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Fri, 19 Mar 04; Op-eds
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NE-@latvia-usa.org
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Mar 18, 2004 22:59 PST
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NATO ENLARGEMENT DAILY BRIEF (NEDB)
Friday, 19 March 2004, 01:28 EDT
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* THE PRICE OF FREEDOM IN IRAQ / NYT / Donald H. Rumsfeld
(U.S. Def Sec)
* ONE YEAR AFTER / NYT / Editorial
* TIME FOR SOLIDARITY WITH EUROPE / WP / Joe Lieberman (
U.S. Sen.,Dem.)
* RETURNING TO OLD EUROPE, AND OLD AMERICA / IHT /
Dominique Moisi (IFRI)
* EUROPE'S NEW CHALLENGE / IHT / Editorial
* WESTERN UNITY TAKES A HIT / WP / Anne Applebaum
* LEARNING THE HARD WAY NOT TO FIGHT ALONE / FT / Philip
Gordon, Jeremy Shapiro (Brookings Institution)
* GOING BACKWARD IN THE BALKANS / WP / Morton Abramowitz
(Century Foundation)
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THE PRICE OF FREEDOM IN IRAQ
New York Times, 19 Mar 04, by Donald H. Rumsfeld *
* Donald H. Rumsfeld is U.S. secretary of defense.
This week, as we mark the one-year anniversary of the
beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom, it is useful to
recount why we have fought. Not long ago I visited South
Korea, just as the Korean government was debating whether
to send troops to Iraq. In Seoul, I was interviewed by a
Korean journalist who was almost certainly too young to
have firsthand recollection of the Korean War. She asked
me, "Why should Koreans send their young people halfway
around the globe to be killed or wounded in Iraq?"
As it happened, I had that day visited a Korean War
memorial, which bears the names of every American soldier
killed in the war. On it was the name of a close friend of
mine from high school, a wrestling teammate, who was killed
on the last day of the war. I said to the reporter: "It's a
fair question. And it would have been fair for an American
to ask, 50 years ago, `Why should young Americans go
halfway around the world to be killed or wounded in Korea?'
"
We were speaking on an upper floor of a large hotel in
Seoul. I asked the woman to look out the window ? at the
lights, the cars, the energy of the vibrant economy of
South Korea. I told her about a satellite photo of the
Korean peninsula, taken at night, that I keep on a table in
my Pentagon office. North of the demilitarized zone there
is nothing but darkness ? except a pinprick of light around
Pyongyang ? while the entire country of South Korea is
ablaze in light, the light of freedom.
Korean freedom was won at a terrible cost ? tens of
thousands of lives, including more than 33,000 Americans
killed in action. Was it worth it? You bet. Just as it was
worth it in Germany and France and Italy and in the Pacific
in World War II. And just as it is worth it in Afghanistan
and Iraq today.
Today, in a world of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction
and states that sponsor the former and pursue the latter,
defending freedom means we must confront dangers before it
is too late. In Iraq, for 12 years, through 17 United
Nations Security Council resolutions, the world gave Saddam
Hussein every opportunity to avoid war. He was being held
to a simple standard: live up to your agreement at the end
of the 1991 Persian Gulf war; disarm and prove you have
done so. Instead of disarming ? as Kazakhstan, South Africa
and Ukraine did, and as Libya is doing today ? Saddam
Hussein chose deception and defiance.
Repeatedly, he rejected those resolutions and he
systematically deceived United Nations inspectors about his
weapons and his intent. The world knew his record: he used
chemical weapons against Iran and his own citizens; he
invaded Iran and Kuwait; he launched ballistic missiles at
Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain; and his troops
repeatedly fired on American and British aircraft
patrolling the no-flight zones.
Recognizing the threat, in September 2002 President Bush
went to the United Nations, which gave Iraq still another
"final opportunity" to disarm and to prove it had done so.
The next month the president went to Congress, which voted
to support the use of force if Iraq did not.
And, when Saddam Hussein passed up that final opportunity,
he was given a last chance to avoid war: 48 hours to leave
the country. Only then, after every peaceful option had
been exhausted, did the president and our coalition
partners order the liberation of Iraq.
Americans do not come easily to war, but neither do
Americans take freedom lightly. But when freedom and
self-government have taken root in Iraq, and that country
becomes a force for good in the Middle East, the rightness
of those efforts will be just as clear as it is today in
Korea, Germany, Japan and Italy.
As the continuing terrorist violence in Iraq reminds us,
the road to self-governance will be challenging. But the
progress is impressive. Last week the Iraqi Governing
Council unanimously signed an interim Constitution. It
guarantees freedom of religion and expression; the right to
assemble and to organize political parties; the right to
vote; and the right to a fair, speedy and open trial. It
prohibits discrimination based on gender, nationality and
religion, as well as arbitrary arrest and detention. A year
ago today, none of those protections could have been even
imagined by the Iraqi people.
