

'Governments which backed the US invasion and occupation of Iraq were right to do so because they did it, but it is impossible to consider that they had not done so, because they didn't, yet in retrospect they are still correct because that is what they did.'

On the one hand one "finds truth by looking at facts"; on the other hand, truth is determined by political fiat. But not systematically -- exclusively on those occasions when fiat agrees with preferences.

Facts are related to truth when politicians interpret the facts. Facts are unrelated to truth when politicians vote against your preferred argument.

Historians often oppose counterfactuals because they invoke predictions of impossible worlds.

They don't however, attempt the pathetic and vain task of arguing that their arguments are sound because of what political actions occurred but cannot be invalidated by the possibility that different political actions could have occurred.

In other words, you are right because you are right, and any attempt to review the process of arriving at rightness is counterfactual and disallowed.

Posted by El Cid | November 26, 2007 11:34 AM

EQ--Anfal certainly occurred in 1988, but I can't imagine that you could have missed the appalling disaster in the Kurdistan in 1991 when hundreds of thousands of civilians were driven into the freezing mountains. Check it out, and while you're at it you may find something out about the massacre of the Shiia and Marsh Arabs in the south, and the toll of the sanctions regime you ignore.

Cid, I guess you're just much too clever for me to argue with. Your last post seems utterly incoherent. I'm sure it's just me, but see ya'...

Those who want to go to bat for the memory of genocidal tyrants, and to excuse our responsibility for enormous crimes of both omission and commission during the years '91-'02 may, as usual in this sort of activity, assume the mantle of "International Law" and "methods other than invasion" that were available in theory. The people who actually had to make the decisions at the time, in both parties, did the best they could with the information they had. All the arguments here to the contrary are based on rumor, gossip, and political fashion rather than facts.

A pleasant Good Evening to all.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 11:52 AM

@Powell: Are you mad? 687 suspended 678's authorization for invasion. So yes, there was no 'sunset' on the suspension of war authorization. Congrats. Who's showing contempt for the UN again?

As 687 was contingent upon a cease-fire, revocation of the suspension requires a violation which the 'Security Council considers sufficiently serious to destroy the basis of the cease-fire.' The US and the UK chose Saddam's 'material breach' to be 'sufficently serious,' despite a lack of such a conclusion by the UNSC. If there was an open-ended invitation to Iraq invasion, why was Resolution 1205 obtained to justify Operation Desert Fox? Oh yeah, becasue 687 was still in effect. As for your 'there was already an army' schtick, what does aggression from a non-UN-sanctioned coalition have to do with UN authority? Really, I'd love to know.

Posted by EpicureanQuaker | November 26, 2007 11:53 AM

Well, at least we know that Robert Powell was right all along because he said he was right and because political events went the way he wanted them to, as long as you remember that he cannot not be right for the same reasons because political events did not not go the way he wanted.

Anyone who disagrees with his rightness is a genocidal tyrant's boot licker, but also do not fail to praise him for standing up for free discourse and facts and Western logic and humanitarian values and debate -- as long as those who disagree with him are clear that they are in fact pro-genocidal tyrant and that he will always be right and always will have been right because things went the way he wanted and it is literally impossible to think that things could have happened in a way he didn't want.

Posted by El Cid | November 26, 2007 12:04 PM

Powell, you're all over the map now. It's almost cute, that after my initial post, you would actually conflate support for international law with appeasement of dictators. I suppose you're for a massive, overarching draft, so as to put down every brutal tryrant sitting atop a Texas-sized piece of land, anywhere on the globe? No? So what exactly makes Iraq so special? Hell, the crimes you dredge up occurred over a decade before the current war began, regardless of your '91-02' line...are we now in the business of overthrowing nations for previous crimes? Better start enslaving and enlisting other countries to fuel our moral crusade!

I also adore the 'good evening' quip...combined with the ad hominem, it makes for an airtight argument...I'm flipping like a subprime mortgage!

P.S. - What sort of 'crime of omission' did Saddam commit, exactly? Was he running a prurient underground 'zine, or something?

