US can't afford to go it alone against Iraq


	March 6, 2002	atimes.com

Central Asia/Russia

COMMENT
US can't afford to go it alone against Iraq
By Ahmad Faruqui

There are reports that United States Special Operations Forces have been injected into northern Iraq as a prelude to a bigger operation. The Pentagon has denied these reports, but cynics may be forgiven for not taking the Pentagon at its word.

Only recently, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld scuttled the launch of an "Office of Strategic Influence", as it became clear to him that the US public would not stomach the creation of such an Orwellian agency.

In his State of the Union speech, President George W Bush branded Iraq as a member of an axis of evil, paving the way for military action. Ever since September 11, the hawks in Washington have been arguing that it is time to attend to the unfinished business in Iraq.

Influential academic Eliot Cohen asserted that "the enemy is far weaker, and we know him far better than in 1991". Since the US has made numerous technological advances in its military systems, and successfully demonstrated its resolve to carry out unorthodox warfare against the Taliban using these systems, Cohen argued that the risks of attacking Iraq and destroying Saddam Hussein's regime are minuscule in comparison with the benefits that would flow from the elimination of his weapons of mass destruction.

But is warfare simply about winning and losing battles?

No one doubts that the US can successfully defeat Iraq in battle, or that it has the resolve to do so. But is the US prepared to act unilaterally, as Cohen argues, using the rule: if you are not with us, you are with them? Such binomial logic will be difficult to sustain for very long, since it would convey to the world that the US has given itself a blank check to invoke Pax Americana any time and anywhere.

The US cannot fight Iraq without a coalition of forces drawn from the neighboring countries. Can it assemble such a coalition? Even King Abdullah of Jordan, probably America's closest Arab ally, has cautioned the US against attacking any nation in the Middle East. Words of caution have been coming from Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia. Some of the leading intellectuals in the Muslim world point out that the US will not stop with Iraq, and will take the war to several other Muslim countries. They argue that not all terrorists are Muslims, but the US only plans to attack Muslim countries, even as it states that its war on global terrorism is not a war on Islam.

A recent Gallup survey of 10,000 ordinary people in nine Muslim countries indicates that 77 percent felt that US military action in Afghanistan was unjustified, even though an absolute majority condemned the September attacks. The US was seen as "ruthless, aggressive, conceited, arrogant, easily provoked and biased" in its foreign policy. The US has failed to win the hearts and minds of the Muslim world, even though it may have prevailed in battle against the Taliban and al-Qaeda forces.

Early indications are that a US attack of Iraq is unlikely to find much support in Europe, Russia or China. Many countries supported the US in its attack on Afghanistan because they saw it as a victim of the September attacks. However, only one other country, Britain, joined the US in the military attack.

Several countries joined the US in prosecuting the Gulf War because they saw Iraq as an aggressor that had invaded and occupied Kuwait. Most people around the world are unlikely to see the US rationale for taking on Saddam now. Unilateral action will impair US national interests by creating diplomatic friction with its European, Asian and Arab allies. It may cause serious harm to American security interests if much of the Muslim and Arab world ends up seeing the US attack as evidence of its un-evenhandedness in dealing with the Middle East.

It is also likely to play into the hands of extremist elements in these countries, and will cause many friendly governments to lose face. Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf, who has been providing the US with "unstinted cooperation" in its war on terrorism, has openly expressed his opposition to expanding the war beyond Afghanistan.

It would be far better for the US to work through the United Nations in resolving the threats posed by Saddam. The UN was created to resolve disputes between nations, and if the US continues to bypass it whenever it does not serve its purposes, it sets a bad precedent for other countries. Just as it follows democratic governance principles within its own polity, and just as it continues to press for democratic processes in other countries, so it should abide by the weight of world opinion, as reflected in the votes of the UN General Assembly.

Ahmad Faruqui, PhD, is a Fellow at the American Institute of International Studies. The views expressed in this article are his own.