Editorial: This decision could change how we live

Until yesterday the war that the United States has been determined to unleash on Iraq seemed a long way from New Zealand. But since President Bush in his televised address acknowledged some of the possible consequences, no part of the world can count itself safe. All Western countries that might be associated, rightly or wrongly, with an invasion of Arab territory, must steel themselves for the increased possibility of terrorism.

The danger is greater now because this time the US will be truly the aggressor. Arab nationalists no longer need the sophistry formerly employed to convince themselves they were victims of imperialism. It was the US President who resorted to convoluted logic yesterday, arguing that terrorist retaliation would confirm his suspicions of the Iraqi regime.

The President also alluded to the possibility that the regime will use the chemical and biological weapons that have been the pretext for this assault. Indeed, if Saddam Hussein still has stocks of the gas and anthrax he used against Iranians and Kurds in the 1980s, he must be counted likely to use them in any desperate stand against the overwhelming forces he will face.

With nothing to lose he may have established connections with religious fundamentalist terror networks, as the US claims, and conceivably he has supplied them with the ability to spread disease and to poison populations. All vulnerable countries will need to be particularly vigilant as the noose tightens around Saddam's neck.

Some of the less terrifying, but no less damaging, global consequences of the American action are already noticeable. The outlook for oil supplies and prices is now less certain. Stockmarkets rose yesterday in expectations of a short war. A longer struggle could send them in the other direction.

The World Trade Organisation's Doha round of negotiations, on which developing countries placed so much hope, have been neglected and subordinated by the US to the pursuit of bilateral trade talks with those prepared to stand beside it in Iraq. New Zealand's principled opposition to this war will no doubt carry a cost in trade preferences.

The Doha round is just one of the international projects that depend on dealings between the US and the European Union. Washington's relationships with the leading EU members, France and Germany, have been severely strained by the proposed war and they will not be easily repaired. In fact, the venom in the President's tone when he talks of France suggests that relationship is going to get worse.

The US is going into this war without the endorsement of Nato or the United Nations Security Council. Its decision not to seek a clear resolution authorising an attack on Iraq is a virtual admission that it could not summon majority support. If it had the necessary nine votes it surely would have taken the issue to a vote and dared France, Russia or China to use their veto.

But the most serious global implication of the American decision is for the concepts of international law and collective security that order our world. Because it is an unchallenged superpower the US has both the capacity and the inclination to step into the affairs of another country without UN endorsement.

It has acted not in response to a provocation or from a sudden and urgent humanitarian crisis. It has taken it upon itself to remove a detestable dictator who has not been in a position to pose a threat since he was ejected from Kuwait. The US has decided to deal with him now as a demonstration of its wish to use "pre-emptive" strikes when it alone chooses. That is what disturbs much of the world today.

Herald Feature: Iraq