Knowledge Partner
Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Diplomatist
Y ears ago, while I was toiling at the United Na * ons, the interna * onal community— gathered together at the level of heads of state and government at a Millennium Summit in New York— endorsed the idea that they had a collec * ve responsibility to protect civilians whose own governments were unable or unwilling to do so. Sovereignty was all very well, the world leaders agreed, but it came with certain du * es to the people in whose name it was exercised, and if sovereign governments couldn’ t prevent massive human rights abuses( or worse, inflicted them on their own people), then the world had the duty to do something about it. The new doctrine was immediately dubbed‘ R2P’, short for‘ responsibility to protect’.
This was a twist to the earlier arguments for‘ the right to humanitarian interven * on’, turning the issue on its head: the principle was no longer about the right of foreigners to intervene in third countries for humanitarian purposes, but rather their responsibility to protect people, if necessarily through interven * on. The evoca * ve image behind R2P was that of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, when perhaps a million people died in a mass slaughter conducted by machete-wielding Tutsi mili * a— a horror that could have been prevented had the interna * onal community taken on such a responsibility, and intervened with a few thousand troops, instead of withdrawing the UN Blue Helmets who already happened to be there.
It all sounded very noble and altruis * c. The UK’ s telegenic and hyper-ar * culate then prime minister, Tony Blair, memorably declared that in the future, the West would go to war in the name of its values, not just of its interests. The wars of the future, Blair and his acolytes argued, would be fought for peace and human rights, not over something as crass as na * onal interests, oil
Indeed, the first major military interven @ on aier the Millennium Summit— the Iraq war in 2003— was ini @ ally sought to be couched in the language of humanitarianism by its proponents.
( perish the thought!) or imperial lust for territorial aggrandizement. The only catch in all this was in applying the principle to an actual case. As Rwanda had revealed, governments were all-too-unwilling to risk blood and treasure for the sake of foreign lives. Would armies actually intervene out of disinterested humanitarianism, or only do so when such declared intent in fact masked more cynical mo * ves?
Indeed, the first major military interven * on ajer the Millennium Summit— the Iraq war in 2003— was ini * ally sought to be couched in the language of humanitarianism by its proponents. But this was hotly rejected by the votaries of R2P, who argued that the war was squarely anchored in Washington’ s geopoli * cal interests rather than in any real concern for suffering Iraqi civilians. Blairite altruism never quite recovered its credibility in the ajermath of Iraq.
R2P has suddenly come to life again, though, with the aerial military interven * on by NATO forces in Libya. Since the UN Security Council resolu * on that authorized the ac * on permiQed countries to use‘ all necessary means’ to stop the assaults by Gaddafi’ s forces on Libyans rising up against his oppressive regime, the bombardments were described as humanitarian in intent, aimed at saving Libyan lives. The idea was supposed to be to level the playing field so that a peaceful seQlement could be nego * ated by the contending par * es, as had happened in Egypt and Tunisia. This was meant to be a war for peace.
It hasn’ t worked out that way. The Western air forces did not simply stop their ac * on once they had neutralized Gaddafi’ s aQacks on rebel-held Benghazi. They went on pounding ground targets, causing considerable civilian casual * es. An aQack on Gaddafi’ s compound, which killed one of his children, suggests that the objec * ve has moved well beyond the imposi * on of a‘ no-flight zone’ to protect civilians on the ground to geqng rid of Gaddafi himself— in effect, regime change. Exactly as it eventually transpired.
My American writer friend David Rieff, who was once an enthusias * c interven * onist in the civil war in Yugoslavia but has since recanted( see his book, At the Point of a Gun) now cri * cizes‘ the messianic dream of
Image 37: President George W. Bush, surrounded by leaders of the House and Senate, announces the Joint ResoluLon to authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq, October 2, 2002.
My American writer friend David Rieff, who was once an enthusias * c interven * onist in the civil war in Yugoslavia but has since recanted( see his book, At the Point of a Gun) now cri * cizes‘ the messianic dream of remaking the world in either the image of American democracy or of the legal utopias of interna * onal human rights law’. This is not just because it isn’ t easy to do, nor that it involves taking more lives than it saves. It’ s also, simply, because Rieff, and gradually other Americans, are coming around to the view that interven * on isn’ t right in any circumstances. He even told the New York Times’ Maureen Dowd that‘ Qaddafi is a terrible man, but I don’ t think it’ s the business of the United States to overthrow him. Those who want America to support democra * c movements and
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