76. Ibid.
77. Ibid.
78. George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed (Knopf: New York, 1998), 487.
79. George Bush, “A Question of Policy.” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 27, March 27, 1991, 369.
80. Bush and Scowcroft, A World Transformed, 482.
81. Ibid., 483.
82. Ibid., 486–487.
83. Ibid., 488–490.
84. Col. David H. Hackworth, “The Snake That Slithered Off for Another Day,” Palm Beach Post, September 15, 1996.
85. Bush and Scowcroft, A World Transformed, 487.
86. Max Van der Stoel, special rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights, “Report on the Situation of Human Rights in Iraq,” prepared in accordance with Commission Resolution 1991/74, February 18, 1992, paragraph 100, p. 28.
87. Ibid., paragraphs 100, 104, pp. 28–29.
88. Ibid., paragraph 152, p. 64.
89. UN Security Council Resolution 688 (S/Res/688), April 5, 1991.
90. See Charter of the United Nations, Article 2(4).
91. UN Security Council Resolution 688 “On Repression of Iraqi Civilians”
The Security Council,
Mindful of its duties and its responsibilities under the Charter of the United Nations for the maintenance of international peace and security,
Recalling Article 2, paragraph 7, of the Charter of the United Nations,
Gravely concerned by the repression of the Iraqi civilian population in many parts of Iraq, including most recently in Kurdish populated areas which led to a massive flow of refugees toward and across international frontiers and to cross border incursions, which threaten international peace and security in the region,
Deeply disturbed by the magnitude of the human suffering involved,
Taking note of the letters sent by the representatives of Turkey and France to the United Nations dated 2 April 1991 and 4 April 1991, respectively (S/22435 and S/22442),
Taking note also of the letters sent by the Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations dated 3 and 4 April 1991, respectively (S/22436 and S/22447),
Reaffirming the commitment of all Member States to the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of Iraq and of all States in the area,
Bearing in mind the Secretary-General’s report of 20 March 1991 (S/22366),
Condemns the repression of the Iraqi civilian population in many parts of Iraq, including most recently in Kurdish populated areas, the consequences of which threaten international peace and security in the region;
Demands that Iraq, as a contribution to removing the threat to international peace and security in the region, immediately end this repression and expresses the hope in the same context that an open dialogue will take place to ensure that the human and political rights of all Iraqi citizens are respected;
Insists that Iraq allow immediate access by international humanitarian organizations to all those in need of assistance in all parts of Iraq and to make available all necessary facilities for their operations;
Requests the Secretary-General to pursue his humanitarian efforts in Iraq and to report forthwith, if appropriate on the basis of a further mission to the region, on the plight of the Iraqi civilian population, and in particular the Kurdish population, suffering from the repression in all its forms inflicted by the Iraqi authorities;
Requests further the Secretary-General to use all the resources at his disposal, including those of the relevant United Nations agencies, to address urgently the critical needs of the refugees and displaced Iraqi population;
Appeals to all Member States and to all humanitarian organizations to contribute to these humanitarian relief efforts
Demands that Iraq cooperate with the Secretary-General to these ends;
Decides to remain seized of the matter.
92. William Drozdiak, “Europeans to Press Bush to Back Enclave Plan, EC Responds to Outrage Over Kurds’ Plight,” Washington Post, April 11, 1991.
93. George Bush, “Remarks at Maxwell AFB War College, Montgomery, Alabamba,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 27, April 13, 1991, 431.
94. George Bush, “Address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York City,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 28, September 21, 1992, 1697.
95. Bush and Scowcroft, A World Transformed, 491–492.
96. UN Department of Public Information, The Blue Helmets, A Review of United Nations’ Peacekeeping, 18 UN Doc. DPI/1065, Sales No. E.90 I.18 (1990), Part I, pp. 5–7.