Today, as we think about the tens of thousands of United
States soldiers in Iraq ? and in Afghanistan and elsewhere
around the world fighting the global war on terrorism ? we
should say to all of them: "You join a long line of
generations of Americans who have fought freedom's fight.
Thank you."
ONE YEAR AFTER
New York Times, 19 Mar 04, Editorial
One year ago, President Bush began the war in Iraq. Most
Americans expected military victory to come quickly, as it
did. Despite the administration's optimism about what would
follow, it was also easy to predict that the period after
the fall of Baghdad would be very messy and very dangerous.
In that sense, right now we're exactly where we expected to
be.
It's nonetheless important to remember that none of this
might have happened if we had known then what we know now.
No matter what the president believed about the long-term
threat posed by Saddam Hussein, he would have had a much
harder time selling this war of choice to the American
people if they had known that the Iraqi dictator had been
reduced to a toothless tiger by the first Persian Gulf war
and by United Nations weapons inspectors. Iraq's weapons
programs had been shut down, Mr. Hussein had no threatening
weapons stockpiled, the administration was exaggerating
evidence about them, and there was, and is, no evidence
that Mr. Hussein was involved in the 9/11 attacks.
Right now, our highest priority is making the best of a
very disturbing situation. Even our European allies who
opposed the war want to see Iraq stabilized and turned over
to its citizens ? even if they don't necessarily see
Washington as the force to do that. The other possibility,
an Iraq flung into chaos and civil war, open to
manipulation by every unscrupulous political figure and
terrorist group in the Middle East, is too awful to
contemplate.
This is a good moment to take stock of what has been
accomplished and what has not, especially since the day is
rapidly approaching when the United States hopes to turn
over the governing of Iraq to the leaders of the nation's
three major ethnic or religious groups ? who have shown no
serious signs of being able to cooperate.
Grim Scenes From Iraq
In the short run, the invasion of Iraq and the toppling of
its leader have done virtually nothing to stop terrorism.
In Iraq, as in Spain, Turkey, Indonesia and other
countries, terrorist attacks have continued since the
capture of Mr. Hussein. On Wednesday, and again yesterday,
Americans saw on television news the flames and casualties
from bombings in Baghdad and Basra by forces opposed to the
American-led occupation, which have become more deadly and
more sophisticated in response to every change in tactics
by American soldiers. Indeed, the war in Iraq has diverted
scarce resources from the war against terrorism in
Afghanistan and other places.
For many Iraqis, freedom has come at a high price. In
Baghdad, civilians line up at offices where the American
military doles out money to compensate them for relatives
killed, limbs lost and eyes blinded in the war. The
innocent Iraqi casualties of Mr. Bush's war are literally
countless because the Pentagon refuses to estimate their
number.
Still, there have been important gains that are the basis
of our hopes for the future.
A bloodthirsty dictator who tortured and murdered his
people, and sacrificed their well-being to his gilded
palaces, is locked up. An interim constitution has been
adopted, a step toward laying the groundwork for a
democratic government in Iraq, should the country's
fractious groups ever resolve their differences.
American-led efforts to rebuild Iraq have progressed to the
point that some services are better than they were under
Mr. Hussein, and Iraqis are starting to express
satisfaction with how things are going. Iraq's power grid,
for example, generates more electricity than ever.
Still, there are enormous gaps. According to the United
States Agency for International Development, Iraq has a
third less drinking water than it did before the war. And
the pace of the rebuilding is alienating some Iraqis who
clearly overestimated the powers and efficiency of the
occupying forces. While some of that disappointment was
inevitable, there was a bewildering lack of planning put
into the occupation by an administration that seemed to
believe its own talk about American soldiers' being greeted
with flowers as an army of liberation.
The so-called surgical bombing did indeed limit damage to
Iraq's civilian areas, but American troops did not come
into Baghdad in enough force last April to deter the
shocking sabotage and looting that occurred. In addition,
the American government, under presidents from both
parties, had spent 13 years in denial about the civilian
toll of the economic sanctions imposed on Iraq. The Bush
administration was unprepared for the total collapse of
Iraq and for the disastrous state of crucial services.
Strains on the American Military
The American military's ability to deal with all of this ?
and supervise the construction of a new democracy ? is
declining by the week. Even with the current rotation,
reducing American troop strength to 110,000 from 130,000,
the Army, Marine, National Guard and Army Reserve forces
cannot sustain the occupation.
