Book Report: Chasing the Flame (1)

I am not ready yet to give my thoughts on Samantha Powers' book Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World. I finished reading it a while ago, but I have not been able to organize all my thoughts on it yet. So while I do that, here is a post with some golden quotes from the book (the Kindle is amazing!).

Here is the quote of the book:

To nonexperts, humanitarian action and human rights sounded like synonyms or, at the very least, complements. But he knew that, in the real world, feeding people was often incompatible with speaking out. "How do we reconcile the need for humanitarian access and thus discretion, with the need, sometimes the obligation, for human rights?" he asked a gathering of diplomats from donor countries in Geneva, undoubtedly with the events of Zaire and Tanzania on his mind. "In the face of overwhelming human rights abuses, when do humanitarian agencies withdraw?"

And now some others to get you thinking:

Released from the cold war stalemate, the Security Council of the 1990s had been liberated to enforce international peace and security. But the back-to-back calamities had made it clear that, if civilians were not pawns in a larger ideological struggle, as they had been in the cold war, their welfare would command hardly any attention at all. Instead of using the Security Council to establish and enforce a new global order, the major powers sent lightly armed peacekeepers into harm’s way simply to monitor the carnage. The results were devastating in two regards. First, civilians were murdered en masse. And second, the UN peacekeepers took far more of the blame than the politicians who had handed them an assignment that was, Vieira de Mello liked to say, "mission impossible."

in the 1980s Western governments had spent millions aiding the Cambodian refugees as a way of destabilizing the Vietnam-installed regime in Phnom Penh. But in the Great Lakes area, a region of marginal strategic value, Western governments were not using aid as a tool for promoting their national interests. Rather, they were using aid as a substitute for meaningful foreign policy engagement of any kind. [Something Western governments do way too often.]

He urged UN officials to accept "that humanitarian crises are almost always political crises, that humanitarian action always has political consequences, both perceived and real." Since everybody else was playing politics with humanitarian aid, he wrote, "we can hardly afford to be apolitical."

In 1999 scholar Edward Luttwak published an influential article in Foreign Affairs entitled "Give War a Chance," in which he suggested that aid workers and peace-brokers were prolonging wars that would only end permanently if they were "allowed to run their natural course." "Policy elites," Luttwak wrote, "should actively resist the emotional impulse to intervene in other peoples’ wars—not because they are indifferent to human suffering but precisely because they care about it."

Vieira de Mello wrote a steaming letter to the editor slamming Luttwak’s "simplistic compilation of old arguments and wrong conclusions." He faulted Luttwak for his "uniform picture of war." Since few conflicts tidily confined themselves within national borders, Vieira de Mello argued, turning one’s back on violence would often result in wider, messier regional conflicts. In addition, since so many governments and rebel movements benefited from war, they had an incentive to prolong war on their own. They didn’t need any help from aid workers.

While he acknowledged that humanitarian action could sometimes have perverse consequences, he wrote that "to deny aid altogether is not only unhelpful, it is unthinkable." He noted that he generally valued critical commentary, but he found unhelpful such "oversimplified accounts far removed from the complexities of actual war and blanket statements that lead to quietism." [I have heard this same argument before, and de Mello's response is perfect.]

But he thought the flawed tendency of aid workers to give aid uncritically and indefinitely was a lesser danger than the tendency of rich countries to turn their backs on humanitarian crises altogether.

Only when Western powers stood together unequivocally, flexing their collective diplomatic and financial muscles, did Russia and China come around, as in the Persian Gulf War or in the belated decision to act militarily in Bosnia. But Vieira de Mello knew that occasions would arise when all the Western unity and diplomacy in the world would not change their views. In those circumstances, he was prepared to admit, exceptional emergencies might require a "coalition of the willing" to bypass the paralyzed Council. Ever so rarely, the urgency and legitimacy of the cause could excuse the illegality of the procedures. [Notice how this echoes the US justification for Iraq - without the legitimacy of the cause.]

He adopted a formulation common among those who supported NATO’s action but were nervous about its implications: The war was illegal (under the procedural rules of the UN Charter) but legitimate (according to the substantive ideals the UN was trying to advance).

he also did not understand why disarmament was a key item on the Security Council checklist while human rights were not. "A regime that can grossly violate the rights of its own people is ipso facto a threat to its neighbors and to regional and international peace and security," he insisted.

