BASIC PAPERS

Military Intervention in Afghanistan:
Implications for British Foreign and 
Defence Policy [1]

By Jenny Warren

Foreword:  Dr Ian Davis, Director of BASIC

Military intervention is a particularly contested and controversial tool of international statecraft and the government decision-making process leading up to it notoriously secretive. In the current climate where advocates of ‘military pre-emption’ are in the ascendancy in the United States, and appear to be gaining ground in the United Kingdom as well, this BASIC Paper written by Jenny Warren is an important and timely contribution to the debate under way in London and other capitals on military intervention.

The Labour Government has chosen to make the United Kingdom the strongest supporter and closest ally of the United States in Afghanistan and in the war on terrorism more generally. This has already generated some tensions with and resentment from other EU states (as well as Middle Eastern and other states) and may generate more of the same in the future. Indeed, in providing strong military support to the United States, Britain has even been prepared to take on combat operations with risk of casualties that the United States has itself been reluctant to take on.

Jenny Warren draws attention to the remarks made by the British ambassador to the United States in 1939, about the need to “ask ourselves some very awkward questions not only about the policy of other nations, but about our own policy and that of the dominant powers of the world”.  Some of the awkward questions that we should be asking ourselves today, include:

• Is it right that Britain should provide such strong and largely uncritical support for the United States at this time? 
  
  
• By working so closely with the United States, to what extent does Britain gain influence over the United States and encourage it towards engagement and multilateralism rather than unilateralism and isolationism?
  
  
• History suggests that for all the ‘special relationship’, the United States will have no hesitation in breaking with Britain if it wants to (e.g. McMahon Act, Suez, Bluestreak and Bosnia). Is it now appropriate for Britain to pre-empt such a break by taking a more independent line or working more closely with its EU partners to provide a counter-balance to the United States?
  
  
• Would a more forceful and critical European response really help to moderate US policy or would it exacerbate the move towards unilateralism? 
  
  
• What are the risks and implications of a fundamental breakdown in US-European relations?
  
  
• How can Britain, the EU and other states best encourage what we may see as more positive aspects of US policy while moderating more negative ones? 

In short, in a world in which the United States is the only superpower and neither US isolationism nor unilateralism is desirable, how can Britain help shape US engagement with the world? This is arguably one of two fundamental British foreign policy questions of the new post-September 11 era. The other (and a more enduring question) concerns the decision to wage war on another country: “the most important domestic and foreign policy decision that a country has to make”, according to Jenny Warren. However, despite a plethora of debates and studies on how to strengthen and modernise government machinery and parliament, little of this is linked to foreign policy. And as has been shown in this paper, the decision to wage war on another country continues to be taken in advance of any proper parliamentary discussion and certainly prior to any informed public debate. This is surely an anachronism that needs to be urgently addressed.

The House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs has initiated a number of important discussions around some of these issues, including inquiries into ‘Foreign Policy Aspects of the War Against Terrorism’, and ‘British-US Relations’.   Unfortunately, there is no other high-profile focus for the analysis of foreign policy, such as that provided by the regular Defence Reviews.  An annual parliamentary statement and debate on overall foreign policy, together with the publication of a quadrennial foreign policy or national security document may be one way forward. However, any review of British foreign policy decision-making will also need to be considered in the context of a wider debate about the British political system, and especially concerns about too much power residing in the executive and the growing weakness of parliament.

With the next US-led military intervention in Iraq seemingly imminent, and Britain again poised to play a supporting role, such a debate must begin immediately.

Executive Summary
The British Government's decision to join the United States in its 'war on terrorism' raises a number of key issues regarding the formulation of its foreign and defence policy which need to be publicly debated, including the decision to wage war, the rationale for military intervention, the role and conduct of troops deployed abroad, the place of coercion and conflict prevention in asserting British national interests, and the nature of the 'special relationship' with the United States.

The roots of the post September 11 war in Afghanistan can be traced to decades of failed mediation, a failure to implement effective and timely sanctions, and a failure to implement internationally agreed anti-terrorist measures. The decision to opt for a military solution to the threat from terrorism was in line with the United States' longstanding policy of launching punitive air strikes against countries suspected of being responsible for terrorist attacks on US military or government personnel and of overthrowing non-compliant governments. Tony Blair acceded to a US request for British 'military assets' and authorised use of the British base on Diego Garcia, and the Cabinet met only after the Prime Minister had committed Britain to decisions already taken unilaterally by the United States. Britain is the only EU and NATO country to be directly involved in joint military combat operations in Afghanistan, under US command.  In the single largest deployment of troops since the Iraq-Kuwait war, Britain assigned 4,200 service personnel in support of nearly 30,000 US forces in military action against Afghanistan.

The United States and its NATO allies used the argument of self-defence against terrorism for the first time as justification for their military intervention in Afghanistan.  Now, the United States has asserted its right to pre-emptive self-defence against the development and proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons as justification for a full-scale military attack on Iraq.  This re-interpretation of the legal basis for waging war in self-defence radically alters the 'laws of war' and threatens a disturbing escalation in the threat or use of force.

The decision to attack another country, to commit British troops to military action, and to permit the use of foreign military bases on British territory is the most important domestic and foreign policy decision that a country has to make.  In the new context of combating terrorism, the role of government and parliament in taking this decision has emerged as a key issue for parliamentary democracy.  The participation of British forces in the war in Afghanistan raises two further critical issues regarding the conduct of war in accordance with the internationally agreed Geneva Conventions: should cluster and thermobaric bombs be banned as 'inhumane' weapons that disproportionately target civilians; and how can the army's proclaimed reputation as a 'force for good' be safeguarded – or indeed, be restored – in the light of the allegations of a massacre of prisoners of war in Afghanistan?

