From Portside

An interview with Jean Bricmont

Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan : have the advocates of
intervention in Libya not learnt the lesson ? Jean
Bricmont, who wrote a book about humanitarian
imperialism, tells us why the right to interfere is
incompatible with world peace, and that it goes against
humanitarian principles. Unless, of course, those
principles are just an excuse.

Interviewer: Gregoire Lalieu

Can you remind us of what humanitarian imperialism
consists of ?

It is an ideology which aims to justify military
interference against sovereign countries in the name of
democracy and Human Rights. The motive is always the
same : a population is the victim of a dictator, so we
must act. Then all the usual references are trotted out
: the Second World War, the war with Spain, and so on.
The aim being to sell the argument that an armed
intervention is necessary. This is what happened in
Kosovo, Iraq or Afghanistan.

And now comes Libya's turn.

There is a difference here because a United Nations
Security Council resolution makes it possible. But this
resolution was passed against the principles of the
Charter of the United Nations themselves. Indeed, I see
no external threat in the Libyan conflict. Although the
notion of the " responsibility to protect " populations
had been evoked, many short cuts were taken. Besides,
there is no proof that Gaddafi massacres his people
just for the sole purpose of slaughtering them. It is a
bit more complicated than that : it is an armed
insurrection, and I know not of any government that
would not repress an insurrection of this kind. Of
course, there are collateral damage and civilian
casualties. But if the United States knows a way to
avoid such damage, then it should go and tell the
Israelis about it, and apply it themselves in Iraq and
Afghanistan. There is also no doubt that coalition
bombings will cause civilian casualties. From a
strictly legal point of view, I think the U.N.S.C.
resolution is questionable. It is, in fact, the result
of years of lobbying for the recognition of the right
to interfere, which proves here to be legitimized.

And yet, many - even among the parties of the left -
deemed it necessary to intervene in Libya in order to
stop the massacre. Do you think it is an error of
judgment ?

Yes, I do, and for several reasons. First of all, this
campaign ushers in the reign of the arbitrary. Indeed,
the Libyan conflict is not exceptional. There are many
other conflicts anywhere in the world whether it may be
in Gaza, in Bahrain, or in the Congo, which happened
some years ago. As for the latter, it occurred within a
context of foreign aggression on the part of Rwanda and
Burundi. The enforcement of the international law would
have saved millions of lives but it was not done. Why
not ?

Besides, if we apply the underlying principles of
interference behind the aggression against Libya, it
means that anyone can intervene anywhere they want to.
Imagine that the Russians intervene in Bahrain or the
Chinese in Yemen : the world would be a general and
ongoing war. Therefore one major feature of the right
to interfere is the infringement of standard
international law. And if we had to change
international law to new laws justifying the right to
interfere, it would result in a war of all against all.
This is an argument to which the advocates of the right
to interfere never give an answer.

And lastly, such interventions strengthen what I call
the " barricade effect " : all the countries in the
sights of the United States will start to feel
threatened and will seek to increase their armaments.
We all remember what happened with Saddam. Moreover,
Gaddafi had said to the Arab League : " We have just
lost a member state of the league and none of you have
done anything. But it can happen to you too, because
even though you are all U.S. allies, so was Saddam in
the past. " Now the same thing is repeating itself with
Gaddafi and the threat which hangs over many states is
likely to relaunch the arms race. Russia, which is not
an unarmed country, has already announced that it would
reinforce its troops. But it can go even further : if
Libya had the nuclear weapon, it would have never been
attacked. Actually, this is why North Korea is
untouchable. Therefore, the left which supports the
intervention in Libya should definitely realize that
humanitarian interference is inevitably going to
relaunch the arms race and lead to long-term wars.

And yet, wouldn't the armed intervention against
Gaddafi be a lesser evil ?

One has to consider the consequences. Now that the
Western forces are involved, they will obviously have
to go all the way, overthrow Gaddafi and bring the
rebels to power. Then what is going to happen ? Libya
seems to be divided. Is the West going to occupy the
country and embark on an endless war similar to the
ones in Iraq or in Afghanistan ?

Be that as it may, let us suppose that all goes well :
the members of the coalition remove Gaddafi in a few
days, the rebels take power, and the Libyan people is
united. Everyone is happy and then what ? I do not
think the West will go : " Well, we did it because we
are nice people and fond of Human Rights. Now you can
do whatever you please. " What is going to happen if
the new Libyan government is too Muslim-like or does
not properly limit migration flows ? Do you think the
West will let them do ? It is obvious that after the
intervention, the new Libyan government will be caught
up in the interests of the West.