97. UN Security Council Resolution 688 (S/Res/688), April 5, 1991.
98. UN Security Council Resolution 794 (S/Res/794), December 3, 1992.
99. UN Security Council Resolution 687, (S/Res/687), April 3, 1991.
100. Thomas Pickering, United Nations press release, “Security Council Says Iraq’s Unconditional Agreement to Implement Obligations of Resolutions Essential Precondition for Reconsideration of Sanctions,” Federal News Service, February 19, 1992. Also, John M. Goshko, “UN Charges Iraq with Violations: New Confrontation Over Arms Looms,” Washington Post, March 12, 1992.
101. Rowan Scarborough and Frank J. Murray, “Iraq Backs Down, Allows Inspections; Bush Keeps Pressure High,” Washington Times, July 27, 1992.
102. See Article III, “Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,” International Atomic Energy Agency Information Circular. April 22, 1970. http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Infcircs/Others/infcirc140.pdf. Also, “Statue of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),” July 29, 1957, Article XII, Agency Safeguards, which states:
A. With respect to any Agency Project, or other arrangement where the Agency is requested by the parties concerned to apply safeguards, the Agency shall have the following rights and responsibilities to the extent relevant to the project of arrangement:…6. To send into the territory of the recipient state or States inspectors, designated by the Agency after consultation with the State or States concerned…and with any other conditions prescribed in the agreement between the Agency and the State or States concerned. [Emphasis added.]
Iraq has consistently violated the terms of Section A6 of Article XII, which states, “Inspectors designated by the Agency shall be accompanied by representatives of the authorities of the State concerned, if that State so requests, provided that the inspectors shall not thereby be delayed or otherwise impeded in the exercise of their functions.” [Emphasis added.] In Resolution 687 on April 3, 1991, the Security Council charged the IAEA with identifying and destroying Iraq’s nuclear weapons capabilities.
103. See “IAEA Statute,” Article IV, Membership and Article VI, Board of Governors.
104. George Bush, “Annual State of the Union Address,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 27, January 29, 1991, 90.
105. Lawrence Martin, “Peacekeeping as a Growth Industry,” National Interest, no. 32 (Summer 1993).
2. SAVING SOMALIA
1. Barry M. Blechman and Tamara Cofmen Wittes, Defining Moment: The Threat and Use of Force in American Foreign Policy Since 1989, Committee on International Conflict Resolution, Occasional Paper No 1. (Washington, DC: National Research Council, 1998).
2. Joel S. Migdal described the characteristics of such “states” in his book Strong Societies and Weak States: State Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988). Migdal’s model and description resemble the pattern of political development offered in Gabriel Almond and G. Bingham Powell, Comparative Politics, a Developmental Approach (Boston: Little Brown, 1966), and other studies in that series. However, Migdal focused sharply on state/society boundaries, interactions, and development. In fact, such states were less “failed” than weak.
3. Gerald B. Helman and Steven R. Ratner, “Saving Failed States,” Foreign Policy, no. 89 (Winter 1992): 3–20.
4. Defining an internal breakdown as a “threat to internation
al peace and security” is how the Security Council claims jurisdiction over a situation such as that in Somalia. Charter of the United Nations, Chapter VII, Article 39.
5. “Interim Leader OK’s Caretaker Cabinet,” Los Angeles Times, February 3, 1991.
6. That Egypt had a long-standing close relationship with Said’s government made Boutros-Ghali suspect in the eyes of Said’s enemies, especially Farah Aideed.
7. Anton Ferreira, “More Than 1000 Somalis Die Every Day—Red Cross,” Reuters Library Report, October 5, 1992. Also, William Claiborne and Keith B. Richburg, “U.S. Envoy Arranges Talks Between Top Somali Warlords,” Washington Post, December 11, 1992. The United Nations estimated that “out of a total population of 8 million, approximately 4.5 million Somalis required urgent external assistance. Of those some 1.5 million people were at immediate risk of starvation, including 1 million children.” Boutros Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 1992–1996 (New York: United Nations Department of Public Information, 1996), 5.
