| |
China goes down
with UN defeat
By Francesco Sisci
BEIJING - The accountancy of foreign policy is
always extremely difficult. Choices that might seem
wrong in the short run may prove right in the long run,
and vice versa.
In his first news conference on
Tuesday, China's new Premier Wen Jiabao insisted on a
political solution for the crisis in Iraq, and the same
afternoon Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan
underscored that China was working and hoping for a
solution within the framework of the United Nations. In
fact China's position since the beginning has been
consistent: it wanted to achieve a solution, no matter
which one, by going through the Security Council, where
it holds the important and prestigious veto power.
But US President George W Bush's war ultimatum
to Saddam bypassed a vote at the UN and the UN was de
facto defeated. It was a major setback for China, which
had been betting heavily on the United Nations. Bush's
ultimatum underscored a major turning point in the
diplomacy of the United States, which had declared war
without UN approval for the second time. The first time
it was in Kosovo under president Bill Clinton, and so
the trend is definitely bipartisan: the United States is
willing to work within the framework of the United
Nations only if doing so fits US interests, and it
refuses to be constrained by the UN straitjacket.
China still argues that the majority of
countries in the world favor working within the United
Nations, where they have representation, and even the US
has no interest in doing without the UN altogether, as
it is a useful arena to exercise its global diplomacy.
But the truth is that the interest of a weak majority
doesn't count as much as that of a strong minority.
Besides, most countries opposing the Iraq war do so not
because they want Saddam to be stronger (which would
happen without the US attack) but to take a protective
stand in view of the anticipated wave of terrorist
attacks against Saddam's enemies. There were thus two
levels of opposition, those who sided with Saddam (very
few) and those who doubted the safety and wisdom of US
strategy but were nevertheless sure that the attack
would occur.
In this second category there is
France, which worked to make it impossible to declare
war on Iraq through the United Nations. Paris had much
to gain with this tactic. In fact it exercised its veto
power without having to cast a ballot, and consolidated
its ties with Germany, forming a unique, strong,
political European front whose interests were
distinctively different from those of the United States.
China didn't get any of this.
The US
ultimatum dilutes the importance of the UN in a way
similar to what happened in the late 1930s with the
League of Nations, when Italy proceeded to occupy
Ethiopia despite the scathing criticism of the League.
The veto power granted to the winners of World War II
was to compensate for the League's lack of restraining
power, but veto power only really worked until the
collapse of the Soviet Union. Until then the two
superpowers had an interest in restraining themselves
and finding diplomatic settlements for the many proxy
wars fought in those 50 years, avoiding direct
confrontation. For this the framework of the UN was
necessary. If one of the two superpowers was to act
outside of the UN it would immensely increase the risk
of direct confrontation without the support of most
nations, which remained non-aligned or had to fight in
the West, with restive public opinion seeking legal
legitimacy for the war.
Such restraints do not
apply with Saddam now. No competing power can restrain
the United States, the US has no fear of a direct
confrontation with any other country, and US domestic
opinion is supportive of a war on Saddam. At the same
time it was risky for the US to drag things out with the
UN, as the public debate on Iraq was denting its public
determination to fight and thus weakening Bush's drive
for war.
But this proves that the UN now is no
longer what it used to be, and it will no longer be, and
China's bet on this organization has come up short.
In fact the Group of Seven is proving a more
authoritative arena. The G7 assembles the most powerful
economies on the planet, it distributes power according
to the real economic weight of each participant, and by
associating with Russia, an economic lightweight, shows
its interest in taking over security concerns as well.
But China is not part of the G7 despite being at least
the sixth-largest economy in the world. So far it has
not wanted to show openly that it is no longer a Third
World country; also, in the G7 there is no veto power,
and Japan, which has no permanent seat on the UN
Security Council, is much stronger than China would be
in the G7.
Bush's ultimatum, however, could push
China to consider the G7 a more realistic forum to talk
with and "restrain" the United States.
The war
in Iraq is certainly no military problem. But the peace
is a big one. The US no longer has the economic muscle
to reconstruct a country from scratch by itself. True,
Iraqi oil will partly take care of the bill, but only
partly. The financial assistance of the big economies is
and will be essential to the US for many years, and thus
the G7 could be a more realistic forum. The G7 has the
severe drawback of keeping out the majority of
countries, but there could be measures to accommodate
that.
Anyway Bush personifies a problem that has
existed for at least a decade. The structure of the
United Nations was designed to give representation to
every country, but also acknowledged the role of the
strong ones. However, relations of power have changed
since the end of World War II, but those changes have
not been reflected in the UN. China failed to see these
changes, and insisted on the role of the UN, whereas the
US-UK and France-Russia alliances were set on a
collision course. France didn't want to have a war with
UN blessings, and the US wanted a war even without those
blessings. China was squeezed in between.
(©2003
Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
contact content@atimes.com
for information on our sales and syndication policies.)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
