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So Iraq has caved in. It has permitted the United Nations -
which, in effect, means the United States to inspect its
arsenals. Iraq has been charged with storing weapons of mass
destruction (WMD) which is a cruel joke, considering. that
practically every great power, and that includes, the United
States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China, has its own
WMD stock in plenty. But Iraq is considered an irresponsible
state that cannot be trusted. But can one trust the United
States which waged a 10-year long war against Vietnam,
practically levelling it to the ground? Can one trust Britain and
France which waged the Suez War in the mid-1950s? Or China which
has openly supplied Pakistan with nuclear expertise? Who is
talking? But the United States has control of the international
news agencies. It can exert pressure on countries which are
members of the United Nations. And never mind if the United
States has not paid its legitimate membership dues to the world
body.
When, according to rules it should have been disqualified, it
continues to run the U. N. as if it is a subsidiary of the U. S.
State Department. It is to this state that international politics
has been reduced to. It is nobody's argument that Iraq is nor
bristling with arms. Or that Saddam Hussain run's a benevolent
democracy. But where is democracy in all of the Middle East?
Syria is as much a dictatorship as Iraq and Hafez al Assad is no
saint. The less said about Saudi Arabia, the better. The fact is
that democracy is foreign to the entire Arabian peninsula which
was divided into several states to suit the purposes first of
Britain and France and still later of the United States.
With the collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the first
World War it was left to the then two Great Powers. Britain and
France, to carve out the land into principalities that they could
govern by proxy. Their role has now been taken over by the United
States for the simple reason that 40 per cent of the world's oil
reserves are to be found in this compact geographical area.
The United States cannot afford to let power in the Middle East
slip out of its hands. In Saddam Hussain of Iraq it has found-
some one challenging its supremacy. Hussain, therefore, has to be
destroyed. He has been demonised. But if Saddam Hussain has
become a demon, part of the blame rests on the western powers.
They have done everything to destroy him. In that they have
failed - and so far failed miserably. Mr Clinton had. even
pledged $ 97 million to Iraqi Opposition groups to eliminate
Saddam or at least topple him. Such support has been the kiss of
death to them. It is they who have been largely eliminated.
Saddam's ruthlessness has become legendary. And shocking. But
half measures would have taken him nowhere. Iraq would have been
turned into another American protectorate, just as are Saudi
Arabia or Kuwait. According to Judith Miller of the New York
Times and Laurie Mylroie of Harvard University, - “the United
States did not send forces to the Gulf because Kuwait was a nice
country”. in their book Saddam Hussain and the Crisis in the Gulf
they write: "Honest analysts acknowledge that had Kuwait been for
example, a country in sub-Saharan Africa and without oil, not a
single American soldier would have been deployed to protect it.
So the United States did not become entangled in the Gulf to
defend the principle of sovereignty or to restore Kuwait's rulers
to their genial department stores and palaces... Rather American
forces were sent to protect the nation's (America's) access to
oil". As simple as that. If Saddam Hussain had been a willing
tool of the United States in the wholesale looting of oil by
western countries, not only would he have been spared, but he
would even have been lionised in the western press as God's
special gift to the Arab world.
That Saddam has chosen not to be an American stooge riles
Washington no end. During the short Gulf War when Saddam
threatened to take over Kuwait, the punishment meted out to the
Iraqi people was nothing less than sub-human. The war has long
been over but in the last eight years since the end of
hostilities, Iraq has been laid low through meaningless
sanctions. The people have been denied basic medical supplies and
the children even milk. Thousands have died because of
malnutrition. But America - and Britain, its running dog - would
not relent. In recent weeks the U. S. had marked out 250 targets
for pin-point bombing in the course of which some 10,000 Iraqi
civilians would have been killed.
That doesn't at all sit on the conscience of the United States.
According to military analysts, the mounting of military air-
strikes against Iraqi targets would have cost the United States
some $ 4,000 million! America was willing to spend that money to
establish its superiority in the Middle East and safeguard its
oil interests. That is an eloquent example of America's own
'sense of responsibility". It is a crying shame, but few dare
challenge the U. S. openly. According to line Hindu, "ironically,
major European powers have not displayed any particular
enthusiasm for Anglo-American military initiative in Iraq". Why
should they? The European countries see Iraq as a valuable export
market once the economic sanctions are lifted and this perception
apparently is shared by France, Russia and even China. Actually,
reports The Hindu, 'Europeans have secretly admired the
brinkmanship of Saddam Hussain". Nobody in Europe really loves
America or its tactics as the only super power. Waging wars
against Iraq has done incalculable harm to the Iraqi people, but
they are holding out bravely. It may be that they have no other
alternative, given the rigour of the Saddam administration which
brooks no internal opposition. But has the United States no other
alternative? Writing in the London Times, Simon Jenkins has made
the point that instead of continuing what he calls the
"inspection minuet' (insistence on inspecting Iraqi arms
stockpiles), it would be better to 'lift economic sanctions,
flood the country with money, bankers, journalists and
consultants and see what happens next".
According to Jenkins, it could well be that this very generosity
would topple Saddam. To that he adds: "No modem nation is made to
“see sense" by being bombed and impoverished into the Middle
Ages". Regimes are destablished by contact, not ostracism.
In all this devilish activity, the United States is alone.
Britain does not matter, as Jenkins concedes. European nations
are opposed to the United States. Presently, the term “West"
signifies only the English-speaking North Atlantic axis. This
axis is not just amoral. It is thoroughly immoral. It is
unprincipled. Even The New York Times has now come to the point
of saying that "CIA effort to kill the Iraqi leader would not
only violate Presidential ban on assassination, but would also
invite retaliation against American leaders”. But Clinton
couldn't care less. Nor could Tony Blair.
Tarnishing Saddam Hussain's name may be good fun from America's
point of view, but there is no reason why India should not stand
up and speak out in favour of Iraq. India is respected in
Baghdad. According to a Financial Times (London) report, much
credit for pulling Iraq back from the brink of conflict goes to
Mr Prakash Shah, the Special Representative of the U.N. Secretary
General, Mr Kofi Annan, in Baghdad. It was Shah who was at the
centre of diplomatic efforts which resulted in Iraq's decision to
cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors.
It was again Shah who worked on the strategy of providing Iraq
with a face-saving formula that allowed the Iraqi government to
claim that it did not back down out of fear of a U. S. military
attack. Shah had been called our from retirement in March to work
on a special diplomatic mission in Iraq. It would seem that he
has succeeded to a large extent. His presence in Baghdad had
become necessary for reasons both of protocol and diplomacy. For
such are the rules that U. N. Secretary General Annan could not
travel to Baghdad without a direct request by the Security
Council where, of course, the United States remains the boss.
What this shows is that India itself has a role to play in Middle
East affairs that it has been reluctant to play in part because
it does not have the right kind of leadership. Vajpayee is no
Nehru nor Shah a V. K. Krishna Menon. But that does not mean that
we have to sit back and watch as the United States plays ducks
and drakes with the lives of innocent Iraqis. What the United
States is practising in the Middle East is politics of the lowest
order, politics without principles, adventurism without morals.
India, it is readily conceded, cannot change the map of the
Middle East. nor can it undo history. But surely it can organise
world opinion to make Washington behave. God did not make oil to
keep U. S. prosperity going at the cost of the developing world.
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