Roughly one in three of the Army's 480,000 active-duty
soldiers are on duty overseas, and an even higher
proportion of its combat brigades are either in the field
or have just returned. Rotations are spaced too closely
together ? some of the troops that took part in the
invasion of Iraq are to return there later this year ? and
that cuts into training and readiness. The strain on the
Reserves and the National Guard is already enormous. While
sending more American troops to Iraq is not the answer, the
United States does need a larger active Army.
For Iraq, the only answer is greater peacekeeping and
police help through the United Nations, from nations as
varied as France, India, Bangladesh, Russia and the Arab
countries. These nations can provide more than the token
forces the United States is getting from most of its
current allies, but are unlikely to help until their
citizens see real United Nations authority, transforming a
military occupation into a legitimate exercise in
international nation-building.
Some members of Mr. Bush's coalition are shaken by the
electoral defeat of the Spanish government that joined the
invasion despite the opposition of some 90 percent of its
citizens. In Poland, President Aleksander Kwasniewski said
yesterday that he might withdraw troops from Iraq next year
earlier than planned, adding that Poland had been "misled"
about Iraq's weapons programs.
Repairing the Diplomatic Damage
Winning the cooperation of countries like France and Russia
will require the Bush administration to be far more serious
about turning over real responsibility in Iraq to the
United Nations and NATO. The United Nations is,
commendably, no longer so hesitant about taking the lead in
Iraq.
The Bush administration has barely begun the job of
repairing the damage from its virtually unilateral rush to
war last year. What the public and foreign leaders have
learned about the way it managed the run-up to the invasion
is only worsening the situation.
Asking a political leader to take his country to war in the
teeth of overwhelming popular opposition is tough enough.
Add to that a public that feels misinformed about the
reasons for the war, and you've got political combustion.
Polls show that a plurality of Americans say it was worth a
war simply to remove a vicious dictator ? an argument that
Mr. Bush offered after it became obvious that his original
justifications for the war were vaporous. But in Europe,
there remains overwhelming popular opposition to the
invasion of Iraq. Vice President Dick Cheney was wrong on
Wednesday when he accused Spain of abandoning the war
against terrorism by talking about withdrawing its forces
from Iraq unless the U.N. becomes more involved. It's
nonsensical to suggest that the Spanish people are
appeasers, and doing so only isolates Washington further.
This page strongly opposed invading Iraq without
international backing. The events since Mr. Bush decided to
go ahead with only Britain as a major ally have further
underscored the recklessness of this sort of adventurism.
It is not, as Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney have argued in
campaign speeches and commercials, a question of getting
permission from the United Nations to do the right thing.
It is a matter of listening to the reasonable objections of
proven friends, like Germany, which was privately warning
Washington about the quagmire that Iraq represented.
Stability for a Divided Iraq
The United States is now about 100 days away from June 30,
when it hopes to turn Iraq's government over to Iraqis. As
welcome as the adoption of the interim constitution was, it
underscored how much more remains to be done before the
Iraqis can begin to hope for a stable, workable leadership
to govern their wounded country. So far, the United States
has not found the formula for accomplishing what has in the
past always seemed impossible: getting Iraq's majority
Shiites, minority Sunnis and separatist Kurds to make real
concessions and cooperate in governing Iraq. Days after
compromising on the constitution, Shiite leaders were
talking of amending it, and it took an ultimatum from
Washington this week to make them back down.
Without any culture of trust and accommodation, any form of
real elective democracy empowers the Shiites, reduces the
influence of the Sunnis and once again leaves the Kurds,
who have long wanted to break away from Iraq, at the mercy
of people they do not trust. A Shiite-dominated Iraq may
run into trouble with Iraq's Arab neighbors, who generally
identify with the Sunni Iraqis, who dominate the country's
military and ruling classes.
One temporary solution could be a prolonged period of Iraqi
federalism imposed from the outside or an international
trusteeship. Either, however, is likely to generate intense
Iraqi opposition. Whatever model emerges, it must be guided
by international bodies and not Washington alone.
In some ways, the prime-minister-in-waiting of Spain, José
Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, did Mr. Bush a favor when he said
he would withdraw Spain's symbolic military force from Iraq
if the United Nations' role did not significantly increase
after June 30. He has, in effect, given the president time
to plan and to get cooperation from those countries that
can contribute real forces. We hope the president uses this
time to plan his next steps better than he planned the
occupation.
TIME FOR SOLIDARITY WITH EUROPE
Washignton Post, 19 Mar 04, by Joe Lieberman *
* The writer is U.S. Democratic senator from Connecticut.
Last week's bombings in Madrid mark a critical turning
point in our war against terrorism -- a crossroads as
important as Sept. 11, 2001. When historians look back on
March 11, 2004, will they see it as the time after which
Europe and the United States locked arms against a common
foe and went on to achieve greater security on both sides
of the Atlantic? Or will they see it as the day al Qaeda
drove a wedge between Europe and America and some Europeans
decided that they could achieve an accommodation with
fanatical Islamic terrorists? In other words, will Madrid
be remembered as Pearl Harbor or as Munich?