Britain's seemingly open-ended commitment to join the United States in its 'war on terrorism' raises a number of questions concerning its own national interests and how they may best be promoted. In this new situation of major military confrontation in Afghanistan, Israel-Palestine, and Iraq, which has destabilised the whole of the Middle East and Gulf region and beyond into central and south Asia, Britain's national interests would seem to be best served through the implementation of conflict-prevention policies that strengthen international peace and security in the interests of global development. As an alternative to hegemonic military intervention, there are already policies in place or under discussion, which need to be strengthened and much better resourced, including:

• non-military mechanisms for combating terrorism, such as improved law enforcement and intelligence cooperation, and mandatory sanctions on the sponsors of terrorism;
  
  
• conflict resolution and prevention measures, including mediation and peacekeeping, and the imposition of effective sanctions;
  
  
• international non-proliferation agreements and other mechanisms for preventing the development and deployment of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, including proper verification and inspection regimes; and
  
  
• more consistent and forceful political and economic intervention in support of human rights, international humanitarian law and good governance.   At this point, Britain has to ask itself some 'awkward questions' about its own policy towards other nations and about the foreign policy of the United States as the dominant global power.  A debate on what kind of foreign policy is needed in the national interest and what kind of armed forces are needed to implement that policy would help to inform government and parliament on what is the most important domestic and foreign policy decision that a country has to make – the decision to wage war on another country.

Introduction

On 11 September 2001, a small group of unarmed men hijacked four passenger planes in America and used them as 'weapons of mass destruction'. The World Trade Center in New York was totally demolished and considerable damage was caused to the US Defense Department's Pentagon headquarters in Washington; a fourth plane crash-landed in Pennsylvania.  Nearly 3,000 people were killed, including 62 British citizens.

The British Government's decision to join the United States in its 'war on terrorism' raises a number of key issues regarding the formulation of its foreign and defence policy in its own national interests, which need to be publicly debated. This paper examines Britain’s role in the military intervention in Afghanistan (Part I) and the implications for future British foreign and defence policy (Part II).  The issues arising from this analysis include the decision to wage war, the rationale for military intervention, the role and conduct of troops deployed abroad, the place of coercion and conflict prevention in asserting British national interests, and the nature of the 'special relationship' with the United States.

PART I: Military Intervention in Afghanistan

1979-99: Two decades of military intervention and failed mediation
The original, domestic cause of the civil war in Afghanistan  was the unresolved conflict between the old form of society and government and the new, between the traditional way of life and modernisation, and its impact on different social groups and ethnic communities.  In 1979, however, the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan provoked a 'proxy war' with the United States, which lasted throughout its ten-year military occupation.  Intervention by the two superpowers, each pursuing its own goals of global and regional hegemony, set a different agenda for the civil war and ensured the supply of high-tech weaponry to the opposing sides.  The United States, Britain, and Pakistan backed the mujahideen opposition forces with weapons, military intelligence, and their own 'special forces'.  Construction of the underground military base on the border with Pakistan, subsequently used by the al-Qaeda terrorist group, was organised and financed by the United States and Pakistan.  This 'war of intervention' turned out to be the last of the Cold-War 'proxy wars'.

The civil war continued after the Soviet Union had withdrawn its troops in 1989.  The Taleban regime, which gained control of most of the country in 1996, was more conservative and more brutal in exercising its authoritarian power but in many ways was not dissimilar to the two principal regional states which supported it – Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.  Under the Taleban regime, Bin Laden's al-Qaeda group was able to organise the military training and financing of foreign Islamist groups and individuals.[2]

In the early 1990s, the United Nations took the lead in trying to achieve a political settlement of the civil war in Afghanistan through a dual policy of mediation and the imposition of sanctions.[3]

In 1996, the UN appointed a new mediator, Mr Brahimi, to work with all parties to the conflict in an attempt to end the war and establish a broad-based government.  Their various sponsors who supplied them with funds and weapons were also brought together in a working group made up of the United States and Russia and six regional countries, notably Iran and Pakistan.  Agreement finally proved impossible and Brahimi resigned at the end of 1999.

In August 1998, following bombings on US embassies in Africa, the UN Security Council finally began to impose sanctions in the form of an embargo on the supply of weapons to the Taleban regime and the freezing of bank accounts held by the regime and by Bin Laden.  However, an effective monitoring system was not set up until 2001.[4]

The United Nations has also taken the lead since the early 1990s in developing an internationally-agreed policy for combating terrorism.[5]  Britain, which has had its own experience of armed opposition in Northern Ireland and of money-laundering through its financial institutions, has implemented all the UN conventions on combating terrorism.  The United States had not ratified any of them.

Because the mediation process in Afghanistan had failed, because effectively monitored sanctions were put in place too late, because internationally agreed anti-terrorist measures had not been widely implemented, war pre-empted peace.  

Rapid-reaction declaration of war
Immediately after the terrorist attack, the CIA announced that it had been expecting an attack on US personnel and installations somewhere in the world but not in America.  In September-October 2001, Britain was conducting its biggest military exercise since the Iraq-Kuwait war in the Gulf state of Oman, at the same time as the United States was holding its annual military exercise in Egypt and elsewhere in the region, and NATO had started its annual military exercise in the Mediterranean region.  Britain quickly re-assigned or subsequently redeployed a significant number of troops from the exercise for the attack on Afghanistan, while NATO's naval force was put on standby.  While it had taken the United States five-and-a-half months to organise the deployment of troops for the Iraq-Kuwait war, it took only four weeks to start the war against Afghanistan.

