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UN resolution: Dangerous
ambiguity
By Ian Urbina
The
UN Security Council has finally passed an Iraq
resolution, with France, Russia and China on board. For
now, the diplomatic tussles are finished. Still, it may
be worth considering what was, and remains, at stake in
all the diplomatic wrangling.
Clearly, the most
immediate threat is that the US will invade without
further UN approval. Though Washington insisted that the
final resolution draft include the wording "Iraq has
been and remains in material breach of its obligations",
the next line gives Iraq "a final opportunity to comply
with its disarmament obligations". However, what is not
offered anywhere in the draft is a clear, unequivocal
statement that the UN has final say. The resolution
calls for the UN "to convene immediately upon receipt of
a report [of Iraqi non-compliance] in order to consider
the situation …"
But there is no reference to a
council decision being required to determine whether or
not an Iraqi violation noted by arms inspectors
constitutes a "material breach", and if so what the
appropriate response should be. The resolution’s
"severest consequences" language is vague enough that if
the US perceives a violation, it can react unilaterally
and directly with force, only later to claim that it was
within the bounds of the law.
A diplomatic
precedent
This sort of interpretive maneuver is
not without precedent. In 1998, when the UN Security
Council passed a resolution endorsing Kofi Annan's
negotiated stand-down with Iraq, the resolution at that
time also called for "severest consequences". At the
close of those negotiations, every council ambassador
except that of the US said explicitly that use of the
term did not constitute an automatic authorization of
the use of force for any country or group of countries.
The US ambassador, Bill Richardson, alone of all the
council, said, "We think it does authorize immediate
unilateral use of force." Above and beyond the prospect
of a potentially massive war, the larger issue at stake
is the status of UN authority. The recent diplomatic
skirmishes are, in part, a fight over whether the US is
willing to recognize the centrality and legal
sovereignty of the Security Council to handle not just
Iraqi disarmament but international peace and security
issues generally. In the present resolution, the US
clearly does not recognize this authority, instead
maintaining a fully instrumentalist view of the
international body.
For the US, this position is
quite clear: the UN is to be respected only in so far as
it overlaps with plans set in Washington. US Secretary
of State Colin Powell has stated the matter plainly: "If
Iraq violates this resolution and fails to comply, then
the council has to take into immediate consideration
what should be done about that, while the United States
and other like-minded nations might take a judgment
about what we might do about it if the council chooses
not to act." In other words, the US will subjugate
itself to the UN - that is, force will subordinate to
law - only when it is useful.
Self-interest
Geopolitics rarely
features beneficence and many of the staunchest critics
of the US resolution had nakedly pragmatic motivations
at stake in the fight over the Iraq resolution.
In the case of Russia, Iraq presently owes that
nation about US$8 billion. Baghdad also recently signed
a $40 billion oil development agreement with the Russian
government. The US has attempted to reassure Moscow that
those transactions would be respected and debts paid
under any new administration in Baghdad, but skepticism
remains. Russia is also suspicious of the extent of US
ambitions, and there are real fears of encirclement by
American military bases from Central Asia through the
Gulf. Other chips in the bargaining include America's
support for Russia's World Trade Organization and a
quieter US State Department when it comes to Russian
human rights abuses in Chechnya and Georgia.
For
the French, economic factors may also be relevant. Paris
certainly does not want to be left out of the
post-Saddam order, especially when it comes to its oil
concessions. But the economic variable should not be
overstated. The country’s exports to Iraq make up only
0.2 percent of the total, and imports from Iraq are only
0.3 percent of France’s total trade. More important here
is a general weariness of US unilateralism.
China has also played hard to get. Beijing hopes
for the United States to look the other way when it
comes to the Chinese crackdown on Muslim minorities in
its Western provinces. A softened stance toward the
Tibet issue would be an added plus. Even better would be
if the US leaned on the Dalai Lama to lighten up in his
public pressure campaign. China’s support of the war on
terrorism has already gone a long way in easing prior
tensions over the downing the US spy plane and Bush’s
dogged pursuit of a national missile defense program.
Leverage
Behind the scenes, other
matters were also at issue. Partially at stake was the
extent of the US ability to exert effective pressure on
its fellow Security Council members. Much like the
lead-up to the Persian Gulf war in 1991, the recent
diplomatic struggle was a test of whether the world’s
sole superpower could bring to bear sufficient economic,
military and political influence to quickly transform
the myriad skeptics into a coalition of supporters.
The tactics in this effort are hardly new. In
1990, George Bush Sr wielded cheap Saudi oil for nations
such as the Soviet Union, whose economy was in utter
shambles. On Bush’s request, the Saudi foreign minister
hustled to Moscow to offer a billion-dollar deal before
the Russian winter set in, and Mikhail Gorbachev
promptly dropped all prior dissent.
Elsewhere,
other carrots were dangled: arms packages for
militarizing states such as Ethiopia and Columbia; debt
forgiveness like the $14 billion provided to Egypt (then
the most indebted country in Africa). All came through
in the months immediately preceding the war. Iran’s
first World Bank loan (of $250 million) was approved on
the day before the ground attack in Iraq. US diplomats
went to China, whose veto was feared, asking them to
name the price. Beijing was still under the cloud of the
Tiananmen Square incident, but diplomatic rehabilitation
was fast on the way as the White House soon announced a
visit from the Chinese foreign minister.
Of the
available sticks, the most famous was that used on
Yemen. The sole Arab nation in the Security Council,
Yemen voted against the war, joined only by Cuba.
Moments after the vote, a US diplomat, unwittingly
caught on an open microphone, commented to the Sana'a
representative: "That will be the most expensive 'no/
vote you ever cast." Three days later, the US axed its
full aid package of $70 million to the country and Saudi
Arabia expelled 800,000 Yemeni workers from its
territory. The country’s economy took an immediate
nose-dive.
It's far too soon to know what
carrots were offered this time. But there are
indications that the stick has already struck in some
cases. Mauritius, which holds Africa’s seat on the
Security Council and which was perceived by many as a
critical swing vote, felt the force as its UN ambassador
made the mistake of not openly backing Washington’s
position. After being immediately recalled home and
given a stern talking to from the nation’s prime
minister, the ambassador was subsequently dispatched
back to New York to vote in favor of the resolution.
Mauritius’s aid agreement with the US requires the
impoverished country to vote with the US in any
multilateral scenario.
For the time being, all
is quiet at the UN, and the US has its hard-fought
resolution. Though most agree on the inevitability, no
one knows what the trigger will be or when it will fire.
But when it does, the diplomatic wrangling will begin
anew, but with the stakes even higher. And by that time,
the US forces may already be on the ground.
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