Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
PROFESSOR MICHAEL
CLARKE, PROFESSOR
FRED HALLIDAY
AND MR
JAMES RUBIN
TUESDAY 30 OCTOBER 2001
Chairman
1. Gentlemen, can I welcome you to the first
public meeting of the Committee in our new Parliament. All of
you are distinguished commentators in your relevant fields and
we look forward to this, the first of our hearings in respect
of the British/US relationship. We welcome, then, Mr James Rubin,
a former US Assistant Secretary of State; Professor Michael Clarke,
an old friend of this Committee and, indeed, of the Defence Committee,
our sister Committee, who is from Kings College, London, and,
again an old friend, Professor Fred Halliday of the LSE. Gentlemen,
September 11, and the special relationship. I think, Mr Rubin,
you began an article which you wrote in December of last year
by saying "It is going to be very special after all . . .
." That was before September 11. What can you say about the
effect of September 11 in terms of the relationship between ourselves
and the US?
(Mr Rubin) For those of you who have
friends in the United States or hear from people in the United
States I think it is fair to say that Tony Blair, the Prime Minister
of your Government, has become almost a folk hero in our country.
Many of the people who have seen him speak and seen him come to
the support of the United States in its hour of need will never
forget it. That is what ultimately is meant by the words "special
relationship". In political substantive terms, that is usually
a reference to intelligence co-operation, military co-operation,
diplomatic co-operation and co-ordination of economic activities.
If you look at those four areas I think you will have seen a remarkable
development in the last few weeks when, I think—and this
is a public hearing so let me say fairly candidly—it was
believed that because the Prime Minister was very close to the
previous President that somehow this would have an effect on Britain's
relationship with the United States. What we have seen in these
last two months is that the special relationship is not about
personalities, it is about policy, and that regardless of who
the Prime Minister would have preferred won the election or who
is his better friend, the policies of our governments go down
so deeply and are in such consonance at deep levels that personalities
at the top are really not that relevant. So when it came to deciding
how to put out information on who is responsible for this crime,
this government, working I suspect in close co-ordination with
the United States, did so. Only this government was involved in
the initial air strikes. I think arguably there is a risk now
that it is too much of an Anglo-Saxon operation—
2. Before I call in your two colleagues, can
you say what it means in practice in terms of not the applause—Tony
Blair for President—but what it means in terms of real political
influence at the highest levels?
(Mr Rubin) I think what it means is that because this
Government here in London immediately said they were going to
provide whatever the United States needed, they had a seat at
the table. I think there were other governments that hedged their
bets a little bit in Europe and said, "Well, we might provide
you what you need, we probably would provide you what you need,
but we want to be part of the consultative process". By saying
that first rather than offering the full 100 per cent support
I think they lost some influence, and now the views of the Blair
Government are taken seriously.
3. Have you any examples of the way in which
it has?
(Mr Rubin) Yes, certainly when it comes to the political
track of Afghanistan, namely how you put together this operation
on the political side. Number two: the whole idea of staying in
Afghanistan after the war is over and dealing with the consequences
of 15 years of war on that country, I think, is something where
this Government played a role, and you have started to see US
officials repeating what British officials were saying three,
four, five days ago.
4. Professor Halliday, do you agree with that?
(Professor Halliday) I do. I think that initially
the Bush administration came into office saying it will not get
involved in what they call "nation building". It is
a rather inaccurate term; I think a more accurate term is "state
building", but leaving that aside they were not going to
do the kind of thing which was the long-term commitment which
you have seen in Bosnia or Kosovo, where you go in for a few months
but, actually, have stopped there for years. Of course, they did
not do it in Somalia, which is an important precedent for how
others may see America now. The long and the short of it is, however,
that this Government decided very quickly that there is no point
in just going to Afghanistan and finding and eliminating al-Qaeda
(even if you could do that). You have got to reconstruct the political
system or even construct one. One of the ironies of Afghanistan
is it does not have a state: there are no railways, there are
no roads, there is no education system (or a minimal one but even
that has been destroyed). So, yes, the Blair Government, I think,
has got people in Washington to realise they have to get into
the business of, if not nation building then of coalition building,
with the added and, I think, very important point, which is not
sufficiently recognised in discussion in this country, that there
is a UN process going on which has been going on actually since
1993—the 6+2 process. This is about creating a coalition
government in Afghanistan, one which is going to stop terrorism
and stop drug exporting. So this is not something plucked out
of the blue by Britain, it is something for which there is strong
view and precedent.