He knew that the organization he cherished was at once an actor in its own right and simply a building, no better or worse than the collective will of the countries that constituted it.

but he never imagined that U.S. planners would think so little about the peace [in Iraq]. Surely, he thought, they had watched as UN peacekeepers foundered in their "morning after" efforts to maintain order in the 1990s. Surely the Coalition would take precautions to stave off the kind of chaos that could be far deadlier than anything a regular army could unleash. Surely they would understand that establishing human security was a prerequisite to achieving other aims.

In 2000 he had embraced a new norm first put forth by an independent commission: the "responsibility to protect." The first responsibility to protect individuals from violence fell to those individuals’ government, but when that government proved unable (in a failing state) or unwilling (in a repressive state) to offer such protection, then the responsibility vested upward to the international community, which had a duty to mobilize the means to stop mass murder.

This last quote is amazing.

Here is Our Chance

For those of you who have read Samantha Power's book A Problem From Hell, you'll remember her argument that throughout all of the genocides of the 20th Century, the US did nothing. It did not take action and it did not even condemn the genocides. The arguments used were the same - that to even condemn the genocide could cause the leaders of the guilty countries to choose not to cooperate with peace processes. Power argues convincingly that in the end, those leaders did not cooperate even though we avoided condemning them.

Despite countless examples in history to learn from, the same arguments continue to be made and sometimes carry the day. Those arguments have been voiced in regards to Sudan - although the US has condemned the genocide, many voices said that the International Criminal Court should not seek charges or an arrest warrant against Bashir, the President of Sudan. Those people said it could cause Bashir to stop participating in peace negotiations. I am glad those people were not listened to this time and that an arrest warrant for Bashir has been issued.

Those that argued against this in the specific case of Sudan claimed that if Bashir is arrested or otherwise loses power, those that might take over are far worse and that Bashir's role right now is somewhat productive. That may be true (although where are the results?). But for once we need to actually stand up to genocide. We need to show that we won't back down for fear that an uncooperative leader will not cooperate - that a murderous leader will murder more people.

But as with all experiments or new courses, we will be judged by the outcomes. So here is our chance - our opportunity - to show that the one time we condemned genocide and sought action in the ICC while the situation was ongoing, it made a difference. We can show that the best way to stop a killer is not to avoid making his life hard, but to do everything we can to make his life hard.

Here is our chance. Let's follow through. Let's actively seek Bashir's arrest, then continue by seeking charges against anyone else involved. Let's finally put an end to this genocide and set a serious example (unlike all the others before) to those who might perpetuate the second genocide of the 21st Century.

Better Not Forget Samantha Power

The New York Times has a feature that gives short bios of all the people in Obama's inner circle and candidates for high level positions in his administration. Well, let's hope it's not actually all the people. There is at least one important name missing from this list - Samantha Power!

I really don't want Obama to make an early signal that he doesn't really care much about human rights. I don't want to lose all the good feelings I have so quickly. During the campaign, Obama gave signals that he supports human rights; in the last debate (or was it the second debate?), he made it clear that he thought the US should intervene in genocides / ethnic cleansing. The talk was good, now he needs to show it by giving Samantha Power a high level position. Sure, there are others he could appoint. But Power was a close adviser to Senator Obama and continued on in his campaign. She resigned during the primaries because she called Hillary Clinton a monster. Enough time has passed. President-elect Obama needs to bring her back to the inner circle.

Maybe She Can Reapply

I can't even express how disappointed I am that Samantha Power had to resign from Obama's campaign. It said a lot to me that Obama would hire someone whose only claim to fame is an exhaustively researched book about the genocides of the 20th Century. I don't want to go into whether she should have resigned or not - or how bad her comment was (or not) because I can't even pretend that I am capable of being objective. I am a huge fan of Samantha Power; in fact I think I like her more than I like Obama. My hope though is that if Obama does win the nomination and eventually the White House, there will be a big role for her there. As the leading voice for intervention in genocides (as well as the leading critical voice for the times we haven't), she is seriously needed inside Washington.

And just as a reminder, Samantha Power was very critical of the Clinton Administration (which includes Hillary if she is claiming that time as part of her extensive 35 years of experience) in her book A Problem From Hell for refusing to do anything in Rwanda as 800,000 people were slaughtered. And we know how much Clinton's hate being criticized. So I am sure they are particularly happy knowing they knocked Power out.

In an ideal world, the Clintons would truly be sorry for letting the Rwandan genocide happen, and would forgive Power and say that someone who has worked so hard to advocate for those without a voice deserves a second chance. But we know the Clinton's are not capable of that.

