Fw: Containment, Deadlier Than War, Says Author Walter Mead

NOW they tell us!

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Subject: Containment, Deadlier Than War, Says Author Walter Mead


> Byliner: Containment, Deadlier Than War, Says Author Walter Mead
> (Op-ed from The Washington Post 3/12/03 on Iraq) (860)
>
> (This byliner was published on the editorial page of the March 12, 2003
> issue of The Washington Post.  Persons who intend to redistribute this
> byliner should give credit to The Washington Posts as the source.
> Copyright (c) 2003 Walter Russell Mead)
>
> (begin byliner)
>
> Deadlier Than War
> By Walter Russell Mead
>
> Those who still oppose war in Iraq think containment is an alternative --
a
> middle way between all-out war and letting Saddam Hussein out of his box.
>
> They are wrong.
>
> Sanctions are inevitably the cornerstone of containment, and in Iraq,
> sanctions kill.
>
> In this case, containment is not an alternative to war. Containment is
war:
> a slow, grinding war in which the only certainty is that hundreds of
> thousands of civilians will die.
>
> The Gulf War killed somewhere between 21,000 and 35,000 Iraqis, of whom
> between 1,000 and 5,000 were civilians.
>
> Based on Iraqi government figures, UNICEF estimates that containment kills
> roughly 5,000 Iraqi babies (children under 5 years of age) every month, or
> 60,000 per year. Other estimates are lower, but by any reasonable estimate
> containment kills about as many people every year as the Gulf War -- and
> almost all the victims of containment are civilian, and two-thirds are
> children under 5.
>
> Each year of containment is a new Gulf War.
>
> Saddam Hussein is 65; containing him for another 10 years condemns at
least
> another 360,000 Iraqis to death. Of these, 240,000 will be children under
> 5.
>
> Those are the low-end estimates. Believe UNICEF and 10 more years kills
> 600,000 Iraqi babies and altogether almost 1 million Iraqis.
>
> Ever since U.N.-mandated sanctions took effect, Iraqi propaganda has
blamed
> the United States for deliberately murdering Iraqi babies to further U.S.
> foreign policy goals.
>
> Wrong.
>
> The sanctions exist only because Saddam Hussein has refused for 12 years
to
> honor the terms of a cease-fire he himself signed. In any case, the United
> Nations and the United States allow Iraq to sell enough oil each month to
> meet the basic needs of Iraqi civilians. Hussein diverts these resources.
> Hussein murders the babies.
>
> But containment enables the slaughter. Containment kills.
>
> The slaughter of innocents is the worst cost of containment, but it is not
> the only cost of containment.
>
> Containment allows Saddam Hussein to control the political climate of the
> Middle East. If it serves his interest to provoke a crisis, he can shoot
at
> U.S. planes. He can mobilize his troops near Kuwait. He can support
> terrorists and destabilize his neighbors. The United States must respond
to
> these provocations.
>
> Worse, containment forces the United States to keep large conventional
> forces in Saudi Arabia and the rest of the region. That costs much more
> than money.
>
> The existence of al Qaeda, and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, are part of
> the price the United States has paid to contain Saddam Hussein.
>
> The link is clear and direct. Since 1991 the United States has had forces
> in Saudi Arabia. Those forces are there for one purpose only: to defend
the
> kingdom (and its neighbors) from Iraqi attack. If Saddam Hussein had
either
> fallen from power in 1991 or fulfilled the terms of his cease-fire
> agreement and disarmed, U.S. forces would have left Saudi Arabia.
>
> But Iraqi defiance forced the United States to stay, and one consequence
> was dire and direct. Osama bin Laden founded al Qaeda because U.S. forces
> stayed in Saudi Arabia.
>
> This is the link between Saddam Hussein's defiance of international law
and
> the events of Sept. 11; it is clear and compelling. No Iraqi violations,
no
> Sept. 11.
>
> So that is our cost.
>
> And what have we bought?
>
> We've bought the right of a dictator to suppress his own people, disturb
> the peace of the region and make the world darker and more dangerous for
> the American people.
>
> We've bought the continuing presence of U.S. forces in Saudi Arabia,
> causing a profound religious offense to a billion Muslims around the
world,
> and accelerating the alarming drift of Saudi religious and political
> leaders toward ever more extreme forms of anti-Americanism.
>
> What we can't buy is protection from Hussein's development of weapons of
> mass destruction. Too many companies and too many states will sell him
> anything he wants, and Russia and France will continue to sabotage any
> inspections and sanctions regime.
>
> Morally, politically, financially, containing Iraq is one of the costliest
> failures in the history of American foreign policy. Containment can be
> tweaked -- made a little less murderous, a little less dangerous, a little
> less futile -- but the basic equations don't change. Containing Hussein
> delivers civilians into the hands of a murderous psychopath, destabilizes
> the whole Middle East and foments anti-American terror -- with no end in
> sight.
>
> This is disaster, not policy.
>
> It is time for a change.
>
> (Walter Russell Mead is senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the
> Council on Foreign Relations and author most recently of "Special
> Providence: American Foreign Policy and How It Changed the World.")
>
> (end byliner)
>
> (Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
> Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
>
> ============================================================
>     See also: http://usinfo.state.gov/regional/nea/iraq/
> ============================================================
>
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