5. And real influence?
(Professor Halliday) Real influence in the long haul,
I think, is very important. I think one of the deep problems which
we had better face now is that there is a real crisis of leadership
and policy in Washington. Basically, what to do? There is no intelligence,
the military are at sixes and sevens. The President himself has
weathered this crisis, I think, as well as anybody could have
done since he has been dealt a hand which nobody could have responded
to initially. However, in relation to the anthrax thing, the state
cannot even protect its people and its executive buildings from
anything like that, so there is a long-term problem. I think George
Bush is up to the short-term challenge but I worry about him keeping
US public opinion or an international coalition going. In that
context, I think British advice and that of others is important.
He has a good relationship with Schröder in Germany, and
Schröder has moved German opinion and I think very responsibly
so (and as someone who has German family I am glad to see the
German leadership here), and the French are on board for all sorts
of reasons, some of them to do with the Algerian war, which are
not entirely happy—
6. The GIA?
(Professor Halliday) No, I meant the war in the fifties
which they do not want people to talk about. So I think we should
not think we are the only people to listen to. Bush has obviously
got some kind of working relationship with Putin and they have
got a deal on the ABM Treaty, for which this country is not prepared,
I think. So not the only voice but an important voice. However,
the real problem is that not only is this a very difficult challenge
but Washington is in a mess. In addition, and this is something
Mr Rubin might want to comment on, the Democratic Party is in
a mess. Where are the Democratic leaders who are offering ideas
on this? There is only one and he has already served his term.
7. Professor Clarke, do you agree?
(Professor Clarke) Yes, broadly, Chairman, I do. The
levers of influence which the United Kingdom has with the United
States tend to be in the military and intelligence sphere, and
these levers are more prominent as a result of the crisis than
they were before. As it happens, we have the biggest military
presence in the region, second to the United States. In fact,
the United Kingdom has 27,000 of the 40,000 who are in the region.
It has about a quarter of all the aircraft and about a third of
all the ships. Some of that is lucky because of this major exercise
that was taking place in Oman, but it does create elements of
influence which are not lost, I think, in Washington. More specifically
than that, British intelligence has always favoured human intelligence
because it is low-tech, and we did not get out of the human intelligence
business in the way that the United States did in the last ten
years—certainly after the late-70s, early-80s. So our human
intelligence resources are quite high, our Special Forces work
is prized in Washington and those very specific advantages which
the UK has offers some element of leverage, but one should be
aware that they are very specific.
8. Does it translate itself into procurement
decisions?
(Professor Clarke) I am not aware of any direct translation
in that direction, Chairman. Let me put it this way: I am not
aware that it has happened in the past. It is not inconceivable
that it may happen in the future, but when we think about procurement
decisions one is talking now about generations of weapons systems
that will not be available, at least, until 2010/2012 from decisions
taken now.
Sir John Stanley
9. Professor Halliday, you said that you thought
that President Bush and President Putin had agreed a deal on the
ABM Treaty. Are you suggesting that there is an agreed modification
or an agreed scrapping? If it is an agreed modification, what
do you believe the agreed modification is?
(Professor Halliday) I believe the agreed modification
is that the Americans will go a long way to meeting the Russian
demand for a lowering of the number of strategic missiles. In
other words, the Russians had implied, in line with all the previous
negotiations, that they would not object to modification of the
ABM Treaty provided the ABM Treaty was kept and, rather than being
scrapped, altered. Secondly, that the United States would greatly
lower the number of strategic missile warheads which it has. Putin
is going to Washington, and symbolically it looks like he is also
going to Crawford, Texas, which is Bush's home town, on his visit.
That will then mean that the Russians will not object to various
forms of testing. Rumsfeld stated last week that the United States
has suspended further testing until they reached such an agreement
with the Russians. My understanding is that, after the Shanghai
meeting, that is the deal.
10. Are you saying that as far as the agreed
modification on the American side is concerned, they will get
the consent of the Russians to be able to deploy their ABM field
not around the national capital, which of course is a right they
have not exercised so far, but into Alaska?
(Professor Halliday) Yes. What forms of testing the
Americans go in for, and indeed what kind of national missile
defence they have—because there are several possibilities—is
an open question. The Treaty will not be abolished and the Russians
will agree to a modification in terms of testing. It seems to
me to be a done deal. A broad comment I would make is that I do
think that both in the universities and in the press knowledge
of America is very weak in this country. People think they know
about it but they do not. As an academic I am very struck by this.
I have read 100 articles in the British press in the last year
about Bush this and Putin that, and never once seen one which
actually goes over the text of the ABM Treaty and says "Okay,
we have sat down, what would the modification be? How could this
Treaty be revised". It is always at a very generic level.
I think we are going to be faced with some quite precise decisions
in the coming weeks.
