10 October 2001
The war now raging between America and radical Islam
is a war neither side can win. Poison from the unresolved conflict is therefore
likely to infect international relations and world politics for many years to
come. At a moment like this, perhaps the dawn of a new historical era, leaders
of Arab and Muslim countries face a grave challenge. Caught between their ties
to the United States and the anger of their own people, they need to be
vigorous actors and not mere spectators if they are to avoid being among the
first casualties of the unfolding conflict.
Why can neither side win the war? Because both sides
have set themselves unrealistic and unattainable objectives. This may not be
entirely true for short-term objectives, but it is certainly true for their
ambitious longer-term goals.
Consider the objectives of both sides in some sort
of order of priority.
·
The
Americans want to overthrow the Taleban regime in Afghanistan. This is
certainly attainable and may happen quite shortly, although the ensuing chaos
may be difficult to control and would require a sustained commitment of men and
resources for which the American public may not be ready.
·
They
want to kill or capture Usama bin Laden and destroy his Al-Qa’ida headquarters.
This, too, may be possible, although no one on the Western side should
underestimate the horrendous difficulty of finding and defeating him in the
mountains of Afghanistan during the coming winter.
·
This
is not all. The Americans speak of rooting out and destroying the entire
Al-Qa’ida network, not just in Afghanistan but through the world. Indeed, they
speak of waging war on all ‘terrorist networks’ and the
states protecting them. This is a vast agenda, which begins to verge on the
improbable.
·
But
this is still not all. Beyond the ‘war on terror’ is the US ambition to restore
that sense of security and immunity, which Americans used to enjoy in their own
country and which was shattered by the 11 September attacks. Americans today
live in fear – fear of terrorist reprisals, of more plane hijackings, of
biological or chemical attack, of the spread of a dreaded disease like anthrax.
The public mood has swung violently from a complacent sense of security to a
state of acute paranoia. Regaining their lost innocence will not be easy nor
will it be accomplished quickly. Americans at home – and even more Americans
abroad – will have to learn to live with stress, anxiety and physical insecurity
much like most other people in many countries around the world.
·
America’s
undeclared war aims are greater still. They are to restore America’s global
leadership, to affirm its battered hegemony, to demonstrate its supremacy, to
impose its ‘order’ on the world. Above all, by inflicting terrible punishment
on the Taleban and on Afghanistan, and by seeking to wipe out bin Laden and
al-Qai’ida, the aim is to deter anyone, anywhere, from ever
again daring, or even thinking, of attacking America. This is the sort of
utopian, absolutist ambition which, almost by definition, is unrealisable.
If America is pursuing unattainable objectives, so are its enemies. Judging from his speeches and those of his followers, Usama bin Laden may have relatively realistic short- and medium-term aims, but wholly unrealistic longer-term one. Let us attempt to list his aims in some sort of order of priority.
·
He
has firmly linked his struggle to a resolution of the Palestine problem – and
rightly so. The suffering of the Palestinians has outraged and mobilized Arabs
and Muslims everywhere. The United States has been foolish and short-sighted not to see it coming. Washington
should have reined Israel in long ago and forced it to accept the
land-for-peace formula of international legitimacy. There are strong
indications today that this message has at last been heard. Once the United
States rethinks its policies – as it must -- a just peace in the Middle East is
possible, even if it has to be imposed.
·
America’s continued
punishment of Iraq more than ten years after the Gulf War is another mistake --
indeed a crime -- which can and
must be put right. This, too, is a realistic objective. There is no insurmountable
reason why Washington cannot start a sensible dialogue with Baghdad and seek to
resolve its quarrel with Saddam Hussein by negotiation rather than by force.
Hawks in the American government, led by Assistant Defense Secretary Paul
Wolfowitz, who want to extend the war to Iraq are only compounding the errors
of the past decade, which have brought catastrophe to America.Islamic radicals
want American troops to leave Arabia, the birthplace of the prophet Muhammad.
There is, in truth, no compelling reason for the troops to be there. If they
are required in the region, they could be located in other countries or, better
still and less provocatively, on US ships ‘over the horizon’. This, then, would
appear to be a reasonable and realizable objective.
·
But
then, as we seek to identify the further ambitions of the Islamic radicals, we
enter the realm of the unrealistic and the unreasonable. Usama bin Laden and
his followers clearly hope that the current war will trigger a mass Islamic
uprising across the world against ‘corrupt’ and ‘hypocritical’ rulers, against
regimes in league with the ‘infidel’ West. No doubt they would like to
overthrow the governments of Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Algeria and
Indonesia – for a start -- and change the balance of power in their favour
throughout the Arab and Muslim world.
The jihad they preach would like to see
‘radical’ Islam triumph not only over ‘moderate’ Islam but also over
Western-style secularism across the whole world. This big agenda could possibly
score some limited gains but it is most unlikely to be wholly successful.
America and radical Islam have something in common:
they are both pursuing over-ambitious and hence essentially unattainable ends.
Their aims are so broad and unreal that there are no clear criteria of what
would constitute ‘winning’ or ‘losing’. But, as any soldier will confirm, a war
without clear, realistic, well-defined objectives is bound to end badly.
It would seem that, in this war, both America and
the Islamists are bound to be disappointed. It is their disappointment which we
need to fear, because disappointment breeds violence.
American military action against Afghanistan is
likely to be ineffective and could backfire against American interests
world-wide. In much the same way, spectacular terrorist attacks, such as those
of September 11, may give radical Muslims a temporary sense of triumph but are
also likely to be ineffective and even counter-productive in the long run as
they force America and the West to mobilize their full resources against the
‘threat’ from Islam.
Contradictions
of war
As the strikes against the Taleban continue, it is increasingly clear that America’s war effort is plagued by numerous contradictions. For example, the US would evidently like the Northern Alliance of Tadjiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras to play a prominent role, while Pakistan, which detests the Northern Alliance, is determined that any future government in Kabul will be Pashtun-dominated and remain firmly in Pakistan’s orbit.
President Bush and Britain’s Tony Blair talk of a ‘long haul’ against the ‘terrorists’, possibly extending over several years, while General Musharraf of Pakistan fervently hopes for a ‘short, sharp’ war. Anything long-drawn out could threaten his survival.
Yet another contradiction, hinted at above, is the conflict between ‘hawks’ and ‘doves’, not only in President Bush’s Administration but in Tony Blair’s government as well. The hawks want to extend the war to Iraq and also no doubt to Hizballah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and so forth, while the doves want it strictly limited to Usama bin Laden’s al-Qa’ida.
Another debate taking place in Western military circles, reminiscent of a similar debate during the Kossovo conflict, is over the potential use of ground troops. Hawks want troops to go in to teach everyone concerned respect for America’s military strength. Doves are more aware of the unpleasant things that happened to the Russians in Afghanistan and indeed to the British in the 19th century.
But whether hawks or doves win the argument, the difficult question of who will keep the peace in Afghanistan once the Taleban are overthrown will not go away.
What should Arab leaders do in this highly dangerous situation? In my view, they should remind Washington, with all the force and persuasion they can muster, that military action alone will not solve the problem and that the roots of terrorism must be addressed.
Overthrowing the Taleban, killing bin Laden and destroying Al-Qai’da will not be the end of the matter. In fact, it could make matters far worse. Now is the time for Arab leaders to insist that Washington settle the Arab-Israeli conflict, if necessary by an imposed peace; that it reach a negotiated settlement with Iraq; and that it think long and hard about the future of its military presence in the Gulf and Arabia.
Recognizing past mistakes, and putting them right, is not a sign of weakness but of statesmanship.