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| May 16, 2002 |
Dropping Out - American Style
Colonel Daniel Smith, USA (Ret.), Chief of Research, dsmith@cdi.org
In the ‘60s they were beatniks, peaceniks, even unmentionable-niks -- labels liberally applied to those who refused to accept the expectations of "responsible living" that were part of the prevailing national culture.
Today, in the prevailing international culture, the United States is in danger of becoming a new kind of dropout, an international treaty "refusenik."
The latest example occurred May 6, when the Bush administration announced it had resolved to "unsign" the Rome Statute creating the International Criminal Court (ICC). President Bill Clinton signed the treaty in 2000 to keep open the opportunity for the United States to influence the evolution of rules, procedures, and guidelines for prosecutors and the selection of jurists for the Court. Equally important, staying engaged allowed the United States the chance to influence talks aimed at defining the crime of aggression and the criteria for determining when a nation’s judicial system is "unable or unwilling" to investigate charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide. But Mr. Clinton never sought Senate advice and consent for ratification of the treaty because opposition to the treaty was so fierce.
What is gained by the unprecedented action of "unsigning" the Rome Statute? Bush administration officials argue that nullifying the U.S. signature means the United States will not be bound by the ICC’s jurisdiction or have to follow any of its orders. But that was the case whether or not the U.S. remained a non-ratifying signatory. As already pointed out, the United States would pre-empt ICC jurisdiction by investigating any charges against U.S. citizens. Moreover, the treaty specifically limits the court’s jurisdiction to "the territory of any State Party and, by special agreement, on the territory of any other State" (Article 4).
What is lost is costly. First, the rest of the world will regard this action as another unilateral rejection of engagement by the United States except when narrow U.S. interests are involved. In turn, general U.S. diplomatic leadership will also suffer. Worse, the U.S. action sets a precedent for other nations who have signed but not ratified treaties to renounce any inclination to abide by the provisions of such treaties or to refrain from undermining their provisions when it suits their interests - as provided by the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties.
The administration’s action also sets a precedent for similar U.S. actions with regard to other signed but unratified treaties. A prime example is the Clinton-era Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty that was rejected by the Senate in October 1999. Some officials are pushing for the development of new nuclear "bunker-busting" munitions and even nuclear-tipped missiles for the national missile defense system, either of which could require testing to ensure the systems operated as designed.
What may also be at stake is U.S. adherence to the Vienna Convention itself. Media sources reported that the administration was prepared to announce it would also "unsign" the Vienna Convention at the same time it renounced the Rome Statute. (Indeed, the New York Times article stated that U.S. "officials" said the ICC withdrawal notification "was also intended to relieve the United States of obligations under the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties.") Article 18 of the Convention obligates nations not to take any action that might undermine treaties to which they are signatories even if the treaties are not ratified. Ironically, the United States signed but has never ratified the Vienna Convention although it has adhered to the provisions of Article 18.
To undo the Vienna Convention on top of "unsigning" the Rome Statute would constitute a second serious blow to the whole international system of the rule of law, and personal and national accountability for actions that the United States has championed for decades. Such action would further isolate the United States from allies and friends, and confirm for many the charge that the United States is becoming not just a dropout or refusenik but a "rogue" nation itself. That may be why a move against the Vienna Convention, if really contemplated, was postponed. Unfortunately, once such an idea surfaces, it may never go away.
Footnotes:
(1) Article 17 of the Rome Statute holds that a case is inadmissible where (a) "the case is being investigated or prosecuted by a State which has jurisdiction over it, unless the State is unwilling or unable genuinely to carry out the investigation or prosecution; or (b) the case has been investigated by a State which has jurisdiction over it and the State has decided not to prosecute the person concerned, unless the decision resulted from the unwillingness or inability of the State genuinely to prosecute.
(2) Neil A. Lewis, "U.S. to Renounce Its Role in Pact for World Tribunal," Washington, DC, May 4, 2002. Mr. Lewis also authored "U.S. Rejects All Support For New Court on Atrocities," which appeared in The New York Times on May 7, 2002, p. A9.
"America’s Team" -- A Personal Commentary
Jeffrey Mason, Research Analyst, jmason@cdi.org
On May 18, 2002 tens of thousands of "fans" will assemble at FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland to take a gander at "America’s Team." This is not a reference to owner Daniel Snyder’s gridiron warriors -- the Washington Redskins professional football team. The team these "fans" are dying to get a look at is a much more expensive "franchise" than the local pro football club -- the U.S. Department of Defense. While Snyder boasts the most valuable franchise in the world of sports (its value is conservatively estimated to be in the range of $800 million), this "America’s Team" has an annual budget of almost $400 billion and has assets valued in the trillions of dollars.
