Do Moustaches Cause Retardation?

That what's I'm thinking after reading this:

John R. Bolton, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, questioned the need cited by Secretary General Kofi Annan last week to return peacekeepers to East Timor, where an Australian-led multinational force has ended violence that killed more than 30 people. Mr. Bolton said the current conflict was internal and unrelated to the tiny nation's struggle for independence from Indonesia that had been the basis of an earlier United Nations presence. "This has the look of disagreements among politicians with rival security forces," he said.

The U.N., by most experts accounts, left East Timor too early. The country aided by a jackass president, then tumbled into anarchy. Bolton's response: Don't come back!

Comments

[Zathras]

Look at this on three levels.

First, what Bolton says about East Timor today seems to be not only true but not especially controversial. Second, there appears to be a common conceit among advocates of nation-building that if only we do it right -- devote enough resources, spend enough time, build up enough local relationships and so forth -- that prosperous, stable societies fit to enter the community of nations can emerge. It's an assumption identical to what a 1920s British imperial official in, say, West Africa might have made, with considerably more likelihood of being proven right. But today, whether we are talking about the Balkans or East Timor, once a peacekeeping mission is embarked on there may be no good time to end it, not in our lifetimes anyway. Historically stable nation states have most often arisen not through a process of outside mediation of a societies differences, but through resolution of those differences: one side wins, another loses, the rest accomodate the winner. Could "doing it right" in East Timor allow an exception to that rule to emerge? It might. But it probably wouldn't.

The final level, though, involves how American foreign policy is made. East Timor is not one of our vital interests. It is instead a subject with which Australia feels vitally concerned; any peacekeeping effort there will involve many more Australian troops and resources than ours. Is there any pressing reason for the American UN ambassador to take a public position on this subject different from that of the Australian government?

Not one that I can see. Leaving aside for the moment the question of whether John Bolton is expressing State Department policy or running his own quasi-independent operation in New York, American foreign policy and the world in general would have many fewer problems if more governments undertook to look after disorder in their neighborhoods as Australia's has. The Balkans exploded because Europe refused to step in unless America went first; Zimbabwe descends now because South Africa lets it; Egypt's policy on genocide is determined by the government in Khartoum, not the one in Cairo; North Korea is a problem now because China has made it possible over many years.

So a resumption of UN peacekeeping operations in East Timor may well amount to a bandage that will have to be left on for decades, but there is no good reason for the United States not to support whatever Australia decides to do about the situation. That support should not extend to our making major commitments of our own men and resources to an area where our interests are not engaged in a major way. But in terms of our diplomatic posture, public disagreement about East Timor from our UN ambassador accomplishes nothing for us.

[Eric Umansky]

Zathras,

Bolton didn't say, "This is the Aussie's call, we have no position." He suggested the U.S. is against the idea and I would imagine the only effect that would have is to make it marginally--marginally--less likely that a U.N.-mandated force will be deployed.

[John]

The UN has had a major role in East Timor's fate for decades - through both action and inaction - especially since Indonesia invaded with explicit U.S. backing in 1975. The UN directly administered the territory in the two and a half years following Indonesia's destructive withdrawal in 1999 and its record in helping Timor recover from the occupation and establish govenmental structures was mixed at best. Even so, the rapid drawdown of the UN presence in East Timor after independence was championed in the Security Council by the U.S. and Australia, and happened despite protests from the the UN Secretariat and East Timor's government.

Aside from help in mediating the current political conflicts, Timor clearly needs assistance in building its institutions and reconstructing its police force (a product of outside training). But security is only one component and any new UN mission. Even the U.S. has agreed that Timor needs extensive electoral assistance for next year's presidential and parliamentary elections.

Other needs include, institutional advisors who serve on more than short-term contracts, and economic assistance targetted at ending the widespread youth unemployment, which was a major factor in the gang activity after the police collapsed in the capital.

Finally, the destruction and the trauma inflicted on the East Timorese then has certainly contributed to its current crisis. The failure to hold accountable the Indonesian generals and others responsible for organizing the violence in 1999 and before is also an important factor sending a message to those using violence for their political ends that they will likely go unpunished, and leaving many of the victimized feeling they have to take justice into their own hands.

The UN, which has pledged that impunity must not prevail for the 1999 crimes, should create an international tribunal to try those responsible for the crimes against humanity committed during the occupation. This would make a significantly contribution to stability in the new nation and democracy in Indonesia.