Explanations for attacks on Iraq
Clement Ng
Here are some explanations I thought up of for the recent
Anglo-American missile strike on Iraq. The discussion will be limited to
the state-centric theories of international relations (IR as a
discipline); realism, idealism, and globalism. Comments and criticisms
are appreciated.
REALISM - America, allied only strategically with Britain, does not
perceive Iraq to be the only threat. Rather, Russian and possible Chinese
influence within the Middle East also compromises American interests,
chief of which is the maintenance of stable and low oil prices. Oil would
obviously classify as what Jacob Viner designates a *strategic sector*,
one essential for the consolidation of national security. Safe-guarding
national welfare is the realist-mercantilist prerogative, enshrined in
number 3 of Hans Morgenthau's six principles of realism. Principle number
2 alludes to the multi-faceted character of power; it can have military,
economic (resource and industry based), and ideological dimensions.
Moreover, the anarchical nature (I here follow Kenneth Waltz) of the state
system allowed the US and the UK to act with impunity, evidenced
especially by their breach of UN Charter law and Security Council
procedures. In a competitive world polity, self-help is the relevant
virtue for IR analysis. Accordingly, ethical qualms about injuring Iraqi
civilians did not seem to weigh in heavily on the decision to bomb.
Realism is an interesting perspective for its theorists don't always
countenance intervention whenever it seems to be warranted for a
superpower to contain a threat, especially a regional one (for example,
Morgenthau was opposed to the US foray into South Vietnam). What realist
theory can't explain is how the declining reliance of the West on Middle
Eastern oil should in fact lead to a more isolationist stance towards the
region. Furthermore, Russian sway over the Middle East is waneing, at
least for the here and now. From a realist standpoint, Russia should have
backed Iraq, a former ally, like they sustained the Serbs through arms
transfers in the Yugoslav conflict.
Also of importance was the so called denial of nuclear capability to Iraq.
Contemporary neo-realist scholarship is ambigious on this matter of
high-politics. Indeed, Waltz and Jonathan Mearsheimer have argued that
slowly intensifying nuclear proliferation should have a stabilizing effect
on the state system (Waltz, "The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: More May be
Better", *Adelphi Paper*, vol. 171, September, 1981). If the
international system re-establishes its balance-of-power equilibriums
fortuitously, then why were the US and UK so anxious to 'disarm' Iraq,
given an inevitable Muslim backlash? Perhaps state leaders aren't as
rational as some scholars make them out to be. As such, the state as a
unitary, discriminating actor would be an assumption found wanting.
(Surely Saddam Hussein's record of decision making is a candidate for
*irrational* behavior).
IDEALISM - Regional arms control management constitutes a semi-dead-letter
regime underwritten by a benign hegemon, the United States (I here follow
Robert O. Keohane). The international community, as embodied in the
Security Council, wishes to dismantle, by negotiation hopefully and by
force if necessary, the infrastructure of Iraq's military industry. The
gains made in enhanced Middle Eastern security cooperation should, from a
liberal approach, compound the gains made by Iraq as it remodels its
economy from a military to civilian orientation. Indeed, current research
has established a strong positive correlation between high levels of arms
procurement and below average GDP growth (Alex Mintz and Randolph
Stevenson, "Defense Expenditures, Economic Growth, and the Peace
Dividend," *Journal of Conflict Resolution*, 39(2), pp. 283-305, 1994).
Such collective advancement runs counter to the zero-sum paradigms of
realism, fitting well instead with the mutual winnings screnarios of
idealism. Naturally, neo-liberals like Francis Fukuyama will extrapolate
this peace dividend 'trend' to forecast the future spread of democratic
capitalism - yet thus far, his right-Hegelian exposi of the 'End of
History' remains invalid. As a pacific union is inaugurated between
states, each will pursue their comparative advantage (in what?).
Consequently, a cosmopolitan world is slowly but surely realized through
the holistic engagements of Kantian federalism.
