If We’re Not There, Start Without US

By David Glenn Cox

It is well-documented that Joe Biden has been known to speak out of turn. Of course the flip side of such a reputation is the ability to say things meant in earnest and then to simply laugh them off. On Sunday the Vice President told George Stephanopoulos that Israel has a sovereign right to decide how to deal with Iran’s nuclear ambitions whether the United States agrees or not.

His statements are beyond absurd, more worthy of a Dick Cheney or of Genghis Kahn. The Vice President of the United States is again preaching Bush’s preemptive war doctrine, based yet again on dodgy evidence. The United States is a founding member of the United Nations and preaches to other nations about international law. Article two of the United Nations Charter states:

“The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members. All Members, in order to ensure to all of them the rights and benefits resulting from membership, shall fulfill in good faith the obligations assumed by them in accordance with the present Charter. All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered. 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, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”

This leaves the administration with a problem because no one has corrected the Vice President’s statements. The government of the United States is in open breach of the founding principle of the United Nations Charter once again. The Obama administration inherited the Bush administration’s wars of aggrandizement. President Obama went to Cairo, Egypt to speak to the Arab public to offer a change and a new beginning. This makes Biden’s comments even more troubling. Was the President lying when he spoke in Cairo? Was Biden expressing the administration’s true feelings about the region? The Arab public will not wait to find out and Obama will not get a second chance to prove his good intentions.

While Obama professes a desire for a new beginning, Israel continues to expand settlements. Obama then tells the Arab audience that the United States won’t tolerate that expansion, as predator drones kill over six hundred Pakistani civilians. Six years into war and large segments of Baghdad and Kabul have only limited electricity and water, while billion-dollar American embassies rise into their skylines. We ignore the occupation of Gaza; we ignore the arrests of humanitarian activists, as the Vice President preaches that the United States has no right to correct Israel.

First, Iran is a member in good standing in the United Nations and is entitled to the full protection of the UN. Secondly, Iran is a signator of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. They have every legal right to pursue the peaceful use of nuclear power whether Israel likes it or not. Thirdly, Iran is surrounded by nuclear neighbors, one of which has made repeated threats of pre-emptive attacks against their nation. This nation has gone so far as to stage and publicly announce plans for mock attacks with it’s airforce against Iran. That nation is Israel, a nation that operates its own illegal nuclear weapons program. The pot calling the kettle black indeed!

Yet no one has threatened to bomb Israel’s nuclear sites despite Israel’s threatened attacks on her neighbors. No one calls for inspections of Israel’s nuclear sites or its weapons labs. Iran is arguably working inside international treaties while the claims that are made against her come mainly from a nation that has never signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, a nation that has no legal right to nuclear power and is demonstrably acting outside of the existing nuclear conventions.

The Vice President continued, "We cannot dictate to another sovereign nation what they can and cannot do when they make a determination, if they make a determination, that they’re existentially threatened."

Following the Vice President’s logic, Germany had every right to attack Poland in 1939; The North Koreans had every right to invade South Korea. It is childish baby talk. Saddam claimed that Kuwait was driving down the price of oil to force Iraq to default on international loans, and under the new Biden doctrine Saddam did the right thing by invading Kuwait. We send the nation of Israel $3,000,000,000 each year in military assistance. In each and every one of those contracts is the provision that the weapons cannot be used in any way that is unacceptable to the United States government.

Several years ago, due to US sanctions, Hugo Chavez decided to sell his country’s fleet of American-built warplanes. The US State Department quickly emerged out of the recesses of their office waving contracts at the Venezuelans that they could not sell or give away those planes without specific US approval. Nor could they dismantle or sell parts from the aircraft, nor are they allowed to share technology found inside the aircraft. The Biden doctrine says different; if Chavez claimed an existential threat, Chavez is free to sell those airplanes to China for a truckload of gumballs.

What could the US do then? Go to the UN and complain? We voted for change; we voted for that change because as a nation we were sick of arbitrary action with only a pretense of legality. The Vice President’s uncontested statement is a full promotion, acceptance and furthering of the Bush doctrine. But what if Iran feels existentially threatened? Is she free to use pre-emptive war to solve her problems? Are all nations now free to use war to solve foreign policy problems, or is it just the United States and Israel?

This nation helped to found the United Nations and hosts its headquarters in New York. But when responding to questions of international peace the Vice President doesn’t even mention its name.

“If the United Nations once admits that international disputes can be settled by using force, then we will have destroyed the foundation of the organization and our best hope of establishing a world order.” (Dwight Eisenhower)

Let me be clear, I’m not pro-Iran or anti-Israel; I’m pro-peace and anti-war. I’m pro law and anti unitary preemptive action. I don’t care about religions or historical claims; the law is the law and you can’t just bend it for your friends and double it on your enemies. Otherwise you cease to be a leader and you become just a thug. Statements such as those made by the Vice President and not repudiated by the administration are saying, in effect: If we’re not there when you’re ready, just go ahead and start without us. That’s not change, and that’s not legal, and that’s not a responsible statement for a world leader to make. It’s just more Bush thuggery.

“The heroes of the world community are not those who withdraw when difficulties ensue, not those who can envision neither the prospect of success nor the consequence of failure — but those who stand the heat of battle, the fight for world peace through the United Nations.” (Hubert H. Humphrey)