Mr Chidgey
11. Professor Halliday, I would like to draw
your mind back to your comments earlier about the law of the UN
and how the US sees it. I recall, in the evidence you submitted[1]
that you clearly believe that international law and the UN is
the key point in dealing with these conflicts between states and
their differences. The thrust of my question is, really, given
the record of the UN, given your own statement that since the
early 1990s the UN has been in deep discussion and given your
recognition that the risk has never been of a similar administration
not recognised as a state, what sort of time-scale are we talking
about before we can look forward to any development of any sort
of state that we would recognise? How can the US see that going
forward with the UN? Is the US prepared for the commitment in
that will clearly be necessary? What sort of time-scale are we
talking about? What is your opinion of the US's understanding
of the impact and importance of cultural and religious leadership
in both the east and the west? Might they perceive that leadership
becoming part of the solution rather than the problem?
(Professor Halliday) A short answer to
some of those questions. International law is important but to
make what, in my profession, is called a `realist' point: international
law which is not backed by force gets nowhere. That would go for
Kosovo, and it would go for Kuwait; you tried it globally, you
tried international law but there has to be a point at which you
say "it ain't worked", which is why I am sometimes sceptical
of the "Give peace a chance/drop food parcels et al"
brigade, because I think it will go on forever. I could be wrong
but that is a very general point. So when we are talking about
international law we are talking about the instruments of international
law and we mean the Security Council, which brings us back to
the permanent members. That is the way the system was set up.
So when people say, including some honourable Members of this
House, that you have got to go to the UN, they have gone to the
UN, they have gone to the body, which is the Security Council,
which has passed two resolutions. There is an authorisation for
the use of force by members in writing with the UN charter. The
UN 6+2 process—which, as I say, began in 1993—reached
a particular point in 1999 (and I think it would be worth Members
getting hold of the Tashkent Declaration of July 1999). The 6+2
means the Russians and the Americans plus the six neighbouring
states—Pakistan, Iran and the others. If you read that document
it is pretty precise. It says there has to be a coalition government,
it has to be broadly representative, it has to stop exporting
drugs, it has to stop exporting terrorism and it has to stop violating
human rights inside Afghanistan. In other words, there are five
or six quite clear points there which make a programme authorised
by three members of the Security Council (and by implication by
all the others) for the creation of a coalition government in
a new state of Afghanistan. That is, if you like, the policy framework
within which Britain, the United States and others are operating.
The UN Special Representative Mr Brahimi, who
I may say is a great friend of this country—he was the Algerian
Ambassador here in the 1970s and those of you who know the London/Middle
East role, he was an active ambassador who went out and talked
to people and had many, many friends in all parties and was greatly
respected—resigned at the end of 1999 because the neighbouring
states were refusing to co-operate, particularly Pakistan and
Iran. Iran supported the Alliance, Pakistan supported the Taliban.
My view is if he takes up the job again, which he has now, it
is not out of loyalty to Kofi Annan, to whom he is very close,
it is because he believes that the Iranians and the Pakistanis
are willing to help in this endeavour. I could say more about
that if you wish. So one of the main problems of the 1990s has
gone. Secondly, he knows and we all know that if you are going
to deal with the terrorism problem in Afghanistan you have got
to create a state that will control it because ultimately the
problem is the state and where it is on the map. This is the time
to do it. It is not a perfect opportunity. Leaving aside the humanitarian
issues, this is the only time you are going to be able to put
through UN policy. On the broader question of stamina, I think
this, as we all know, is a much more complex crisis than the Gulf
in 1990 or Kosovo in 1999 or even Cuba in 1962. I think one of
the huge issues facing ourselves and facing anybody who wants
public debate here is going to be, if you like, policy stamina
on this one. It is going to be very complex, it is going to take
a long time—years—to get the thing done. In that sense
I worry about the stamina of any state (perhaps a little bit less
about this one) and certainly I think that anything that helps
produce a practical, reasonable policy in the US, one that does
not lash out at Iraq is welcome. The Secretary of State says that
stamina is very important but one cannot assume stamina and I
have to say I think the lack of leadership and the lack, also,
of intelligence and, indeed, of policy ideas in Washington is
a very serious one, for which we will all pay the price. On your
final point, I would say there is not much you can do about this
inter-cultural stuff beyond doing what we all do, which is try
and make sensible points. The biggest problem in the Muslim world
is unemployment, which people do not talk about. We devote far
too much to Jihad and Sharia and not enough about jobs and corruption
and so on. I can talk about this if you want. The second point
is I do think there is an enormous problem—and we are on
the wrong side of this problem and there is no quick fix—with
what I call `global rancour'. There is rancour against America.