8. Mohamed Sahnoun, Somalia: The Missed Opportunities (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1994), 18.
9. Ibid., 28–29.
10. UN Security Council Resolution 751 (1992), April 24, 1992.
11. The violence in Mogadishu in July 1992 was judged too great to permit Senator Nancy Kassebaum from visiting the city. Jane Perlez, “UN Observer Unit to Go to Somalia,” New York Times, July 20, 1992.
12. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, “Report of the secretary-general on the situation in Somalia, proposing the deployment of four additional security units, each with 750 troops, in Bossacco, Berbera, Kismayo, and the Southwest,” S/24480, August 24, 1992, and addendum, S/24480/Add.1, August 28, 1992, in Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 187.
13. Sahnoun, Somalia, 27.
14. Robert Kaplan, “Continental Drift,” The New Republic, December 28, 1992(v. 207, n. 27), p. 28.15. Sahnoun, Somalia, 37–40.
16. Ibid., 28.
17. Ibid., and Thomas W. Lippman, “UN Chief Faulted in Somalia Mess,” Washington Post, August 29, 1994.
18. Mohamed Sahnoun, “This Way Out (of Somalia),”Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 7, 1993.
19. Michael Maren, The Road to Hell (New York: The Free Press, 1997), 214–15.
20. “The Somalia intervention was a unique geopolitical event…In sum, Bush’s intervention in Somalia contained the seeds of a new doctrine: that Americans would fight for human and moral values, in contrast to the cold war, when it was willing to fight only for its strategic interests.” In William G. Hyland, Clinton’s World (Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1999), 54.
21. UN Security Council Resolution 678 (1990), November 29, 1990.
22. Somalia was not the first instance of the deliberate use of hunger and famine as a weapon of war in Africa. Mengistui Haile Mariam had produced mass famine in Ethiopia in the decade before famine developed in Somalia, and many thousands of Ethiopians died. One important difference was the absence of foreign troops in Ethiopia. Another difference was in the lesser control exercised by any one faction leader in Somalia.
23. Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait had created an international problem, not an internal problem. Both Iraq and Kuwait were recognized as wholly independent members of the United Nations.
24. Charter of the United Nations, Chapter VII, Article 39, et seq.
25. UN Security Council Resolution 688 (1991), April 5, 1991, on Repression of Iraqi Civilians, “The Security Council…Gravely concerned by the repression of the Iraqi civilian population in many parts of Iraq, including most recently in Kurdish populated areas which led to a massive flow of refugees toward and across international frontiers and to cross-border incursions, which threaten international peace and security in the region.”
26. Not only was there a humanitarian catastrophe, but the Bush administration believed that Somalia “was a problem it was able to solve, indeed one that only the U.S. was capable of solving, and at relatively little cost…. The differences between Bosnia and Somalia were thus quite clear and rest fundamentally in the perception of the Bush administration, and particularly of the Pentagon, that the mission in Somalia was achievable.” In Steven Hurst, The Foreign Policy of the Bush Administration: In Search of a New World Order (New York: Cassell, 1999), 220.
27. John M. Goshko, “UN Orders U.S.-Led Force Into Somalia,” Washington Post, December 4, 1992.
28. Eagleburger quoted: “This is a tragedy of massive proportions…and, underline this, one that we could do something about.” In Patrick Glynn, “The ‘Doable’ War: Somalia v. Bosnia. Now,” New Republic, August 16, 1993, 15.
29. George Bush, “Address to the 46th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 27, September 23, 1991, 1324.
30. Alan Elsner, “Baker Attacked in Congress for UN Peacekeeping Expenditures,” Reuters Library Report, March 3, 1992.
31. Secretary of State James A. Baker, III, “Hearing of the Commerce, Justice, State and Judiciary Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, State Department Fiscal Year 1993 Funding Proposal,” March 3, 1992.
32. Ibid.
33. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, An Agenda for Peace, Preventative Diplomacy, Peacemaking and Peacekeeping (New York: United Nations, 1992).