The decision to opt for a military solution to the threat from terrorism was in line with the United States' longstanding policy of launching punitive air strikes against countries suspected of being responsible for terrorist attacks on US military or government personnel and of overthrowing non-compliant governments, in military operations organised by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and carried out by its own Special Operations forces and by surrogate, 'proxy' forces.[6]

Within a few hours of the terrorist attack, President Bush declared that “no distinction would be made between those who committed those acts and those who harboured the criminals”.  Within a few days, the US Congress authorised his administration under the War Powers Act "to use all necessary and appropriate force" against any country, organisation or individual involved in the attack; the US Defense Secretary signed an order declaring war on Afghanistan; and on 2 October the President took the decision to start military action at a meeting of the National Security Council. On 7 October, the armed attack on Afghanistan began, and President Bush announced:  "We are joined in this operation by our staunch supporter, Great Britain."

Under the Royal prerogative, the British Prime Minister had full authority to decide to wage war, although there was no formal declaration. Unlike in America, neither the Cabinet nor Parliament had any significant institutional input to the decision on what kind of response should be made to the terrorist attack in America. The House of Commons debates but does not vote on military action.

On the day that the United States declared war on Afghanistan, the Prime Minister agreed with President Bush that a military operation should be undertaken largely by US and British forces.  The day after the US administration had decided to start the war, he acceded to a US request for British 'military assets' (armed forces) and authorised use of the British-owned base on Diego Garcia.  In both instances, the Cabinet met only after the Prime Minister had committed Britain to decisions already taken unilaterally by the United States.

It was not until the day after the war had started that the Prime Minister set up a War Cabinet of senior government ministers.  Only then did the government produce an internal document defining its immediate war aims:  military action would be directed solely against the al-Qaeda terrorist network and the Taleban regime.

While the Defence Secretary made no statement to the Commons about the deployment of special forces to Afghanistan in October 2001, he did inform them, in March 2002, that a sizeable contingent of regular combat troops was being deployed for the first time to support US forces in Afghanistan but  there was no prior debate nor any vote on the issues raised by this decision.[7]

Britain's military contribution
Despite being the sole superpower, the United States remains critically dependent on its allies' military assets for conducting certain military operations.  In order to be able to deploy its immense capability of sea and air power, for example, it needs to be granted access to their military bases as its staging posts, their airspace and naval ports as its transport network, and their military intelligence as its 'eyes and ears'.  At the moment, its Stealth bombers are the only military aircraft that can fly direct from their base in the United States to Afghanistan.

Britain is the only EU and NATO country to be directly involved in joint military combat operations in Afghanistan, under US command.  Its armed forces are particularly valued for two reasons. First, they are used to working in close cooperation with US command-and-control systems, and second, they have over 200 years of global combat experience. Most recently, this includes: over 30 years in Northern Ireland; the 1982 Falklands war; conflict in Afghanistan during the 1980s; the 1991 Iraq-Kuwait war and subsequent and continuing 'no-fly zones' operations against Iraq; and conflicts in the Balkans and Sierra Leone in the 1990s to the present day.

Moreover, Britain still maintains a significant military presence throughout the strategically-important, oil-producing region of the Middle East and the Gulf, 30 years after its declared withdrawal from east-of-Suez in 1971.  Besides sharing military intelligence from its Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) surveillance centre with the United States, Britain contributes information on the Middle East from the communications centre at its military base in Cyprus.  Its regular armed forces are deployed at military bases, alongside far larger contingents of US military personnel, in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf states of Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain (the headquarters of the US Fifth Fleet), and Kuwait.  After expelling the population to Mauritius, Britain gave the United States a longterm lease to its air base on the island of Diego Garcia in the British Indian Ocean Territory from where B-52 planes launch mass bombing raids on Afghanistan.

British reconnaissance and bomber planes based in Turkey, Kuwait and Oman have been on patrol in the 'no-fly zones' over northern and southern Iraq since 1993.  In 1998, they took part in a major air offensive against Iraq's military command centres, air bases, missile factories, and units of its 'special forces'. In February 2001, the United States carried out heavy airstrikes on Iraq's military command-and-control centre.  A week after the terrorist attack in America, RAF Tornadoes launched a Cruise missile attack on an anti-aircraft missile site near Basra.

In the single largest deployment of troops since the Iraq-Kuwait war, Britain assigned 4,200 service personnel in support of nearly 30,000 US forces in military action against Afghanistan.  Most were re-assigned or subsequently redeployed from the military exercise in Oman in which 21,500 troops took part.  A naval task force, including an aircraft carrier and three nuclear-powered submarines which fired Tomahawk Cruise missiles on targets in Afghanistan, and an RAF contingent, including 10 reconnaissance aircraft and inflight refuelling planes to service US naval planes, were deployed in the Gulf region.  A British warship was also in command of NATO's rapid-reaction naval force on standby in the Eastern  Mediterranean.[8]

Although the Ministry of Defence does not normally comment on the role of its 'special forces', the Defence Secretary confirmed for the first time on 12 November 2001, a month after the war had started, that Special Air Service (SAS) troops were fighting alongside US forces.  Their most important tasks were to pinpoint bombing targets for US aircraft and to advise Afghan ground troops on how to carry out operations against the Taleban and al-Qaeda.   Because the US command was fighting an air-to-ground war and using locally-recruited Afghan fighters as its ground forces, the army's regular forces, which had taken part in the military exercise in Oman, did not originally form part of Britain's task force. In March 2002, however, the United States abruptly requested the despatch of 1,700 Royal Marines to support US forces in eastern Afghanistan.

The conduct of war
The 1949 Geneva Conventions that regulate the conduct of war regarding non-combatants state that every effort should be made to avoid 'collateral damage' against civilians.