Anti-Americanism is a very widespread, global phenomenon, which
is also present in this country. Far too little challenge, far
too little basis, actually, on studying America. I worked on an
American liberal think-tank which was a wonderful experience for
me and I have great affection for the country. I also have many
American students, I think partly because I am Irish and I do
not share some of the anti-American prejudices. The Irish do have
a special relationship. I do think the issue of rancour and this
issue of global hostility to America into which bin Laden has
tapped—his strategy is extremely intelligent. Finally, one
of my students has just come back from Thailand and Malaysia yesterday
and he said the T-shirts on sale everywhere were with portraits
of Bin Laden.
Sir Patrick Cormack
12. Can I follow two of those points with Mr
Rubin? First of all the question of stamina. You heard what Professor
Halliday has said in his frank comment. How do you assess the
stamina of the United States administration and how do you assess
the consensus of political opinion in the United States, which
is clearly behind the President at the moment. Do you believe
that it is ready for the long haul? The other key question that
came up as a result of Professor Halliday's comments is this widespread
rancour, as he calls it; this feeling of hostility towards the
United States which is present, especially of course in particular
countries but around the world—something which I deeply
deplore and greatly regret, but nevertheless it is there. I wonder
if you would like to comment on those two things?
(Mr Rubin) First of all, on the stamina issue, I think
there are no precedents by which to judge the stamina of the American
people. Kosovo is not a precedent, Somalia is not a precedent.
Arguably, Pearl Harbour is not a precedent because it was an attack
on the United States out in the ocean; this was on the home land
and there were far more people killed and they were all civilians.
I think, in my mind, those who use Vietnam analogies—body
bags, loss of soldiers—or use Somalia analogies—mutilation
of American soldiers—are living in the past. After September
11, even the farthest Left people, the people who opposed every
intervention in the modern era, have said the use of force is
appropriate in the United States. My favourite example of that
was the lawyer for the "Yippies" in the Chicago Seven
trial. He said he has been against everything, Vietnam, Somalia,
Kosovo, and he always said that the only time force was appropriate
was when our homeland was attacked. It has now been attacked and
I think it is wrong to even suggest that the United States is
going to be "wobbly" or weak on this issue. The only
debate now in the United States, is whether to take this to the
next level and to send in ground divisions—not Special Forces
but divisions on the ground—to take over Afghanistan. So
I do not see stamina as a problem. There may be problems in co-ordinating
the political objectives for an Afghan government post-Taliban
with the military objectives of the air campaign, but I do not
see that stamina is a problem at all. On your next question, the
conventional wisdom now is on the US/UK losing the propaganda
war. I think most people will say that they believe that. The
way I think of this, having confronted people's views about the
United States in my travels for the government and from the podium
every day at the State Department, is we are a country that creates
both love and hate around the world. Many of the same people who
want to buy an Osama bin Laden T-shirt, want to go to Yale. That
is just the nature of the beast. When it comes to substance, that
is a not-fixable problem. I think to the extent that President
Clinton tried to soften the edges of globalisation he was seeking
to address it, but it is not a fixable problem. What is a fixable
problem? If you ask me to grade on a scale from 1 to 100 how did
many of these populations we are talking about feel about the
United States prior to September 11, with 100 being complete support
for our policies and 1 being they are prepared to join a war against
the United States, sadly, because of the collapse of Camp David
and because of the difficulties of dealing with Iraq, and because
of the resentment in the Arab world against some of the rulers
in that world, the number was about 15 before September 11 (again,
1 being complete anti-Americanism and 100 being total support).
So when somebody goes out there now and says, "Okay, how
does the same populace feel about the United States after the
attacks on Afghanistan?", it is my judgment that it has moved
from 15 to 12, that it has not changed that much, and that we
need to remember American policies towards the Israeli government
and towards the Palestinians, the continued bombing of Iraq (mostly
when Iraq is shooting at planes that are there to protect their
own population from Saddam using his aircraft and his helicopters
but that is always forgotten), the resentment against the extreme
wealth of a few individuals in the Arab world, and the jobs problem
(as Fred put it), and the support America provides to governments
like Saudi Arabia and Egypt, create enormous resentment. Yes,
there is a little bit more, but it is only a little bit more.
So we need to be realistic: the Palestinian issue, the Saudi Arabian
democracy issue that nobody likes to talk about, the long-term
challenge of Iraq—these are not problems that can be solved
with good rhetoric or appearing on Al-Jazeera or interviews with
London-based Arab newspapers. These are long-term policy problems
that only get resolved when they get resolved. That is my basic
answer to the resentment issue.
13. I am grateful, but when you say that it
has fallen, in your estimation (just taking your figures as being
acceptable) from 15 to 12, certainly the movement is in the wrong
direction.
(Mr Rubin) Correct.
