R.F.I.:
I want to ask you first about the Arab masses and political opinion. They seem to be behind Iraq to a large extent. To what do you attribute that?
M. ELMANDJRA:
Your question is a sound one, before looking at the present conjuncture and whatever is happening in the Middle East since 2 August, one should first take the trouble of making a broader analysis concerning the Arab world as a whole. It is a region where there is no respect for the "rule of law." There is not a single Arab state where the rule of law is fully respected at the national level. One must bear in mind this point when one speaks of the respect of international law. The populations of the Arab world have suffered in terms of their daily life with respect to the violation of human rights and the lack of civil liberties. What do they see now? A number of Arab governments among those who have been the biggest violators of basic legal principles at the national level are those which are backed politically, economically and militarily by the West. These populations find a great deal of hypocrisy in this sudden defense of international law by a West which has never shown the same zeal for the violations in the occupied territories of Palestine.
R.F.I.:
To come back to the immediate problem of the Gulf, do you think there will be a military confrontation?
M. ELMANDJRA:
I think that there will be a military confrontation. Never, since the Second World War, have we seen such a deployment of strength and military force, particularly on behalf of the United States. There is a big change in the international system because the bipolar structure (USSR/USA) has been broken producing a kind of vacuum.
The United States does not intend not to take advantage of this new situation as well as of the economic crisis which the Soviet Union is undergoing. It will therefore set foot and occupy politically and militarily an important strategic part of the world with enormous oil reserves. We should not forget that while the United States represents less than 5% of the world population, it consumes more than 25% of the total world production of oil and that it imports about 50% of its needs.
I think that the deployment of forces we have witnessed in the Gulf, regardless of what Iraq does, will be used at one point or another. When will the conflagration start? What form will it take? Will it occur directly or indirectly, through whatever excuse, by Israel? I do not know. I would love to be proven wrong, but I would be surprised if it does not take place.
Furthermore, the economic situation of the United States is quite bad - everybody knows it and the White House acknowledges it - independently of the events of the Gulf which are making it worse. There is a recession. The encouragement of the arms industry is one of the possible answers to this recession. We must also remember that, in the last few years, many new arms have been developed in the USA and have not yet been tested operationally because of the fear that the Soviet Union may learn about some of these new secret technologies. This problem no longer exists in the post-cold war era because of the holy alliance between the USA and the Soviet Union.
Finally, the Gulf countries and Saudi Arabia in particular have invested hundreds of billion of dollars in the purchase of arms during the last 10 or 15 years. There is need therefore, like in the instance of the Iraq-Iran war, to have a military conflict in order to use and destroy this hardware so as to be able to replenish it in the future.
I regret this pessimistic view but it is the only analysis one can make in the present situation.
R.F.I.:
Does this mean that the East-West rival conflict is replaced in a way by the North-South conflict?
M. ELMANDJRA:
This is exactly the conclusion I have reached and which I have exposed in an article written a few days ago and which will appear in the next issue of FUTURIBLES (Paris, October 1990). It is a new form of North-South conflict with which we have entered into what I call the era of "post-colonialism." We have lived the colonial period until the 1960's, then the new-colonial period where the former colonial powers put into power people who continued to follow their directives.
With post-colonialism things are much clearer, more open and more direct because it is with the help of governments of the Third World, and at their "request", that the West is not only occupying again territories in the South but it is doing so at the cost of the latter. The United States has been to collect over $ 20 billion dollars in a few weeks of which more than 80% come from the Arab countries in the Gulf. Something never seen in the history of international relations. This post-colonial era is going to be a hard one for the South and it is likely to last at least until the end of the century if not more.
When you see things, in the long term, as I do being a specialist of future studies, you discover that it is the end of an era and the beginning of a new one which cannot last for very long because it is a self-defeating situation. You cannot think of a peace problematique conceived for only 20% of mankind which is exploiting 80% of the material resources of the world, and at the cost and to the detriment of the well-being and dignity of four quarters of humanity. It goes way beyond the current events in the Gulf. It is an issue of a more equitable redistribution of power and material resources within an international system which cannot go on preserving the status quo for ever.
