Power and morality

Martin Jacques

You may remember that Robin Cook, newly appointed as Britain's foreign secretary back in 1997, promised to introduce an "ethical foreign policy". Such talk disappeared long ago, brought to an abrupt end by the illegalities and immorality of the invasion of Iraq.
I was reminded of Cook's efforts by Gordon Brown's address yesterday to the Israeli Knesset, where he uttered barely any criticisms of Israel and fulminated long and hard against Iran and its alleged nuclear policy. I have a serious problem with western hypocrisy over Iran and the bomb. We are against nuclear proliferation and yet no one breathes a word about the fact that Israel has many nuclear weapons, and has had them for a long time. So, why not Iran? One might add that Israel has always lived by the sword in the Middle East but the same cannot be said of Iran.
I am against nuclear proliferation (though sceptical that the line can be held in the long term) but only if the policy is even-handed (there is also the small fact that it clearly privileges those that already possess them). This is clearly not the case in the Middle East. Israel is the agent and surrogate of the United States and as such is treated entirely differently from every other country in the region. How can anyone expect Iran to accept that it is right for Israel to have nuclear weapons while itself being disallowed?
Recently the international criminal court (ICC) charged the Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir with war crimes in Darfur. That the Sudanese regime has behaved with considerable barbarity in Darfur is beyond question. But again I find myself troubled by the moral logic of the argument. The biggest war criminals of recent years are President George Bush and former premier Tony Blair. They have been responsible for the death of more than 700,000 Iraqis as a result of the war, countless grave injuries, massive displacement and a serious deterioration in the conditions of life. Perversely, notwithstanding their crimes against humanity, they have not yet been charged by the ICC.
The reason, of course, is simple. Though the discourse of such a court is concerned with justice and morality, there is a higher priority altogether in its work, and that is called power. The ICC is not mainly about morality; it is about power combined with a very light sprinkling of morality. Its targets are western-approved and powerless. Established in 2002, the court has opened investigations into four situations: Northern Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic and Darfur. The court has issued public arrest warrants for 12 people; six of them remain free, two have died, and four are in custody.
Every major power always seeks to justify its action on moral grounds. Such behaviour is almost as old as the hills. The west has been a particularly vigorous exponent of this credo; and there is no reason to believe that China, for example, will be any different. But behind the moral rhetoric invariably lies interest and ideology. While the west has enjoyed overwhelming global power, its moral preachings have been legitimised, and in effect enforced, by that power. But as that power begins to ebb, then the morality of its actions will be the subject of growing scrutiny and challenge.
The western line on Iran's bomb is morally flawed while it turns a blind eye to Israel's. Likewise, the charging of Omar al-Bashir, the prosecution of Slobodan Milosevic, and the arrest of Radovan Karadzic will always lack moral force while those who possess infinitely greater power are allowed to escape the clutches of justice.
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This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Wednesday July 23 2008. It was last updated at 10:00 on July 23 2008.

Source: Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/23/foreignpolicy.warcrimes/print

The menace in Pakistan

Editorial

Pakistan's new ambassador to the United States is asking for understanding as the new civilian government tries to cope with the persistent insurgency in tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan. That is asking a lot of the U.S. and its Afghan allies, whose past patience has not been rewarded. If Islamabad wants time, it needs to show the world it is prepared to act firmly against a chronic menace that endangers not only the Pakistani government, but Afghans, and quite possibly, Americans.The insurgents include elements of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. They have terrorized Pakistan, and they have launched attacks more frequently this year across the border into Afghanistan. American forces recently killed 11 members of Pakistan's paramilitary forces by mistake, in a bombing attack on enemy units along the border. Meanwhile, Taliban forces struck at a prison in Kandahar, freeing some 1,200 prisoners. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said he would send troops into Pakistan to "destroy terrorist nests"—though he probably doesn't have the forces to carry out the threat. According to U.S. intelligence, there is a growing flow of foreign jihadists into Pakistan. Most sobering is that Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says Al Qaeda operatives in the tribal areas are plotting new attacks on the American homeland. The U.S. needs no reminder of what can happen when it allows terrorism to flourish in a safe haven provided by a foreign government.The U.S. options, from cutting off aid to Pakistan to launching missile strikes against insurgent sites, are hardly foolproof. But they look better than doing nothing. Islamabad has to understand that no American president can sit by and ignore the danger. Under military ruler Pervez Musharraf, however, Islamabad preferred to negotiate feckless deals that left the terrorists free to continue making trouble across the border. The new government has to make an unequivocal break with that cynical, short-sighted policy. U.S. policy has also been plagued by internal disputes over how aggressive the U.S. can be against Al Qaeda leaders holed up in Pakistan.Pakistan has launched a new military offensive against militants. Pakistani ambassador Husain Haqqani promises things have changed. The Washington Post reported that he "will not agree to any cease-fires that do not include a halt to attacks in Afghanistan as well as in Pakistan, and the expulsion of foreign fighters—which means Al Qaeda." That's a hopeful signal. But Washington can't afford to wait long to see it backed up with concrete action. When asked by the Post if he worried what would happen if Al Qaeda forces use this haven to plan and execute another spectacular act of terrorism against America, Haqqani replied, "What do you think keeps me up at night?" He's not the only one losing sleep.

Source: Chicago Tribune
www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0712edit1jul12,0,5959144.story