The Prime Minister claimed that the war was directed against the Taleban regime but not against the people of Afghanistan.  But modern warfare is no longer a series of battles between two armies.  Instead, asymmetric, air-to-ground warfare between the high-tech armed forces of industrialised countries and the low-tech armies of underdeveloped ones has become the norm.  In this kind of war, helicopter gunships take the place of the infantry, while weaponised 'unmanned aerial vehicles' (UAVs) serve as the artillery.  Long-range cruise missiles are fired from aircraft carriers or distant military bases, long-range heavy bombers drop their loads and fly back home.  Precision bombs destroy not only military installations but a country's whole infrastructure of buildings, electricity supply, and the transport network which also serves the civilian population. Like landmines, cluster bombs and the new thermobaric bombs, first used in March 2002, indiscriminately kill soldiers, and farmers and children.

The Geneva Conventions also state that combatants including irregular forces who have surrendered or have been captured should be treated humanely as prisoners of war.

At the end of November, some 400 Taleban fighters who had been captured after a two-week battle with Northern Alliance forces were imprisoned in a secure fort and then  killed after they had turned on their captors. Although the course of events is still uncertain, journalists at the scene saw the bodies of about 50 prisoners whose hands were tied behind their back;  two CIA agents were caught on film interrogating a prisoner.  TV news bulletins showed SAS soldiers and US special forces, fighting alongside Northern Alliance soldiers, to regain control of the fort, as US aircraft bombed the prisoners.[9]  The International Committee of the Red Cross immediately appealed to all the warring parties to observe international humanitarian law. The call for an enquiry into the killing of prisoners by the human rights group Amnesty International was supported by Mary Robinson, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (and a former President of Ireland), by nearly 100 MPs, and by Human Rights Watch.  In December, the UN High Commissioner said her staff in Afghanistan were already "mapping out patterns of massacres" of prisoners elsewhere.[10]

The legal basis for war
The United Nations Charter, which is the key document in international law regarding the maintenance of international peace and security, states as its basic principle that "All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, ... ."  (Chapter I, Article 2.4)  It further states that "Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security."  (Ch.VII, Art.51)  The phrase 'an armed attack' has generally been understood, within the United Nations' remit to maintain peace between nations, to mean an armed attack by another state.  Following the terrorist attack in America, however, the United States and its NATO allies including Britain interpreted Article 51 as sanctioning the use of force against a state that harbours a terrorist group, one that was directed from abroad, that was 'of global reach'.

Should the UN Security Council decide not to authorise the use of armed force  (Ch.VII, Art.42), sometimes because one or more of its permanent members would veto them, self-defence is the only legal basis for a member state to take military action against another state.  The UN Charter states, however, that "Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state ..."  (Ch.I, Art.7) , with the single exception of enforcement measures under UN auspices.

The United States and its NATO allies used the argument of self-defence against terrorism for the first time as justification for their military intervention in Afghanistan.  Now, the US Defense Secretary has claimed self-defence as the legal basis for all the United States' military interventions throughout the world.  Most significantly, the United States has asserted its right to pre-emptive self-defence against the development and proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons as justification for a full-scale military attack on Iraq.  In this way, the plea of self-defence where no clear aggression by another state has occurred can become the justification for hegemonic military intervention by powerful states – the same plea that was made by the Soviet Union as justification for its invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 - and creates the legal basis for a dangerous anarchy in international relations in the new multipolar world of powerful states.

In effect, this re-interpretation of the legal basis for waging war in self-defence radically alters the 'laws of war' and threatens a disturbing escalation in the threat or use of force.  First, any powerful state can now wage war against another country on the pretext of fighting terrorism. Second, every vulnerable country will now feel under pressure to build up its military capability, including nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, in order to deter an attack by a powerful state on the allegation that it has harboured or sponsored terrorists. Third, terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda find themselves in the powerful position of being able to provoke a high-tech war through a low-tech attack, possibly using nuclear, chemical or biological materials.

The UN Security Council has set out its own response to the threat from terrorism.  It affirmed "the need to combat by all means, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts, ...".  It called on all states "to bring to justice" those responsible for the attack and stressed that those responsible for helping the perpetrators and sponsors of these acts "will be held accountable".  It set out a whole series of practical measures that should be taken by member states  "to prevent and suppress terrorist acts, ... in their territories through all lawful means".  It also expressed "its readiness to take all necessary steps to respond to the terrorist attacks", in conformity with the UN Charter.[11]  Nowhere in these Resolutions does the Security Council propose or imply any modification of Article 51 to cover a terrorist attack.

The plea of self-defence as a legal basis for war has already been used in a number of cases to justify an armed attack against a non-aggressor country, which the UN Security Council was not prepared to authorise.  In the new circumstances of a multipolar world of strong states, an agreed interpretation of the legal basis for waging war has become an important condition for maintaining international peace and security.[12]  

Crisis of military confrontation
The decision of the US President, with the backing of the British Prime Minister, to opt for waging war in Afghanistan as a means of combating terrorism has had serious repercussions for political stability and economic development in other regions of the world, most notably the Middle East and Gulf region.

Israel and Palestine

In May 2001, for example, the UK Government approved the recommendations for completing the final stage of the peace process, drawn up by an international commission headed by US Senator George Mitchell (who also chaired negotiations for the Northern Ireland peace agreement).  In June, it endorsed the Tenet plan for establishing security cooperation between Israel and Palestine, drawn up by the Director of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).  The terms of the peace agreement were that: Israel should end its military occupation of Palestine and border areas of Syria and Lebanon; no more 'new towns' for Israeli citizens should be built on Palestinian land; Palestinian refugees' 'right of return' to Israel should be recognised and negotiated; and the status of Jerusalem should take account of the diverse needs of its ethnic population of Arabs, Jews, Christians, and Muslims.