Posted by EpicureanQuaker | November 26, 2007 12:09 PM

Robert Powell takes one last, desperate swipe:

Those who want to go to bat for the memory of genocidal tyrants,

Oops...you got a little carried away didn't you.

and to excuse our responsibility for enormous crimes of both omission and commission during the years '91-'02 may, as usual in this sort of activity, assume the mantle of "International Law" and "methods other than invasion" that were available in theory.

Please, do apply this logic universally. I can't wait for all the unavoidable invasions that'll ensue.

The people who actually had to make the decisions at the time, in both parties, did the best they could with the information they had. All the arguments here to the contrary are based on rumor, gossip, and political fashion rather than facts.

Yes. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, etc.

The (serious, responsible) people who had to make the decision at the time were, of course, forced into making a political decision, to be viewed in light of its potential domestic ramifications. Which you childishly mistake for everybody's honest attempt to manage this difficult world we live in. People who voted for the war, in the wake of 9/11, were managing their jobs in the face of an executive eager to wield 9/11 as a political bludgeon. As you're too willing to remember yourself, they did not care about Iraq qua Iraq, or in any way vote to reverse their "sins of omission" from a decade prior. If they hadn't cared then, they weren't going to care now. The Iraq War vote was about 9/11 period. The justifications that temporarily swayed a majority of Congress were a pack of lies and had nothing to do with the 1990s except inasmuch as Saddam's internal actions then could be manipulated to appear as an existential threat to a hyperpower halfway around the world today.

So no, they did not "do their best with the information they had." They either drank a bunch of Kool-aid or voted out of fear, or both. Maybe you're happy with political decision-making based on lies and fear, and feel this is the way arguments should be won or lost. Sane people aren't and don't. But people like you are exactly why it will happen all over again. You mock others of looking in the rearview mirror: at least their view in that direction is accurate and may even inform their way ahead. Whereas your own rearview, this so-called historical analysis of Saddam's insufferability, is transparently all just lame hindsight justification for a policy gone wrong.

Posted by Bill | November 26, 2007 12:52 PM

EQ--687 "suspended, but did not terminate authority. A material breech of 687 revives the authority", and 1441 held Iraq in material breech, not only in terms of compliance with inspections but other terms as well.

"Resolution 1441 would in terms have provided that a further decision of the Security Council to sanction force was required if that had been intended. Thus, all that Resolution 1441 requires is reporting to and discussion by the Security Council of Iraq's failures, but not an express further decision to authorize force."

Koffi Annan, much less Jacques Chirac, don't get to decide all by themselves what's legal. In fact, much as I'd like to see more responsible action by the Security Council, the UN is not in fact The World Legislature. The chief legal officers of perhaps the two most legalistic societies in the world, which not incidentally wrote the UN Charter, decided it was legal to enforce the ceasefire. Moreover, the democratically elected governments of the US, the UK, and all the others who supported the action have a lot more legitimacy than the Security Council to decide what their interests are, and how their forces are to be used.

Support for international law, such as it is, means at least enforcing Chapter VII Resolutions against genocidal dictators. If you can name any that are currently in defiance of as many as Iraq in 2003, I'd say it's legal, if ill-advised, to invade them. The crimes of Saddam were certainly ongoing during the period in question, but those of omission and commission I was referring to were ours. I thought I was pretty clear about that.

Now, really, Good Evening. I'll check back tomorrow.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 12:54 PM

Christ on a cruch -

Resolution 1441 stated that Iraq was to be given a 'final opportunity,' not that the material breach itself constituted authorization. As said originally, a lack of cooperation from Iraq consequently led to a decision made, not by the UNSC, but by the 'coalition of the willing,' that the material breach was in fact a rebuffing of the 'final opportunity,' and was therefore grounds for invasion. Therefore, there was NO UN approval of the Iraq War.

Also, are you truthfully claiming that Saddam was currently the most egregious dictator worldwide, and therefore most worthy of regime change? Sorry, but since 1991 his oppression has been of the mundane sort that is either ignored or praised 'round these parts. I suppose we'll be bringing our pure light to Indonesia next, hmmm?

Finally, if you're going to argue about UN resolutions, at least do it honestly -- the incessant need to appeal to the morality of fighting oppression as a means to bolster a legal argument is tiresome.