If military intervention is not the solution, then what is ?

It would have been better if we had honestly attempted
all peaceful solutions. It might not have worked but
here, there is a blatant intention to reject these
solutions. And by the way, this is an abiding feature
of humanitarian wars. Concerning Kosovo, there were
very detailed propositions on the part of Serbia in
order to come to a peaceful solution but they were
rejected. The West has even imposed conditions that
made any negotiations impossible, such as the
occupation of Serbia by N.A.T.O. forces. In
Afghanistan, the Taliban proposed to try Bin Laden by
an international court if they are provided with
evidence of his involvement in the W.T.C. attacks. The
U.S. refused it and bombed the country. In Iraq, Saddam
had accepted the return of the United Nations
inspectors as well as many extremely restrictive
conditions. But it was never enough. In Libya, Gaddafi
accepted a cease-fire and proposed to have
international observers sent out there. The observers
were not sent and it was said that Gaddafi did not
respect the cease fire. The West also rejected Chavez's
offer to mediate in Libya, even though it was backed up
by many Latino countries and the Organization of
African Unity as well.

In that connection, I am angry when I hear left-wingers
in Europe expose the horrible Bolivarian Alliance for
the Americas which supports dictator Gaddafi. They got
it all wrong ! The leaders in power in Latin America
have important responsibilities. They are not just
small leftists chattering in their corner. And the
major issue for these leaders is the interference of
the U.S. : the less it can do whatever it pleases,
wherever it pleases, the better it will be for all
those countries which try to free themselves from
tutelage by state power, and also for the whole world.

Does the systematic rejection of peaceful solutions
mean that humanitarian interference is an excuse ?

Yes it does, but if it works well with the
intellectuals, I am more doubtful about the reaction of
the peoples of Europe. Will they support their leaders
during the aggression against Gaddafi ? People consider
the wars for security to be the most legitimate ones :
for instance, if there is a threat against our
populations or our way of life, etc. But in the context
of an overall climate of islamophobia (that I
disapprove, but it does exist) here and in France, you
try explaining that we are fighting in Cyrenaica for
rebels whom we see screaming " Allah U Akbar ". This is
contradictory ! At the political level, most parties
support the intervention, even the parties of the left.
The most moderate ones only supported the
implementation of a no-fly zone, but if Gaddafi sends
his tanks to Benghazi, what are we to do ? During the
Second World War, the Germans lost quite quickly
control of the air space but they held out for several
years yet. Insofar as the objective is to overthrow
Gaddafi, the moderates should have suspected that it
would go even further than the establishment of a
no-fly zone. Unable to take genuine and alternative
stands, the left finds itself trapped by the logic of
humanitarian interference and is compelled to support
Sarkozy. If the war goes well and quickly, the position
of the French President will undoubtedly be secure for
the 2012 presidential elections, thanks to the left
which would have contributed to it. The left, unable to
assume a coherent attitude against wars, is compelled
to tag along behind the interventionist policy.

And what if the war does not go well ?

It is regrettable, but the only French party that set
against the intervention in Libya as regards French
interests is the National Front. It particularly
alluded to human migration flows and took occasion to
distinguish itself from the U.M.P (Union for a Popular
Movement) or the S.P. (Socialist Party) by claiming
that it had never collaborated with Gaddafi. If the war
in Libya does not go according to plan, it will benefit
the National Front for the French presidential
elections in 2012.

If humanitarian interference is just an excuse, then
what is the objective of this war ?

The uprisings in the Arab world surprised the
Westerners, which were not well informed enough about
what was happening in North Africa and the Middle-East.
I do not dispute that there are good experts on the
issue, but they are seldom listened to at some level of
the government, and by the way, they are complaining
about it. So now, the new governments in Egypt and
Tunisia might not align themselves with the interests
of the West any longer, and consequently become hostile
to Israel.

To take control of the area and protect Tel Aviv, the
West is likely willing to get rid of governments that
are already hostile to Israel and the West. The three
main ones are Iran, Syria and Libya. The latter, since
it is the weaker one, is attacked first.

Can it work ?

