So back when Iraq invaded Kuwait, the UN passed economic sanctions on Iraq.
And when Gulf War I was over, the sanctions regime was continued, contingent on Iraq’s adherence to the cease-fire conditions — which included, of course, giving up WMDs and promising to work and play well with others.
Saddam never did, of course, and his cat-and-mouse with UN inspectors eventually drove them out of the country. The sanctions continued.
Of course, there were loud cries as to how these sanctions will killing zillions of people, and how they ought to be lifted.
The sanctions regime metamorphosed into the Oil for Food program. The idea was that the UN would monitor Iraqi oil sales to see that the revenues were being used for Good, Virtuous Things, like food and medicine, and not for weapons and anthrax samples.
So, where are we today?
The Iraqi regime that was developing/hiding WMDs has been overthrown.
The country is under the military control of an UNSC member, which is, one should note, paying for getting Iraq’s oil producing capabilities back up to snuff. It’s also paying for massive aid to Iraq, and helping rebuild its infrastructure and its government.
The US wants the sanctions and the Oil for Food program suspended, so that Iraqi oil can pay for some of all this — to the direct benefit of the Iraqi people.
The threat is over.
Not so fast. The countries — France, Russia, and Syria — that were most approving of lifting sanctions once upon a time, are suddenly loathe to do so, until the UN is able to certify that Iraq is free of WMDs — a task that was once estimated would take months, if not years, under the cloud-cuckoo ideal cooperation from the old regime.
And the UN leadership seems inclined to support this.
But … isn’t the threat over? Aren’t sanctions and Oil for Food a hardship on the Iraqi people?
Well, yeah, but there are, after all, bigger things to worry about. We don’t want to legitimize the war, after all, by pretending that it happened and we have to respond to it. And, since we all know the US is after Iraqi oil, we can’t let that happen.
And, after all, the UN gets billions of dollars for “administration” of the Oil for Food program. Without any oversight or supervision or auditing of who gets how much, or why, or for what.
And while France now grudgingly accepts removing sanctions (“We’re willing to sell them anything they want!”), it still wants the Oil for Food program to be maintained, under UN control (and with the same EU-style secrecy that it’s been operating under). That way, it can be sure that French oil companies get to keep their contracts, and that the UN (France) gets to have a say in Iraq’s rebuilding. Control the purse strings, control the country.
Interesting times ahead.
Economic control has always been partially what this war was all about. The threat of OPEC exchanging their oil currency from USD to the Euro has had severe ramifications, which is what might really be driving a lot of current US foreign policy.
You can rail about the sanctions all you want, but smart sanctions were always the way to go, not war, and not the current sanctions.
Technically, the sanctions are in place until such a time that Iraq is shown to have no more WMD. Isn’t that what the war was all about, Dave? WMD? Or was it about liberating the Iraqi people? Or was it about establishing a US base in the heart of the Middle East?
How come we haven’t found any WMD? Every single time we hear something has been found, it turns out that we didn’t. Did Saddam destroy things in the weeks leading up to the war? Well, isn’t that what he was supposed to be doing, if he had them?
Look, I’m no Saddam apologist; I think our own policies are screwed up, since we’ve never, ever stuck to one particular thread — we changed it daily.
Lastly, what if we drop the sanctions, the Iraqis force an Islamic government into power — it is about giving them a chance to govern themselves as they want, isn’t it? — and then they find his weapons, hidden underground somewhere? Do you want an anti-US government to have these weapons?
This is exactly what I’ve been arguing about since the push for war became so intense. There’s been no thought given beyond the neo-con/PNAC agenda, whose worldview is completely out of whack with reality.
Let’s see Scott, we haven’t found any WMDs so they must not exist. Is that right? So with that logic, Scott, since we haven’t found Saddam, he must not have existed either. Or Osama Bin Laden, we haven’t found him, so he doesn’t exist. The FACT is that Saddam and his cronies have shown that a) they have had in their possesion WMDs and b) that they have the state of mind to use them (Iranians and Kurds).
As Adam notes, not only did the UNMOVIC find (and destroy) large amount of WMD material back in the early 90s, but Iraq claimed that it had quite a bit as well — and claimed that it destroyed it (but couldn’t produce any records of same).
Is that believable?
Interesting article here on the WMD search. It’s critical of some of the moves taken so far, but it also notes that, given the now-demonstrated Iraqi tendency to (a) bury stuff, and (b) hide stuff in the most apalling places (yes, we really do have to search elementary schools for chemical weapons stores), tracking down all of this stuff is going to take a long time.
The purpose of the sanctions was to compel Iraq to comply with arms inspections and to prevent the Iraqi government from bringing in more WMD raw material and equipment. As things currently stand, both of those points are are handled. Maintaining the sanctions makes no sense; maintaining the Oil for Food program (which was an appendix to the sanctions) makes no sense, either.