Bearish economy and bullish war-cry
While the US economy is shivering helplessly and unemployment has reached 6 per cent, the highest fall in last eight and half years, President Bush seems to be all-out beating around the bush to find some remedy to lift its sinking economy from the cold in order to boost the pace of his promised growth and job creation for the benefit of his rather depressed people, because of the unfruitful result of the President's preaching during the last two years since his assumption of office. These two things -- the economic situation, call it slop or flop, and the rising unemployment -- are increasingly pinching Bush like two sharp nails in his shoes. As they say, the wearer knows where the shoe pinches, Bush knows well what has gone wrong. Hence he is quite worried over the disturbing domestic situation which now appears to be a black-spot on his administration. So he is desperately in search of a way-out from the mess created by himself. He has rightly felt the pulse of his nation and now eager to prescribe a right type of 'medicine'. One is to identify himself with the concern of the people closely at home and the other is the creation of a war hysteria by drawing up the immediate danger to the very existence of America due to rising 'monster' in Iraq with its weapons of mass destruction. So he has been trying both the techniques to see how they work and which one works faster.
Bush finds 'scape-goat'
Thus to express his deep concern over the falling economy and share miseries and mental torture of the people, Bush has recently fired two of the lading members of his economic team -- Treasury Secretary, Paul O'Neil and Economic Adviser, Lawrence Lindsay, replacing them with two new recruits, namely, the rail-road executive John Snow as Treasury Secretary, and Stephen Friedman of the Goldman Sach brokerage firm, as Economic Adviser. So the politicians know well where to hit and when to hit to find an escape route from the black-hole of politics, by making somebody 'scape-goat'. It is an open secret now that all these are being done with an eye on the next presidential election scheduled for 2004s as an analyst has put it that Bush Administration is "determined to get the economy going in the run-up to the 2004 elections." So for Bush the most 'eligible' 'scape-goats' were found in his two 'masterminds' whom he had showered with praise and mouthful of eulogy after firing them when he said "my economics team (Paul O'Neil and Lawrence Lindsey) has worked with me to craft an economic agenda that helped lead the nation out of recession and back into a period of growth" and thanked them for their "excellent service."
Bush seems to be blowing hot and cold at the same time. Otherwise how he could force out (as said by the US media) the two "fallen angels" who had rendered such an "excellent service" to "craft an economic agenda" according to Bush himself? The most pertinent question is, therefore, what were their 'crimes' for which they were 'penalised' and proved 'worthless' before the American people? Is it not just to hide the 'holes' in one's own politico-economic policy and find an 'escape route' to emerge as a national hero? But will the American people benefit from the new 'capsule' now being prescribed by Bush to revamp the US economy? Only time will show whether he succeeds in wining the hearts of the American people in boosting the US economy, now in poor shape, following the September 2001 tragedy, when his father Bush Sr had failed trying his hand to breathe a new life in the US economy in the post-Gulf war period that ultimately proved fatal for him in his Presidential election, making room for democrat Clinton. So what Bush will now be trying is a 'tax-cut' formula which has always been against Republican policy. So as a neo-strategist, Bush will be showing his people the eye-catching carrots (perhaps hiding his stick for the time-being) to get them around him during the next two years. He had already announced that "many Americans have very little money left after the taxes" adding that "the economy needed a boost" and suggested that it would contain "tax-cuts".
However, it is a good sign that Bush has at least realised, though in the mid-stream (after crossing about two years of his four-year term), that the consumer is the 'engine' of the economy end to keep it running there must be enough purchasing power in the hands of the consumers who are now being deprived of that power by imposing taxes on them. Hence 'tax-cut' comes in as the remedy.
Dancing to wild tune
But as a superb strategist, a politician always adopts more than one 'thrust' to achieve his objective by fomenting bigger troubles. President Bush seems to be going that way traversing both economic and political fields. There is no doubt that in the recent election to the Senate and House of Representatives, Bush's Republican Party members made a smooth walk-over throwing out rival Democrat candidates. This unprecedented achievement has undoubtedly lionised Bush who is posing as a national hero in grounding that "thief of Baghdad," with his non-stop war-cry for creating a hysteria among the Americans to stand solidly behind him as he is the only person to salvage them from economic collapse and ensure steady supply of Iraq's oil, the main US target of all howling and shouting. Thus even if Bush's ambitious economic programme fails to achieve the much-promised results, there is the 'Saddam card" to be played as beau ideal to bemuse the American people. And Bush is already dancing to that wild tune.
