http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Iran has pulled off a tidy little success with
its seizure and release
of those 15 British sailors and marines: a pointed humiliation of Britain, with
a bonus demonstration of Iran's intention to push back against coalition
challenges to its assets in Iraq. All with total impunity. Further, it exposed
the impotence of all those transnational institutions — most prominently the
European Union and the United Nations — that pretend to maintain international
order.
You would think
maintaining international order means, at least, challenging acts of piracy. No
challenge here. Instead, a quiet capitulation.
The quid pro quos
were not terribly subtle. An Iranian "diplomat" who had been held for
two months in Iraq is suddenly
released. Equally suddenly, Iran is granted
access to the five Iranian "consular officials" — Revolutionary
Guards who had been training Shiite militias to kill Americans and others —
whom the United States had arrested in Irbil in January. There may have been
other concessions we will never hear about. But the salient point is that
American action is what got this unstuck.
Where then was the
European Union? These 15 hostages, after all, are not just British citizens
but, under the laws of Europe, citizens of Europe. Yet the European Union
lifted not a finger on their behalf.
Europeans talk all
the time about their preference for "soft power" over the brute
military force those Neanderthal Americans resort to all the time. What was the
soft power available here? Iran's shaky economy is highly dependent on European
credits, trade and technology. Britain asked the European Union to threaten
to freeze exports, $18 billion a year of commerce. Iran would have lost its
No. 1 trading partner. The European Union refused.
Why was nothing
done? The reason is simple. Europe functions quite well as a free-trade zone,
but as a political entity it is a farce. It remains a collection of sovereign
countries with divergent interests. A freeze of economic relations with Europe
would have shaken the Iranian economy to the core. "The Dutch,"
reported the Times of London, "said it was important not to risk a
breakdown in dialogue." So much for European solidarity.
Like other vaunted
transnational institutions, the European Union is useless as a player in the
international arena. Not because its members are venal but because they are
sovereign. Their interests are simply not identical.
The problem is most
striking at the United Nations, the quintessential transnational institution
with a mandate to maintain international peace and order. There was a
commonality of interest at its origin — defeating Nazi Germany and imperial
Japan. The war ended, but the wartime alliance of Britain, France, the United
States, China and Russia proclaimed itself the guardian of postwar
"collective security" as the Security Council.
Small problem: Their
interests are not collective. They are individual. Take the Iranian nuclear
program. Russia and China make it impossible to impose any serious sanctions.
China has an interest in maintaining strong relations with a major energy
supplier and is not about to jeopardize that over Iranian nukes that are no
threat to it whatsoever. Russia sees Iran as a useful proxy in resisting
Western attempts to dominate the Persian Gulf.
Ironically, the
existence of transnational institutions such as the United Nations makes it
harder for collective action against bad actors. In the past, interested
parties would simply get together in temporary coalitions to do what they had
to do. That is much harder now because they believe such action is illegitimate
without the Security Council's blessing. The result is utterly predictable.
Nothing has been done about the Iranian bomb. In fact, the only effective
sanctions are those coming unilaterally out of the U.S. Treasury.
Remember the great
return to multilateralism — the new emphasis on diplomacy and "working
with the allies" — so widely heralded at the beginning of the second Bush
administration? To general acclaim, the cowboys had been banished and the
grown-ups brought back to town.
What exactly has the
new multilateralism brought us? North Korea tested
a nuclear device. Iran has accelerated
its march to developing the bomb. The pro-Western government in Beirut hangs by
a thread. The Darfur genocide continues unabated.
The capture and
release of the British hostages illustrate once again the fatuousness of the
"international community" and its great institutions. You want your
people back? Go to the European Union and get stiffed. Go to the Security
Council and get
a statement that refuses even to "deplore" this act of piracy.
(You settle for a humiliating expression of "grave concern.") Then
turn to the despised Americans. They'll deal some cards and bail you out.
© 2006 WPWG
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