The international affairs editor of the Financial Times says the US has the most to lose by destroying the credibility of the UN which does “the dirty work for it.” Quentin Peel writes that the UN acts as a buffer for the US when America exercises its global power, but the Bush administration is determined to sabotage the instrument it most needs. The British fear the UN will lose its authority if it refuses to sanction US military action; the French reply the organization will be condemned to irrelevance if it simply acts as an international rubber stamp for aggressive policies decided in Washington. Peel thinks Washington is committed to unilateralism and will ignore the UN in either case. He also reveals Tony Blair’s controversial support for US intervention is frowned upon by both the British Foreign Office and Defence Ministry which share European fears that war will further destabilize the Middle East.
-Supporting facts
The United Nations is facing a crisis of credibility over Iraq. We have it on the best possible authority.
Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, and Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, both say so. Tony Blair, the prime minister, and Jack Straw, his foreign secretary, agree. Eight European prime ministers said the same when they published a joint letter pledging their support for US policy in Iraq.
"Seventeen times the UN has drawn a line in the sand - and 17 times Saddam Hussein has crossed that line," Mr Rumsfeld said a week ago, referring to the number of UN Security Council resolutions Mr Hussein had failed to comply with. The crisis of the international community, in Mr Rumsfeld's view and that of like-minded leaders, is that if those resolutions are not complied with, and not enforced with military might if necessary, "the Security Council will lose its credibility and world peace will suffer as a result." It is a powerful argument that cannot lightly be dismissed, even by the millions of pro-peace demonstrators who took to the streets in Europe and around the world at the weekend. Mr Hussein has repeatedly cocked a snook at the Security Council and its resounding resolutions since he was defeated in the Gulf War in 1991. He has always made a few concessions, but never quite revealed the full extent of his programmes to produce weapons of mass destruction.
Yet enforcing its writ in Baghdad is only one of the crises of credibility that the UN is facing. The other is arguably even more potentially destabilising. For the world's prime international organisation, the ultimate source of international legitimacy for peace-making and law-making, is facing the greatest threat to its credibility from its relationship with another member state: the US.
The dilemma for the 15 members of the UN Security Council, five permanent and 10 elected, is not just that they are divided over the US-led demand for military action against Iraq. Twelve of the 15 want to continue to pursue the peaceful path of weapons inspections. But behind the wrangle lies a more fundamental question. Will the Council lose its credibility more if it fails to dissuade the US from taking unilateral action, or will it suffer most if it gives that action its blessing, even if a majority of Council members are convinced it is wrong, premature, and potentially disastrous?
The administration of President George W. Bush is engaged in a dangerous game of diplomatic blackmail with the rest of the Security Council. "We are going to take military action against Saddam Hussein whether you like it or not," is the clear message from Washington. "If you want to be relevant, you must back us. If you refuse, you will never be relevant again."
Tony Blair and his government have bought the argument, against most of the advice they have received. Both the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defence would prefer to hold back. They fear the destabilising consequences of war. They do not believe the argument that the overthrow of Mr Hussein will start a virtuous domino effect spreading democracy across the Arab world. They foresee a chaotic struggle for power in Baghdad and an aggravation of the terrorist threat from the Islamic world.
But Downing Street is more fearful of the consequences of letting Mr Bush go it alone. Mr Blair fears that would fatally undermine the authority of the UN, and give a green light to US unilateralism. So he has gone all the way in pledging his loyal support to Mr Bush. Now it looks too late for him to pull back, even if he wanted to.
Jacques Chirac of France seems to have reached the opposite conclusion. He fears that the UN will be condemned to irrelevance if it rolls over and says Yes to Washington. That is why he is holding the line against military intervention. He knows the US and UK have failed to make a persuasive case that the threat from Baghdad is enough to justify an invasion. So far, they have lost the battle for world opinion, and are losing the battle for Security Council support.
Yet it is a huge gamble by Mr Chirac, too. If he denies the US the resolution it wants - just a nice international rubber stamp for a quick and clinical exercise in "regime change" - it may not bother even to ask next time. And there will be a next time.
Britain and France have much to lose. Both are permanent members of the Security Council. It is their last real claim to a global role, a vestige of the old empires they once ruled. Yet neither is the member state with most to lose from destroying the credibility of the UN. That is the US itself.
America is the empire in denial. It does not want to be a unilateral trouble-shooter. It is not very good at it. Look at Vietnam. Look at Somalia. Look at Afghanistan. It needs an effective UN to do the dirty work for it. It needs a credible UN to mediate, to provide the buffer between its own power and the chaotic world outside. And yet this administration seems hell-bent on undermining the institution it most needs. It is a strange way to run the world.