14. Would you not think that certain initiatives
are necessary on the propaganda front, in particular the way in
which Sharon is dealt with in Israel, to try and put that 12 back
to 15 and then up to 20 and 25? Twelve is a significant minority
and we do need to engage—to use the trite phrase—hearts
and mind within the Muslim world if we are going to win the long-term
battle and if the stamina that you talked about in your response
to my first question is indeed going to be sustained.
(Mr Rubin) Yes, I agree with you and I was not suggesting
that we should not do more, and I think you are quite right to
suggest that we could. Let me address that directly. Propaganda,
hearts and minds, public diplomacy—whatever you call it—is
usually not first on the policy-makers list when they are putting
together a policy. So military issues, coalition building, intelligence,
law enforcement, all of those came first, and it is only in the
last couple of weeks that they have realised that we really need
to organise ourselves for this. They are a new administration
and they are extremely strong at the top, but the people in this
area have just been hired or have just started their jobs and
may not really be in position to act. I think they are going to
act now, and what they can do is begin to develop real policies,
real programmes using radio, using field trips, using co-ordinated
speeches and statements to all of the community. I think it was
a mistake in an otherwise brilliant performance by Secretary Powell
to be caught questioning Al-Jazeera and putting pressure on the
government in Qatar. That was unfortunate in an otherwise brilliant
performance. Instead we should be on there every day for an hour;
every day some official from the US Government or British Government
should be on that programme. So there are policies that can be
pursued. I think they are getting it together. There are meetings
probably going on in the next few hours sitting down, organising
themselves for a long-term battle over the hearts and minds in
that part of the world. Being prepared to do nation building in
Afghanistan, and to provide billions of dollars of reconstruction
assistance, is part and parcel of solving that problem.
The second and last part, I think, of your question
is Prime Minister Sharon. This is a very difficult subject, as
I think we all know. We first need to recognise what it is like
to live in Israel. It has been a pretty horrific experience over
the last year, to have totally innocent civilians walking down
the street, going to the pizza parlours, going to the discos,
doing whatever it is, and being slaughtered and murdered for nothing
that they have done. That happens most days in Israel. They are
either killed or attempts are made. So that is the context in
which the Israeli Government approached September 11. I think
they made some real big mistakes, because instead of realising
that this was the moment to give full and complete solidarity
to the United States—the government that has come to Israel's
defence time and time again when they were in trouble—Prime
Minister Sharon made probably the stupidest remarks by a head
of government in the modern era, by comparing President Bush to
Neville Chamberlain. That is something that the President will
have a hard time forgetting for the rest of his term in office.
That is cutting very, very, very deep. He was wrong in his analogy,
he was wrong in his attempt to offer the United States a history
lesson, but what he was most wrong in is not understanding that
to be a friend of the United States means to, yes, lose a little
bit of what you are doing. When you have a friend who comes to
your defence when you are in trouble, that means that they need
to make sacrifices for you, and all that the President was asking,
as I understand it, at that time was to have a meeting between
the Israelis and the Palestinians. That was too much for the Prime
Minister to accept. He misunderstands the long-term impact of
American public opinion. Whenever Israel has been threatened,
the United States—even at the risk of confrontation with
the Soviet Union—was there, and now the United States is
in jeopardy and where is our friendship with Israel when we need
their help? So that message was an extremely flawed decision by
the Prime Minister, and they have not really fixed it. That does
not mean that we should let the Palestinians off the hook. Arafat
is playing a very dangerous game and has been for a year. He has
been using violence when it is convenient for him. I believe the
intifada started when, for the first time in his career, Palestinians
were not thought of as the under-dog. Post-Camp David most of
the world thought that Barak had made the decisions we had all
been asking him to make, and the response from the Arab world
was not, "This is a breakthrough. You have done all the things
we are asking for. We cannot finish the deal yet, we need to negotiate
some more, but Barak is a man of peace and this is a breakthrough."
Instead they did not like it because the whole world was asking
them hard questions for the first time, rather than asking the
Israelis the hard questions about what are you doing about the
Palestinians? They were faced with the hard questions and they
did not like it. I believe that they played the violence and the
intifada to a point where he did lose some control. So every day
the Israelis are living under the kind of threat and fear that
Americans are just getting used to, and that may have—how
shall I say—not encouraged them to make the best decisions
at the top.
Mr Illsley
15. I would like to ask Professor Clarke and
James Rubin whether they agree with Professor Halliday's assertion
that there is this lack of leadership in America, which is pretty
disturbing from my point of view, bearing in mind that our Government
is tending to stand shoulder to shoulder with the United States
in the military action with the United States as the dominant
partner leading the military action and leading the coalition?