R.F.I.:
To come back to the short term what will be the beginning of the confrontation? What will a military confrontation do to Middle Eastern economies and societies?
M. ELMANDJRA:
The economies and the societies of the Arab world are already in a bad shape. It is not because about 4% of the population of the Arab world has large oil incomes that one should thing that arab societies live decently. We should not forget that the total GNP of the Arab countries is less than half than that of France. The Arab world is presently poor but with a few small rich countries where a limited elite disposes of a great wealth. Most of their assets, over $ 700 billion dollars (almost the GNP of France) are deposited in the West.
The average per capita income in the Arab world is around 1500 dollars so we should not be impressed by the statistics concerning the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar or Saudi Arabia. Broadly speaking the great majority of Arabs have practically nothing to lose economically. Those who may lose something are those who made money in a very easy fashion, with much corruption and in a close alliance with Western economic interests. So, I am not very much worried about the economic implications of a military conflict for the common Arab. It might even lead ultimately to a "new Arab order" with a redistribution of power and wealth and a greater respect for democracy and human rights.
At any rate, already the Arab world is no longer what it used to be. To go back to your first question, thanks to the American and Western occupation of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries, there is now a real and total divorce between the Arab governments in power and their populations. These governments have lost their credibility. The only way they can regain any credibility has nothing to do with war. The democratic process, the respect of the rule of law and civil liberties is the only answer because it is the most important cause of the present dramatic situation.
It is this war against feudalism and authoritarianism that the West should join if it wants to help the Arab world and the South in general. The least it can do is to leave the Third World to fight this battle alone instead of backing the local oppressors. For the moment, unfortunately, the Gulf crisis is showing us that the West has opted in favor of its immediate short-term material interests and is not at all interested in the quest of democracy which the populations of the Third World are pursuing on every continent with great local and international opposition. People are closing their eyes on what is going on today in the Ivory Coast, Gabon, Senegal, Pakistan...
R.F.I.:
When do you think that the embargo and the economic blockade will start hurting Iraq and its people? Is there any chance that it forces President Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait?
M. ELMANDJRA:
I think that the embargo has hurt from the very first day but that is not the problem. We should examine the stakes. It is not just the question of defending little Kuwait and its population of a few hundred thousand people. We are watching the reliance on a number of scenarios concerning the occupation of the Gulf region which students of strategy and future studies have been analyzing during the last 15 years. So regardless of what has happened, with or without the occupation of Kuwait of which I do not approve, the stakes are so big for the United States and the West, that the embargo can only be seen as the first step to justify other measures as part of a well orchestrated escalation leading to a military intervention.
R.F.I.:
The Maghreb countries have been building an economic community or tried to build such a community. Do you think there is hope for an economic community in the Middle East?
M. ELMANDJRA:
Even the recent process of integration at the level of the Maghreb is a quite limited one in which I do not greatly believe since how it being carried out. Before you can build an economic community you must have one thing which, unfortunately, the Arab world, including the Maghreb, do not yet have--but which is likely to come about during the post-Gulf period--a common vision of a new society. We lack vision. The new economics teach us that no regional grouping of less than 150-200 million inhabitants has the slightest chance of making a dignified entry into the 21st century.
In the meantime, the Arab world continues to be balkanized, at a moment when the two Germanies are reuniting and the European Economic Community is on the eve of its integration. At a time where even North and South Korea are thinking about some form of reunification, for objective and not just subjective and sentimental reasons because survival calls for a minimum economy of scale. At this very same time the West, because of its narrow interests, will not allow any form of regrouping which may endanger the existing status quo.
So, I think that whether it be the case of the Maghreb or of the
whole Arab world, there can be no form of economic integration unless it
is preceded by a real process of democratization, that is until the people
concerned are given the right to speak out their mind. So the big problem
is one of democracy. The last 30 years, following decolonization, instead
of being used to forward democratization within the countries of the Third
World have been used to maintain in power systems and governments which
do exactly the opposite. That is the real crisis in North-South relations
and what is happening in the Gulf is only a small episode in a new serial
with many other episodes still to come.
* Interview, Radio France International,
English Programme, 27 September 1990,
broadcast on 6 October 1990).
* Al Alam, Rabat, 1 October 1990.