Editorial

‘Bush's Xmas present

The invasion of Kuwait by Iraq is being condemned by world public opinion,
and rightly so. Nothing can justify the use of military force in the settling of
inter-state conflicts. That there were serious emerging differences between Iraq
and Kuwait there is no doubt, but the way of big power politics must be abandoned.

It has been the example of just such politics that led the Saddam Hussein
government to think it could act with impunity in the Persian Gulf. Iraq has long
basked in the support of its two superpower friends. The Soviet Union supplied
Iraq with arms throughout the long and bloody Iran-Iraq war. Washington clearly
backed the latter as its warships patrolled the gulf in ostentatious displays of
solidarity with Baghdad. Even Iraq’s attack on a U.S. warship in the gulf was
handled with unusual restraint on the part of Washington.

And watching the big operators, Saddam may have been encouraged by
Washington’s invasion of Panama last December.

But the world shows signs of being a different place, and Iraq seems to have
badly underestimated the change. Nothing can justify the U.S. invasion of Panama,
or the Israeli aggression in Lebanon. The actions of the Iraqi government are no
different.

_ The greatest crime in the invasion of Kuwait is giving George Bush a pretext
for military intervention in the Middle East.

U.S. policy in the region was bankrupt. Its main client state, Israel, was
increasingly isolated throughout the world. Now the U.S. president, like a would-
be hero riding to the rescue, rushes to defend U.S. oil and other strategic interests
at the expense of 200 million Arab people, with little response from the world
community. Saddam has handed George Bush his Christmas present early.

Hawks in the U.S. military-industrial complex hungry for another enemy to
replace the Soviet Union can now land on Iraq. Arms programs jeopardized by the
post-Cold-War climate can now be given the green light.

Regional tensions may also result in an oil shock, tumbling the North American
economy into the long-awaited recession the neo-conservatives have been trying
to engineer.

This is why world pressure must mount on Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, and
all economic measures taken to condemn such aggression. At the same time,
progressive opinion must also struggle against equally adventurous military inter-
vention by a hypocritical U.S. administration that itself has not abandoned military
aggression or gunboat diplomacy.

CANADA WILL NoT STAND
bce WHILE THE MILITARY

MIGHT OF 'KAQ

IN VADES

A TINY NATION -
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IPIBUNE

EDITOR
Sean Griffin

ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Dan Keeton

BUSINESS & CIRCULATION MANAGER
Mike Proniuk

GRAPHICS
Angela Kenyon

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These days, following the collapse of _ the countries he has chosen as his sample

most of the East European communist gov-
emments, Michael Walker — he is of the
Fraser Institute — is as close to being in
heaven as anyone can be without first
dying. His regular column in the Fraser
Forum abounds in right wing homilies cel-
ebrating the demise of socialism and the
triumph of capitalism.

In one recent column he described as “a
ludicrous argument” and “completely il-
logical” the following syllogism: “Soc-
ialism has failed wherever it has been tried.
Capitalism has been a success, creating
great prosperity in the nations that have
embraced it. Therefore we need more
socialism.”

Nobody could argue with that if, by
socialism, he means the Stalinist command
model, and if by capitalism he means “the
United States, Canada, Japan and Western
Europe.” The trouble is that he doesn’t.
Here is his definition of socialism: “Uni-
versal social welfare programs are still
seen as a "sacred trust". Socialized med-
icine, marketing boards, rent controls,
zoning regulations still gamer wide sup-
port in the media. Canada Post, the CBC,
and hundreds of other Crown corporations
remain in the public sector not yet priv-

ti j "

Leaving aside the United States,
Walker’s definition of socialism nicely fits

of successful capitalism: England, West
Germany, France, Italy, the low countries,
Canada, etc.

When we look at the OECD’s list of the
10 most prosperous capitalist countries,
measured by per capita real income, they
are Switzerland, Iceland, Japan, Sweden,
Finland, Norway, Denmark, West Ger-

many, Uni-

WALKER

In a subsequent column, he paints what
he feels is a damning picture of pollution
in Eastern Europe, which he attributes to
public ownership. Here are some of his
examples:

* “In Hungary, one out of 17 people dies
from environmentally induced causes.”

Leaving aside the unanswered question of
how he defines that term, can he tell us
what proportion of Americans die from
similar causes? Actually, average life ex-
pectancy in the Warsaw Pact countries is
one year higher than in the Nato countries.

¢ “At Leipzig, an East German indus-
trial centre, life expectancy is six years less
than the national average.” Can Walker tell
us how life ex-
pectancy in
Hamilton, Kiti-
mat, or Sudbury
compares with
the Canadian
average?

e “In Czech-
oslovakia’s coal
mining and in-
dustrial region,
children are ta-
ken out of the
area for a month
each year as a
health measure.”
Can Walker. produce examples of
Canadian or American industrial areas that
make that kind of provision for their
children?

BJARNSON

Finally, Walker tells us that in Poland,
95 per cent of the river water is unfit for
drinking. I wonder when Walker last tried

By Walker’s yardstick ‘socialism’ is successful

drinking water from the Fraser or the St.
Lawrence?

His only reference to pollution in the
West is that, “There is a lesson here for
North America ... we need to recognize
that the problem in the Communist system
that led to such wanton disregard for the
environment was the complete lack of
private ownership of the land that was
being polluted.”

Indeed. No doubt the Polish state
“owned” the Vistula River. Who owns the
Fraser? And whom owns the B.C. forest
lands that are being ravaged by clear cut-
ting? And, to come to the heart of the
matter, who owns the forests and lakes of
Easter Canada and who owns the mills,
smelters, factories and power plants that
are rapidly destroying those precious
resources through their output of acid rain?

No doubt the former socialist regimes
of Eastern Europe have much to apologize
for. But have they ever done anything to
compare with the market-driven inter-
American drug trade? Or the blinding of
thousands of Third World young people in
the production of chips and integrated cir-
cuits for the American computer industry?
These things, too, are aspects of Walker’s
capitalist heaven on earth.

Emil Bjarnason
Vancouver

4 Pacific Tribune, August 20, 1990