To hear it said there was a complete lack of leadership is not
exactly good news. I would like to ask whether you agree with
that. Is it because there is a view that there is a lack of leadership
per se, or a lack of leadership within the coalition? I am conscious
of reports I read earlier this year, after the Bush election,
that the sole strategy of the Bush camp was to get Bush re-elected
four years hence. Colin Powell was being sidelined by not being
allowed to travel as widely as the Secretary of State might have
been, and that perhaps Donald Rumsfeld is taking up the role of
a Secretary of State. Is it a lack of leadership per se?
(Professor Clarke) Thank you. I think the lack of
leadership which Professor Halliday mentioned really arises from
two different sorts of problems. One is that this crisis itself
is uniquely complex and challenges the best of policy-makers.
Secondly, it has forced the United States into a series of re-orientations.
The Bush policy on re-election—on the whole series of issues
such as arms control, on regional stability, on relations with
a number of allies—has had to be re-thought because the
United States now needs to keep a coalition together, both a military
coalition with its close partners and a broader, anit-terrorist
coalition with a number of countries that it would not have thought
of as partners before. So I think the complexity of the crisis
and the need to re-orientate is creating a form of policy vacuum
in the United States which it is very hard for any government
to fill and which it is going to take time to remedy. Beyond that,
I think the leadership problem also comes down to something else
Professor Halliday introduced, which is the need to have a political
structure for the future of Afghanistan sooner rather than later.
We always acknowledge the need for political structures but we
tend to think of them in the middle of military campaigns. We
tend to say "Let's get the military campaign out of the way
first and then we will think about the political structure, and
if we think about it a bit earlier then that is all to the good".
That will not do in this case. It is intrinsic to the propaganda
war that we spoke about, intrinsic to the question of US stamina
and intrinsic to the rightness of policy that a clear sense of
what we want to happen in Afghanistan in the next six months,
a year, two years and five years is part of the military policy
that is being pursued at the moment. The leadership failure that
seems to me to be most evident is a failure to have a clear political
policy, or a sense of a political future, in Afghanistan. Without
that the war against terrorism will make no sense. If the policy
is only to remove the Taliban and then see what the options are,
or remove the Taliban and conduct search and destroy operations
against the network of Osama bin Laden, that will not be good
enough. In order to keep allies on side and coalition partners
on side, a manifestly workable and, perhaps, roughly just but
just settlement in Afghanistan has got to be part of the package.
The fact that it is not is, to my mind, the most important element
of policy failure. Anything the United Kingdom can do to help
remedy that gap would, I think, be very welcome and very useful.
Ms Stuart
16. If I move us on slightly. I think we all
struggle to draw analogies from history, and as has been made
quite clear before, the one thing history cannot do is help us
predict the future. We can, however, draw some lessons. One of
these is that we are dealing with a new kind of war, some elements
of which we will recognise but others we will not. Robert Cooper,
one of the diplomats, wrote a very interesting article, before
he was given the job of dealing with the future of Afghanistan,
where he was talking about creating new empires. It is very unfortunate
terminology but I think he talks about building those structures.
I just want to take that a little bit further now. Professor Clarke,
in your submission to the Committee, you identified a change in
the UK policy in terms of its military relationship within the
European Union and the United States of America. We are building
these new alliances, some of which are pretty surprising ones,
which may worry us for the future. Very specifically, within the
United States and Europe, are we moving to a state where you think
the United States may well see itself making military assets available
to European-led initiatives, which would be quite a considerable
change, or are we continuing in a kind of "big brother"
relationship, which I would almost identify with the big brother
who irritates you when he is around but, by God, you miss him
when he has gone? Are we continuing to rely on that US leadership,
where we fall in, or do you see any real hope of becoming an equal
partner in this, which I think we are not?
(Professor Clarke) If I can start at the end of those
questions and work back to the beginning, the European Union will
always be a junior in military terms to the United States, and
the project for a European Security and Defence Policy (which
is what the Blair initiative in 1998 really gave impetus to) is
a policy only to engage in crisis management—the so-called
Petersburg tasks. Nevertheless, it is intrinsic to the design
of ESDP that NATO assets, which really means American assets in
the particular areas of shortages, would be available to the Europeans
if they participated in crisis management operations. What that
means, in practice, is that if the United States disapproved of
something the Europeans wanted to do it would effectively have
a veto over the military use of its assets. On the other hand,
Europeans are not likely to engage in operations of which the
US thoroughly disapproves, it is much more likely that the Europeans
will engage in operations where the United States is in full support
but does not want to be involved itself and so says "Fine,
let the Europeans handle this and we will make some of our intelligence
assets and logistics assets and, perhaps, some other forms of
support available for the Europeans to actually get on and do
the job." That is the sort of relationship which the Europeans
envisage and which, I am sure, the Prime Minister envisages in
making the ESDP reality. The Helsinki Headline goals which are
part of this process are due to be met by the end of 2002. I think
that is rather optimistic. Nevertheless, the Europeans will have
some form of military capability at some time after that which
could be used, I think, in this way. Going back to the earlier
part of your question, this is a new type of war and a new type
of conflict. Yes, I think this will impact on what the Europeans
need to think about in ESDP quite a lot. It may well be that the
Europeans and particularly the United Kingdom, is signing up for
a long series of campaigns which will be campaigns of counter-terrorism,
of intelligence-sharing, of counter-crime operations (which are
very close to counter-terrorist operations in many ways), and
if this is a long-term war it is a war that will exist at several
different levels simultaneously. It will be the war that we see,
at the moment, in Afghanistan, which is the obvious face of it,
and there will also be a dirty war which will be conducted in
a counter-insurgency mode, perhaps on the ground in Afghanistan.