For now the response of too many Spanish voters looks more
like Munich. By electing a new government, the people of
Spain implied that they not only reject U.S. policies in
Iraq but also the need to join us in the war against
terrorism. A recent Pew Research Center poll shows that
similar opinions are shared in much of Europe. Majorities
in France and Germany hold unfavorable views toward the
United States and doubt our sincerity in the global war on
terrorism.
I understand the Europeans' unease over American power and
their anger at the one-sided ways the Bush administration
has exercised that power. For example, when the Europeans
invoked Article V of the NATO charter after Sept. 11 and
pledged to send their troops to fight alongside ours in
Afghanistan, the Bush administration rejected the offer and
chose to go it alone. That was a mistake, and it sent an
offensive and divisive message to our European allies.
But such decisions cannot be allowed to blind the Europeans
to the interest they share with us in confronting the
jihadists. In our domestic politics, it is critical that
Republicans and Democrats not let the quest for partisan
victory this November prevent us from working together now
to achieve a national victory over the terrorist insurgency
in Iraq. In the same way, it is important that our European
allies not allow their opposition to many of the Bush
administration's foreign policies to separate them from
America in defeating Islamic terrorists.
Lost in the growing transatlantic divide is an
understanding that the same solidarity that enabled us to
defeat communism is urgently needed to defeat terrorism.
Last week's attacks show that al Qaeda does not distinguish
between Americans and Europeans -- and anyone in Europe who
thinks a separate peace can be made with the terrorists has
not heard or read the warnings of Osama bin Laden. We are
all their enemies, because we share the same values of
freedom and democracy that brought us together as an
alliance.
In the wake of the Madrid bombings, our leaders and
Europe's must work to repair the breach. President Bush
should seize the opportunity to turn this tragedy into
solidarity by personally reaching out to the people of
Spain, honoring their dead, and speaking to our common
values and cause. The United States should also request
that NATO's North Atlantic Council convene to forge a
united strategy for combating terrorism and to invoke
Article V of the alliance's charter -- to let the
terrorists know that we regard this attack against Spain as
an attack against us all. Bush might personally attend this
meeting, which would be held in Brussels, to show our
willingness not only to lead but also to listen. In
response, Europe should take our outstretched hand and
commit to working through NATO, not outside it.
Then, through our renewed alliance, nations, such as Spain,
that sent troops to Iraq and those, such as France, that
did not, might all see that the terrorist insurgents we are
fighting in Iraq today come from the same fanatical
movement as those who struck Madrid. Together we should ask
the United Nations to pass another resolution paving the
way for NATO to join the critical battle against terrorism
in Iraq. If Europe is given a formal role in Iraq through
the alliance, and not just a voluntary one through a
coalition of the willing, the unilateral withdrawal of
troops by any nation is highly unlikely.
At the height of the Cold War, President John F. Kennedy
made clear that America stood with Europe in the fight
against communism by asserting that he was one with the
people of Berlin. After the Sept. 11 attacks, Europe echoed
this sentiment, with a French newspaper proclaiming, "We
Are All American." It is time for Americans and Europeans
to reaffirm our solidarity by declaring "Somos todos
Madrileños" -- we are all citizens of Madrid -- and go
forward together to win the war against terrorism.
RETURNING TO OLD EUROPE, AND OLD AMERICA
International Herald Tribune, 19 Mar 04, by Dominique Moisi
*
* Dominique Moisi is a senior adviser to IFRI, the French
Institute of International Relations.
After Madrid
PARIS Despite immediate and emotional declarations of
solidarity by Europeans, the Sept. 11 attacks did not bring
Europe and the United States closer to each other. The
reverse happened. Since Sept. 11, America has been at war,
Europe not.
When Washington was warning Europeans how dangerous the
world had become, most of them - with notable exceptions,
such as Tony Blair - were not listening. Instead, the
Europeans viewed Americans as manipulative Cassandras, and
the feeling was only reinforced by the unfounded emphasis
on weapons of mass destructions in Iraq. Of course the
world was a dangerous place, the Europeans conceded, but
the Bush administration made it look even more dangerous by
its reckless emphasis on military power alone. The
Europeans were keen to emphasize to Washington that the
world was indeed complex, and that the war in Iraq would
raise more questions than answers.
Could both sides have been proven right by the events of
last week, a terrorist attack that led to a new government
in Spain and a new balance of power in Europe? Will the two
sides now be compelled to reconsider their divisions as
irrelevant skirmishes between close relatives?
