Propaganda offensive
The aim of the internationally-sponsored Brussels conference on Iraq was to ascribe legitimacy to an illegitimate war, writes Jean Bricmont* from Brussels
An international one-day conference on rebuilding Iraq sponsored by the United States and the European Union, which has drawn foreign ministers from the 25-nation EU, the US, Iraq and its neighbours, took place in Brussels 22 June. The international meeting raises several important questions: Why does the US want an international conference with the participation of European countries two years after its "victory" in Iraq? What is to be expected from this conference? How should the antiwar movement in Europe react?
The answer to the first question was, paradoxically, given by Zalmay Khalilzad, nominated to be US ambassador to Iraq, speaking before the US Senate: "The degree of support for our policies, opinion polls indicate, is not very high," he said. This has partly to do with "the perception that what we are about in Iraq is occupation, what we're about is to gain control of Iraqi resources. I think what we need to do is a better job of explaining our goals, the goal of an Iraq that's self-reliant, an Iraq that's successful. We want Iraq for the Iraqis, an Iraq that works for the Iraqi people."
Whether Zalmay Khalilzad believes what he says or not, I don't know, but certainly, very few people outside the US believe him, and, more importantly, it is not rational to believe what he says.
Indeed, what would an "Iraq for the Iraqis" look like? I am not an expert on the Middle East, but one does not have to be an expert to realise that a truly free and democratic Iraq would almost certainly seek to achieve these three goals:
1. Control of its oil resources, which would mean choosing its business partners and seeking agreements with other oil-producing countries in order to be able to limit production and raise prices.
2. Full national sovereignty, without foreign troops on its soil (i.e., no permanent US military bases.)
3. Freedom to use its wealth to build an effective military counterweight to Israeli military hegemony in the region, including, if necessary, by acquiring nuclear weapons; there is nothing scandalous or undemocratic about this. Israel has plenty of nuclear weapons and France acquired such weapons supposedly to counter a far less pressing Soviet threat.
None of these policies would conceivably be accepted by the US, and this is the basic root of the present conflict in Iraq, whatever form it takes, from "elections" to "terrorism".
It is well known that things in Iraq did not go as advertised. The population is not exactly welcoming the "liberators", and this fact is slowly dawning on the American public, whose support for the war is waning. The latest damaging incident concerns the "secret" Downing Street Memo, which shows that Bush lied not only to the American people, but to the US Congress, by pretending that the issue was Iraq's WMD and is lying again by saying that his administration was misled into war by "intelligence failures" (fixing intelligence is hardly the same thing as intelligence failures). It is an odd feature of American democracy that its president can order his troops to go halfway around the world, invade a country with no valid reason, kill thousands of people and create a mess that nobody knows how to fix, and get away with it. But if he lies to Congress and to the American people, then he might be in trouble. It is odd, but perhaps better than nothing.
Of course, since Republicans control both houses of Congress, the Supreme Court, and, one might add, most of the media, it is impossible that Bush will be impeached. But the Downing Street Memo may give a boost to the antiwar movement, and play a role similar to the one of the Pentagon papers during the Vietnam war, since both documents show the total contempt of US governments for such things as truth, democracy or accountability.
As for the Brussels conference, the mere fact that it took place shows that the US is in serious trouble. When it invaded Iraq, it did not expect to come begging for support two years later from "Old Europe". The US government has received from the Iraqi resistance a serious lesson in humility. But all the Brussels conference offers is moral support. Whether this will have any effect in Iraq, where people face facts, not symbols, remains to be seen.
The real target of support is the US population -- opposition to the war is mounting, the army has increasing recruitment problems, and the morale of the troops is low. Therefore, the US government wants to be able to show to its population that the international community supports its efforts in Iraq. This was also the entire purpose of the "coalition of the willing", the US allies at the time of the invasion, none of which, not even Britain, has played a significant military role. This war is purely a US war, but that fact has to be carefully hidden from Americans, who might be very displeased if they knew how isolated their country is in the world.
What is striking is that the mainstream peace movements, both in Europe and the US, are rather lukewarm about the prospect of bringing the troops home now. They may somehow ask for a timetable for withdrawal, but are not making much noise about it, or taking action. A common reaction is to say that, yes, we opposed the war, but now that it has taken place, we cannot abandon the Iraqis to their fate; they might even say that we must help the Iraqis build a stable democracy (which presumably means crushing the resistance first).
It is no small paradox of our time that opposition to this war is probably more vocal on the right, or among apolitical people, like the families of soldiers, than on the left. The mainstream peace movement is scared to death of being accused of supporting the resistance (whatever that may mean), as it was scared to death before the war of being accused of supporting Saddam. They have interiorised what one might call the Pol Pot effect: the Vietnam war was kept going in large part on the pretext that Americans could not abandon the Vietnamese to their fate, and because of the "bloodbath" that might take place when they left. When the Americans finally did leave, horrible things did happen, but in Cambodia rather than in Vietnam.
This argument can only be countered by taking a more global point of view. Indeed nobody knows what would happen in Iraq if the US left (by the same token, nobody knows how long they would have to stay and how many people they would have to kill in order to create a stable Iraq to their liking). But the significance of this war goes far beyond the borders of that unfortunate land.
From the 16th to the middle of the 20th century, we saw the rise of European hegemony over the rest of the world. With the decolonisation process, a whole new historical era began, which heralded major progress for mankind, comparable to the fall of absolute monarchies or to the end of slavery. War-loving, imperialist Europe was demoralised by its misadventures and this has opened Europeans to the possibility of a more universal morality in relation to the rest of the world.
Unfortunately, a new imperial centre emerged from the self-destruction of Europe, the US, as well as a new mode of control, through economic and diplomatic pressures, embargoes, military coups and, if all else fails, but only then, direct military intervention; in other words, neo-colonialism instead of colonialism. The US still convinces itself that imposing its will on the world is both profitable and moral, serving, as the standard phrase goes, "ideals and interests".
The importance of the Porto Allegre global justice movement, of the protests against the WTO, of the revolts and elections in Latin America, as well as of the Iraqi resistance is to reject this new mode of control; the crisis of the neo-colonial system is likely to be the main crisis of the beginning of the 21st century. The goal of a genuine Western left and of the peace movement should be to help this process by demoralising, as much as possible, the imperial powers from within. If the latter lack the "moral fiber" to fight, then the rest of world will free itself from the shackles of neo-colonialism, as it did with colonialism in the past. That is why we should oppose gatherings such as the Brussels conference, even if, or rather, precisely because, its goal is purely to offer moral support.
The most important difference between Europe and the US is that, in the former, there is no longer enthusiasm for foreign adventures (except, to some extent, in England). Losing wars has had a civilising effect on this most violent continent. Let's hope that the Americans will finally be forced to follow this path.
* The writer is professor of theoretical physics at Louvain University in Belgium and is a member of the Brussels Tribunal on Iraq.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2005/751/in2.htm