In response to the second intifada, the Sharon government has violently destroyed the peace process by waging its own 'war on terrorism' in the occupied territories in an asymmetric war against the Palestinian Authority. It has equated mainstream Palestinian resistance with attacks on Israeli civilians by 'suicide bombers' and rejected all appeals for a ceasefire, the withdrawal of its forces, and the renewal of negotiations.  In March-April 2002, it demolished the seat of Palestine's government in the city of Ramallah, re-occupied major towns and villages in territory ceded to the Palestine Authority under the 1993 Oslo agreement on 'land for peace', and crushed Palestinian resistance.  As detailed in a recent report by the World Bank, it has finally succeeded in destroying the social, economic and administrative infrastructure developed with donor funds and has brought the Palestinian economy close to collapse.

In the middle of April 2002, a second peace conference was held in Madrid to discuss the Israel-Palestine peace process.  The foreign ministers of the United States and Russia as co-sponsors of the peace process, the foreign-policy representative of the European Union, and the UN Secretary General called on Israel to end its military offensive and proposed that a ceasefire should be monitored by international observers, but Israel still refused to withdraw its troops from Palestinian territory.  From Madrid 1991 to Madrid 2002, Israel has maintained its military occupation of Palestine with the active and passive support of the United States and the European Union and its member states, including Britain.[13]  

Iraq

When they were first imposed, the United States and Britain expressed the hope that the 'no-fly zones' would provide 'safe havens' for the Kurdish and Shiite communities. In the event, however, the Turkish army, which has long experience of fighting ethnic Kurdish guerrillas inside the country, has been able to attack their base camps across the border in the northern zone with impunity.  Similarly, in southern Iraq, large numbers of Shiites have been killed by Iraqi ground forces.  In more realpolitik terms, both the United States and Britain openly stated, in an implicit reference to the secessionist movement for Kurdistan and the Shiite secessionist movement aligned to Iran, that they were opposed to the dismemberment of Iraq, which has immense oil reserves.

In response to Iraq's aggression against Kuwait, the UN Security Council immediately took measures to compel the regime to destroy its chemical and biological weapons, ballistic missiles, and nuclear-weapons-usable materials, under UN supervision.  It considered that such action would "... represent steps towards the goal of establishing in the Middle East a zone free from weapons of mass destruction and all missiles for their delivery and the objective of a global ban on chemical weapons."  In order to secure Iraq's compliance, the United Nations imposed international sanctions on Iraq:  an arms embargo and restrictions on the export of oil, eventually allowing some oil to be sold to pay for the import of medicines and food.  By the end of 1998, however, Iraq refused to accept any further UN inspections, accusing the United States of using them as a cover for espionage.  In 1999, the United Nations established a new UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) but Iraq continued to deny access to its inspectors.  In June 2002, the Security Council is due to decide on a new sanctions mandate that would strengthen the arms embargo but significantly ease restrictions on all non-military imports including equipment for the oil industry. [14]

In the meantime, however, the United States threatens to extend its 'war on terrorism' by launching a full scale military attack on Iraq with the aim of finally 'changing the regime', rather than simply 'containing' it, on the allegation that Iraq is developing nuclear, chemical, and biological 'weapons of mass destruction'.     

PART II: Implications of the war in Afghanistan for British foreign and defence policy [15]

The heavy burden of war has fallen unilaterally on one of the world's poorest and most heavily mined countries, which has already suffered a long period of civil war and years of drought and hunger.  Large numbers of civilians have been killed and wounded. A third of the population is estimated to be at risk from a severe shortage of food but the fighting and bombing has prevented emergency food and medical aid from being distributed to those in need.   People have fled from their homes, three million have become refugees whom nobody wants. Post-war reconstruction of the damaged economy is a slow and long process.  Social reconciliation takes even longer.

Transparency and accountability
Britain's participation in the war in Afghanistan has raised a number of key issues that need to be debated and decided by government and parliament.  To this end, the British Government has recently announced a fresh review of British defence policy as a 'new chapter' for the 1998 Strategic Defence Review, while the head of the armed forces has publicly recognised the need for a wider debate on defence [16].  In December, the Commons Select Committee on Defence called for 'a thorough reappraisal' of the role of Britain's armed forces and is conducting an Inquiry into Defence and Security in the UK following the 11 September Terrorist Attacks.

Key issues that arise from this analysis of the war in Afghanistan include the decision to wage war, the rationale for military intervention, the role and conduct of troops deployed abroad, the place of coercion and conflict prevention in asserting British national interests, and the nature of the 'special relationship' with the United States.

The decision to attack another country, to commit British troops to military action, and to permit the use of foreign military bases on British territory is the most important domestic and foreign policy decision that a country has to make.  In the new context of combating terrorism, the role of government and parliament in taking this decision has emerged as a key issue for parliamentary democracy.  While the job of government is to govern, in a parliamentary democracy it should do so with the informed and democratic consent of the people.

Britain's military exercise in Oman was the first major test of its Rapid Reaction Force, which was defined in the 1998 Strategic Defence Review as the principal component in reshaping its armed forces for the new task of global military intervention. Now that the RRF has taken part in the war on Afghanistan, it becomes more urgent than ever to give some thought to the kind of military intervention for which it will be deployed in future conflicts.  Britain's continued military presence in the Middle East and Gulf region and, in particular, its missile attacks on Iraq need to be completely re-assessed in light of the new global security situation.

The participation of British forces under US command, fighting alongside US forces, in the war in Afghanistan raises two further critical issues regarding the conduct of war in accordance with the internationally agreed Geneva Conventions.  First, should cluster and thermobaric bombs be banned as 'inhumane' weapons that disproportionately target civilians? Second, how can the army's proclaimed reputation as a 'force for good' be safeguarded – or indeed, be restored – in the light of the allegations of a massacre of prisoners of war in Afghanistan?  In this respect, the role and democratic accountability of the Special Air Service and Special Boat Service forces within the regular armed forces also needs to be clearly defined.

