The transformation of the international arena over the past two years entails the need for the Left to rethink its approaches that have been designed to encourage international peace and welfare. The key international changes at issue are, in summary:

• the widespread realisation that non-state actors with sufficient motivation have the ability to cause large-scale disruption and destruction to the lives of people in the North. This could have led members of the US administration to adopt a "hearts and minds" strategy, to win over disenfranchised individuals who had been deeply alienated by past US policy, and to forestall the increasing popularity of radical movements based on the use of extreme violence. Instead, an extensive military campaign, the "war on terrorism", was launched.

• the articulation by the present United States administration of a radical agenda to translate their military superiority into an effective system of international coercion and control. This is backed up by a large increase in military expenditure and the development of new forms of weaponry. This is intended to prevent regional military competitors from arising. Instead, it may encourage the proliferation of non-conventional weapons, particularly nuclear weapons, as many governments which seek to remain outside the US orbit sense that the only way in which to prevent an attack upon them is to acquire a credible deterrent.

• the use of Iraq as a staging post for a programme of remaking the Middle East. Two key mechanisms that are furthered through the invasion of Iraq, and which will facilitate this reordering of the region, are the maintenance of a substantial and open-ended US military presence the Gulf and the creation of a free trade area in the Middle East that would allow economic interests aligned with the US to achieve regional political dominance.

Many of the international issues that the British Left has analysed and mobilised around extensively in the past -- such as opposition to the arms trade and nuclear weapons, support for international fair trade arrangements, opposing the imposition of economic liberalisation on the South, and developing strategies to counter the persecution of minorities (and excluded majorities) abroad -- are linked to the changes outlined above, and remain important. However, to focus on these themes alone is not to engage with the central political processes that have emerged since 2001 and which are reshaping the international situation in dramatic and potentially devastating ways. This paper will look at what Britain can do to grapple with these issues, under a different foreign policy outlook, other than carp from the sidelines.

As many within the Bush team stated prior to the Iraq war, one feature of the invasion would be to remove the extensive US public reluctance of the past thirty years to engage in large-scale and long-term military operations. That is, it would cure the "Vietnam syndrome" by demonstrating that war-fighting could be relatively painless for the US armed forces. If successful, the Iraq conflict removes the predominant factor that has constrained US politicians in recent years, providing them with the flexibility to deploy personnel at will and order them into battle. The decision to launch future combat operations can then be taken purely on the basis of considerations of international politics: is another war the most effective way of securing our interests in, say, Iran, Syria or Venezuela, or would another method work better? The special status of war as a last resort is thus removed, and it can be seen as one tool amongst many in the repertoire of foreign policy.

One way in which this approach may collapse would be if it fails in its basic premise: that war-fighting can be relatively painless for the aggressor. Iraq was the testing ground of the "neo-conservative" ideologues, in their assertion that a determined and confident push by US military forces into the tyrannies of the Middle East would be welcomed by their inhabitants, and respected by others of the region. The demonstration of military might, so the argument goes, leads opposition groups into compliance, and the populations find (sometimes to their surprise) that the Pax Americana suits them very well, thank you: it might take them a while, but they will realise that eventually. Therefore, nothing will show this approach to be wrong better than failure. If Iraq descends into full-scale civil war, with US and UK troops attacked relentlessly by Iraq's inhabitants, the death toll mounting, the Iraqi economy sinking even further, then the neo-conservative case for war will have been discredited. Even President Bush might think twice before taking advice from Paul Wolfowitz next time.

This is not a scenario that I urge the British Left to encourage. That is not because I think it unlikely: in fact, it may be more probable than British policy makers seem to realise, with Iraq's army now disbanded but its soldiers possessing that deadly combination of weapons and no income, and with even former US-supported leaders referring to the US as the "Great Satan". However, the consequences of civil disorder in Iraq are devastating for a population that has already suffered so extensively under Saddam and sanctions, particularly if it needs to be so bad that even the US President must notice. Equally, the result of a speedy withdrawal of Anglo-American forces would be a collapse of central authority, the absence of any security for the Iraqi population and with it the forestalling of any attempts to reconstruct a basic infrastructure that will serve the wellbeing of the people. My own perspective is that the only responsible course of action, for the sake of the Iraqi people, for the UK and US armed forces, and for the long-term security of the rest of the world, is to encourage the occupying powers to govern the country with sufficient foresight and understanding to stave off the potential for rebellions against their rule.

But would the US administration be able to deal with such success without inflicting it upon the rest of the world?

One of the avenues that will not serve by itself to dissuade the present incumbents of office from launching more wars is by appealing to the international law of the United Nations, the traditional mainstay of those concerned with international peace. Put quite simply, the members of the US administration do not consider themselves bound by anything such as international law, and some senior members of the administration are quite happy to say so openly (as are, incidentally, some of Mr Blair's most senior foreign policy advisors).

