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News: Globalisation & social justice
The US Vs Iraq16 September 2002Gareth Evans and Tariq Ali are interviewed by Maxine McKew. Gareth EvansMAXINE McKEW: Gareth Evans, you said in [a comment piece published in the International Herald Tribune] that [President Bush's United Nations] speech had to be compelling. Do you think it was? GARETH EVANS: I'm afraid there wasn't very much in the speech that was either compelling or comforting. It was comforting to the extent that President Bush committed himself to fully exploring the UN Security Council route before resorting to military action. But what was quite discomforting was the clarity with which he made it clear that the US would go down the route of unilateral military action if the Security Council didn't perform fully to US specifications. And what was also discomforting, I think, in that context, was the very long shopping list that was laid out in the speech, going well beyond the removal of chemical, biological and nuclear capability that Saddam had to live up to, in particular stopping elicit trade, stopping support of terrorism, very broadly defined, stopping persecuting or violating the rights of his own citizens. Now, I think the world is prepared to go with the US as far as the very robust ultimatum is concerned, backed by potential enforcement action, for the removal of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons of mass destruction. But I don't think there is the support there - and the rationale was certainly not offered, nor any other grounds for confidence - if the US wants to go beyond that and actually pursue this basic goal of regime change, which seems to lie behind the rest of that long shopping list. MAXINE McKEW: Yes, that's the problem, isn't it? The double agenda. When we look at Europe, where you're sitting, we see the whole spectrum of opinion, from full support from Tony Blair to complete opposition by Gerhard Schroeder. Is any of this likely to change in the wake of what the President has said? GARETH EVANS: No, I don't think so. I think the support is there for going down the removal of weapons of mass destruction. But it's not there for going beyond that because the case hasn't been made for going beyond that - in terms of pursuing other objectives like regime change or for indeed getting to the primary objective by unilateral military force. I mean, what we were looking for, I guess, was some kind of plausible rationale in terms of clear and present danger. But if you're going to make the case that a country is a military threat to others, you have got to do more than just describe its capability, which President Bush did very well although not saying anything new. You have got to demonstrate it has the intent to misbehave, and here we heard nothing other than an extrapolation from past behaviour. No new evidence of current or future intentions. And you've also got to have a demonstrable proof that containment or deterrent policies won't hold the line. And there's every reason, I think certainly in European thinking, to believe that Saddam Hussein can be kept in his box in the future just as he's been in the past. Perhaps not just with the existing armoury of responses. I think there is consensus that we have to go beyond that and do something very serious about his weapons of mass destruction capability. But that again is very different from regime change as such ... and all the rest of the items on the US list. MAXINE McKEW: Just in terms of what we're likely to see over the next couple of days Secretary of State Colin Powell is now set to begin talks with the four other permanent members on the specifics of a resolution. How do you see the dynamics on the Security Council? GARETH EVANS: Well I think provided that the US stops talking about regime change, you will get support, Powell will get support for a very robust resolution, particularly one that's narrow in its focus and just concentrates on chemical, nuclear, biological weapons and getting the inspectors back in, to prove that they've been destroyed. If he starts going beyond that, then I think he loses pretty rapidly the Russians and, of course, Chinese and he'll find it very difficult to keep the Europeans sticking firm. The problem is, if you just ask - if you make it clear that what you're about is getting rid of Saddam, you don't give Saddam any incentive at all to behave according to UN Security Council regime designed to destroy his weaponry because he thinks he co-operates on that and he gets zapped anyway. And that's been the big sort of conceptual problem in the way the US has handled this. President Bush did something to get through that ... MAXINE McKEW: But assuming Colin Powell can navigate that for the moment, what would you imagine a robust resolution would look like? Being able to get, if you like, coercive inspectors back in and to a deadline? GARETH EVANS: Yep. I think that all of the above is necessary. And the Europeans ought to swear up to that, ought to be prepared to put their money where their mouths are. MAXINE McKEW: And that being the case, and Saddam, if you like, Saddam Hussein being a survivor, will he let them in? GARETH EVANS: Well, I think this is the critical issue. If he believes that that's the agenda, getting rid of the weapons and proving to the world that he has, with the prospect of being turned into toast if he doesn't, I think he will let them if in. If he believes that that's not the agenda and the US has another additional agenda going way beyond that, of the kind that was really mapped out in President Bush's speech, then there's real reason to doubt that he will be co-operative. That's ... that opens up the prospect of full-scale war, indiscernible consequences throughout the region, a