U.S. Policy Towards Iraq

Hearing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
Subcommittee on Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs

March 01, 2001

PREPARED STATEMENT OF

DR. MORTON HALPERIN
Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations, Washington, D.C.

Mr. Chairman: It is a great privilege and a pleasure for me to testify once again before this very distinguished committee. I first had the opportunity to appear before this committee when it conducted far ranging hearings on China in 1966. I believe that we are as urgently in need now of a serious debate on Iraq, as we were then on China, and I commend this committee for holding these hearings.

There can be no doubt that what happens in Iraq and how we manage the process of developing a consensus in the international community on Iraq is of enormous importance to American and international security. This is so for at least four reasons.

First, as we learned dramatically a decade ago, Iraq has both the intention and the capability to threaten its neighbors. There is no reason to think this has changed. If Iraq were to conclude that the United States were no longer willing to use force to protect its interests in the Gulf, it would be sorely tempted to press its neighbors. Preventing conventional aggression by Iraq and maintaining the military relations necessary for us to respond effectively if deterrence fails, must be a high priority for the United States.

Second, Iraq poses a direct and immediate threat to our nonproliferation policy. An Iraq with missiles and nuclear or biological weapons would pose a threat to all nations within its reach, including Israel. Moreover, our efforts to extend the principles of nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction to the arc of states in this area would be fatally undercut, if we are unable to prevent Iraq from developing such weapons in the face of very explicit United Nations Security Council resolutions.

Third, our efforts to maintain support for the Middle East Peace Process among the states of the region and to have their assistance on other critical issues, including the price and supply of oil, critically depends on our securing the support of the nation's of the region for our Iraq policy. It is not only that the embargo will continue to erode if it lacks support in the region, but it is also the case that our ability to continue to have the support that we need on other issues will be jeopardized if we pursue a policy towards Iraq which lacks support in the region.

Finally, if we permit the Iraqi sanctions to continue to erode in the face of a clear Security Council mandate, we run the grave risk of undermining the respect for Security Council sanctions, which have served American interests well in many parts of the world.

One of the most important and positive developments of the post-cold war period, was the willingness of the Security Council to use its powers under Chapter VII to impose economic sanctions on states for a variety of infractions of the basic norms of international law and the willingness of almost all states to abide by these rules. We need to remember, however, that there are no effective means to force states to comply with such embargoes and that they often do so at significant economic cost. If the Iraq sanctions simply fail it will be much harder to get the Security Council in the future to impose such sanctions and to get states to obey them.

I start with these points, Mr. Chairman, to underline two basic themes. There can be no question that the stakes are high in how we deal with Iraq. Where there are differences of view, and surely there are, regards how to accomplish these specific goals in ways which are compatible with other worldwide interests. The differences of opinion about what the United States should do in regard to Iraq reflect much less disagreements about the threat posed by Iraq, than differences about how effective different courses of action might be. This reflects the genuine difficulty in ferreting out the facts and interpreting them. I do not believe that disagreements result from differing access to classified information. People with full access disagree with each other as much as they do with those who rely entirely on unclassified information.

I believe that there are three options that are likely to compete for adoption as the Bush Administration reconsiders Iraq policy. The first would be a continuation of the recent trends. The second would involve a refocusing of the sanctions. The third will give higher priority to attempting to replace the current regime. In short, I believe that the first option will inevitably end in disaster, and the third simply cannot be implemented successfully. This leads me to support the second option of focusing on the Iraqi program to develop weapons of mass destruction and its capacity to threaten its neighbors.

Over the past several years there has been a steady erosion in the key elements of our current Iraq policy:

• We have gone from demanding sweeping changes in Iraq, beyond the end of the program to develop weapons of mass destruction, before we would agree to end the embargo, to making ending the weapons of mass destruction program essentially the sole criteria.
• We have gone from demanding the right of UN inspectors to go everywhere to having no inspectors.
• We have gone from severely limiting how much oil Iraq could sell to permitting Iraq to sell as much oil as it can pump.
• We have gone from severely limiting what Iraq can buy with the funds that it gains from its oil sales to permitting it to purchase a much larger—but still very limited—range of items.

