[PEN-L:27164] Bush's Middle East War Plan

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Bush's long awaited speech has been reported with some scepticism by the
BBC:-  It is a clever plan. It carefully puts the responsibility on the
Palestinian's to achieve peace, and sets them impossible goals. Bush is not
very interested in peace in the Middle East: his priority is that he must
not appear weak in the "war against terrorism" in front of audiences in the
US.

Some aspects of the plan reflect analytical thinking. It appears to conform
to the model of allegedly enlightened capitalism imposed on the Balkans and
Afghanistan. Nevertheless it violates all the established principles of
conflict theory that you have to get the protagonists round the table.

Further it has code about corruption - which is probably a reference to
informal social and financial networks within the Palestinian society in
which the radical islamic groups move with ease.

It fails the test of a democratic approach to conflict resolution to work
upwards from helping the local people themselves to stabilise their lives
and on the basis of cooperative labour and peaceful trade.

His call for

> reforms in Palestinian finances, encouraging transparency
> and independent auditing.


is particularly laughable as world wide investors are shunning US stocks
after Enron and Anderson. This really reveals his cultural prejudices.


There are also coded swipes at Europe. In the bipolar world before the fall
of the Berlin wall, the US used anti-communism to whip its alies and
hangers on into line. Now Bush has to use the (crusade) against terrorism.

> I've said in the past that nations are either with us or against us in the
> war on terror.


> Every nation actually committed to peace must block the
> shipment of Iranian supplies to these groups, and oppose regimes that
> promote terror, like Iraq.


But consider this story from Wednesday's IHT.

> EU, in split with Bush, seeks Iran trade pact Barry James International
> Herald Tribune Wednesday, June 19, 2002
>
> 'Enormous potential' is seen in deal
>
> PARIS European Union foreign ministers have agreed to seek negotiations on
> a trade and cooperation agreement with Iran, marking a split with the
> United States.
>
> At a time when Washington is openly discussing the prospect of action to
> topple President Saddam Hussein of Iraq, the EU's decision sends a strong
> signal that Europe will act independently in the Middle East, according to
> observers at a meeting of foreign ministers in Luxembourg, who said that
> both the United States and Israel had lobbied hard to prevent a deal.

http://www.iht.com/articles/61800.htm

The rules of interimperialist rivalry nowadays are that any split must not
be too explicit.

Bush is gambling that Europe will not dare to contradict his speech,
although it is a speech for continued war against the Palestinians. Europe
however will mutter and gossip. It will note the splits in the US
administration, and note the likelihood that it will fail to bring peace to
the Middle East. Where it does, Europe will be ready to move in to get
economic advantage where it can in place of the US, with (somewhat) cleaner
hands as far as the islamic peoples are concerned.

Meanwhile the collapse of the dollar in international exchanges emphasises
to Europe that the US is not almighty.

Yes finance capitalism and its intelligentsia cannot approve of suicide
bombers, but it expects peace plans to be more scientific than to simply to
crush an oppressed people. If Arafat calls Bush's bluff, stands for
election and wins again, Europe will ask what has happened to Bush's
inititiave. There are limits to the number of tours Colin Powell can carry
off in the Middle East, each designed to fail, before people realise there
is something wrong with the plot.



Chris Burford