In what traditionally has been a two-day event, the Pentagon’s 2002 Joint Service Open House and Air Show has undergone some changes in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. In the past, the huge sprawling 4,300-acre Andrews Air Force Base has opened its gates every May to allow American taxpayers to take a look at state-of-the-art U.S. military airpower. This year, for security reasons, the open house is being cut to a single day (unless you are one of the lucky members of the DoD Family, in other words -- you happen to have a DoD "pass" card for access to military reservations). And, as an additional security precaution, air show fans are being instructed to park at FedEx Field, walk through a metal detector, and board a bus for the 10-mile ride from the Redskins football facility to the airbase.
This year, the visiting public will see a number of amazing aircraft: the Air Force B-2 "Spirit" stealth bomber (used sparingly in combat probably because of its $2.2 billion dollar per airplane price tag), the Navy’s F/A-18 E/F "Super Hornet" fighter-bomber (priced at $86 million per aircraft—the Navy plans to build 548 of them at a total program cost of 47 billion dollars), the huge Air Force C-17 "Globe Master" transport airlifter (the most expensive air freighter in the world) and the Air Force’s A-10 "Thunderbolt" ground attack aircraft affectionately referred to as "the Warthog" by Gulf War soldiers.
While the "open house" is advertised as "free to the public, " in actuality U.S. taxpayers will pay about $1.2 million to fund one of the largest military air expositions in the world. (This price tag is about six times the usual cost for the Andrews air show, mostly because of heightened security measures after 9-11.) Although some believe it is important to allow Americans an opportunity to see what they are buying with their tax dollars, other analysts realize that this "open house" is just another aspect of an annual multi-million dollar public relations campaign carried out by the Pentagon.
The Pentagon spends over 20 million dollars annually on participating in and running its own air shows in the U.S. and at international venues. These aerial demonstrations are very popular with the public. But the American people should realize they are seeing the Department of Defense at its very best. And that is a good thing to see -- for the professionalism and expertise of our pilots and maintenance personnel is outstanding.
However, visitors to these air shows are missing the whole story -- they’re not seeing the tremendous cost overruns associated with many of these programs, they’re not seeing the interservice rivalry that spawns inefficiencies and wastefulness in procuring these aircraft, and they’re not seeing the huge amount of money spent by our military every day to keep these aircraft flying.
If only the American people were as well educated on their military as they are on the intricacies of salary caps, multiyear player contracts and the endless trivia associated with the world of sports.
Cuba: Bioweapons Threat or Political Punching-Bag?
Ben Friedman, Research Assistant, bfriedman@cdi.org
Speeches by undersecretaries don’t usually get much media attention, but speaking at the Heritage Foundation on May 6, John Bolton, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control, made news. Bolton, in a speech on the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, mentioned more than usual suspects: Iraq, North Korea, Iran, Libya and Syria. He also singled out Cuba, asserting that it not only develops biological weapons but exports technology that helps other states make such weapons -- raising eyebrows and questions. Namely: Are his assertions accurate? Are they backed up by evidence? Do they expose a threat too long ignored or do they smear Cuba to squelch a growing American sentiment that is time to radically redefine U.S. policy towards Cuba?
Bolton stated, "The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort. Cuba has provided dual-use biotechnology to other rogue states." These remarks repeat, word for word, allegations made in congressional testimony in March by Carl Ford, undersecretary of state for intelligence and research.
Bolton and Ford’s allegations are not new. Experts generally agree that with the third largest biotechnology industry the third world and as a major exporter of related infrastructure, products and expertise, Cuba could have an offensive biological weapons program, and could help other nations with their programs. Cuba’s capabilities are particularly troubling given Fidel Castro’s open relations with ‘rogue’ nations, especially Iran. But evidence that Castro has exploited this industry for nefarious purposes is thin. Even the New York Times used questionable information in its reporting on the issue, quoting a section of the Federation of American Scientists web site that has since been pulled off the website.
A former KGB agent who has defected to the United States, Ken Alibek, briefly mentioned Cuba’s bioweapons program in a book in 1999. The book said only that another Russian scientist who had visited Cuba believed that Cuba had an offensive biological weapons program. Similar claims have been made by Cuban defectors, according to press reports, but have never been publicly confirmed. Suspicions about Cuba’s bioweapons capability stem in part from Cuba’s accusations that the United States has used biological weapons against its crops and people 12 times -- accusations that have generally been dismissed as absurd. True or not, some say these alleged attacks might have driven Cuba to seek biological weapons.
