effect on global relations
Noting that throughout history war has been "the normal state of affairs," and a phenomenon that we need to understand, President Richard C. Levin convened a panel of five Yale professors on March 26 to help explain the present conflict in Iraq to students who have barely known war at all.
The crowd that gathered for the panel filled the Law School's Levinson Auditorium and spilled over into nearby classrooms where audience members could watch the event via live-feed on television.
The forum was a revival of the "teach-in," a tradition that grew out of the controversial Vietnam War, explained John Gaddis, the Robert A. Lovett Professor of Military and Naval History, who moderated the event.
The faculty speaking at the teach-in were Paul Kennedy, the J. Richardson Dilworth Professor of History; Ellen Lust-Okar, assistant professor of political science and director of undergraduate studies in ethics, politics and economics; Charles Hill, visiting lecturer in the International Affairs Council of the Yale Center for International and Area Studies; and Donald Kagan, Sterling Professor of Classics and History.
While the tone of the March 26 event was respectful and civil (unlike some of the teach-ins during the Vietnam era), the panelists reflected a wide range of opinions -- from Hill's assessment that the future of democratic societies depends on the military victory of the Coalition of the Willing to Paul Kennedy's concern that a fractured United Nations Security Council will not be able to defuse threatening conflicts in other parts of the world.
The one point on which the panelists seemed to agree was that the coalition forces would win the war in the end.
Asked by Gaddis to remark particularly on events of the first week of the war, the panelists considered its historical context and the future its outcome might determine.
Lust-Okar compared this war to the Gulf War 12 years ago and found many fundamental differences. Prominent among them, she noted, is America's lack of international support in this war, especially among former Arab allies in the Middle East. Lust-Okar said that following Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, which precipitated the 1991 Gulf War, "There was no question about who the aggressor was. ... You're getting a lot more discussion now about U.S. aggression in the region," she said.
It is also significant, she observed, that the Gulf War was fought in Kuwait, not in Iraq. "That's going to change the nature of the war itself," she said. "Iraqis are fighting for their lives. At least the regime is fighting for its life."
Lust-Okar also expressed doubt at whether deposing Saddam would necessarily make things better in a country that is fraught with ethnic and religious rivalries. Saddam, she suggested, might present a stabilizing force among the Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish factions of Iraq. "Is this regime the worst alternative?" she asked.
Whether Hussein is alive or dead, she concluded, is less important than the fate of the regime he represents.
Last, she pointed to the presence of Al Jazeera and other Arabic cable news stations that broadcast a viewpoint quite different from that of CNN, which dominated the airwaves in the Gulf War of 1991. "Now," she said, "you have two very different narratives going on."
Hill had a much more optimistic view of the war's outcome, but called for a serious diplomatic effort following a coalition victory -- which, he predicted, is imminent. While he said that "the U.N. has disgraced itself" in handling the Iraq crisis, he conceded that it could be useful in providing humanitarian, social and economic aid in the aftermath. He thought it especially important that the U.N. administer free elections and lead peacekeeping efforts after the war is over.
Hill also expressed hope that the Arab League would provide a stabilizing force in the region. "It could be indispensable in the process of relegitimizing Iraq as a state in good standing in the world," he said.
He went on to share his perspective on the broader world picture. Instead of a Cold War, he said, we now have a new international system supported by a Russian-U.S. coalition, and rather than a rivalry between two superpowers, we now have one international system faced with two major threats.
On the one hand, Hill sees groups such as Al Qaeda epitomizing the "non-state" terrorism of religious fanatics and "revolutionary ideology." On the other hand -- and no less threatening, he noted --are the nations governed by gang lords and tyrants like Saddam Hussein "masquerading" as legitimized states. Hill said it is incumbent on nations of the international system to defeat the terrorist groups and the rogue states that threaten its existence. He sees this as the greatest challenge America has faced since the end of World War II, yet he is optimistic for a happy outcome. "If we act with urgency and moreover with solidarity we can bring this war to a successful conclusion and in far less time than the Cold War," he concluded.
In his presentation, Kennedy listed ways in which the events of the last week had, or had not, surprised him. He was not surprised, he said, that Bush had rejected his advice to continue using containment against Hussein; that there had been sandstorms in the desert; that the Iraqis were trying to defend themselves; that there were civilian casualties; that there had been no uprising among the Iraqis against Hussein; and that Haliburton, the corporation once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, had just been awarded the first government contract to rebuild Iraq. Kennedy was also not surprised by the administration's ongoing attempt to recruit allies to the coalition, and noted, to much laughter, that Micronesia had just joined the Coalition of the Willing.
What had surprised him, Kennedy noted, was that the "U.S. Congress has been so incredibly supine." Rather than vociferously questioning the Bush administration, Congress was passing resolutions about "Freedom fries," he said.
"It has a job -- the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the House Armed Services Committee -- and it's not really doing it," he contended.
He also expressed dismay that Americans, according to the opinion polls, were being "so rosy and optimistic. As if this war was a video arcade war. ... They expected to win without casualties, without nastiness, without wartime atrocities, without prisoners of war, without [soldiers] missing in action."
"We will win," Kennedy assured the audience, but the United States must be prepared to face the long-term "collateral damage." He named a much weakened NATO, the questionable viability of the U.N. Security Council to deal with world crises and America's standing in the Arab world as among the possible casualties of the war in Iraq.
"I am surprised by one thing, out of my wits," said Kagan, opening his remarks. "I listened to my colleagues and I have not heard anything that bothered me very much." He did say he was perplexed, though, by Kennedy's surprise at the popular optimism regarding the war. "The American people are always naïve," Kagan said. "People believe what the media tell them."
One reason the war is much tougher than most expected is that "America is fighting this war with its arms tied behind its back," reported Kagan. The American military is "desperately concerned to see to it that nobody gets killed."
He questioned the strategic sense of America's reluctance to use its full force in waging the war and was surprised and disappointed that the Turks had not joined the coalition. Kagan said the United States had no reason to expect a quick and easy surrender. Most Iraqis hate Saddam Hussein, he said, but they also hate the United States.
"History teaches me that when attacked for whatever reason by an outsider, nations and people tend to pull together with their fellow nationals as their first instinct and it takes quite a lot to shake them loose," Kagan said.
Kagan took the U.S. Department of Defense to task for leading people to believe the war would be easy. Nonetheless, he said, he was surprised by the speed of American advances. He thinks that the reported problems of the coalition at the onset of the war had been exaggerated by the media. "We need to be prepared for an unpleasant war that will be longer than we had been prepared for," he summed up.
Kagan also agreed with his colleagues that war is only the first step in establishing stability in the region.
-- By Dorie Baker
Repercussions of war
The Yale Center for International and Area Studies (YCIAS) will host a panel on "The War and Its Repercussions" at 4 p.m. on Thursday, April 10, in the Luce Hall auditorium, 34 Hillhouse Ave.
It is free and open to the public.
The panel will include visiting diplomat Charles Hill (see story, this page); Gustav Ranis, YCIAS director; Bruce Russett, United Nations Studies Program director; Gaddis Smith, the Larned Professor Emeritus of History; and Abbas Amanat, Middle East Studies Council chair, who will moderate.
T H I S
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