TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/012891/01289913.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 8.4 KB | 173 lines

                                                                                THE GULF WAR, Page 67

THE EUROPEAN ALLIES

Closing Ranks Behind the Yanks


When the bombs started falling, the British, French and Italians
were there; others with a stake in the gulf stayed to the side

By MICHAEL S. SERRILL -- Reported by Daniel Benjamin/ Bonn,
Frank Melville/London and Frederick Ungeheuer/Paris


    As the countdown to conflict began, U.S. commanders surveyed
the coalition's order of battle with some trepidation.
Certainly British forces would be in at the start, but who else
would line up to fight? French air and land units were in
place, but at the 11th hour President Francois Mitterrand had
launched what looked like a misguided missile: a compromise
that offered Saddam Hussein his coveted Middle East peace
conference. Italy, Spain, Germany and Greece backed Mitterrand.
Had Baghdad not spurned the French proposal, the Arab alliance
members might have wavered too and deserted the anti-Iraq
coalition.

    Only when conflict was clearly unavoidable did the Europeans
close rank. Even then their show of support was unequal -- some
contributing far more than others -- and that was likely to
lead to later recriminations, within both Europe and the NATO
alliance. In Paris the nine-nation Western European Union
defense grouping gave rhetorical support to military action
last week, but while British, French and Italian warplanes ran
the gauntlet of Iraqi antiaircraft fire, other European nations
with a stake in gulf stability stayed on the sidelines. Germany
was particularly conspicuous by its absence in the gulf, even
if it had a constitutional excuse for nonparticipation. Warned
British Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd: "This will weigh on
U.S.-European relations for some time."

    On the home front, Europe, like the U.S., braced for
terrorism. Armored vehicles took up positions around London's
Heathrow Airport as part of a dramatic increase in security in
the capital. Throughout Europe, security forces carrying
automatic weapons patrolled government offices, airports,
airline offices, train stations and bus terminals. Key
potential targets such as U.S. embassies, cultural missions and
military bases were heavily guarded; schools catering to
American students were closed. At the exclusive resort of
Marbella on Spain's Costa del Sol, police and private guards
swarmed around the summer palace of Saudi Arabia's King Fahd,
transforming the oversize replica of the White House into an
armed camp. "Marbella looks like a war zone," complained
resident Nigel Bowden, a British writer.

    So did other parts of Europe, although, ironically, the
belligerents were pacifists. While waiting for what many
regarded as an inevitable Iraqi-instigated terror campaign in
retaliation for the allied bombing in the gulf, security forces
had their hands full keeping antiwar protesters in check. In
the days before war began, and every day thereafter, tens of
thousands of demonstrators, many of them students, took to the
streets in Germany, France, Italy and other European countries.
In Berlin they broke windows at the Grand Hotel and the French
Cultural Center and hurled Molotov cocktails at a U.S. embassy
annex. Even in Britain, where polls showed that the public
supported gulf intervention by a 3-to-1 ratio, opponents of
military action mounted antiwar demonstrations of an estimated
50,000 people.

    Beyond the rallies, however, there was never any doubt about
Britain's resolve, even after Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
was replaced in mid-crisis by John Major. In a rare show of
unity last week, the opposition Labour Party endorsed the
Conservative Prime Minister's handling of the crisis and helped
pass what was in effect a declaration of war by a House of
Commons vote of 534 to 55. "We will not flinch in the battle
against evil," Major told the British people. "Over the months,
we have worked for peace. And hoped for peace. But we are
prepared for war."

    In France there was never such clear resolution. Much to the
annoyance of the U.S. and Britain, Mitterrand pursued his
separate peace plan down to the wire. Eager to protect French
interests in the Arab world, he also sought to appease a
population nervous about military involvement and France's 4
million-strong Arab immigrant community. His plan called for
an Arab peacekeeping force to move into Kuwait in the wake of
retreating Iraqi forces, which would be spared attack by
coalition troops. It linked such a withdrawal to the convening
of a U.N. Middle East conference to settle the Israeli-Arab
conflict and the Palestinian problem. The majority of European
Community members supported Paris' last-ditch effort, but it
was opposed by the U.S. and Britain, which feared it would
split the allies and let Saddam off the hook.

    In the end Baghdad brushed aside the French initiative, and
less than 24 hours before hostilities began, the National
Assembly voted overwhelmingly to support France's participation
in armed intervention. Concluded Mitterrand: "Now arms will do
the talking." It was an outcome Thatcher had foreseen as early
as last August in the aftermath of the Iraqi invasion. Visiting
George Bush in Aspen, Colo., the Iron Lady had predicted,
"Mitterrand will give you trouble until the end, but when the
ship sails, she [France] will be there."

    In Italy the decision was equally painstaking. It took an
all-night emergency session, which ended 12 hours after the war
started, for parliament to decide that its Tornado
fighter-bombers deployed in the gulf since September should go
into action against Iraq. Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti
defended his decision to back the anti-Iraq coalition with
vigor: "We cannot always demand that the Americans assume the
entire burden of action." Accused of abetting a U.S. complot to
safeguard cheap oil supplies, Andreotti shot back, "There was
no oil to safekeep in Europe when the U.S. came here to fight
and die as a decisive contribution in our liberation from the
Nazi-Fascist dictatorship."

    With Britain, France and Italy aboard the war wagon, Germany
was very much the odd man out. But with polls showing that 79%
of the German people favored negotiations beyond the ultimate
deadline, Chancellor Helmut Kohl concluded it was politically
impossible for Bonn to go beyond supporting the coalition with
cash, transportation aid and nonlethal supplies, such as
poison-gas-detecting vehicles, to a total value of $2.2
billion. Even its stationing of 18 aging fighters in Turkey in
fulfillment of NATO obligations has been widely criticized at
home. Upon hearing news of the attack on Iraq, the Chancellor
declared himself "deeply distressed."

    The Bundestag eventually passed a resolution of support for
the U.S. and its European neighbors. "They have a right to our
solidarity, and we stand by them," said Kohl.

    The failure to unite in the face of the gulf crisis, even
behind a single peace plan, dismayed advocates of a more
assertive Europe and cast doubt on the Community's ambitions
to achieve "political union" and a Euro-defense strategy.
"Fundamental forces are tearing at the European Community,"
said a senior U.S. official in Europe. "These strains will
cause it to be taken less seriously as a united political force
-- by itself, by the U.S. and by others." Added Karl Kaiser,
the director of Bonn's Foreign Policy Research Institute: "The
E.C. is not available for out-of-Europe activities." What many
Europeans, and particularly the Germans, do not understand,
said Kaiser, is that "an international order under a United
Nations mandate doesn't mean just resolutions. Under
international law, force is legitimate."

    Were Europe, and in particular Germany, more assertive on
the international stage, there would doubtless be protests from
the very people hurling accusations of pusillanimity. But so
far, the gulf crisis has shown that fortune favors the brave,
and the laurels in the high-stakes enterprise of global
leadership remain with the U.S. Seen just six months ago as a
weak, declining power, Washington is attempting to pull a
reluctant Europe into George Bush's new world order. The events
in the gulf, says Pierre Dabezies, head of France's Foundation
for National Defense Studies, reconfirm the U.S.'s new status
"as the world's only remaining superpower -- indeed, as its
sole policeman."