Punch Someone in the Face

So I finally finished A Problem From Hell. I don't think I need to say too much about it, since I posted about it when I first started reading, and ever since it has obviously had a huge impact on my beliefs and writings. In fact, I think I will let a good friend of mine sum it up:

Everytime I look at that book on my shelf it makes me angry to think about. I think about how much of a parallel situation Sudan is with Rwanda or the Balkans and how we're absolutely doomed to repeat ourselves. Its amazing that this country has fallen into exactly the same pattern. A few vocal individuals supporting action, lip service by the higher ups, and not nearly enough outrage by the general public. I mean, how can this not be a topic of debate for the upcoming election? It makes me want to punch someone in the face!

Seriously, that sums up everything I have been thinking about that book. It is the most enraging book I have ever read. It makes me disgusted at almost everyone - from politicians I thought I respected (Colin Powell, Bill Clinton, Bob Dole, etc.) to family and friends who aren't as outraged as I am.

And yet I feel quixotic when I try to convince people how important this issue is. People tell me that the world doesn't care about genocide and this fact will never change. Samantha Power in her book shows how the few people who did speak out were thought naive, that they didn't understand the world. With her final paragraph, she inspires me to continue talking about this.

George Bernard Shaw once wrote, "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man." After a century of doing so little to prevent, suppress, and punish genocide, Americans must join and thereby legitimate the ranks of the unreasonable.

If you want to know the two books that have most changed my political life, it is of course this one and From Beirut to Jerusalem. The later was my introduction to international events and gave me nightmares when I was in the middle of it.

Lessons Learned

Summary:
After finishing Overthrow and coming to the end of A Problem From Hell, I have learned two things. First, we need to accept that America has made many mistakes in our past. Second, America needs a consistent foreign policy.

The two books I am finishing now have a common theme: American foreign policy is full of examples where our decisions have not lived up to our projected better nature. Both books show this from two very different angles; Overthrow contends that our actions have pushed many countries into chaos while A Problem From Hell shows how our inaction allowed millions of people to fall to genocide.

It is armed with knowledge like this that people like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky earn converts. (Also, one of Jimmy Carter's weaknesses as a President was his acknowledgment of these flaws.) Where I disagree with Zinn and Chomsky is not their view of history, but in how it affects our policies. Chomsky opposed our invasion of Afghanistan because we lacked the moral standing to call anyone terrorists. It seems to me that his goal in pointing to Americas flaws is to call for inaction, instead of calling for better action in the form of more moral policies.

My goal is the latter. We need to understand where we failed the world to understand where we can do better. With Overthrow, we learn that in the past we have used military force to change democratic governments that are not friendly to the US (and US businesses) - but in some situations not dangerous - into oppressive but US-friendly governments. Policies like this hurt our international standing; we can't claim to support democracy if we only support pro-US democracies.

On the flip side, the US has refused to intervene in every genocide of the 20th century. In fact, Samantha Power shows that we didn't even speak out against them. The lesson we still haven't learned is that we have a moral obligation to do what we can to stop mass murder. Each time we say never again, but each time we ignore the next one. If Samantha Power had waited a few years, she could have included a chapter on Darfur.

This leads me to my second point - that we need a consistent foreign policy. The interesting thing is that these two books can lead to opposite cautions in foreign policy. Overthrow warns of intervention, and A Problem From Hell calls for it. But the two can be part of the same foreign policy plan. An administration can choose to do all it can to stop genocide, while also recognizing that it shouldn't intervene in situations like Bush's Iraq War, or Cuba, the Philippines, Nicaragua, or Panama. (I think Afghanistan was the right decision and had Bush kept his eye on the ball, there would have been a far better outcome.)

Every once in a while - or all the time - we need to look at our past decisions and ask if they live up to our moral standards. And we need to do this objectively. There is nothing wrong with criticizing our flawed policies, as long as it is meant to improve our decision-making in the future.

Being Unreasonable

My good friend The Beard sent me a link to Samantha Power's commencement address at Swarthmore College in 2002. The address as a whole is really good, and sums up the main points of her book, A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide. But what really got me was her closing:

George Bernard Shaw once wrote, "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

I wish you, Swarthmore's graduating class of 2002, all the best in the journey that lies ahead. And I pray that you join the ranks of the unreasonable.

Often when I debate issues with my family, I can tell by their tone that they think I am a crazy idealist who just doesn't understand the way the world works. To be fair, I must admit that I have probably implied, if not outright accused, that some of my more liberal friends are guilty of the same thing I am trying to defend myself against.

