#3
Political Experts' Analyses of Goals, Consequences of US Strike on Iraq
Trud
October 8, 2002
[translation for personal use only]
Article by Andrey Stepanovich under rubric "The World Today": "Awaiting H Hour: Political Scientists Argue About Goals and Consequences of a US Strike on Iraq"

Everyone "is tired of waiting" for the US operation against Iraq; officials in Washington and the mass media have been talking about it over and over so persistently for so long. There also is no shortage of various speculations regarding its goals and its possible consequences, both regional and global.

This topic hasn't left the Russian politicians, political scientists and spin doctors (PR specialists who promote a certain opinion to the masses) indifferent. Among them are Aleksey Pushkov, Vyacheslav Nikonov, Sergey Markov, Andrey Kokoshin, Aleksandr Dugin, Gleb Pavlovskiy, Mikhail Leontyev, Irina Khakamada, Aleksey Mitrofanov and others.

A great number of them agree that a strike on Iraq is something that has been decided, it will be swift, and it will lead to the elimination of Saddam Hussein's regime. Whether we like it or not, this is a kind of force majeure circumstance. The thesis also generates no special arguments that the ballyhoo over the Iraqi threat in the form of weapons of mass destruction and the dictatorial Baghdad regime is no more than a pretext for military intervention. But the main motive is the fight for resources, for high-quality, inexpensive, middle-eastern Iraqi (in this case) oil. Iraq possesses up to a fourth of world oil reserves compared with 2.5 percent in the United States, which consumes around a fourth of the liquid fuel produced in the world.

From this point on, the viewpoints diverge substantially. Some experts assume that a certain renewed version of Desert Storm II will lead to the consolidation of the "unipolarity of the world" and to a strengthening of the domination of Pax Americana--a "New Roman Empire" under the Stars and Stripes. Their logic is as follows: undivided US military-political, economic and cultural hegemony will antagonize the diverse majority of mankind and create a potential base for the consolidation of all those who are dissatisfied and for a subsequent rebuff of US pretensions. "Anti-Americans of the world, unite!" is, in their opinion, the motto of the not too distant future.

Others believe that the US action being prepared is an adventure and its consequences have not been calculated. Moreover, it is doomed if not to military failure, then to political failure, since its planners aren't taking into account either the Iraqi factor--the capability and readiness of Saddam Hussein's regime and his mass support for resistance, or the problem of finding a viable replacement for him, or the negative position of the majority of the international community (except for Great Britain), or the possible reaction of the Arab-Muslim world, or the prospect of regional destabilization and a powerful flare-up of terrorism.

Still others hold the opinion that nothing catastrophic will occur. The Iraqi action allegedly is a reflection of US domestic policy projected onto great-power ambitions on a global scale. Saddam's regime will be swept away, but the United States won't occupy the country. It will take the oilfields in northern and southern Iraq under its control. And this should be considered inevitable.

With respect to what this might entail for Russia, the opinions again almost coincide: nothing good. First of all, it will lead to a further "shrinking" of Russia's geopolitical role, inasmuch as its prestige and economic interests will suffer seriously.

Secondly, the United States is interested in cheap oil more than in new allies and reliable partners, and control over the Iraqi oil reserves gives it that opportunity. The world price on "black gold" will be determined not by supply and demand, but by direction from Washington. Russia, whose relative economic stability depends almost wholly on the export of liquid hydrocarbon raw material, is awaited by tough times: sequestration of the budget, default, a very acute crisis, a change of government, and much more right down to its disintegration. Washington's promise to share the spoils of war is taken very skeptically--it has too many unpaid Russian advances.

Thirdly, an Iraqi "blitzkrieg" certainly will whip up a new spiral of an uncontrolled arms race, a nuclear one. Iran, the next target of Pentagon strategists, will be striving for a nuclear bomb as a panacea for the sake of preserving sovereignty. China, India and Pakistan will be swiftly building up their missile-nuclear potential.

Fourthly, Russia may come closer to a united Europe on the common basis of nonacceptance of US hegemonism, but this hardly will save the overall situation.

And the question automatically arises: Just what should be done? Experts believe that the choice of options is severely limited by Russia's weakness, both economic and military. Suggestions vary depending on political orientation.

Here are just a few: win time at any cost to build up forces; be reconciled with the inevitability of a US empire, but in the process try to achieve the status not of an outlying US province, but at least of a junior partner; resort to proud isolationism; finally, bargain with the Americans--we offer not to veto the ultimatum to Iraq in the UN Security Council, and they offer us something from the Iraqi petroleum pie. The following also was said: let's help the United States put an end to the dictatorial regime in Baghdad. Although it seemingly has no traditional weapons of mass destruction, or very few, Baghdad is producing a new type, suicidal kamikazes, and this is a serious threat to everyone...

The most cautious and moderate still propose to come to an agreement with the Americans, inasmuch as we nevertheless are incapable of preventing a strike. In the final account, let them carry out this action with unpredictable consequences, but then they also will have to bear full responsibility by themselves.

One other rather original opinion was heard. A wide-scale military campaign like the 1991 Desert Storm hardly is possible nowadays. Washington will prefer to resort rather to a surgical, sophisticated, multiple-move special operation, and this requires superb coordination of a broad set of forces and assets. But so many in the world and even in the United States itself are interested in having such an operation fail that trouble in some one element of it at some stage in it and a subsequent fiasco become almost inevitable. One only has to wait for H Hour; very little time is left...

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