The Foreign Service Journal, October 2005

T he Bush administration made it clear from its first day in office that it does not care much for working with international organizations except on its own terms. Indeed, its attitude has often been lit- tle more than contemptuous. It has fought climate control measures, worked to dissuade countries from recognizing the authority of the Inter- national Criminal Court (e.g., by cut- ting assistance to countries that refused to sign agreements that would immunize American citizens from ICC jurisdiction), and shown little interest in nonproliferation issues. The administration’s recent deci- sion to cultivate closer ties with India in the field of civilian nuclear activities at the expense of the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty is emblematic of this mindset. Following the July 2005 visit to Washington of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, his office issued a press release which sums up the U.S. decision: “The [India-U.S.] Joint Statement reflects the preparedness, on the part of the U.S. government, to begin a process of dismantling the restrictive technology denial regime that restricted India’s access to nuc- lear technology and materials for [its] not having joined the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty.” Enough has already been said about President Bush’s appointment of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations in New York. Mr. Bolton has shown himself to be artic- ulate, aggressive, intelligent, fiercely protective of his positions, and more than a little skeptical about the ability of the United Nations to accomplish a great deal of major import. It remains to be seen if this combination of char- acteristics will be an effective mix for promoting U.S. interests in the world body. There should be no doubt, however, that appointing a figure like Bolton, especially during a Senate recess, sends a message about the president’s desire to deal with the U.N. on his own terms. Iraq represents the most blatant instance of this preference for unilat- eral action — except, of course, when Washington finds it convenient for others to share the burden, such as when it “invited” the United Nations back into Iraq to help conduct the Jan. 30, 2005, elections. Compare the use of the “Coalition of the Willing” of 2003 with President George H.W. Bush’s use of such a coalition in 1991 in Operation “Desert Storm” to end Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait. While the current campaign is overwhelm- ingly conducted by U.S. troops (although with a sizable British contri- bution), the 1991 military campaign, by contrast, made use of more than 500,000 U.S. troops supplemented by 160,000 coalition forces, or almost 25 percent of the total force, according to a CNN Web-based fact sheet. That earlier coalition — which included Egypt, Syria, France and Germany in the 34-nation fighting force — was a tremendous accomplishment for which both former President George H.W. Bush and Secretary of State James Baker deserve great credit. And we should not forget that the other countries in the “Desert Storm” coalition also picked up the lion’s share of the first Gulf War’s cost. Good Politics, Bad Policy This “go it alone” approach is good domestic politics. It certainly rever- berated quite well in the 2004 elec- tion campaign, when former Senator Zell Miller, D-Ga., told the Republ- ican National Convention that “Sena- tor [John] Kerry has made it clear that he would use military force only if approved by the United Nations. Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending.” This obvi- ous misrepresentation clearly won over the Republican delegates, but it is downright unhelpful when it comes to fighting terrorism — an area where collective action holds great promise. Yet apart from some post-9/11 mea- sures against money-laundering pro- moted through the United Nations and the U.S.-backed Financial Action Task Force, there have been few sus- tained efforts to promote an organized international approach to counterter- rorism that would build upon the mul- tilateral strengths of international organizations. The idea is not to replace U.S. and “Going it alone” is good domestic politics but bad policy, especially when it comes to fighting terrorism. Let’s Use International Organizations to Fight Terrorism B Y L EON W EINTRAUB O C T O B E R 2 0 0 5 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 17 S PEAKING O UT w