As the United States' 'staunch supporter' throughout the Cold War and post-Cold War period, Britain has become heavily dependent on the United States' superior military power and on the supply of US military equipment, especially nuclear weapons. The United States, on the other hand, as the war in Afghanistan has confirmed, has become increasingly less dependent on Britain (and its other NATO allies) as it has developed its long-range, high-tech military capability and recruited its own 'proxy', ground forces. In this new situation, increasing attention has been given in recent years to developing Britain's own military capability in collaboration with European partners (for example, heavy-lift transport aircraft, satellite surveillance systems).  The kind of military capability that is developed will ultimately be determined by foreign-policy decisions regarding the role of Britain's armed forces:  whether they will be deployed in support of US-led military interventions or in support of UN-authorised peacekeeping operations.[17]  

Conflict prevention as a first priority
While the armed forces are an important instrument of government policy, the 'use of force' against other countries represents only one option in the formulation of foreign policy.  Britain's seemingly open-ended commitment to join the United States in its 'war on terrorism' raises a number of questions concerning its own national interests and how they may best be promoted.   

During the 1990s, Britain like other European countries began to adjust its foreign policy to the new realities of a multipolar world of sovereign states intent on asserting their own national interests.  In particular, it normalised its diplomatic relations with countries that, as the Cold War ended, were becoming re-integrated into a newly-globalised world through a difficult process of modernisation and democratisation.  Eager to compete for its share of expanding world trade and investment, it strengthened its economic ties with Russia and China and with other emerging-market countries, particularly in the Middle East and Gulf region, and in Asia – including 'rogue' states accused by the United States of sponsoring terrorism.  It has long had friendly relations with Cuba and resumed diplomatic relations with Libya in 2000, following the trial and conviction of a Libyan citizen for the Lockerbie bombing.  In 1998, Britain re-established normal relations with Iran, which has emerged as an important oil producer in the development of the Caspian Sea oilfields and transit pipelines. In 2000, it opened an embassy in North Korea, which is potentially a valuable economic partner for South Korea with which Britain has important trading and investment links.

In this new situation of major military confrontation in Afghanistan, Israel-Palestine, and Iraq, which has destabilised the whole of the Middle East and Gulf region and beyond into central and south Asia, Britain's national interests would seem to be best served through the implementation of conflict-prevention policies that strengthen international peace and security in the interests of global development.

Within the established framework of the United Nations Charter, mediation and peacekeeping – the 'pacific settlement of disputes' (Ch.VI) – takes priority.  This is the most difficult task:  to resolve conflict between opponents in a civil war or in a war between states, and then help keep the peace between them.  As part of this process, in July 2001, the British government, at the request of the United Nations, hosted a diplomatic conference on Afghanistan which agreed that a future government should be broad-based.  Subsequently, a few days before the war began in October, Mr Brahimi was re-appointed as the UN's mediator and finally led negotiations on an interim administration to a successful conclusion in December.  Britain immediately appointed a former head of the UN Special Mission in Afghanistan during the Taleban regime as its Ambassador to the new government.  Then, in December 2001, Britain took command of the multinational International Security Assistance Force with a mandate from the UN Security Council to establish security in the capital Kabul and its airport during the six-month term in office of the new administration.[18]

With respect to 'threats to peace, breaches of the peace, and acts of aggression'  (Ch.VII), the imposition of sanctions (Art.41) is the next priority.  Generally speaking, the most effective sanctions are those that stop the flow of weapons and funding to warring parties and terrorist groups.  They are also the most difficult to implement because of powerful opposition from sanctions-busters:  governments that sponsor a warring party or terrorist group, governments that promote arms exports, and banks that make substantial profits from handling accounts held by a warring party or terrorist group and its foreign sponsors.  The United Nations has therefore improved its procedures in recent years to ensure that mandatory sanctions are effectively monitored and that sanctions are also imposed on sanctions-busting governments – for example, sanctions on Unita in Angola since 1999, and on combatting terrorism since 11 September 2001.  In September 2001, Britain was selected to chair a Committee, set up by the UN Security Council, to monitor the mandatory implementation by member-states of "measures to prevent and suppress, in their territories through all lawful means, the financing and preparation of any acts of terrorism" through international cooperation.[19]

The third priority for the United Nations, when all other measures fail, is to enforce peace through military action on the decision of the Security Council (Ch.VII, Arts.42-50).  While the Security Council authorised military action to repel Iraq's aggression against Kuwait, it did not authorise military action by the United States and Britain against Iraq, after it had been defeated in the Iraq-Kuwait war.  Nor did it authorise military action by the US-led coalition in Afghanistan, which was undertaken on the plea of collective self-defence (Art.51).

While Britain has supported UN mediation and peacekeeping, sanctions, and enforcement measures, it has also joined the United States in the military 'containment' of Iraq and in the 'war on terrorism' in Afghanistan, and failed to take a firm policy stand against Israel's military occupation of Palestine, seemingly without any thought for the longer term consequences for global stability.