As the coming events invariably cast their shadows before, the Bush Administration has been showing for the six months or so the signals of war against Iraq, one of the three in "axis of evil" for its assumed possession of "weapons of mass destruction".
The UN weapons inspectors, under the UN Security Council Resolution 1441, have already completed one month of their search for "the weapons of mass destruction" in the 'hide-outs,' and are beginning their second month of searching. As wanted in the Resolution 1441, Iraq has already submitted to the UN its 12,000 page Weapons Declaration corroborating its earlier stand on the weapons.
Finding fault
But America and its closest second-in-commend Britain are out with their pre-planned shouts, dismissip the Declaration as "rubbish." Bush has started saying that Declaration is full of "holes" (or 'black-holes'?). And his Secretary of State Colin Powell jumped one step ahead saying there are "lies" and "gaps." And British Prime Minister added that Saddam was "playing hide and seek." Bush, in an interview with US TV channel, ABC News, had also said that his "gut feeling" about Saddam was that "he is a man who deceives, denies". So goes the anti-Saddam "flowery" speech competition among US officials and President. Perhaps the ground has been warmed up by continuous anti-Saddam tirade for a final show-down. Some of the Arab countries have already started dancing to the tune of the American spit fire, ready for opening their country's back-yards and court-yards for allied forces.
The latest prediction in a British tabloid says that the war against Iraq is likely to begin on 21 February. Blair, like a PRO to Washington, had earlier announced that the war was coming in the second or third week of February. So the stage is set for another "international action against terrorism," may be on a much bigger scale than what had happened in Afghanistan, even if the UN Inspectors fail to locate the existence of the weapons of mass destruction. The whole situation can be summed up as, to quote a popular Bangla proverb, "Jare Dekhte Nari Tar Chalan Banka" (roughly translated it means: whom your dislike, you can find fault with him at every step.
And when Saddam is a 'devil', perhaps a Frankenstine, created by America during a decade-long Iran-Iraq war, he can't be allowed to go scot-free to endanger world peace and "our future" and to quote Bush, "I will not-allow a nation, such as Iraq, to threaten our very future by developing weapons of mass destruction". Meanwhile, Prince Charles, the next heir to the British throne, seems to have thrown icy water on Anglo-American, rather Bush-Blair, entente by his recent anti-American and pro-Iraq utterances, as a result of which Prince's scheduled visit to America has been abruptly cancelled. It is a big headache for Blair government, no doubt. Perhaps Blair will overcome this speck in the wheel, by adopting some face-saving device.
During the last ten years or so, there have been several US plans and programmes to remove Saddam, the root cause of all troubles but so far all of them had failed. Despite mobilization of anti-Saddam forces, mainly Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south, by creating so-called 'No-fly zones', an innovation of the Anglo-US block, and bringing together other 'dissidents', both civilian and military, Saddam had survived as an outsized or over-sized national hero. At least five or six army coup attempts against Saddam had failed. Hence America is now quite optimistic that a US-led push with a major air action and a ground invasion, using between 70,000 to 2,50,000, troops planned by the US Central Command Chief, Gen. Tommy Franks, as disclosed by US officials in the leading US daily The New York Times, would be a good 'treat' for Saddam to retreat from the war field for good. The only silver lining behind the darkest war clouds hovering around the Mid-East, particularly Iraq, is the tremendous popular upsurge throughout the world, including America and Britain, against US-fomented war against Iraq and pro-Iraq stand taken by Russia, though a weak nation now compared to superpower America, but with its most powerful and valuable 'veto' power in the UNSC which will have the last say on Iraq's future. But how far Russia will be able to maintain its present posture will be seen when an-anti-Iraq resolution is brought to the UNSC by America or Britain. Will it be able to face the 'music' from America? That's a big question.
'Preventive war: Catastrophic consequences'
Before I conclude I would like to refer to a recent most significant statement made by former US President Jimmy Carter, while receiving his this year's Noble Peace Prize at Stockholm, Mr Carter, in his speech took a sharp "snipe" at President Bush, of course, without mentioning his name, saying that "for powerful countries to adopt a principle of preventive war may well set an example that can have catastrophic consequences." They say "a word to the wise is enough". But does Bush care for such an advice? Perhaps he will, if he is not a "moron", as called by a senior Aide of Canadian Prime Minister.
Just as each coin has two sides, similarly there are two sides of each action: throwing coins in the "wishing well" and collecting the coins at the end of the day. Now Bush is throwing his 'coins'. But who will collect the 'coins' at the end of the day, Bush or Saddam? US economy or Iraq's oil? Perhaps this new year will soon unfold a wider scenario of the deal!
AMM Shahabuddin is a retired UN official.
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