Posted by EpicureanQuaker | November 26, 2007 2:02 PM

Koffi Annan, much less Jacques Chirac, don't get to decide all by themselves what's legal. In fact, much as I'd like to see more responsible action by the Security Council, the UN is not in fact The World Legislature. The chief legal officers of perhaps the two most legalistic societies in the world, which not incidentally wrote the UN Charter, decided it was legal to enforce the ceasefire. Moreover, the democratically elected governments of the US, the UK, and all the others who supported the action have a lot more legitimacy than the Security Council to decide what their interests are, and how their forces are to be used.

Translation: 'I like the UN when it does what I want it to do and then it's legitimate. And then when other countries do what I want them to do which is different than what the UN is doing then it makes those nations doing what I want more legitimaterer than the UN.'

Posted by El Cid | November 26, 2007 2:39 PM

If Resolution 1441 authorized the invasion, why was President Bush calling for a second resolution authorizing the use of force? As late as March 6, 2003, President Bush said, "No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote."

Of course, he didn't call for the vote because he knew he wouldn't prevail. Funny how the people who love is tough talkin' straight shootin' style don't call him on it when he chickens out.

Posted by croatoan | November 26, 2007 3:47 PM

I'm a whole bunch of time zones east of you guys, so this is positively the last one today--maybe we can actually settle something for a change.

1441 was unanimous that it constituted Iraq's "final opportunity". If words mean what they say, no further Resolution was needed. Blix's report was unequivocal in terms of "material breech". At that point Chirac announced that under "no circumstances" would France vote again for enforcement. I see, as responsible officials saw then, no reason to take his "legal" reasoning over Goldsmith's. Game over.

Blair, Jack Straw, Powell, and no doubt grudgingly Bush, spent a great deal of high-level time at the UN on this, probably more than any previous administration, but at the point you've got a 180-degree reversal by a Security Council permanent member who vows a veto rather than stick to the previously accepted understanding of the situation, a decision is required. If the only consequence of violating a Chapter VII Resolution is another Resolution, the UN no longer has an enforcement mechanism, and we've got League of Nations II. This would be an unequivocally Bad Thing.

By what seems to me a perfectly clear and logical reading of the UN Charter, enforcing the ceasefire and subsequent Resolutions was well within perogatives of Security Council members. But there is a Higher Authority, which is why US and British troops don't wear blue helmets or go into battle under the command of the UN. It wasn't just the UN which signed the ceasefire that Iraq comprehensively violated, it wasn't just the UN that had its credibility and interests on the line, and decisions like that for countries like the US and Britain aren't up to people like Jacques Chirac.

It's true that legal arguments shouldn't be conflated with "fighting oppression". But the moral factor of our association through the UN with actions that had genocidal consequences in Iraq throughout the 90's while serving to enhance the regime's grip on power, is an unavoidable fact of life, and a factor in the decision to change the terms of the situation. I don't know how you can continue to ignore it.

You keep suggesting that enforcing the terms of the ceasefire and Resolutions against Iraq should mean invasions all over the place, but you can't name a single state or leader with a remotely similar record. Not one. You seem to be suggesting that Iraq could just run out the clock on its obligations. It seems to me that there's no statute of limitations on genocide, nor should there be a precedent for avoiding the most serious sanctions about the gravest matters by simply stalling.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 4:49 PM

Powell is the revisionist's revisionist.

Nothing he says is even remotely close to what happened, no matter what he says.

Just about every group of international law experts on the planet has declared the Iraq war illegal in every respect and has specifically stated that none of the UN resolutions authorized the US to attack Iraq. Even the Brits finally revealed that their original opinion was exactly that, but they changed it under pressure from Blair.

Powell is a complete fucking hallucinogenic nutcase.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | November 27, 2007 12:11 AM

Rpbert Powell: Blix's report was unequivocal in terms of "material breech".

For the record, here is the relevant text from Blix's March 7, 2003 statement to the U.N. Security Council:

Against this background, the question is now asked whether Iraq has cooperated "immediately, unconditionally and actively" with UNMOVIC, as required under paragraph 9 of resolution 1441 (2002). The answers can be seen from the factual descriptions I have provided. However, if more direct answers are desired, I would say the following:

The Iraqi side has tried on occasion to attach conditions, as it did regarding helicopters and U-2 planes. Iraq has not, however, so far persisted in these or other conditions for the exercise of any of our inspection rights. If it did, we would report it.