But generally, the allegations against Cuba seem to have been too sketchy to make their way into official U.S. reports. Which raises the question: why the renewed interest now?
New secret intelligence may validate Bolton’s accusations. But if there is such intelligence, few have seen it, even in the military and intelligence communities. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has not seen it, as he told reporters on May 9. (One would hope that if new evidence emerged suggesting a biological weapons threat from Cuba, someone would inform the secretary of defense.) And several anonymous senior military and intelligence officials with access to classified information have undercut Bolton’s remarks, with one calling them "way overstated" and based on shoddy evidence.
The former Commander in Chief of U.S. Southern Command, Gen. Charles Wilhelm USMC, (Ret.), whose purview included Cuba, told NPR, "During my three year tenure, from September 1997 until September 2000 at Southern Command, I didn’t receive a single report or a single piece of evidence that would have lead me to the conclusion that Cuba was in fact developing, producing or weaponizing biological or chemical agents."
In his speech, Bolton took issue with a 1998 report by the Defense Intelligence Agency that concluded that Cuba was not a major military threat to the United States. Although the report mentioned Cuba’s biotechnology industry as cause for concern, according to Bolton, the report downplayed the Cuban threat because a Cuban spy helped write it -- Ana Belen Montes, a former U.S. analyst now convicted of espionage. But as recently as January, with Montes safely in prison, another official U.S. government report made no mention of Cuba’s WMD efforts.
The CIA’s "Unclassified Report to Congress on the Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Chemical Munitions," released in January, mentions nine countries who acquired or sought WMD and three countries who are "key suppliers." Cuba is not mentioned at all. In fact, since the CIA was required by law in 1997 to start submitting this report every six months, no issue has ever mentioned Cuba.
Why not? One possibility is mentioned by the report, which states: "We have excluded countries that already have substantial WMD programs…as well as countries that demonstrated little WMD acquisition activity of concern." No one has asserted that Cuba has a substantial WMD arsenal. It is then likely that the CIA never included Cuba’s WMD acquisition efforts in its report because, in their opinion, it demonstrated little "WMD acquisition activity of concern." On the other hand, the portion of the report on Cuba might be left out of the unclassified version.
That latter interpretation is bolstered by the likelihood that the United States has previously accused of Cuba of violating the Biological Weapons Convention, if only by inference. Every year, under the Biological Weapons Convention, which Cuba has signed and ratified, the United States has accused several nations of developing biological weapons in violation of the treaty. The United States has specifically named some of these countries, but has not revealed others. Analysts speculated that the missing nations could include Cuba, Taiwan, Israel or Indonesia, all of which have been accused of having biological weapons. As recently as January, Bolton declined to say whether Cuba was one of the nations the United States had in mind. His recent accusations, however, indicate that Cuba is one the three. But if Cuba was not mentioned before, why mention it now? And why do so without giving evidence?
Following a growing effort in the United States to reexamine relations with Cuba, former President Jimmy Carter is leading a delegation to Cuba from May 12 to May 17. The Bush administration is due in the coming weeks to release both a review of U.S. policy toward Cuba and its report on state sponsors of terrorism, which will include Cuba. The timing of Bolton’s remarks raises suspicions that they are intended to undercut a burgeoning desire on both sides for a rapprochement between the two states and to justify a more hawkish policy toward Cuba. In the days since Bolton’s speech, editorials, academics, and the Cubans themselves have accused the Bush administration of playing politics with the war on terrorism and called for proof of the purported Cuban bioweapons program. Those suspicions are enough reason for Bolton and Ford to give some idea of what evidence substantiates their claims. Surely more information could be provided without jeopardizing intelligence sources.
The risk of states allowing terrorist to acquire weapons of mass destruction is the most severe threat we face, as President Bush has said. If Cuba -- or any other nation -- has such weapons and proliferates them it is cause for allegations and actions. But it is incumbent on those who make such accusations to explain to frightened Americans what lies behind them, and to explain why the threat is suddenly being showcased. When President George W. Bush lays out his Cuba policy on May 20 in Miami, he should provide evidence for Bolton’s claims. American credibility is critical in the fight against terrorism. It follows that the United States ought not to make allegations it is not prepared to substantiate. Allowing politics to bias the war on terrorism, or even allowing the perception that politics is biasing the war on terrorism to flourish, would undermine that credibility and deflect attention from the places where dangers lie. That would harm the war on terrorism more than it would help it.