And at the same time, as President Bush has noted, the embargo is becoming less and less effective as more oil is sold outside the proscribed UN sanctioned scheme. While the changes that have been made move us closer to what other countries, especially France, Russia and our allies in the region want, there has not been a corresponding increase in support for our Iraqi policy. On the contrary, support continues to decline. Incremental changes simply erode our position without gaining more support for what remains in place.

If we continue down this path Iraq will be able to buy more and more goods within the sanction system, and will have more and more funds from sales conducted in violation of the UN Security Council embargo. One day we will wake up and the whole world will know that the sanctions are no longer working and many more states will feel free to ignore them. The results will be disastrous not only for our Iraq policy, but for our ability to employ UN sanctions in other situations and to have states feel that they have an obligation to act consistent with UNSC resolutions under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.

Despite these clear dangers, the pressures within the government to make only incremental changes in policy are so strong that it will take an act of will with substantial Congressional and public support to move decisively.

Part of the task is to illuminate what the real options are. That is why these hearings are so important and why I very much welcome this opportunity to lay out the option which I believe is most consistent with American interests.

Our concerns about Iraq relate primarily to its effort to develop weapons of mass destruction and to threaten the use of force against its neighbors. If we are to have any chance of keeping the alliance against the current Iraqi regime together we must focus on these concerns. In order to do that we should do the following:

In order to increase the attractiveness of this package to Russia and France we should consider permitting, or even requiring, that Iraq use some of its revenue from the sale of oil, to pay its existing debts to other nations including these two members of the UNSC. Our friends and allies in the region should find it easy to support this package since it will be clear that the embargo cannot be responsible for the continued suffering of the Iraqi people. Of course, that is the case now, since the Iraqi regime has at its disposal sufficient resources, both from the authorized sales and from the illegal sales, to do whatever is necessary to deal with the humanitarian tragedy in that country. The leadership prefers instead to use the funds for its own pleasures and for weapons. However, this new approach should reduce the criticism that the embargo is responsible for the humanitarian crisis.

I believe this approach would gain the needed support of states in the region and of the UNSC and that it could be sustained over a long period of time until there is a change in the Iraqi regime.

Of course, many believe that we should not wait for such change to occur on its own, and that we should instead implement the stated policy and goal of regime change by vastly increased support to the Iraq opposition.

There can be no doubt that American and, indeed, international security interests, would be advanced if the current regime in Iraq were to be replaced by one which was more committed to meeting the obligations which Iraq undertook at the end of the Persian Gulf War. The question is only whether there are means to do that which are consistent with other American interests and priorities and which could get the necessary support from the American people and from other nations. I do not believe that there are such means.

Certainly we have the conventional military power to defeat the Iraqi Army and occupy that country. There was a fleeting moment at the end of the Gulf War when it was plausible that the United States would use its military power to change the Iraqi regime. There is no longer any such possibility. Unless Iraq threatens a new act of aggression, the American people would not, and should not, support such an effort, nor would our allies and friends provide the necessary bases and support.

Thus, those who want to remove the current regime advocate not an American military operation, but rather a "covert operation." I do not believe there is any real option that involves only a covert operation. As in many previous situations, the real aim of the covert operation would be to try to compel the United States to use military force to rescue an operation which was failing. Indeed, most of the Iraqi opposition groups which seek the weapons to launch operations inside of Iraq warn us that they will expect American military support.

Anyone advocating a serious and determined effort to change this regime in the short run by covert force, bears a very heavy burden of demonstrating that such an effort has a real chance of success without massive American military action. Otherwise we run a grave risk of once again abandoning brave Iraqis, who rise up in the mistaken belief that we will defend them, or find ourselves dragged into a war that we cannot sustain.