There will be an Internet war, a cyber-war, in attempts to get
into the networks of organised criminals, terrorist groups and,
in particular, the Osama bin Laden network; a propaganda war and
there will be a psyops war (a psychological operations war) which
will go on in many parts of the world. That will be a very complex
series of operations indeed, and the Europeans, I think, will
find themselves signing up for parts of that war. The United Kingdom
is probably going to sign up for some part of all those levels.
Partly because of our relationship with the United States, I think
we would want to be seen to make a contribution on all of those
levels. On some of those levels we are in a position to do so,
but it will have, I think, quite important consequences for the
future direction of the European Security and Defence Policy,
which ESDP, so far, has not been able to take on board. The attention
of the European military planners is, so far, on the Capabilities
Commitment Conference on 19/21 November which will review progress
towards meeting the Helsinki Headline goals, and the rest of their
attention is on the Headline goals themselves. I think that next
year the fuller implications of this crisis will begin to work
themselves into the ESDP project.
17. A quick follow up. If the United Kingdom
has greater involvement within the European context, on the one
hand, and on the other our traditional intelligence sharing relationship
with the United States, do you feel that could in the long-term
be adversely affected?
(Professor Clarke) Yes. You mentioned the one most
difficult issue that I think the United Kingdom faces. In most
other military areas the UK is able to say, and Tony Blair has
been able to say, we can do both, we can be a good friend to the
United States, a great transatlantic pal, and we can lead the
Europeans in developing a greater military capacity. I think that
is broadly true but in the intelligence area there are some very
severe trade-offs which the UK will have to face. Its intelligence
relationship with the United States is unique and very close.
If we go in for a European intelligence sharing arrangement that
is meaningful then it will, by definition, open the door to some
American intelligence being shared with other European powers
and the United States, on the basis of past experience, is likely
to be fairly hostile to that notion. Equally, if we say we will
keep our special relationship with the United States in intelligence
affairs and work quite separately with the Europeans then the
other European powers are going to be suspicious of what else
we know that we are not telling them. It is a genuine dilemma
and so far there is no easy way out of it.
Mr Hamilton
18. Mr Rubin, you said in the Daily Telegraph
of 16 September that it is crucial that European and American
leaders make it clear that these terrorist attacks are nothing
to do with the Middle East peace process. Osama bin Laden in his
television broadcast linked the 11 September attacks to the Arab-Israeli
conflict quite deliberately and, of course, the role the US plays
in supporting Israel. You made allusions to that earlier, and
I have to say I agree wholeheartedly with your comments, but how
can the United Kingdom and the United States or the European Union
address the genuine grievances without appearing to bow to the
terrorist threat? Following on from that, I think Professor Halliday
said earlier, I am paraphrasing a bit, that the biggest problem
in the Muslim world is not Jihad, it is actually unemployment.
I may have changed what you said slightly there but the gist of
it was unemployment is a much bigger problem than anything else.
Is that not crucial in the conflict between the Middle East and
the Palestinians? Finally, if I can just ask this: in the light
of our Prime Minister's imminent visit to Israel and Prime Minister
Sharon's visit to London, I believe it is next week, does the
United Kingdom have a distinctive role to play in the Middle East
peace process in your opinion?
(Mr Rubin) Thank you for that question. First, the
best way to explain why this has nothing to do with the peace
process is the moment when most of the Arab world thought the
United States was doing everything that they asked them to do,
pressuring the Israeli Government to accept land for peace, trying
their hardest to promote a particular peace agreement, was the
summer of 1998 when the US Government and the Netanyahu Government
were at very, very strong verbal odds with each other. Every Arab
government that I know talked to us about this was thrilled with
what we were doing. The press, so to speak, in the Arab world
was very positive about what we were doing. It was at that moment,
the height of that so-called pressure we were putting on, that
the bombings of the Kenyan and Tanzanian embassies took place.
