The Obstacles to Ending Senseless Economic Wars

Francisco Rodriguez calls once again for lifting broad U.S. sanctions on Venezuela:

No civilized nation should adopt policies that target vulnerable civilian populations. In fact, no other nation does. The United States is the only country to impose economic sanctions on Venezuela. Other countries have explicitly limited themselves to individual sanctions targeted at regime leaders and have openly rejected and criticized the use of economic sanctions that hurt ordinary Venezuelans.

The Biden administration’s Venezuela policy remains a cruel farce, and it is showing no signs of changing for the better. US treatment of Venezuela over the last several years is one of the clearest examples of how Washington’s addiction to broad sanctions as a default option and our political leaders’ desire to be seen “doing something” about a foreign crisis have combined with disastrous results. Using broad sanctions in a bid to compel Maduro to give up power was never likely to work, as many people observed at the time, and more than three years after the Trump administration’s ill-advised decision to recognize Guaidó as president we can say without any doubt that it has failed. Venezuela is becoming a cautionary tale of how a policy of collective punishment has been allowed to continue for years for no good reason. Because there is no significant domestic political pressure to ease or lift the sanctions, the administration is able to let the policy run on autopilot without having to fear any backlash.

As I noted in one of my columns this week, the Biden administration’s official position is that broad US sanctions do not contribute to ordinary Venezuelans’ suffering at all. As Rodriguez mentions in his article, Assistant Secretary of State Nichols made this preposterous claim when he testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee. When confronted with the destructive effects of the economic war that our government is waging against the people, US officials simply pretend that it has nothing to do with the hardship that the people are enduring. If the policy I supported was responsible for causing thousands of preventable deaths and contributing to deepening the misery of millions more, I might not want to admit it, either, but it is unacceptable for the government to wage a relentless economic war against an entire nation and then wash its hands of the consequences as though the sanctions had nothing to do with it. When the administration denies responsibility for the consequences of its policy, I have to assume that they are doing that because they know they cannot possibly defend the sanctions once they acknowledge the costs.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

Using Famine As a Weapon Is Indefensible

Gerald Feierstein makes a very weak case for designating the Houthis as terrorists. First, he acknowledges that he previously opposed the designation when the Trump administration did it, but now claims that it is worth doing:

The letter, which was ultimately signed by nearly 100 former U.S. diplomats and military officers, argued that a designation would do little harm to the Houthis but would endanger the well-being of millions of innocent Yemeni civilians. Unfortunately, things have changed. The past year has demonstrated that the Houthis will not return to the negotiating table until they accept that there is no alternative to a political resolution.

There may have been some changes in the military situation over the last year, but nothing has changed as far as the effects of the designation are concerned. It is still true that a designation would do little harm to the Houthis but would endanger millions of innocent Yemeni lives, so how can a designation be any more justified now than it was then? Put bluntly, why is it somehow acceptable to cause a massive famine in the name of “leverage” now when it was not in 2021?

There is something particularly perverse about the debate over designating the Houthis. For almost seven years, the US has aided and abetted the Saudi coalition as it bombs and starves the people of Yemen, and during that time none of the coalition’s members has faced any penalties for their myriad war crimes. The Saudi coalition has plunged Yemen into the abyss of mass starvation, and they have done this with US backing and protection. The US refuses to use the influence it has with the Saudi coalition to rein in their many abuses, but for the sake of creating supposed “leverage” with the Houthis there is serious consideration of a policy that would cause even more starvation and deprivation than the coalition’s intervention has already caused. Everyone knows in advance that terrorism sanctions won’t alter the Houthis’ behavior or compel them to negotiate. The whole of Yemen – and not just the parts that the Houthis control – will suffer terribly if the designation goes through.

Feierstein says that it is “imperative” that the US and U.N. “do more to end the suffering,” but he is calling for a terrorism designation that will drastically increase the suffering for tens of millions of people. We are already seeing the economic collapse in Afghanistan that comes when a country is effectively cut off from the outside world. The same will happen to Yemen if the US does this, and it will be our policy that kills huge numbers of people.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

Designating the Houthis Would Be a Death Sentence for Countless Innocent Yemenis

The Intercept reports that the Biden administration is seriously considering the request from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to re-designate Houthis as terrorists:

The White House appears to be seriously considering the change. In late January, Biden’s National Security Council circulated a memo exploring the possibility, according to a U.S. intelligence official and a think tank official familiar with the matter. The memo, a policy options paper produced by the NSC, considers labeling the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, Specially Designated Global Terrorists, or a combination of both, the two sources told The Intercept on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

High-level administration officials discussed the paper during a Friday, February 4 meeting of the National Security Council Deputies Committee, a senior interagency forum for the consideration of national security policy matters, the sources said. The officials who discussed the paper were split, with representatives from the State Department expressing strong opposition to the designations.

As I said a few weeks ago, a decision to re-designate the group would be an appalling error. The Biden administration reversed the designation put in place by Mike Pompeo in the final days of the Trump presidency because they understood the devastating effects that it was already having on the civilian population in Yemen. It was outrageous to apply the designation last year, and it would be doubly so to reapply it when it is clear what the consequences would be for millions of innocent people. Oxfam’s Scott Paul recently had this to say about a possible designation:

Unfortunately, we’ve seen how this plays out – and it’s deadly for Yemenis. When these designations went into effect last year, we saw exporters of vital commodities like food, medicine, and fuel all rush for the exits. It was clear to all that Yemen was heading toward economic freefall. The most important difference between then and now is that today, the Biden administration knows in graphic detail what this will mean for Yemenis who are already facing violence, hunger, and preventable disease. They would knowingly be condemning Yemenis to even more desperate suffering and death.

