Jim
Addington will be missed not only by those who knew him, but also by the wider
public who read his articles. He saw in the United Nations the best chance for
abolishing war. He
was chair of Action for UN Renewal for many years. He also wrote regularly in
the Morning Star on UN reforms and international affairs. This prescient article was printed in the
Morning Star on October
10, 2006, six months before the invasion of Iraq.
Corruption
In the latest edition
of her book The Face of War, Martha Gelhorn
writes that war is ‘an endemic human disease of which governments are the
carriers’. ‘Only governments declare and
prosecute wars,’ she says. ‘There is no
record of hordes of citizens, on their own, mobbing the seat of government to
clamour for war. They must be infected
with hate and fear before they catch war fever.
They have to be taught that they are endangered by an enemy and that
vital interests of their state are threatened.
To get a war started you need an aggressor, a government so ambitious,
so greedy that the vital interests of its state require foreign conquest. But an aggressor government sells its people
the project of war as a defensive measure – they are being threatened,
encircled, pushed around, enemies are poised to attack them.’
Her description of the
Bush propaganda – written in 1986 – could not be bettered. Power corrupts – that is a negative element
of any political system. A nation’s size
also has a tendency to corrupt, to make it want to dominate its neighbours.
From its early days the
Untied States dominated the American continent, took part in several wars,
invaded and annexed large areas of neighbouring territory. As the US has become stronger and the world has become
smaller, it has developed an ambition to rule the world. There are US forces in no less than 140 of the 190 member states
of the United Nations and there is no part of the world in which the US does not have an interest or seek to
influence. ‘Lesser hegemons’
are created by states that feel themselves strong enough to dominate, or at
least to lead, their neighbours.
There is also an
element of ‘me too’ when powerful states take military action. Why did 19 independent states support the
NATO attack on the Yugoslav republic over Kosovo? Most took no part whatsoever in the action,
which was almost entirely done by the US military machine. The action contravened the original NATO
treaty, which only specified mutual action when a NATO country was
attacked. Yet 19 states were happy to
take the credit for action which was illegal under international law and whose
final effects will not be known for decades.
Their leader, after the US, was Tony Blair and the British government.
In 1991 many NATO
states took part with others in the ‘coalition’ that pushed Iraq out of Kuwait. Yet
there were few major participants, and the so-called coalition dwindled several
years ago to two states – the US and Britain. Since
1991 they have bombed Iraq regularly – a policy intended to deny Iraq the use
of its airspace, allegedly, but not lawfully, under a UN Security Council
resolution passed in 1990 which called for the expulsion of Iraq from Kuwait by
‘all necessary means’.
After September 11 last
year Bush forced every country into a new ‘coalition against terrorism’. That coalition is wearing thin because
actions taken by the US government, especially the invasion of Afghanistan, have persuaded few that the fight is really
against terrorism, but is part of Washington’s campaign for world domination. The development of the US government’s ‘Star Wars’ missile and laser
systems is a long-term programme designed for the same purpose.
The intended attack on Iraq is thus part of a continuing process which did
not start with President George W Bush, but found in him its fiercest
advocate. Even if this is a natural
effect of size in a nation it is not sustainable and endangers the United
Nations, which is the only fully representative organ of the world’s
independent states. It is not
sustainable because reaction to this growing domination will continue to breed
resentment and further terrorist action.
In addition, the draconian measures which the US government has imposed on its people in its war
on terrorism will undermine that country and may eventually lead to civil
war. For the first time in decades there
has been a long public debate on the merits and drawbacks of going to war.
This is chiefly
because, unlike 1982 or 1990, when Argentina and Iraq sought to annex neighbouring territory, the US government is leading a campaign to attack Iraq. Its reasons? They are
amply described in Gelhorn’s brilliant critique of
states that go to war. Its excuses and
motivations are another subject. As with
Kosovo and Afghanistan, the US will cite humanitarian reasons among those it
draws on to provide a basis for going to war, yet the only humanitarian action
will be to bomb from 15,000 feet to save the lives of US and British
servicemen.
Can the war still be
prevented? As with the Gulf war, which
started when the UN security council was still
discussing the Iraqi offer to withdraw, the military machine is probably
already in motion. It may not be
possible to stop it now.
Washington has another reason for taking action, that is,
its accusation against the Iraq government that it is making weapons of mass
destruction. If the inspectors go in
under existing UN resolutions they are likely to announce that there is no
longer a war machine. The US government therefore will want to bomb first to
remove the ‘evidence’, then act as judge and jury, proving to credulous people
after the event that there were weapons, that they have destroyed them – and
saved civilisation.
Meanwhile, what of the
United Nations? It has survived for
more than twice as long as the League of Nations. Its peacekeeping
role, which has proved the most difficult, is dwarfed by the work of its
agencies. Among these are the World Food
Programme and the UN relief agencies, which continue to provide food to
starving communities and to help a growing number of refugees.
Surprisingly the latest
crisis over Iraq has produced some unlikely co-campaigners for
the UN charter – especially France and Russia, which have worked together to bring sanity to
the security council.
While the spotlight
remains on the UN its supporters should work for a larger security council that
is more representative of the world’s regions.
The UN general
assembly, on which some 190 nations have a seat, should take the lead to create
a more democratic UN.
Jim Addington