The Middle East peace process is not his agenda. He is clever
enough to include it on his list when we are a lower point in
terms of the perception of what we have been doing. What can we
do and what role can the UK Government play in this? It is very
tricky for an American former Government official to be overseas
and to say anything that is at all critical of the Bush Administration
right now, so I am going to choose my words very carefully. Prior
to September 11, I think that there was not enough effort made
at the highest levels to pursue the Middle East peace process.
It is not a very easy thing to do, it is one of the most extraordinarily
frustrating things to do, to try to promote peace between the
Israelis and the Palestinians, but it is part of our job, it is
part of the Secretary of State's job, and it is part of the President's
job. I think prior to September 11, they hoped that by staying
out they could force certain changes on the ground, force Arafat
to make certain decisions by withholding meetings with him and
the President, by withholding trips from the Secretary of State.
Every Secretary of State does not want to get bogged down in the
Middle East peace process, because it is extraordinarily frustrating
and difficult, but it is part of the job. To keep the process
going you have to work at it even when nobody likes you, everyone
is irritated with you, when you do not appear to be making any
progress, because just by the constant presence of the United
States in the region you tend to minimise these resentments, and
you tend to create a brake on Israeli actions, and the two are
necessary. I think higher levels of engagement are necessary than
occurred prior to September 11. After September 11, the equation
has changed considerably and it is not obvious how to move forward
on the Middle East peace process, because you do not want to give
the impression that you are acting because of September 11, and
because of Osama bin Laden's representation of his cause. That
leads me to your last question, which is the UK Government's role,
and, indeed, the Chairman's first question. I think it fairly
unprecedented to have a Prime Minister from another government
playing such an active brokering role in the Middle East peace
process, in a sense with the daily contact and support of the
United States. Let us face it, the United States is the only country
that has unique leverage on both sides. Other countries have leverage
on one or the other side, but it is really only the United States
that has unique leverage on both. With US engagement still focussed
on the war on terrorism and concerned about making new steps,
dramatic steps, that will be perceived as responding to September
11 or will cause the kind of outbursts that we saw from Prime
Minister Sharon, the UK Government is playing a role. The combination
of Prime Minister Blair and his Foreign Minister in Iran and Michael
Levy and others who really know the parties are making a difference.
I think what the results will be, I do not know. Joschka Fischer
tried it, George Tennant tried it, George Mitchell tried it, now
Tony Blair is trying it and that is a good thing. I think he is
doing it in a very highly co-ordinated way and I think it will
help but we all have to be realistic, this is an extraordinarily
difficult problem. The Israeli Prime Minister offered what we
in the State Department never dreamed he would actually put on
the table at Camp David and in the subsequent discussions at Tampa
and the result was a year's worth of violence. The peace camp
in Israel is feeling pretty low and pretty discredited, not just
because they could not agree but because they could not get praise
for the boldness and the courage of what Barak did. They did not
have to agree but they had to say that this was dramatic and courageous
and they would not do that, instead they used the Sharon visit
to launch a year's worth of violence in the hope of improving
their position, which has not got any better.
19. Is there an extent in your view to which
the election of Sharon himself was as a direct result of Arafat
and the Palestinians rejecting Barak's very, very bold offer?
(Mr Rubin) I am sure that Barak is sitting around
thinking a lot about that. He has got a lot of time to do so.
Barak was having a tough time prior to Camp David. For a variety
of reasons his coalition was always quite weak but his notion
was what he called the "big bang", that is "I keep
everyone close to me, I do not alienate any of those who support
settlements by agreeing to small steps on settlements. I do not
alienate anybody, I keep it all inside my pocket. They are all
mad at me right now but I go to Camp David, I get an agreement
and I take it to the public and I get 60/40 support for it and
my political problems are solved". He avoided the coalition
building that was necessary to maintain a certain political power
in the Knesset and then when Camp David collapsed the downside
of the big bang theory came home to roost, which was he was wildly
voted out of office. Was Sharon voted in because of the violence?
The short answer is yes. In another context without that kind
of violence, with progress in the peace process, even without
the big bang theory achieved, Barak would have had a better shot
at it but he was extraordinarily unpopular. He was good at all
the big decisions, but in my opinion not very good at the small
decisions of government.
Chairman: Good general, bad staff work.
Mr Hamilton: Can I just ask Professor Halliday
about his comments about Muslims in general. I think you were
saying that poverty as well as unemployment is a big problem.
1 "No Man is an Island", Article by Professor
Fred Halliday, The Observer, 16th September 2001. Back
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