The West longed to rule the world but we can see since
2003 with the Iraq fiasco that it cannot. In the past,
the United States took the liberty to overthrow rulers
that it had brought to power, such as Ngo Dinh Diem in
South Vietnam in the 1960s. But nowadays, Washington
cannot do that any longer. In Kosovo, the United States
and Europe have to compromise with a Mafia-like regime.
In Afghanistan, people say that Karzai is corrupt, but
they have no other option. In Iraq, they also have to
accept a government they are far from being fully
pleased with.

The problem will certainly arise in Libya too. An Iraqi
once told me : " In this part of the world, there are
no liberals in the Western sense of the word, apart
from a few rather isolated intellectuals. " Since the
West cannot rely on rulers who share its ideas and who
fully defend its interests, it tries to impose
dictators through force. But it obviously creates a
discrepancy with people's desires.

Besides, this approach proves to be a failure and
people should not be fooled by what is occurring.

The West, which thought it could be in control of the
Arab world with puppets such as Ben Ali and Mubarak,
would suddenly think : " We had it all wrong, now we
are going to support democracy in Tunisia, Egypt and
Libya. "   It is all the more absurd since one major
demand of the Arab revolts is the right to sovereignty.
In other words, no interference ! The West has to
relinquish its desire for world domination : the Arab
world, just like Africa and the Caribbean, does not
belong to it. Actually, the regions in which the West
most interfere are the less developed ones. If their
sovereignty is respected, those regions will be able to
develop, just like Asia did, and certainly so will
Latin America. The policy of interference is a failure
for everyone.

Then what is the alternative?

First of all, one has to know that the policy of
interference requires a huge military budget. Without
the support of the United States and its outrageous
military budget, France and Great Britain might not
have become involved in it. And it is much less the
case for Belgium. But all these means which are put at
their disposal are not heaven-sent. The budget is based
on loans from China that lead to U.S. deficits and all
kinds of economic issues. We rarely think about it.
Moreover, we are constantly told that there is no money
for education, research, pensions, etc. And, all of a
sudden, a huge sum comes out of the blue to wage war in
Libya. And it is a limitless sum since no one knows how
long the war will last ! In Afghanistan, money is
already spent fruitlessly. There is a need to adopt a
new political approach and to me, Switzerland is a good
example. Its military budget is only devoted to the
protection of the Swiss territory. The Swiss have a
coherent non-interventionist policy because, as a
matter of policy, the Swiss army cannot leave the
country. You can say that Switzerland is letting
Gaddafi kill the insurgents, nevertheless, it has never
committed any genocide nor any other massacre, even
though we can criticize its policy on other matters
(banks or immigration). And secondly, if all the
countries followed the example of Switzerland for the
reasons I stated earlier, the world would be much
better.

Wars and embargoes have always had disastrous
consequences. I think the best alternative is to
cooperate with all the countries of the world
regardless of their systems of government. Through
trade (not the arms trade of course), ideas spread and
things can evolve, without wars. We can of course
discuss its forms : fair trade, ecological trade, etc.
Nevertheless, trade is a much less bloody alternative
as opposed to sanctions and embargoes, which are the
soft version of humanitarian wars.

Translated from the French by Sheila Carby for
Investig'Action

Source : www.michelcollon.info
_________________________

Jean Bricmont From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jean Bricmont (born 1952) is a Belgian theoretical
physicist, philosopher of science and a professor at
the Universite Catholique de Louvain. He works on
renormalization group and nonlinear differential
equations.

He is mostly known to the non-academic audience for
co-authoring Fashionable Nonsense (also known as
Intellectual Impostures) with Alan Sokal, in which they
criticise relativism in the philosophy of science.
Jean Bricmont also collaborates with activist Noam
Chomsky and campaigns on a variety of progressive
causes.

In 2005 he published Imperialisme humanitaire. Droits
de l'homme, droit d'ingerence, droit du plus fort ?,
published in English as Humanitarian Imperialism in
2006.

In 2006, he wrote the preface to L'Atlas alternatif -
Frederic Delorca (ed), Pantin, Temps des Cerises.
He is a member of the Division of Sciences of the Royal
Academy for Sciences, Letters and Arts of Belgium.

In 2007, he wrote an article in French discussing the
possibility of a US invasion of Iran. "Pourquoi Bush
peut declencher une attaque contre l'Iran."