Some hard choices ahead: British foreign and defence policy options
The human tragedy of the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington and the war in Afghanistan has presented the world with a stark choice between waging war or making peace.  Waging war to combat terrorism, overthrow the government of another country, impose regional or global hegemony, or as a means of ridding the world of weapons of mass destruction is not a long-term or sustainable solution to the problems of a multipolar world whose governments and peoples have a common interest in social and economic development.  As an alternative to hegemonic military intervention, there are already policies in place or under discussion, which need to be strengthened and much better resourced, including:

• non-military mechanisms for combating terrorism, such as improved law enforcement and intelligence cooperation, and mandatory sanctions on the sponsors of terrorism;
  
  

• conflict resolution and prevention measures, including mediation and peacekeeping, and the imposition of effective sanctions;
  
  

• international non-proliferation agreements and other mechanisms for preventing the development and deployment of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, including proper verification and inspection regimes;  and
  
  

• more consistent and forceful political and economic intervention in support of human rights, international humanitarian law and good governance.

At this point, Britain has to make some hard choices regarding its own national interests and its role as the United States' 'staunch supporter'.  The Bush administration's  'new strategic concept' for America as the global superpower is to impose a Pax Americana on a multilateral world through a policy which, rather than being isolationist, is both unilateralist and interventionist.[20]   In an address to the US Congress in October 2001, President Bush said:  "Our war on terror begins with al-Qaeda but it does not end there.  It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated."  On this pretext, the United States has extended its military bases and troop deployments throughout the Middle East and Gulf region, in Asia (notably in central Asia and the Philippines), and in Colombia.  In doing so, it is perceived by governments and many people in the Middle East and Gulf region as the guarantor of an aggressive Israel and by many domestic political oppositions across the world as the guarantor of undemocratic, repressive regimes.

In his State of the Union speech at the end of his first year in office, in January 2002, President Bush designated Iran, North Korea, and Iraq, as states which, "with their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world".  While the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction among such states is a cause of concern, the belligerent approach of the United States contrasts starkly with the European approach of cooperative engagement. Moreover, the United States itself has the biggest arsenal of nuclear and conventional weapons in the world.  It proliferates nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles to its own close allies including Britain, while threatening other countries that develop or export nuclear-power reactors and missile technology.  It also withdrew from major international arms control treaties and rejected irreversible arms reduction agreements, and is seeking to develop new, more usable nuclear weapons.

In order to ensure that the United States has the absolute military superiority it needs to act unilaterally and with impunity, the Bush administration’s ultimate aim is to set up a destabilising and costly multi-layered ballistic missile defence (BMD) system to destroy long-range missiles that are launched against America and its allies.  Britain is likely to be asked to integrate US early-warning stations at RAF bases in Yorkshire into this system.  This would make Britain vulnerable to attack by countries in conflict with the United States but not necessarily directly involving Britain, although given that British foreign policy is (or is widely perceived to be) closely aligned with that of the United States, such vulnerability is already a reality.

Like other countries, however, the United States too has to take account of the new realities of the multipolar world of sovereign states intent on asserting their own national interests, within their own regional groupings.  For example, all 22 Arab League countries, the 57 states belonging to the Organisation of the Islamic conference, and Turkey which is a NATO member, have declared their hostility to Israel's military occupation and now re-occupation of Palestinian territory, while hundreds of thousands have taken part in mass demonstrations in support of Palestine in many Middle East and Gulf countries.  Iraq and Kuwait have finally agreed on a peace settlement of the 1990/91 war, while there has been a public reconciliation between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Perhaps Bush's 'axis of evil' will, like Reagan's 'evil empire', one day be transformed into America's coalition partners. While a future Democratic administration would probably follow a less aggressive foreign policy, the immediate future of US foreign policy suggests a continuation of its recent divisive approach.  The United States is extremely powerful, both economically and militarily.  But if it continues to pursue its unilateralist policy of global dominance, it is likely to provoke an anarchic reaction of terrorist attacks and an organised reaction of a new global arms race by powerful states.

At a very different but similarly critical moment for British foreign policy, the British ambassador to the United States (1939-40) remarked:  'We shall not get back ... a sane foreign policy until we ask ourselves some very awkward questions not only about the policy of other nations, but about our own policy and that of the dominant powers of the world.' [21]  As Britain withdraws its forces from the 'war on terrorism' in Afghanistan and faces a decision on whether to join the United States in a war to change the regime in Iraq, Britain has again to ask itself some 'awkward questions' about its own policy towards other nations and about the foreign policy of the United States as the dominant global power.

As a country which plays a leading role in world affairs and as a member of the European Union and the United Nations, Britain has developed its own distinctive foreign policy for the post-Cold War world.  On the one hand, it supports measures to strengthen international peace and security:  it has developed constructive relations with a widely varying range of countries, taken  part in peace enforcement and peacekeeping operations, and adhered to international arms control agreements.  In its role as a nuclear state trying to retain its status as a global power, however, Britain now finds itself in a subordinate position in its close relationship with the United States on which it is heavily dependent for its military capability.  For these reasons, it has given largely uncritical support to the Bush administration's policy of unilateralism and military interventionism which has seriously destabilised global security.  At this critical moment, if it is to find its way towards  a sane foreign policy, Britain needs to answer the 'awkward question' of where it stands in relation to its contrary policy of supporting measures to strengthen peace and security while supporting destabilising policies of military interventionism.

Britain can be an important 'force for good' in the world in seeking political solutions to conflictual situations as it has shown in its support for mediation and peacekeeping in Afghanistan, the peace process between Israel and Palestine, and international sanctions on Iraq.  On the other hand, the British government's participation in the United States' unilateral military action against Iraq, its decision to support the Bush administration in waging war in Afghanistan as a means of combating terrorism, and its failure to express a clear position on the Sharon government's full scale military re-occupation of Palestinian territory have contributed to a serious destabilisation of  the Middle East and the Gulf region which threatens not just regional security but international peace and security.