March 11 forced Europeans to confront a tragic reality,
which many of them had refused to see for too long: They
too are at war, without any exceptions - both "new Europe"
and "old Europe." Islamic fundamentalism is at war against
democracies, irrespective of their stand toward Washington.
It is liberal democracy that terrorists want to punish, not
our presence or absence in Iraq. In France, the law on the
head scarf provides a convenient pretext for threatening a
country that played a leading role in opposing the war in
Iraq. If there was no such law, another pretext would be
used by the extremists.
In reality, since March 11, we on both sides of the
Atlantic are more clearly than ever in the same boat. But
beyond the obvious and necessary immediate joint action
against the terrorists, we continue to disagree on the best
way to steer the boat through an ocean of perils. The
danger is that each side may use the behavior of the other
to confirm its prejudiced view of the other.
The change of government in Madrid is not seen in
Washington as the symbol of an ebullient democracy - as a
healthy contrast in its unexpected results to the utterly
predictable triumph of Vladimir Putin in new-old Russia.
Nor is the Spanish vote perceived as the result of a gut
reaction by many Spaniards angry with their government for
hiding the truth from them.
In fact, the results of the Spanish election should be seen
not as a victory for Al Qaeda but as proof of the
superiority of the democratic formula; as a perfect symbol
of what the terrorists cannot stand - the ability to change
the course of a country not by the bullet or the bomb, but
by the ballot. Instead, for too many Americans the victory
of the Socialists in Spain is further proof that Europe is
from Venus, if not from Munich, and does not have the
stomach to face the hard realities of the world.
By contrast, most Europeans will see in March 11 a
confirmation of what they have been saying all along - the
world is not a more secure place since the fall of Saddam
Hussein, and the American arguments for the Iraq war have
been proved wrong on all counts. There were no weapons of
mass destruction, and the terrorists are more resolute than
ever. By neglecting to finish the job in Afghanistan, by
spreading themselves too thin, by dreaming of spreading
democracy by force in the "Greater Middle East," the Bush
administration has been proved arrogantly wrong, and "we in
Europe" are paying the price for it.
In reality, recent polls on Iraq show each side partly
right and partly wrong. A majority of Iraqis prefer their
present situation, without Saddam, and a majority of them
also want Americans out of their country, even while not
trusting their present political representatives. So if the
world is not a safer place, Iraq may still be a better one.
More than the bombings in Madrid, the Spanish elections, or
the evolving situation in Iraq, however, what will
determine the future of trans-Atlantic relations is a
combination of American votes in November and terrorist
successes in the world.
The terrorists have already succeeded in changing the way
we live our daily lives. They may also transform the way we
think about each other, if it becomes obvious to all of us
that they are a terrible but resistible threat - barbarism
against civilization.
On both sides of the Atlantic, we must become convinced
that although we have evolved in different ways in the last
decade, though we may no longer see the world through the
same eyes, what unites us - democracy - is much stronger
than what divides us. The war against terrorism, not to
mention the return of autocratic and imperial tendencies in
Putin's Russia, should convince us to transcend our
divisions.
Now that "old Europe" is stronger with the victory of the
Socialists in Spain, the return to "old liberal America"
with the defeat of George W. Bush in the next presidential
elections would not harm trans-Atlantic relations. It may
not lead to a radical change in American diplomacy, but a
different style, and the victory of social and cultural
values closer to Europeans ones, could at least slow down
the process of estrangement.
In the meantime, whatever we may think of each other should
not obscure two deep realities, one for Europeans and one
for Americans. Europe should not confuse its enemies - the
threat is not Bush's America, but barbarism. And the Untied
States, with its responsibility as world leader, badly
needs the support of its European friends - support that
would be more respected and efficient if Europe could get
its act together. European differences should be seen as
irresponsible and childish behavior after Madrid.
Al Qaeda is not winning the war, but we could still lose it
if we fail to unite.
EUROPE'S NEW CHALLENGE
International Herald Tribune, 19 Mar 04, Editorial
Although the mourning for the victims of last week?s
terrorist bombing in Madrid has not ended, the political
effects of the attack and its aftermath are starting to
wash across Europe. It is too early to judge the long-term
effects of March 11, but it is already evident that
Europe?s political leaders have been presented a new
opportunity to shape a more effective joint strategy
against terrorism. Europe can also translate the horror of
the bombings into a stronger alliance, with a clearer sense
of how to work with each other and with the superpower
across the sea.
Spain, along with Britain, Italy, Poland and some other
eastern European states, had been a charter member of the
??new Europe?? that had joined in the invasion of Iraq. The
result was a bitter division within Europe. The fiery
tirade by Spain?s next prime minister, José Luis
Rodrķguez Zapatero, against President George W. Bush
and Prime Minister Tony Blair declared the return of Spain
to the ??old Europe?? led by France and Germany. That will
challenge Washington to maintain its coalition in Iraq,
especially as other members have also felt the anger of
their voters.