34. The reasoning resembled that in the somewhat similar decision that was made concerning Iraq’s repression of Kurds and Shiites after the Gulf War (Res.688), where massive human rights violations by the government of Iraq were said to constitute a serious threat to international peace and security.
35. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, “Empowering the United Nations,” Foreign Affairs 71, no. 5 (December 1992): 89.
36. Ibid., 91. He commented, “It is difficult to avoid wondering whether the conditions exist for successful peacekeeping in what was Yugoslavia.” In fact, the necessary conditions did not exist in either the former Yugoslavia or Somalia.
37. Boutros-Ghali, An Agenda for Peace, 13–38, 41–45.
38. Letter dated November 29, 1992, from the secretary-general to the president of the Security Council presenting five options for the Security Council’s consideration, S/24868, November 30, 1992, in Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 209–212.
39. Ibid., 212. In explaining his idea of how the fifth option would operate and his clear preference for that course of action, Boutros-Ghali writes, “The focus of the Council’s immediate action should be to create conditions in which relief supplies can be delivered to those in need. Experience has shown that this cannot be achieved by a United Nations operation based on the accepted principles of peacekeeping. There is now no alternative but to resort to Chapter VII of the Charter…If forceful action is taken, it should preferably be under United Nations Command and Control. If this is not feasible, an alternative would be an operation undertaken by Member States acting with the authorization of the Security Council.” In Boutros-Ghali’s mind, U.S. troops undertaking the Somali operation under the command and control of a competent U.S. military and its democratically elected leaders was less “preferable” than the submission of U.S. troops to the personal command and control of Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali.
40. The commander in chief of the U.S. Central Command (also the commander of Operation Restore Hope) argued in an article published the following year that “disarmament was…neither realistically achievable nor a prerequisite for the core mission of providing a secure environment for relief operations.” See Joseph P. Hoar, “A CINC’s Perspective,” Joint Force Quarterly, no. 2 (Autumn 1993): 58.
41. John Bolton, “Wrong Turn in Somalia,” Foreign Affairs 73, no. 1 (January/February 1994) (New York: Council on Foreign Relations): 61.
42. On these early understandings and misunderstandings, see especially Robert Oakley, “An Envoy’s Perspective,” Joint Force Quarterly, no.2 (Autumn 1993): 46. Also John L. Hirsch and Robert B. Oakley, Somalia and Operation Restore Hope: Reflections on Peacemaking and Peacekee
ping (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 1995). They stated that “the top UN officials rejected the idea that the U.S. initiative should eventually become a UN peacekeeping operation” (13), but George Bush had said, “once we have created that secure environment, we will withdraw our troops, handing the security mission back to a regular UN peacekeeping force”(14).
43. Rowan Scarborough, “Somalia Dangers Weighed,” Washington Times, December 2, 1992.
44. “Letter dated 29 November 1992 from the Secretary-General to the President of the Security Council presenting five options for the Security Council’s consideration,” S/24868, November 30, 1992, in Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 209.
45. UN Security Council Resolution 794, S/Res/794 (1992), December 3, 1992, paragraph 10.
46. Written statement of President-elect Bill Clinton, issued December 3, 1992.
47. George Bush, “The People of Somalia…the Children…Need Our Help,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 28, December 4, 1992, 2329.
48. George Bush, “Letter to Congressional Leaders on the Situation in Somalia,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 28, December 10, 1992, 2338.
49. “Congressional Leaders Offer Comments on Somalia Plan,” CNN News, Live Report, Transcript #175-3, December 4, 1992.
50. Peter Applebome, “Mission to Somalia,” New York Times, December 13, 1992.
51. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, “Statement made by the Secretary-General to the people of Somalia on United Nations action on security, humanitarian relief, and political reconciliation in Somalia,” UN Press Release SG/SM4874, December 8, 1992, in Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 218.
52. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, “Letter dated 8 December 1992 from the Secretary-General to President Bush of the United States discussing the establishment of a secure environment in Somalia and the need for continuous consultations,” in Boutros-Ghali, The United Nations and Somalia, 216.
Making War to Keep Peace Page 38