Pentagon to Classify Missile Defense Testing Details -- According to Defense Daily (May 15), the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) will now classify details of upcoming flight tests of the ground-based midcourse missile defense (GMD) program. Said MDA spokesperson Lt. Col. Rick Lehner, "It will our policy to no longer offer specifics about the targets or countermeasures used in the flight tests." MDA states that changes are necessary because the tests are getting very complex and the agency is concerned that the release of sensitive information will hurt national security. Critics of the program, however, speculate that this is an attempt to avoid oversight of the program or squelch concerns about the realism of the tests.
UN Revises Iraq Sanctions -- In an attempt to ease the burden on civilians, the UN Security Council unanimously approved a resolution revising economic sanctions Iraq. The new sanctions will allow a much broader range of consumer goods to enter the country. The agreement among the fifteen permanent and rotating members of the Security Council came after the rejection of a proposal by Syria, which currently occupies one of the rotating seats, to include language recognizing Iraq’s right to defend itself under Article 51 of the UN charter. The new sanctions take effect in July, and will have to be renewed after six months.
Pentagon to Review "Handful" of Weapons Programs -- The Pentagon’s new Defense Planning Guidance (DPG), which will help the Defense Department develop its budget request for fiscal years 2004-2009, calls for the review of a "handful" of weapons acquisition programs, according to Pentagon officials. The review is to determine whether the systems meet the Pentagon’s transformation goals, and if not, how they might be adapted. The Pentagon refuses to specify which programs, but according to various news sources the new DPG calls for a review of alternatives to the Army’s Crusader artillery system, which Defense Secretary Rumsfeld canceled last week, and for the examination of different versions of the Air Force’s F-22 fighter plane.
Patriot Missile Defense Test Now Called Unsuccessful -- The most recent intercept test of the Patriot (PAC)-3, which occurred on April 25 was not successful, as the Army and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) initially reported. At the time it was believed that one PAC-3 missile intercepted its target while the other PAC-3 missile failed to launch. Said an Army statement, "Subsequent analysis indicates that the PAC-3 made contact with the target but failed to destroy it. Since the warhead wasn't destroyed, it won't be counted as a successful intercept." Two more operational tests are scheduled to take place this month.
Roof Collapses at Russian Cosmodrome -- The roof of one of the largest buildings at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan collapsed on Monday, killing as many as eight construction workers who were on the roof at the time of the collapse and fell from a height of 260 feet. Once part of the Soviet Union, Baikonur is now leased from the Kazakh government by Russia, and is a source of some tension between the two countries because of the large numbers of Russian troops stationed in the area. The facility is used for the assembly Energia and Buran rockets. Although the cause of the collapse is unknown, investigators are looking at possible structural problems or whether something fell on one of the rocket engines stored there, causing an explosion. Baikonur is the only site Russia uses for manned space flights. The world’s first satellite was launched there in 1957, as was the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, in 1961.
Quotation of the Week -- "[The United States and Cuba] have been trapped in a destructive state of belligerence for 42 years, and it is time for us to change our relationship and the way we think and talk about each other. Because the United States is the most powerful nation, we should take the first step," speech by former president Jimmy Carter at the University of Havana, Cuba, May 14, 2002.
This Week on SUPERPOWER: Global Affairs TV -- "Isolated from the International Criminal Court"
Sunday at 12:30 pm on MHz2 (check local listings) "SUPERPOWER: Global Affairs TV" showcases international television coverage of world events. Host Lisa Simeone along with Mark Thompson of Time Magazine and Jefferson Morley of the washingtonpost.com, discuss current events with a regular rotation of foreign journalists, as well as other guests from the foreign military and diplomatic communities in Washington.
This Week’s Episode: "Isolated from the International Criminal Court"
This week, Superpower examines the International Criminal Court and the recent decision by the U.S. administration to nullify President Clinton's joining signature. Since the ICC has been ratified by enough countries around the world, will it be an effective tool at interpreting international law? Why are so many U.S. officials averse to the idea of the ICC? What role might the ICC play in the war on terrorism? What does this mean for Americans?
Joining Lisa Simeone will be Philip Tazi of the Cameroon Herald and Dieter Dettke of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.
Where to watch: http://www.mhznetworks.org/cable/listings.html
For more information, please send an e-mail to: info@superpowertv.org