This does not amount to abandoning the war on terrorism,
since the war in Iraq at its root is not such a war, and it
would be foolish to assume that only those who support
Washington are in danger. The shock of Madrid should prod
Europeans to start working on measures more useful and less
divisive than sending separate token forces to Iraq. A more
unified Union must start shaping the sort of political,
military and law enforcement response that is needed to
combat terrorism. Among other things, Europe should have a
stronger joint intelligence capacity.
Spain?s realignment within the councils of Europe will also
have an impact on other issues. London will probably lose
an ally in pushing for a more aggressive deregulatory
economic agenda in Brussels. The defeat of Prime Minister
José Marķa Aznar?s Popular Party may breathe new life
into Europe?s constitutional project, as Zapatero moves
Spain closer to Berlin and Paris. Last December, the Union
failed to adopt a Constitution in large part because
Aznar?s government joined with Poland in opposing the
proposed weighting of member-nation votes. Just before
Aznar was voted out of office, Madrid rejected a reasonable
German compromise.
Zapatero seems far more amenable to such a deal, and it is
unlikely that Poland, which will be inducted into the
European Union along with nine other new members on May 1,
will be able to hold the line on its own. That could give
Ireland, which currently holds the presidency of the Union,
or the Netherlands, which takes the office in July, an
opening to revive the Constitution. That, in turn, would be
a major achievement for a union that has often appeared to
lack direction and momentum in recent months.
There are still, of course, many uncertainties. Zapatero is
not likely to be in office for another month and nobody can
predict how an expanded Union will actually function. Yet
the shock waves from Madrid come at a time when many
Europeans are already seeking ways out of their destructive
battles and disputes.
Britain, France and Germany only recently demonstrated a
new collegiality, and Paris and Berlin have made noticeable
efforts to tone down their differences with Washington.
March 11 has the potential to change Europe. The challenge
is to ensure that the changes are for the better.
WESTERN UNITY TAKES A HIT
Washington Post, 17 Ma 04, by Anne Applebaum
Do the Spanish elections matter? Even stating that question
is, in an American political context, absurd: Of course
they don't. Spain is far away. The Spanish voters' decision
to throw out their government can't possibly affect the
U.S. elections. More to the point: Although the Bush
administration always speaks of the "coalition" that fought
the Iraq war and is running that country, I'd wager that
few Americans know which countries the coalition contains.
Some are aware of the British, but I have seen eyebrows
rise in surprise when I mention that the Poles control a
sector of Iraq, or that the Ukrainians and the Japanese
have sent troops. Spain's support for the United States in
Iraq has made little difference to Americans' support for
the war in Iraq, and a change in Spanish policy won't
matter either.
If the Spanish elections don't matter politically, neither
do they matter militarily. The incoming Spanish prime
minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, says he will
withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq. The top U.S. commander
in Iraq, Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, has already said that "we
can adapt readily" to the loss of those women and men.
Spain sent 1,800 troops. American troops in Iraq number
more than 150,000. The military uselessness of allies in
general, and Europeans in particular, is now a cornerstone
of American political discourse, and a Spanish withdrawal
from Iraq will only reinforce it.
The trouble comes, of course, when we get around to talking
about the psychological effects of the Spanish election. By
that I don't just mean the boost it offers al Qaeda. This
is serious, but I don't really expect the Spanish to stop
searching for al Qaeda operatives or cooperating with U.S.
intelligence. No, what worries me far more is what the
change of government in Spain does to what I call the
ideological war on terrorism.
In his first State of the Union speech after Sept. 11,
2001, President Bush spoke of "defending liberty and
justice because they are right and true and unchanging for
all people everywhere." Later, on the eve of the Iraqi
invasion, he said that "the world has a clear interest in
the spread of democratic values, because stable and free
nations do not breed the ideologies of murder."
I don't know whether he wrote those words himself, but they
struck at something most politicians seemed to understand
intuitively in this country during the Cold War but many
have since discarded: The war on terrorism, if it is
ultimately to defeat not just al Qaeda but al Qaeda's
imitators, cannot be only about U.S. national interests or
U.N. resolutions. It must also be conducted by an alliance
of "stable and free nations" on behalf of "liberty and
justice." This is not because we need anyone's approval for
our foreign policy -- or because we need "U.N.
involvement," as the cliche has it -- but because the
values the president sometimes talks about are not just
ours, and it is important that our opponents understand
that.
Spain's announcement that it intends, in effect, to abandon
the fragile "new European" coalition in Iraq is a blow to
the notion of a unified West, and a great boost for those
German and French politicians who have long dreamed of
creating a Europe that is not a partner of the United
States but a political and economic rival.