The truth is that I know the way the world works, but I very strongly believe that I can make a difference to change it (and I am sure the same is true of my more liberal friends). So while I understand, for example, that America's foreign policy decisions are based on our interests and that most Americans want to take care of our own country first, that doesn't mean I find that acceptable. Genocide, mass murder, and mass famine are just as important, if not more so, than issues like food insecurity in America. If the rest of America doesn't agree with me, than I just need to argue louder. Yes, I am an unreasonable idealist, and that is why I strive to adapt the world to me.

Half-Way Through

I have had to stop in the middle of reading non-fiction books before. I didn’t make it straight through John Adams by David McCullough or His Excellency: George Washington by Joseph Ellis. But this time I am stopping for a different reason. It isn’t that I have temporarily lost interest in A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide like I did with the others. This time I have to stop because it is affecting my mood. I find that I can only read the book in small doses because of how enraged it makes me. So I will start again with Rwanda after a short break.

If there was only one thing that I could impart on people after reading through half of this book, it would the following: that there are many options of intervening to prevent genocides that are short of a full-scale ground invasion. Too often our leaders supported doing nothing simply because we were unwilling to perform the most drastic option of a full-scale invasion. During the Holocaust we could have bombed the train lines that were carrying prisoners to the concentration camps. In Iraq, we could have enforced a no-fly zone over the north to protect the Kurds, like we did after the Gulf War. In Rwanda, at the very least we could have jammed the radio signals that were issuing the killing orders. In Bosnia we could have ended the arms embargo against the Muslims in Bosnia and we could have launched air strikes against the encampments that were shelling Sarajevo. And in Darfur, we can also enforce a no-fly zone so that the Janjaweed cannot get air support from the Sudanese military.

But in all of the situations we could have at least spoken out against it, and done so without using confusing language that portrays the situation as a centuries-long civil war between groups that will never get along and trying to make both sides of the conflict equal partners in the atrocities. In all of these situations, we could have demonstrated leadership instead of refusing to act because there wasn’t already a pre-formed consensus to act.

If you are willing, there are other things that are important that I have learned from the book. To my extreme dismay, I found that there are very few lawmakers who are free of guilt in our inaction in the face of genocide. While I knew President Clinton ignored Rwanda, I didn’t realize he also refused to do anything significant in Bosnia. Also, I used to respect Colin Powell because I thought he was the only one in the Bush II administration that was advocating for intervention in Darfur. I based this on his insistence to use the word “Genocide”. I have to admit that I don’t know his actual position on Darfur now, but I do know that he advocated against intervention to protect the Kurds in Iraq before the Gulf War and also against intervening in Bosnia both during the Bush I and Clinton presidencies. I should admit though that I was pleasantly surprised by a number of politicians because of their forceful advocacy for intervention, including Senator Bob Dole.

What has made me particularly upset so far are the quotes from various administration officials in many different presidencies and how they talked around the truth in the same way that Bush II administration officials do over issues like Iraq. For example, Warren Christopher during a number of Congressional testimonies, referred to the situation in Bosnia as “tantamount to genocide.” It angers me so much to watch government officials try as hard as they can to avoid saying what is obvious because of what that entails.

Another thing I have learned is the importance of paying attention to early reports and projections of deaths even though they may lack the level of legitimacy that we seek in other circumstances. In most of these situations, people refused to act, or even pay attention, because they didn’t believe refugee reports or rough estimates of deaths. In retrospect, many of the stories out of Cambodia, Iraq and Bosnia gave a pretty accurate picture of the situation. I also have to recognize that while I tend to discount anecdotal evidence, I cannot let this influence me to ignore something like this in the future.

In the end, the only way this book will be useful is if it encourages action in the next genocide. Although forcing people to feel guilty for their lack of concern over the genocides, that feeling is meaningless if it doesn’t change behavior the next time around. But this is where the book has really changed my outlook and view of politics. I feel so much more cynical now because I get the feeling that we will never actually get involved unless it is in our interest. My resolve has doubled to pay attention to international events and speak out against tolerating these situations, but in the end I do feel like my efforts will be useless. When I tried to talk to my family about genocides, some of them said that we shouldn’t intervene and should take care of our own country first (for the record, two very smart women said we can do both). If I can’t convince my own family that 800,000 dead in Rwanda or two million in Cambodia is completely intolerable, than I am left with no hope that the rest of the world will ever come around.

It is time for another book so that I don’t completely lose faith in humanity and retreat into myself. For those of you who are tired of my moral crusades, rest assured that you will get a brief reprieve.

United Nations: What is it Good For?

Someone told me this weekend that they thought the United Nations is worthless and ineffective. I don’t necessarily disagree, but it made me wonder if he, or even if I, know what we want the United Nations to do. Like any legislative body, it is extremely slow to act and its members often make decisions in their own interests and not necessarily based on morality. But if there was some consensus on what we do want it to do, we could move it in a better direction and help it to become more effective. I think the biggest thing hindering the UN right now is that we don’t know what we really want from it.

