The row in the United States over Dubai
World Ports' US$6.8 billion takeover of P&O,
which would give the United Arab Emirates company
control of operations at six US ports, is a
perfect example of a storm in a teacup that
American politicians can raise, but which can
splash way beyond the saucer.
For days,
legislators on both sides of Congress have united
to attack that unlikely defender of Arab rights,
President George W Bush, for allowing Dubai to
purchase, along with P&O's other
assets, six marine terminals on the east
coast of the US - New
York, New Jersey,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans and Miami.
On Thursday, the Dubai company offered to
delay the part of the deal related to the US to
give the Bush administration more time to convince
lawmakers the deal posed no security risks.
The fuss was wholeheartedly embraced by
Democrat legislators, who, if not as all-around
xenophobic as the Republicans, do not usually have
to be pushed hard to grandstand on an anti-Arab
platform.
While most of their
voters, for example, considered the Iraq war
a disastrous mistake even before it was started, both
New York Senators Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton
have yet to withdraw their support for it. And they
led the charge against Dubai, almost the only ally
the US has in the region. For a New York politico,
the only good Arab is a pilloried one.
Throw together the US fear of
terrorism and Arabs, and the resulting heady brew
drives out all reasonable discourse. No wonder the
Republicans, already wondering whether the Bush
administration was a lame duck or a paraplegic
parrot, broke ranks to join the silliness. They
were not going to be out-xenophobed by a bunch of
liberals.
Anti-Arabism is the only form of racism socially
permitted in the US. For example, Bill Clinton's
first presidential campaign returned donations
from Arab-American groups, and that was
10 years before September 11, 2001. It is unimaginable
for that to happen to any other ethnic
group in the United States.
While we now hear
many patriotic effusions about any foreigners
operating terminals in the ports, no one has shown
any signs of apprehension hitherto. Chinese
state-owned company China Shipping has a terminal
in Los Angeles, for example.
All these
politicians who watched US exports disappear as
they applauded the offshoring of manufacturing to
China and of customer care to India, and going into
deep hock to Asian banks, now want to resort to
the last refuge of the scoundrel, patriotism.
Hysteria apart, in Dubai, most of the productive
economic work is done by expatriates such
as American David Sanborn, who recently left the
offending company to become the US maritime administrator.
British staff the London headquarters
of P&O, and Americans do the port work
in the US. The customs, policing, and coast guard
are also American.
It is worth remembering
that Dubai owns Emirates airline, one of the
fastest-growing in the world, with at least two
flights a day, direct from what some people seem
to think is terrorist central straight into New
York.
You
would never guess that Dubai has never been
at war with the United States and provides huge logistic
backup for US forces in the Persian Gulf. And
certainly the White House is unlikely to explain
that its Dubai ally can only do that because, in
common with the other Emirates, it is a feudal
monarchy that has never bought into the democracy
thing, and so does not have to worry about what
the Arabs on the ground think.
And don't
forget, Dubai has taken, or is in the process of
taking, delivery of about $8.4 billion worth of
military equipment, mostly state-of-the-art
fighter aircraft, ordered from the US ($6.4
billion) and France ($2 billion).
We should not get dewy-eyed at the thought of brave
Bush standing up for the underdog. For a start, it
would be foolish not to assume that there isn't a
dynastic, Texan, or Republican connection between
Dubya and Dubai. Halliburton's Dubai subsidiary
alone should be enough to get any conspiracy
theorist a good head of steam.
Even so, in
the larger scheme of things, the barking in
Congress sends signals across the world. It
reinforces the perception that the globalization
that successive US administrations have been
forcing down other countries' throats means that
they have to allow US companies to buy any asset
they want, but that foreigners need not apply in
the US itself.
In the Arab world it
reinforces the idea that Arabs and Muslims are
special, suspected and a reviled group. One
conclusion for a sensible Arab ruler would be that
if he can't spend his dollars in the US, he would
be much better off demanding euros, yen or gold
for his oil. And then we will see what Wall Street
has to say to Schumer and Hillary Clinton.
But in
the meantime, the one sane point in the
point-scoring is that more should be done on port
security. And the solution is simple. Stop pouring
hundreds of billions into occupying Iraq and
fomenting terrorism, and spend a fraction of it on
port security. Sadly, I do not expect to hear it
any time soon from the New York senatorial
delegation.
Ian Williams is
author of Deserter: Bush's War on Military
Families, Veterans and His Past, Nation Books,
New York.
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