What Under Secretary of State John Bolton and Robert Cooper hold in common is that ideas of legal obligation hold the US and UK back from achieving the aims that they consider valuable. International law may have secured favourable conditions for the US and UK in the past, through preserving international stability, but stability (particularly the stability of hostile regimes) is no longer an objective. Moreover, threats from other States are better dealt with through a demonstration of US and UK power than by appeals to legal frameworks. International law, therefore, need not come into the hard-edged considerations of foreign policy.

The relative significance of international law during the Cold War period arose because both blocs were attempting to demonstrate the benefits of alignment to the governments of non-aligned states. Notions of reciprocal international arrangements served as the framework in which some degree of trust could be built up. Financial incentives from the major power and the client state's position within the bloc were both protected by ideas of law. Thus if the major power violated the terms of the arrangement, there would be repercussions that would impact upon the major power. One clear example among many is the US government's withdrawal of promised funding from the Aswan dam in Egypt in 1956, which led the hitherto largely pro-US government of Nasser to turn to the Soviet bloc. A less wholesome result of this system was that if a client state (Hungary, Guatemala, Iran, Chile etc) attempted to break from a sphere of influence, its government would be overthrown.

This system of reciprocity no longer exists in the unipolar world. At present, the US can and does abrogate what are understood internationally as its legal commitments, without any repercussion on its international standing. The international institutions that served to hold alliances together are no longer useful to the US, in the absence of any other purposeful alliance to which countries can turn. In fact, the image of the "outlaw State" serves the US administration fairly well in strategic terms: now States cannot rely on bits of paper signed by previous US administrations to protect themselves from American military might, but they must instead constantly and dedicatedly ingratiate themselves with the capricious and irascible Superpower in order to avoid its wrath. For if that Superpower turns its military might or its economic muscle on a State, there will be no-one there to promote anti-imperialist forces inside the country in the hope of securing a political base there; indeed, previously loyal allies will desert it, as the case of Iraq demonstrated in 1990 and again in 2001-02.

There are good reasons to seek the reemergence of bipolarity or multipolarity in international affairs. The ability to exercise power without the restraints of checks or balances inevitably results in the irresponsible use of that power, in which particular interests are served at the expense of a broader conception of international legitimacy. Mr Blair has opposed this line of thought (incidentally, it is the approach that lay at the heart of the American Constitution), claiming that if there were "rival power blocs", then this would be "a disaster for the world". One can understand this point of view if rivalry necessarily meant a world ordered on the principle of mutually assured destruction, along the lines of the last thirty years of the Cold War. That is a system for which any nostalgia is surely misguided.

However, bipolarity can also exist within a situation in which the use of massive force between the poles is inconceivable. Such a system would preserve the benefits of providing incentives for the powers to make good on their commitments to other States, out of concern that the State in question would otherwise be tempted to defect to the opposing bloc, whilst preserving a state of non-aggression between the rival powers.

The best contender for such a rival power to emerge in the near future, and which Britain can have a crucial role within, is the European Union with a consolidated foreign policy. The EU, with the largest market, financial resources and set of diplomatic relations in the world, has a potential role in foreign policy that would render it an effective check on US action internationally. At present, the US has a three-pronged strategy towards the potential emergence of a strong EU foreign policy.

Firstly, it has used the British foreign policy alignment with the US to hinder the convergence of foreign policy. This was most clear over Iraq. Successive British governments have acted in effect if not in intention, particularly since 2002, as the mechanism by which the United States prevents the emergence of a viable international competitor. It is difficult to think of a more apt example in the world today of the objective articulated in President Bush's National Security Strategy of 2002 of how the US is successfully managing to "dissuade potential adversaries" who have the "hopes of surpassing, or equaling, the power of the United States" than the present role of the UK in Europe.

Secondly, and again most clearly over Iraq, the US has used its leverage over Eastern European countries to make the process of EU enlargement incompatible with foreign policy convergence. Stark differences in foreign policy have been created between the western mid-continental alliance and the majority of the ten new EU members-to-be.

Thirdly, the weakness of present EU foreign policy has been exploited to demonstrate to non-member countries that the US remains the only major player on the international stage. This has been clear over the contest over the mediating role in the Palestine-Israel conflict, which the US has managed to monopolise by demonstrating to Israel that it will off-set any pressure that the EU applies on it. It was also clear in the recent contest over the US demand for immunity for its personnel from the International Criminal Court. Despite an overt EU position that encouraged States not to sign impunity deals (so-called Article 98 agreements) with the US, around 50 States have granted immunity to US personnel; these include countries that the EU has otherwise had close relations with, such as Romania, Macedonia and Albania. Because the EU was not being able to back up its position with any incentives, the US was able to demonstrate to its international audience that only it could make international demands that were worthy of being taken seriously.

Many within the Left have had a long-held and justifiable reluctance to support closer European integration. The present international situation, in which one power is able to act unchecked in its foreign policy, demands a rethinking of attitudes towards a common foreign policy. The role of the British government remains crucial in this regard, as it has acted as the major impediment to the convergence of foreign policy.

Author: Glen Rangwala

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