Based on what I know, the UN most often defers to a state’s sovereignty. The internal affairs of a state are its own business. This might have been a good policy immediately following World War II (although even that is debatable), but it doesn’t fit now. In my opinion, the biggest problem facing our world is the treatment of groups within states. Genocide continues to be a problem that is ignored despite the commitment of states to take reasonable measures to stop it. There are also far too many people displaced from wars or famine, with governments that are incapable or unwilling to support them. In those situations, we need an international body that is willing to act to protect and defend these people.

The reality is that this change will not happen overnight. It is too easy for member states to turn away from these terrible situations and pretend that they are incapable of doing anything about it. As I read A Problem From Hell, I get depressed at how the world continues to fail in its moral obligation to protect those who cannot protect themselves. We are great at showing regret long after the fact, but we never learn the lesson that true self-reflection leads to. The famous saying is, “Never again, again and again.”

We didn’t learn enough from the Holocaust to stop Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosivic, the Hutu’s in Rwanda or even the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed. We have never learned the lesson, and so our regret comes off as extremely hypocritical.

But I don’t want to focus entirely on genocide. Millions die or are displaced from civil wars every year. We should care about this. War torn regions in Africa or Southeast Asia should not be ignored because they are hard problems. President Kennedy once said, “We choose to do this and the other thing, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

I have been told during my rants that my position will never get me elected. Let me make something clear. My goal is not to get elected, but to change people’s minds. I want to make people think about their beliefs and understand the moral consequences of their positions. When we ignore major international problems, hundreds of thousands of people die. This should be just as enraging when it is Africans as it would be if it were Americans.

I did start this blog hoping there would be dialogue and debate. I want to know what other people think the United Nation’s role should be. I am calling for an end to what is now complete respect for state sovereignty. To me, this seems like an obvious solution to what ails the UN. To the others who think the UN isn’t useful, feel free to tell me what it should be doing.

Genocide - Always so Controversial

There have been some interesting, although heated, debates recently about America’s role in stopping genocide. In a column from last week ($), Nicholas Kristof took a reader to task for suggesting that we should deal with domestic problems before fixing problems around the world. Since then, I have had similar arguments with family. The view expressed by the reader is not uncommon.

If someone says that they don’t get involved in that debate because they choose other issues that are more important to them, I can’t really find fault with that. There are so many problems in this world that choosing to fight any of them is worthwhile and noble. We all have to follow our passion.

What I do find fault with though is a similar argument that says we shouldn’t do anything about genocide because we haven’t fixed our own problems. Those two arguments may sound similar, but to me the difference is that the one I just mentioned dismisses any effort to stop genocide, whereas the first one only says that the particular person is more invested in other issues while not disinvested in genocide.

The reason I find the latter argument problematic is because its foundation rests on putting certain human lives above others simply based on nationality – an somewhat arbitrary division. I realize that we cannot intervene right now to prevent every loss of life or stop every repressive government. We have to draw lines somewhere. I happen to think that one of the first places to draw a line is when someone tries to eliminate, “either in whole or in part, a group based on their race, religion, or nationality.” I find the Holocaust appalling for the same reason that I find Pol Pot’s genocide appalling. It has nothing to do with the race of the victim, but that the victims were attacked en masse because of their race (or ethnicity or nationality).

One of the first things people attack when you talk about genocide is the fact that the UN resolution doesn’t include political groups. This part is debatable, but I can see why it exists. It isn’t because anyone tolerates persecution of political dissidents, but is instead based on a belief that there is something inherently destructive to the fabric of humanity when a culture is eliminated. Since some people might not agree that political mass murders should be excluded, I would accept as a compromise that groups should be forced to intervene when there is mass murder of political groups as well.

What usually happens with this argument though is that they think genocide is a bogus term if it doesn’t include political mass murder. Therefore, somehow it becomes acceptable to ignore mass murder based on race, simply because the genocide convention does not include politics.

The bottom line here is that I don’t see any moral difference between killing Rwandan Tutsis, European Jews, non-Muslim Sudanese, or Americans. The difference to me exists in the numbers that are murdered, the motivation behind the murder, and our ability to stop the murders. I am happy, but not satisfied with, condemnation of genocide. Looking back at our history, even that was too much to expect. I look forward to the day when everyone can feel anguished when they become aware of mass murder, and not be able to dismiss it because the victims are not American.