In part, this has happened for reasons beyond our control.
Despite trade, tourism and European Union membership, Spain
is a country that participated only peripherally in the two
world wars and the Cold War. Its present anti-Americanism
is deeply intertwined with the "anti-globalization"
sentiments that so many young Spaniards have expressed for
many years. Last week's bombings surely caused Spaniards to
ask whether their government had dragged them too close to
the United States and too far from the comfortable
isolationism of recent memory.
In part, though, this is the payback not for the war in
Iraq but for the way it was launched and sold, or not sold,
to Europeans. Before the war, Secretary of State Colin L.
Powell did not travel the continent, explaining why it
should be fought, despite the fact that this was not
blindingly obvious, either here or there. In the run-up to
the war, we launched a U.N. process that -- because of a
quite separate military schedule, one that allegedly
required a springtime invasion -- we clearly had no
intention of taking seriously. In the aftermath of the war,
we lost interest in the allies who sent troops, sometimes
at great political risk. Military aid has not been
forthcoming; contracts have gone exclusively to American
companies; budgets for public diplomacy in Europe have been
cut.
We may still "win" in Iraq, over time. That is, we may
eventually see Iraq become a relatively stable, relatively
liberal society, living in relative peace with its
neighbors. But if, in doing so, we "lose" Europe, that will
be a Pyrrhic victory indeed.
LEARNING THE HARD WAY NOT TO FIGHT ALONE
Financial Times, 17 Mar 04, by Philip Gordon and Jeremy
Shapiro *
* The writers are foreign policy analysts at the Brookings
Institution
One lesson the Bush administration should have learnt from
Iraq is the one Winston Churchill drew 60 years ago: the
only thing worse than fighting a war with allies is having
to fight without them. With Spain moving away from its
policy of supporting the US in Iraq and political pressure
mounting on other allies, the Bush administration needs to
rethink the role of its coalition partners before that
lesson becomes even more brutally clear.
In early 2002, George W. Bush set the US on a course for
war in Iraq with scant input from allies. With his starkly
different political philosophy and culture, he was always
going to have trouble winning support in Europe, but his
policy choices exacerbated the problem. He went to the
United Nations only after his advisers rejected the main
alternative to war - weapons inspections. He dispatched
military forces to the Gulf knowing the deployment could
not be sustained indefinitely, thereby adding to pressure
for war. He exaggerated Iraqi links with terrorist groups
and weapons of mass destruction capabilities and berated
longstanding allies. He failed to engage important
countries such as Russia and Turkey and, by playing rough
with Germany and France, helped bolster European
resistance.
Behind this approach was Mr Bush's conviction that the US
was powerful enough to act unilaterally, and his confidence
that it would not have to. His theory of coalition-building
was that decisive US leadership would inevitably lead
others to follow and if allies failed to join, that would
be their problem, not America's.
Nearly a year after US bombs began falling on Baghdad, it
seems clear that America may not need others to topple
dictatorships but it certainly needs them to put
alternatives in place. Of course, even if the Spanish
withdraw, the Americans will not be the "only ones left" in
Iraq. Plenty of countries, particularly Britain, have
provided assistance. Yet, despite talk of the "coalition",
the reality is that the US is still providing more than 80
per cent of the international troops and 90 per cent of the
money and taking 90 per cent of the foreign casualties.
Meanwhile, the heavy costs of the campaign are adding to a
ballooning US budget deficit, resources have been diverted
from other aspects of the war on terrorism and the US army
is badly overstretched. It is not exactly a situation Mr
Bush may have had in mind when he asserted in his 2003
State of the Union address that "the course of this nation
does not depend on others".
Having partners is vital not only for material assistance
but also for the legitimacy they confer on an operation.
Perceived legitimacy is essential to maintaining domestic
support for a costly struggle and persuading other
countries to contribute resources. A broad coalition would
also help convince Iraqis of international determination to
rebuild and help democratise their country. The Bush
administration has also learnt recently that international
institutions can be more effective than the US acting alone
- for example, through the success of Lakhdar Brahimi, UN
envoy, in persuading Iraq's top Shia leader not to insist
on premature elections.
Mr Bush's flawed assumption was that victory in Iraq would
provide ex- post-facto legitimacy and restore US
credibility round the world. But that theory has proved as
fragile as Iraq's postwar political structures. As the
problems mount in Iraq, these lessons are starting to sink
in. Under international pressure, the Bush administration
has begun to give the UN something closer to the "vital
role" it initially promised but failed to provide, examine
prospects for Nato involvement and accelerate plans for
transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis.