At the end of last year, in response to this situation, the House of Commons Committee on Foreign Affairs initiated a rolling Inquiry into Foreign Policy Aspects of the War against Terrorism.  Unfortunately, there is no high-profile focus for the analysis of foreign policy, such as is provided by the regular Defence Reviews.  Britain does, however, have a wide range of policy research 'think-tanks' on international relations, foreign and defence policy, international security, and arms control programmes, and a coalition of international aid and human rights NGOs that lobbies for the protection of civilians in times of war (landmines, child soldiers), which could make a valuable contribution to a public debate on war and peace issues.  A debate on what kind of foreign policy is needed in the national interest and what kind of armed forces are needed to implement that policy would help to inform government and parliament on what is the most important domestic and foreign policy decision that a country has to make - the decision to wage war on another country.

*Jenny Warren is an independent peace researcher.

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Endnotes

[1] This paper was completed in July 2002. Key sources include: Financial Times (cuttings on file), the BBC Today and World Service news programmes, and Channel Four News (12 September 2001-18 January 2002).  The text is primarily drawn from factual reports in the Financial Times, checked for consistency and corroborated accuracy.  See also, NATO Updates, Speeches, etc., September-October 2001 (nato.int).  Additional sources are cited in the following endnotes.

[2] For background on the civil war and foreign intervention in Afghanistan, see also:  Dr Olivier Roy (Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques, France), The international response to global terrorism – prospects for Afghanistan, General Meeting, 14 February 2002, RIIA; Afghanistan – International responsibility for human rights disaster, Amnesty International, 1995 – on arms transfers and human rights abuses; Irene Khan (Secretary General, Amnesty International), ‘Curtailing Freedom’, The World Today, February 2002, RIIA; Chris Johnson (who worked for Oxfam in Afghanistan), Afghanistan – A Land in Shadow, An Oxfam Country Profile, Oxfam, 1998. On emergence of the Taleban, see:  Ahmed Rashid (Pakistani journalist), Taliban – Islam, Oil and the New Great Game in Central Asia, I.B. Tauris Publishers, 2000; John K Cooley (ABC/American Broadcasting Corporation correspondent), Unholy Wars – Afghanistan, America and International Terrorism, Pluto Press 2000, first edition published 1999 - see especially pp.91-99 on British involvement in the 1980s, and pp.112-117 on BCCI bank.

[3] For information on UN action on Afghanistan, see also Lakhdar Brahimi (UN Secretary-General's special envoy to Afghanistan, former Foreign Minister of Algeria 1991-93), The Case of Afghanistan, General Meeting, 6 May 1998, RIIA; Michael Keating (Senior Adviser, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian and Development Activities in Afghanistan), ‘Principles Clash in Afghanistan’, The World Today, RIIA, May 1998.

[4] UN Security Council Resolutions on sanctions on Taleban and al-Qaeda:  1214 (1998), 1267 (1999), 1333 (2000), 1363 (2001).

[5] UN Security Council Resolutions on combatting terrorism: 1368 (2001), 12.9.01; 1373 (2001), 28.9.01; 1269 (1999), 19.10.01.

[6] Richard N Haass (US senior foreign policy adviser to both Bush administrations), Intervention – the use of American military force in the post-Cold War world, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1994.  For an account of US unilateralism and its relations with Saudi Arabia during White House preparations for the Gulf War, 1990-91, see Bob Woodward (Washington Post associate editor), The Commanders, Simon & Schuster, 1991.  See also, Bob Woodward, Veil – The Secret Wars of the CIA, Simon & Schuster, 1987.

[7]  House of Commons, Parliamentary Debates, 18 March 2002.

[8] See also: NATO Update, 1-7 October 2001.  

[9] Channel Four News; also reported in the Financial Times.

[10] Financial Times, 8 December 2001.

[11]  UN Resolutions 1368 (12 September 2001) and 1373 (28 September 2001). 

[12] See the United Nations Charter.  For discussion on the laws of war, see Christopher Greenwood QC (Professor, International Law, LSE), Adam Roberts FBA (Professor, International Relations, Oxford University), The international response to global terrorism: legal and moral issues and the role of the UN, General Meeting, 28 November 2001, RIIA; Michael Byers (Professor, International Relations, Duke University, US, currently Visiting Fellow, Oxford University), ‘Unleashing Force – Terrorism Response and International Law’, The World Today, RIIA, December 2001.

[13] UN Security Council Resolutions on Israel: 242 (1967), 338 (1973), 1402 (2002), 30 March 2002, and 1403 (2002), 4 April 2002. 

[14] UN Security Council Resolution on Iraq: 687 (1991) on UNSCOM; 1284 (1999) on UNMOVIC. 

[15] A series of articles on terrorism in The World Today, October 2001- March 2002, v.57-58; and a series of General Meetings on Global response to terrorism, September 2001-February 2002, Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA). Victor Bulmer-Thomas (Professor, Director, Chatham House),  ‘Targeting Terrorism’, The World Today, RIIA, October 2001.  Paul Rogers (Professor, Peace Studies, Bradford University), ‘The War in Afghanistan’, October 2001-April 2002.

[16] For a clear statement of policy options, see the speech by Admiral Sir Michael Boyce (chief of defence staff), UK Strategic Choices following SDR & the 11^th September, Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), 10 December 2001.

[17] Trevor Taylor (Professor, Defence Management and Security, Cranfield University), ‘Atlantic Drift’, The World Today, March 2002, RIIA.

[18] UN Security Council Resolution 1386 (2002), 20 December 2002.

[19] UN SC Resolution  1368 (2001), 12 September 2001;  1373 (2001), 28 December 2001;  1269 (1999), 19 October 1999, <http://www.un.org>.

[20] John R Bolton (Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security Affairs, US Department of State), The Bush administration's international security policy, General Meeting, 4 February 2002, RIIA.

[21] Marquess of Lothian, May 1939, cited in Chatham House News, March 2002.

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