It is obvious that, while the numerous initiatives, which are now taken by the Iraqi side with a view to resolving some long-standing open disarmament issues, can be seen as "active", or even "proactive", these initiatives 3-4 months into the new resolution cannot be said to constitute "immediate" cooperation. Nor do they necessarily cover all areas of relevance. They are nevertheless welcome and UNMOVIC is responding to them in the hope of solving presently unresolved disarmament issues.

Powell again: at the point you've got a 180-degree reversal by a Security Council permanent member who vows a veto rather than stick to the previously accepted understanding of the situation...

Blix doesn't provide an estimate of how much the failure of Iraq provide "active" cooperation immediately would delay completion of his work, but even if we were to assume that his team just sat around and did nothing until Iraq began to provide "active" cooperation, that would mean that the completion of his work would only be delayed by 3-4 months. In fact, the report seems to indicate that the inspectors were working continuously since the start of inspections, so it may be that the initial lack of active cooperation didn't actually slow things down at all. Furthermore, France proposed increasing the number of inspectors. If that proposal had been adopted, it might have allowed Blix to increase the pace of inspections and actually complete his work earlier than he would have otherwise.

Furthermore, the amount of time required to complete the inspections was uncertain when Resolution 1441 was adopted. Even in his March 7 statement, the most Blix could say is that (assuming proactive Iraqi cooperation) the process "would not take years, nor weeks, but months." On that basis, it seems reasonable to assume that the "previously accepted understanding of the situation" was that Iraq should be verifiably disarmed in a period measured in months rather than years, and that the Security Council would authorize the use of military force against Iraq if this did not happen. If that was the accepted understanding, France wasn't deviating from it even if its position did amount to accepting a delay of a few months delay.

In short, talking about a "180-degree reversal" is, at best, wildly over the top rehtoric.

Posted by Kenneth Almquist | November 27, 2007 2:20 AM

Mr. Almquist--I'll grant that 180-degrees is excessive. But your selection from Blix's lengthy, diplomatically-worded statement omits significant material on Iraq's ongoing obstructionism, especially in the areas of rockets, and access to scientists without government minders being present. In short, ongoing flagrant material breech.

I think that after twelve years of violating the ceasefire, enough was seen as enough. "Final opportunity", after all, should mean final. It is easy for people like Hans Blix to propose open-ended inspections of the sort that had been frustrated before, but it would be more useful to put oneself in the shoes of the responsible officials who had been dealing with the problem unsuccessfully for over a decade, and had to consider the risk to the hundreds of thousands of soldiers sitting in tents exposed to God knew what, as the climate-dictated window for viable operations was rapidly closing. And the pay-off for continued delay, risk, and bastardization of the intent of "final"? The retention in power of Saddam Hussein.

In my view, it's a lot more valid historically to look at the judgements of the legal experts who were actually qualified and responsible to make them in democracies like the US, Britain, et al, rather than some undefined cabal of kibbitzers on the sidelines.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 27, 2007 3:24 AM

Mr. Powell,

Given the gusto with which you argue the minutia of UN security council debates, you might think it's bad form to bring this back to the original point of contention, but nothing you've written in this entire thread has changed the fact that your statement:

No one in the United States has, or will, propose "launch(ing) unilateral military strikes against countries that aren't attacking anyone else".

is a crock. At the time we invaded Iraq, they were not, in fact, attacking anyone else. Your insistence, therefore, that the US would not do such a thing is wrong. I understand that you do not wish to consider that you were wrong, but the truth is occasionally inconvenient.

...the idea that we can just put 2003 under a microscope and forget about everything else is poor analysis of any type. This is correct. Your choosing to rebut my argument by making this statement, however, implies that you think I was doing so. I will try to simplify my point so that you will not become so confused.

The negative consequences of a full scale invasion of Iraq during the first gulf war deterred us from doing so, in spite of the massive provocation Iraq had provided at the time. In 2003, there was no reason to think that the negative consequences that had dissuaded us from invasion twelve years earlier had changed. When you factor in that Iraq's provocation in 2003 was an order of magnitude smaller than that of 1991 (i.e. they had not attacked anyone), the idea of invasion was clearly folly. The benefit of hindsight proves that it was in fact folly.