Mr Bush remains distrustful of allies and reluctant to
share US authority, but he knows how vulnerable he is in an
election year to the charge that he saddled the US with an
enormous burden Americans do not want to bear alone. His
only hope of keeping Spain and perhaps other increasingly
uncomfortable allies on board will be to enhance the
mission's legitimacy with an expanded UN role and serious
diplomacy with all of Europe's leaders.
The lesson for Washington from the Spanish election is that
power and decisiveness alone are not enough to win enduring
support from allies. The next time the US faces a crisis
such as Iraq, its leaders must think more carefully before
acting alone, refusing to share authority, equating dissent
with disloyalty and seeking to punish allies for lack of
devotion to the cause.
GOING BACKWARD IN THE BALKANS
Washington Post, 19 Mar 04, by Morton Abramowitz *
* The writer, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation, is
a member of the executive committee of the International
Crisis Group.
Once again violence is making policy in the Balkans. This
week's ethnic fighting in Kosovo is the worst since the
1999 war there, and makes it more likely that Kosovo will
ultimately be partitioned between Serbs and Albanians.
The United States and its European allies apparently never
take wake-up calls in the Balkans but end up responding
only to violence. They put pillows over their ears and
declare that everything is going well in that part of the
world. In fact, things have not been going well for years.
Sustainable peace and progress in the region are impossible
until the Kosovo issue, however difficult, is resolved.
The failure to establish Kosovo statehood creates massive
uncertainty in the Balkans, exacerbates tensions between
Albanians and Serbs, delays investment and growth, and
keeps Serbia focused on the past. The main effort of the
European Union in recent years has helped keep the past
alive by insisting that Montenegro remain joined to Serbia
and by holding out to Belgrade the prospect of a connection
to Kosovo. In both the Clinton and Bush administrations the
United States has followed this EU line.
In Kosovo itself, an often hapless U.N. administration
guided from New York has resisted turning over power to the
Kosovars, who despite their inexperience eventually became
frustrated with colonial administration. The United Nations
established a weak government and insisted that it meet
impossible political and economic goals before Kosovo's
final status can even be considered. The U.N.
administration failed to generate any serious investment,
leaving Kosovo with unemployment of roughly 60 percent -- a
potential tinderbox. Equally important, the U.N.
administration, with Security Council blessing, allowed
Serbia to establish a dual administration in Kosovo for the
Serb population there, in effect giving Serbia control over
a significant portion of territory in northern Kosovo,
where Albanians were kept out, and establishing a de facto
geographical basis for partition.
Finally, the U.N. administration pursued the worthy goal of
maintaining Kosovo as a multiethnic state by pressuring
Kosovars to support the return of Serb refugees, even as
the international community refused to make clear that
Kosovo would be an independent state run by Albanians and
not by Belgrade. The notion of a multiethnic state went out
the window this week. Why would Serbs now return to any
state run essentially by Albanians, whatever the promised
safeguards?
As for Serbia, internal economic and political reform had
largely slowed after Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was
assassinated last year. The country has not yet moved
beyond the criminal society set up by Slobodan Milosevic or
even rid itself of the socialist bearings of Tito's days.
It is in serious economic trouble. A poor, unreconstructed
Serbia moved toward nationalist parties in December's
elections. The events of the past few days are likely to
further their influence. Dark forces are at work in Serbia
and in Kosovo. Nevertheless, freeing Serbia from Montenegro
and Kosovo is essential to Serbia's fundamental reform and
to reducing instability in the Balkans.
This week's violence has exposed the failure of Western
policy in Kosovo. We will see in the next few days whether
the West recognizes that or, more likely, continues its
blather on Kosovo's needing to meet unrealistic standards
and on the indispensability of continued U.N.
administration. The Albanian violence -- some or even much
of it preplanned -- cannot be condoned and must be stopped.
More U.N. forces will be needed for an indefinite time as
the forces in Kosovo are stretched thin.
But the violence is not likely to end until the West stops
relying on failed assumptions about a multiethnic Kosovo, a
united Serbia-Montenegro-Kosovo and the power of the EU to
resolve all difficult political issues in the Balkans. That
requires the West to focus now on the final status of
Kosovo before extremists of all stripes take over.
The notion of a multiethnic Kosovo has regrettably become
totally unrealistic, and the stage may have been set for
Kosovo's partition. The issues in achieving a settlement
need careful sorting and may come down principally to where
the partition line is drawn, what receives international
recognition and how the international diplomatic process
proceeds.
By its caution, inattention and lack of candor the West has
allowed events in Kosovo to get out of control and has
raised the prospects of violence not only in Serbia but
also in Bosnia and Macedonia. Reducing the number of
Western forces in Bosnia and Kosovo has become harder.
Resolving the problem of Kosovo has become urgent. The way
forward needs to be made clear.
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