[Nasional-m] Bush needs a vision to justify war

[Ambon]

 Bush needs a vision to justify war

William Pfaff International Herald Tribune, Los Angeles Times Syndicate
International Saturday, September 14, 2002



Targeting Iraq II

PARIS Americans are uncomfortable with foreign policies that are not given a
visionary or idealistic formulation. They are accustomed to having foreign
policy placed in a more generous framework than is currently offered. Where
would victories over Iraq and al Qaeda lead?
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The absence of vision was particularly noticeable this week, as memorial
observances for last year's lost lives included readings from Franklin
Roosevelt's Four Freedoms, the Gettysburg Address and other idealistic past
statements of American purpose.
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President George W. Bush spoke of America's "moral vocation." But his
administration has at the same time been making its most strenuous efforts
yet to convince Americans and their reluctant allies to go to war against
Saddam Hussein's Iraq. There is discordance here, which more than one
American has found troubling.
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Ever since Communism's collapse left the United States in a position of
unchallenged power, there has been much discussion of how this power should
properly be used, or how it could be abused. Articles and books have
described the situation in terms of "global hegemony," and have recommended
that the United States take advantage of its extraordinary position.
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This ordinarily was accompanied by the disclaimer that American interests
nonetheless serve the world's interest because of the high ideals of the
United States. Bush put this in his own way recently when he called the
United States "the single surviving model of human progress."
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The administration's problem is that a war against Iraq does not comfortably
fit into the model of progressive and essentially benevolent national
policy.
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Now there is an effort to supply a remedy. A part of the neoconservative and
pro-Israeli community influencing Bush administration policy argues that a
war against Saddam Hussein should be seen in the context of a long-term
American policy for transforming the Muslim Middle East.
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It identifies "regime change" in Iraq and the campaign against Al Qaeda as
necessary steps in a decades-long American program to replace virtually all
of the existing Middle Eastern governments and install social and economic
reform. The entire Middle East, plus Central Asia, Afghanistan and Pakistan,
would be included in an American policy that its authors compare with the
remaking of Europe ("by America") after World War II.
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Descriptions of this new project have been provided by Michael Ledeen of the
American Enterprise Institute and others. The program itself will soon be
published in Policy Review magazine. Its authors are Ronald Asmus, formerly
of the State Department, and Ken Pollack, formerly of the Clinton
administration.
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It envisages a remade post-Taliban Afghanistan; an Arab-Israeli settlement
on terms acceptable to Israel; "regime change" in Iran, as well as Iraq; and
backing for civil society throughout the region, "particularly among current
allies" (meaning Egypt, Saudi Arabia and probably the Gulf emirates).
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Other advocates of this approach insist that eliminating Saddam Hussein will
release existing but suppressed democratic forces, radically changing the
Middle East. The eminent British historian Michael Howard wrote last weekend
that to believe this "demands a considerable suspension of disbelief."
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There is nothing wrong with having a theory about reform in the Muslim
world. A serious government is expected to have a strategic outlook. The new
Washington proposal rests, however, on the progressive myth that mankind
would be peaceful and democratic if it were not the victim of false
ideologies or evil dictators.
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It rests as well on an inherently contradictory notion that foreign
intervention is capable of solving the Islamic world's distress.
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To justify his war against Iraq, Bush needs a demonstrated grave cause (not
speculation about what Iraq might do in the future); reasonable prospects
for success and legitimacy in the opinion of the American public and that of
his allies.
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He has yet to prove his cause. If he did, the United Nations could provide
the legitimacy. But a theory that rests on the suspension of disbelief does
nothing for him or for the debate. It tends rather toward the characteristic
evil of the 20th century, which was to kill people because of a fiction
about the future.
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International Herald Tribune Los Angeles Times Syndicate International