Please note that the paragraph above does not in any way isolate 2003 under a microscope, but in fact places it in the context of prior circumstances.

Now I gather that you would argue that because it overwhelmed considerations of negative consequences, the provocation in 2003 was even greater than that of 1991. Let's compare and contrast:

2003: ...twelve years of massive, largely counterproductive, efforts to achieve the necessary results without regime change. And let's not forget the oil for food scandal.

1991: Invasion of Kuwait, one of the largest exporters of oil in the world, jeopardizing the entire world economy, combined with the threat of a further invasion of Saudi Arabia.

Hmm...I'm gonna have to go with 1991 on this one, but feel free to pick whichever one you feel is right.

Shorter me again: your bullshit is weak.

Posted by DMonteith | November 27, 2007 10:14 AM

"Your selection from Blix's lengthy, diplomatically-worded statement omits significant material on Iraq's ongoing obstructionism, especially in the areas of rockets, and access to scientists without government minders being present."

Here is the section on rockets:

While during our meetings in Baghdad, the Iraqi side tried to persuade us that the Al Samoud 2 missiles they have declared fall within the permissible range set by the Security Council, the calculations of an international panel of experts led us to the opposite conclusion. Iraq has since accepted that these missiles and associated items be destroyed and has started the process of destruction under our supervision. The destruction undertaken constitutes a substantial measure of disarmament - indeed, the first since the middle of the 1990s. We are not watching the breaking of toothpicks. Lethal weapons are being destroyed. However, I must add that no destruction has happened today. I hope it's a temporary break. [It was; a total of 72 Al Samoud 2 missiles were destroyed before the war started.]

To date, 34 Al Samoud 2 missiles, including 4 training missiles, 2 combat warheads, 1 launcher and 5 engines have been destroyed under UNMOVIC supervision. Work is continuing to identify and inventory the parts and equipment associated with the Al Samoud 2 programme.

Two 'reconstituted' casting chambers used in the production of solid propellant missiles have been destroyed and the remnants melted or encased in concrete.

The legality of the Al Fatah missile is still under review, pending further investigation and measurement of various parameters of that missile.

And here is the discussion of government minders attending interviews:

The second reflection is that with relevant witnesses available it becomes even more important to be able to conduct interviews in modes and locations, which allow us to be confident that the testimony is given without outside influence. While the Iraqi side seems to have encouraged interviewees not to request the presence of Iraqi officials (so-called minders) or the taping of the interviews, conditions ensuring the absence of undue influences are difficult to attain inside Iraq. Interviews outside the country might provide such assurance. It is our intention to request such interviews shortly.

"I think that after twelve years of violating the ceasefire, enough was seen as enough."

According to the Downing Street memo, that's not how Bush saw it:

It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even if the timing was not yet decided. But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbours, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran. We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force.

In other words, Bush had decided to invade before the inspections even started, and the inspections were an attempt to create a pretext for the invasion. To me, that makes more sense than the notion that Bush decided to invade as a result of Iraq's imperfect cooperation with the inspections.

Posted by Kenneth | November 27, 2007 3:31 PM

Resort to "The Downing Street Memo" is grounds for disqualification from serious discussion. Please refer to the actual legal finding for Parliament rather than to purloined bits of theoretical in-house discussion leaked minus context, with bad intent.

The sense of Congress and the White House in 1998 was that "enough is enough". By 2003, the conclusion was even more representative of consensus, not just in Congress but in Parliament and the in the governments of most of the world's important democracies . Parsing the terms doesn't change the fact that Iraq had been a serial violater of unprecedented proportions, and had not in any measurable way either accounted for past crimes or given any indication that it wouldn't at the soonest practical opportunity repeat them.

I would hope that Bush, or any other President post the 2000 election, would have made serious and detailed plans to eliminate the Ba'athist regime in Iraq, given the history. The amazing thing is that Saddam was allowed the option to pull the plug on the invasion almost up to the last minute by simply complying with his obligations under the terms of the '91 ceasefire. The fact that he didn't seems down to the perfidy of the French, and others of the same ilk who were, and apparently remain, willing to run interference for an aggressive, genocidal police state, for narrow partisan motives.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 27, 2007 4:21 PM