July 29, 2004
LIKE COMPARING APPLES AND APPLES:
THE MORALITY OF INTERVENTION: The people of Sudan are paying a high price for the Iraq
War, which blurred the line between humanitarian intervention and moral crusade. (Ian Williams, 7/29/04, AlterNet)
The civil war in Sudan has claimed more than 50,000 lives in Darfur, while a million more have been driven from their homes, caught in the crossfire of the bloody conflict between the Sudanese government and ethnic minority rebels.The need for immediate action is clear. But because of the Iraq War, it may never be taken.
Under pressure from human rights groups, both Britain and the United States have joined Kofi Annan in proposing a UN resolution that calls for economic sanctions and travel restrictions. It is an exercise in futility – the kind that paved the way for widespread massacres in Rwanda and Srebrenica. What is urgently needed now is a credible threat of a military intervention, which was all that was required to preempt genocide in the past.
The sad truth is that the lack of action on Sudan is in no small part a result of George Bush and Tony Blair's not-so-excellent adventures in desert. A study published on Wednesday by the Foreign Policy Center, a British think-tank, unequivocally laid the blame for the unfolding genocide on the Iraq war. The report criticizes Britain and the United States for backing "quiet diplomacy, " a response it characterizes as "utterly inappropriate." Its author Greg Austin told The Independent, "The commitment of the U.S. and the U.K. in Iraq and the use of military force in Iraq pushed them away from considering any sort of military option."
The invasion of Iraq also diminished the prospects for an international consensus for action in Sudan, and too vigorous a push by the U.S. will achieve little except to stiffen resistance. Fears of blurring the line between humanitarian intervention and moral crusade seem all the more pressing because of the Bush/Blair war machine, which has done its best to sell the one as the other.
While Britain and Australia have both expressed readiness to commit troops, it is almost impossible for Muslim nations in the Security Council such as Algeria and Pakistan to agree to U.S. led action against an Arab League member like Sudan. The Arab world's tolerance for the atrocities committed by their rulers is indeed a cause for despair.
One reads along futilely in an attempt to find some way in which Sudan differs from Iraq:
* European indifference* Arab/Muslim complicity
* Opposition from the Realist gang
* The Anglosphere leading the lonely crusade
* A serious response bogging down at the UN
* Complications because of past Western inaction
* The ultimate realization that only America and its military can reorder the situation and save lives
The reasons for intervention are identical. If the Left would help this time, instead of hindering the humanitarian effort, it might restore some of their moral credibility and would certainly hasten vital action. Posted by Orrin Judd at July 29, 2004 8:15 AM
You left out one other similarity. France has oil interests in Sudan.
Posted by: NKR at July 29, 2004 8:38 AMYeah, don't leave out the oil! If we went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq about "the oil" then we can use the beautiful black stuff as an excuse in Sudan too!
Posted by: kevin whited at July 29, 2004 8:42 AMA study published on Wednesday by the Foreign Policy Center, a British think-tank, unequivocally laid the blame for the unfolding genocide on the Iraq war.
A glittering analysis.
I guess that means that one can blame the Rwanda genocide on Bush, Blair, and the Iraqi war too. And Srebernica (and why not the rest of Bosnia?) And Chechnya. and East Timor, etc.
The Arab world's tolerance for the atrocities committed by their rulers is indeed a cause for despair.
Perhaps, but it's not so much their tolerance for it as it is their rabid pursuit and enjoyment of it. Still, there's no real surprise there. We're used to it.
What causes true despair is that the rampant intellectal dishonesty displayed by the authors of this piece of pseudo-commentary has become so ubiquitous in the west.
Even supposing that Iraq, Afghanistan, and 9/11 had never occured, what makes anyone think that Americans would be willing to send thousands of troops to the Sudan ?
We sent plenty of food to Ethiopia, but no troops to resolve the civil war that caused the famines; we sent troops to Somalia, but only because the situation was initially anarchy, with lightly-armed gangs doing hit-and-run takedowns of food convoys, and not organized troops conducting combat operations.
We left Somalia because the Somali warlords were able to achieve a Pyrrhic victory over US forces, and that victory was possible because the Clinton administration had earlier refused to send some requested tanks to Somalia. The refusal was based on the political calculation that if the American public perceived the Somali situation as being so dangerous as to merit armor, then support for the Somali mission would ebb.
Therefore, it seems unlikely that any administration would start out by putting American troops in the middle of a civil war, especially after the experience in Lebanon, which ultimately means that if anything, the Iraqi pacification makes it more likely that a President could get away with putting troops in sure harm's way; we're at least used to it by now.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at July 29, 2004 12:15 PMVery tight analysis, Michael.
I'm still covering all bets.
I additionally bet that, if Bush wants to move, he would like to have more infantry than he's got now.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at July 29, 2004 2:36 PMAs I keep saying, it would only take a handful of American troops and pilots to dispose of Sudan's current government. As long as the next guys got the message that we'd do the same to them if they annoyed us, and that the situation in Darfur (and the South, if the settlement does indeed fall apart) is example #1 of what annoys us, what would we care who they were? They couldn't possible be worse than the current government and if they somehow turned out to be, then it's time for MOAB number 2. Isn't our production rate for these things up over 1 per month yet?
You're right, Kirk, but while that's doable in a material sense, it is inconceivable in any political sense.
I'll cover any bets on that one and give odds.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at July 29, 2004 9:44 PMMaybe Bush has just enough of that 'crank' in his bloodstream to sizzle some Sudanese. Let's find out.
Posted by: ratbert at July 29, 2004 10:18 PMI'm for that, but he won't
Posted by: Harry Eagar at July 31, 2004 3:05 PM