No one believes that this designation will serve any real purpose except to inflict more starvation on a country already wracked by acute malnutrition and famine. Its effects on the Houthis would be negligible, but it would be a death sentence for millions of innocent people. It is deeply troubling that a proposal this awful is even being entertained.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

‘Shut Up,’ They Explained

The Biden administration doesn’t like being asked legitimate questions to provide evidence for their claims:

Top White House and State Department officials tried to shut down reporters’ questions on Thursday about the veracity of Biden administration claims on Russia and Syria.

The reporters were asking for some proof to back up the administration claim that the Russian government was preparing to stage a false flag incident to provide a pretext for military action and a separate claim that the ISIS leader killed in a U.S. special forces raid had blown himself up along with his wife and two children. The White House press secretary and State Department spokesman didn’t offer any evidence to corroborate the claims, and by the end of their exchanges with reporters each one had suggested that questioning these claims implied a preference for information provided by Russia and ISIS. Ned Price, the State Department spokesman, said, “If you doubt the credibility of the US government, of the British government, of other governments and want to find solace in information that the Russians are putting out, that is for you to do.” These exchanges came in the same week that Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, attacked Josh Hawley for “parroting Russian talking points” when he questioned the wisdom of continuing to support Ukrainian membership in NATO.

The dismissive and insulting responses to legitimate questions have been widely mocked and criticized, but they point to a troubling pattern in how the Biden administration is responding to criticism and basic journalistic inquiries. Even if we assume for the sake of argument that official claims about the false flag plan and the special forces raid are entirely accurate (quite an assumption given our government’s track record over the decades), the administration has not done its credibility any favors by blowing off requests for evidence and then accusing the journalists asking the questions of some sort of disloyalty. The Politicoreport summed it up this way:

When it comes to matters of war, the Biden administration’s current stance is “trust us” – and if you disagree, you’re Vladimir Putin’s or ISIS’ talking puppet.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

Senator Menendez’s Attack on Diplomacy

Sen. Bob Menendez delivered a speech today attacking the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and the negotiations in Vienna. It was a typically bad speech filled with false and misleading claims, but it is worth noting because it shows how unreasonable opposition to reviving the nuclear deal is and how pointless it was for Biden to try to placate Iran hawks like Menendez over the last year. Iran hawks will never accept any agreement that would be even minimally acceptable to Iran, because they do not want to see U.S.-Iranian tensions reduced.

Because of Menendez’s position as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, the administration thought it necessary to go slow and offer no sanctions relief, and it indulged in a lot of silly rhetoric about desiring a “longer and stronger agreement” to keep Iran hawks in their own party quiet. The problem is that Menendez’s opposition to any achievable agreement has been unwavering and there was never anything that the administration could have done that would win him over. Feigning interest in a “comprehensive” agreement that could never be successfully negotiated, Menendez has never supported a realistic diplomatic solution to the nuclear issue.

Menendez makes a number of misleading claims, including this one: “In February 2021, we saw the consequences of not insisting Iran permanently ratify the Additional Protocol. Iran simply decided they were done with the Additional Protocol and refused to allow the IAEA to fully investigate locations where it found traces of uranium enrichment.” It is disingenuous to blame this on Iran’s voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol, since Iran took these steps in protest against the Israeli assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh in late 2020. Iran was still choosing to implement the AP until Israel launched that attack, and if the JCPOA survives until 2023 they are expected to ratify it and adhere to it permanently. The development that Menendez wants to pin on the supposed “weakness” of the JCPOA was the fault of the Israeli government’s backfiring sabotage operations.

He claims that Iran already possesses missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons: “The ballistic missiles to deliver them. That, they already had.” This, too, is false, as any serious study of Iran’s missile program will demonstrate. As Gawdat Bahgat and Anoushiravan Ehteshami conclude in their new book, Defending Iran, “the available evidence does not support the claims that Iran has developed an ICBM capability.” Iran’s missile program has been built up for conventional deterrence and not as a means of delivering nuclear weapons, which the Iranian government isn’t even trying to acquire.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

US Inflexibility and ‘Great Power Competition’

Peter Beinart makes an interesting observation about the way most U.S. policymakers understand “great power competition” with China and Russia:

What prevails today in Washington’s halls of power is a defense of unipolarity dressed up as a recognition that unipolarity is dead. In both parties, top officials herald the return of great power competition but resist meaningful great power accommodation [bold mine-DL]. What they mean when they say the US must compete with Russia and China is that the US must prevent Russia and China from altering the frontiers of American dominance established in the 1990s, when China’s GDP was roughly one-third as large as America’s and Russia was flat on its back.

The resistance to accommodation is bound up with our political culture’s disrespect for diplomacy and compromise, but it is mostly a relic of the first decade and a half after the Cold War when US policymakers tricked themselves into thinking that they didn’t have to accommodate any other powers. This reached its peak during the early Bush years when Karl Rove was talking about “creating” our own reality. Back then, US policymakers grew used to thinking that US power was either effectively unlimited or so vast that it could overcome almost any obstacle, and they weren’t shy about using it. Now that the obstacles are bigger, major powers are more formidable than before, and the US has fewer advantages than it once did, the US hasn’t adapted to the new realities.

We see an inflexibility born of pride today in the insistence that the US and its allies should make no alterations to NATO’s “open door” and in arguments that the US must increase its commitments in East Asia to contain a much more powerful China. Right now, the US is still considering expanding its defense perimeter in the face of major powers that are stronger than they were twenty years ago. The US and its allies refuse to rule out further NATO expansion even when everyone can see that the alliance cannot defend the states in question. Something has to give somewhere.

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Daniel Larison is a weekly columnist for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.