Iraq's expulsion of UNSCOM inspectors was obviously a violation of said
regime norm, a transgression somewhat analogous to an unforeseen market
failure in neo-classical microeconomic theory. As reluctant enforcers,
the US, with minor assistance from the UK (I'm sure those RAF Tornadoes
really turned the tide!), had little choice but to punish Iraq for
defecting from the regime. Since game theory models posit an eventual
outcome of collaboration if Prisoner's Dilemma is played many times over,
Iraq should comply with disarmament requirements this turn around.
Otherwise, it will be forced to endure additional rounds of missile
strikes until minimum adherence is ensured. Therefore, the US and UK's
policing of disarmament resolutions ought to be understood as evidence of
regime formation for arms control, albeit a control exercised most
unevenly.
Idealist theory renders a erroneous analysis, I believe. Why did Iraq
defect from a supposed strategy of reciprocal gain (the Nash equilibrium)?
What is to be achieved in the long-term by refusing to comply with
Security Council dictates (i.e. what's the competitive strategy)?
Certainly, no evidence suggests that Iraq was re-arming itself for another
invasion of Kuwait or Iran. Is the international community also concerned
about the plight of the Kurds and Southern Shiites? Also quite certainly,
the losses to be had from defecting are considerable, as evidenced by the
damage the air assault has effected. There seems to be no competitive
strategy, although a 'tit-for-tat' synopsis is unfolding between an
obstinate Iraq and an UNSCOM acting under possible US/UK auspices.
GLOBALISM - (I won't employ the term 'neo-Marxism' for many left-wing
theorists, like Johan Galtung, Richard Falk, and Hayward Alker, are not
Marxists). The US and UK are core states while Iraq is relegated to
semi-peripheral status. As an emerging actor in the global capitalist
economy, Iraq refuses to bow to imperialist powers, striving to fulfill
its own aspirations for upward mobility in the world system (I here follow
Immanuel Wallerstein). Oil exporting is of central importance for it is
part of an exploitative exchange of commodities in which capital is
siphoned off from the periphery and accumulated in the core. This
fashions a relationship of dependency (I here follow Andre Gunder Frank
and Samir Amin) between Arab nations and the core entities, a dynamic
facilitated by comprador class control in the Arab world. Not
surprisingly, all of the Arab and Persian states are non-democratic,
except for Turkey. By propping up authoritarian governments, the core
states maintain suzerainty over all relations of production, forestalling
prospects for socialist democratization.
For Marx and Engels, the evolution of capitalism will be marked by
periodic contradictions, all of them systemic in nature. Ruling class
endeavors to keep the proletariat underfoot will eventually cycle into a
negative feedback, adding to a milieu already rife with class antagonism.
Extending this inquiry, Wallerstein (with a emphasis on tiered states in
place of class) would contend that the ever expanding and monopolizing
tendencies of capital have spawned anti-systemic movements in the
semi-periphery, the latest of which is the Iraqi disavowal of reparations
imposed by the core (i.e. the ultimatum to disarm). In turn, the core,
intent on disallowing Iraq the ability to affect oil prices, has resorted
to military containment. Furthermore, the military-industrial complex of
the core (I here follow C. Wright Mills), a masquerade for the
bourgeoisie, has seized the opportunity to exploit Bagdahd as a testing
ground for the latest developments in laser guidance technology (Raytheon,
designer of the Tomahawk, is the world's largest contractor of
surface-to-air missiles).
Despite going further in explaining the crisis than the other two schools
of thought, the globalist narrative still has its shortcomings. As
previously noted, more and more alternative sources of oil, especially in
the Atlantic, could be extracted from without having to preserve a
military presence. Iraq has also been embargoed from importing core
goods, preferring to trade, in any event, with its Arab neighbors. How
can surplus value be bleeded from the semi-periphery to the core if the
latter doesn't export any higher-value-added merchandise in return (except
for arms)? If the surplus is located only in the mode of wage-labour
production, rather than in the sphere of exchange, then by globalist
accounts Iraq is mired in a *pre-capitalist* phase. For orthodox Marxists
like Robert Brenner ("The Origins of Capitalist Development", *New Left
Review*, vol. 104, 1977), this discrepancy in globalism amounts to a
critical analytical weakness.
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Clement Ng (aka "chigger")
4th yr Integrated Science, Carleton University
E-mail: cn...@chat.carleton.ca