terrible precedent being set. I mean, all the ugliness and horror of war. I think the critical thing is to concentrate everyone's mind in the way that I'm sure Colin Powell wants to but there's always the question mark about others in the administration. Concentrate everyone's mind on just this single agenda item. After all think of this, all year President Bush has been saying the big problem is the world's worst leader possessing the world's worst weapons. Logically, if you can get rid of the weapons you don't also have to get rid of the leader. However ugly he is. That's a different agenda. And that's where the rest of the world gets edgy. Because if you're going to go to war, you've got to have a very, very strong rationale for it and you've got to fully think through the consequences and that's what I think we've haven't been persuaded about. MAXINE McKEW: Equally, just a final point, though. Would you also see this, though, certainly as President Bush does and certainly as the Australian government has, this is a real test for the UN to enforce its own resolutions? GARETH EVANS: Well, if we apply that particular benchmark, we're in a bit of trouble with Israel and lots of other countries where resolutions have not been enforced. The point is, there's always been a degree of selectivity about it and that's been unfortunate. Resolutions that go unenforced go unrespected. And of course the resolutions about the weapons of mass destruction in particular and the inspection regime should have been observed and should be enforced. I for one am very strongly in favour of very, very robust action, including serious threat of military action, to enforce those particular resolutions. But other resolutions can be enforced in other ways than through military action. You don't necessarily enforce military rights violations through military action except in the most extreme cases. And I'm not sure for any of the other items on the shopping list, on the agenda, the case for going down the military route has been made. If President Bush had kept his speech and presentation focused solely on the weapons of mass destruction issue, I think he would have had a full-scale international consensus by today. But there's a tremendous amount of nervousness in Europe and beyond about what the agenda is. That will make it very difficult to deliver this without all the ugliness and horror of a major conflict. AXINE McKEW: All right, thanks for that Gareth Evans, thanks very much for joining us.GARETH EVANS: Thank you.
Tariq AliMAXINE McKEW: Tariq Ali joins me now from Stavanger in Norway. Thanks for joining us. We've all been exposed to some very grand statements lately. But you take the opposite view, don't you? Why do you feel that 9/11 was not much more than a pinprick? TARIQ ALI: Well the actual event certainly wasn't. It's a totally different question what use the United States is making of it. They have declared an infinite war on nebulous enemies and they have used 9/11 to remap the world and are now planning to invade Iraq. That's essentially what we are witnessing. So, from the point of view of how the US is using it, it's not a pin prick. But the actual event itself certainly didn't warrant such a response and I have to say that, you know, I noticed - I was in Berlin two days ago there was great mourning for the victims of the September 11. But no-one, no Western leader, has so far publicly even declared that they're sorry about the innocent Afghan civilians who have been killed, whose numbers are now between 3,000 and 4,000. No-one mourns for them but everyone mourns for citizens of New York. That's the world in which we live today. MAXINE McKEW: In terms of what the scale of the historic shift may turn out to be, though, if that is the case, if September 11 marks the point where America chooses to strike first at its enemies, whether that turns out to be Iraq or some other enemy, do you think that will be a significant shift? TARIQ ALI: I think what's happened is that the events of 9/11 have given the policy makers in the American Administration the feeling that they can get away with anything, and that they needn't fear public opinion because of these terrorist attacks, and they can change the world at will, change regimes whatever they want apply double standards and no-one will care. But I think they're wrong on that, as we see with Iraq. When I was in Berlin, it was very obvious that an overwhelming bulk of the country is opposed to a war on Iraq. And the fact that Schroeder has come out very strongly and has said that, even if the UN supports a war Germany will oppose it, has actually helped him turn the situation round in the German elections and he's now six points ahead. So that is the mood in a large part of Europe, including, I may say, in Britain, where Tony Blair's pretty much isolated from his own party and trade unions. MAXINE McKEW: Hasn't Schroeder been opportunistic? What he's ignoring is 50 years of security ties with the US? TARIQ ALI: Well, I think basically what the Germans feel now is that they've done their duty after the war, they've had several decades without their own foreign policy, they've allowed the Americans to carry out their foreign policy for them, as the Americans still do for Japan, but enough's enough. He feels now that the new united Germany is a democratic Germany and has the right to have its own foreign policy. Certainly there's massive public support for him. I found that very few serious commentators, even on the right, are in favour of a war against Iraq. MAXINE McKEW: It's interesting this week that we're talking more about Saddam Hussein than Osama bin Laden. But of course the American view is that the Middle East would be a lot better off without someone like Saddam, let's change the regime. TARIQ ALI: I know. But I could say exactly the same; that the region would be better off without Ariel Sharon, that Israel has chemical and nuclear weapons; yet no-one is suggesting inspectors go in to Israel to look at these weapons. So these double standards have a very negative effect on people in that region. As Gareth Evans said early on this program, if we're talking about implementing UN resolutions, why not implement them in relation to Israel, that it withdraws from the occupied territories. Why single out Saddam Hussein? As far as I'm concerned Sharon is just as bad. MAXINE McKEW: What about the wider agenda - that the US really should use Iraq to press forward on almost a remapping of the Middle East. How would you see the ramifications of that? TARIQ ALI: Well, I think this is what Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney want and have been pushing it through. There have been reports in the American press - they've provided us with evidence that on September 12 last year Wolfowitz proposed forgetting Afghanistan, let's forget Osama bin Laden, let's focus on Iraq. It's very clear what their aim is. The question is will they get away with it. Here I have to say ... MAXINE McKEW: Tariq Ali, would you shed any tears for any of these governments? You're not particularly flattering about any of them? TARIQ ALI: I'm not. But on the other hand, I have a certain view, which is that the people of these countries are the ones who have the right to topple these governments. They're the ones that should be strengthened and encouraged. People learn through their own experiences much more than through Western interventions, which actually come and stop certain processes, as we're seeing in Afghanistan today. I do not want a Western intervention in the Middle East. I want the people of Iraq, Saudi Arabia, etcetera, to deal with their own regimes. I'm not even for a Western intervention in Israel. MAXINE McKEW: Where is the evidence that in fact there is any leadership in that region? Let me put it to you that one of the disappointing aspects of the past year has been the lack of creativity, the lack of responsiveness coming out of the Arab world to the Americans? TARIQ ALI: There's a massive discussion taking place in the Arab world, if you read the Arab press and watch Arab television. It's very different. You talk about the lack of creativity in the Arab world and there's an element of truth in that. I would say there's an enormous lack of creativity among the Western leadership. George W Bush as a leader of vision and creativity, give us a break! People all over the world laugh when you say that. One of the most noticeable things is the quality of leadership in the United States at the moment is at a very low level. And having Tony Blair licking up to you doesn't particularly help either. I have to say it, even though I disagree with him, your PM is probably the most intelligent right-wing leaders in power today. Mercifully he's completely marginal. MAXINE McKEW: Tom Friedman was on this show the other night and he said there's plenty of evidence that in the past year Americans have looked in the mirror. He said, "Where's the evidence that Muslims have looked in the mirror?" TARIQ ALI: Well, the evidence is if you travel round that world you speak to people. I'm not now talking about the governments the Americans deal with all the time. They say what they want. I'm talking about intellectuals, and ordinary people. I would challenge Friedman to say Americans have looked in the mirror. They certainly haven't. In fact, if they did look in the mirror the only image they would see is one of the ugly American, given what they're doing in different parts of the world. It's interesting that the Canadian PM just next door to the United States had to remind them that one of the reasons for 9/11 was because of their own policies. They were very shocked and it was very brave of him to say it, but this is what large parts of the world believe. There's been nothing on the part of the United States to say, "Where did we go wrong? How can we behave differently?" In fact, they're things worse. If they attack Iraq, I predict there will be more terrorism in the world, not less. MAXINE McKEW: Equally, when many look at the Arab world they see far too many people stuck in that tired old blame game of it's all the fault of the Americans. That's not getting us anywhere, is it? TARIQ ALI: It's not a blame game. What you have in the Middle East is an unsolved problem. That's the question of Palestine. The Western world has given up on it after 9/11. Ariel Sharon has become a valued ally in the war on terrorism. Rumsfeld had the nerve a few weeks ago to speak of the so-called occupied territories. In this situation, why should the Arabs take the West seriously at all? The Europeans behind the scenes are very upset about Ariel Sharon but are incapable of doing anything. I've been arguing for the last year that unless there's a political solution to the Palestinian question, they can do what they want. They can occupy half that country. But the notion that this will bring stability and peace, prosperity and an end to terrorism - they're living in cloud cuckoo land. MAXINE McKEW: For that, Tariq Ali, thank you very much indeed. Gareth Evans is the former Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs and now heads the Brussels-based International Crisis Group. Tariq Ali is editor of the New Left Review and author of The Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity (London: Verso, 2002). These two interviews, which are reproduced with kind permission, were broadcast on the Lateline late night news & current affairs program on Australia' ABC-TV on 14 September 2002. Also on the Evatt site:
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