“A Dreadful Mistake”

The historian Paul Kennedy on the entanglement of the US in Iraq, its relation to the Islamic world and the influence of neo-conservative ideologues on George W. Bush

[This interview is translated from the German in: Spiegel 2/2004. Kennedy, 58, a British historian, is director of International Security Studies at Yale University. He became well-known through his bestseller “Rise and Fall of the Great Powers”.]

Spiegel: Professor Kennedy, an election year has begun in the US. Iraq will be a delicate theme of the election campaign for the challengers of George W. Bush and the president. New attacks occur almost every day. What is now raging in Iraq – a war, cross between war and peace or a guerilla struggle?

Kennedy: A very long phase of asymmetrical warfare is occurring against a multitude of enemies: members of the Baath-party, Saddam-loyalists, some international Mudschahidin, religious fanatics who regard the American presence in the country as intolerable. Washington committed a dreadful mistake in Iraq. The advisors of the president erred militarily and politically. Now we are paying a great price for that mistake.

Spiegel: Has the struggle against terrorism increased the number of terrorists?

Kennedy: Undoubtedly, above all in the younger generation. The pictures of 80 or 90 youths who jumped on the roof of the downed helicopter and rejoiced are among the most disconcerting pictures from Iraq for me. We have lost a whole generation for the project of democracy and tolerance.

Spiegel: But Bush supposedly waged the war to that end.

Kennedy: We should not force any democracy according to the western model on Iraq. In some respects the Bush administration is America’s most ideological government in many years. Even Ronald Reagan who sounded like an ideologue was actually very pragmatic with Secretary of State George Schultz at his side. In contrast, the Bush administration really imagines itself on a crusade. It committed the greatest sin possible in the art of government. The Bush administration only hears what it wants to hear.

Spiegel: And sees what it wants to see even when weapons of mass destruction are undiscovered.

Kennedy: The US government cannot complain of a lack of secret service information. Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush were given all the available facts. However they refused to accept these facts.

Spiegel: Is it true that neo-conservative ideologues kidnapped this government as critics charge?

Kennedy: My friend, the historian Volker Nerghahn, once described the German mentality before 1914 as a kind of autism, an inability to see itself from a distance. I see this here in America.

Describing the Iraq war merely as a war for oil seems to be a second-rate explanation. This war is not waged for domestic political motives. I fear it has to do with a certain mentality. As long as I don’t see any contrary evidence, I believe this administration is really driven by its vision of America’s role in the world as a kind of sending or mission. Cynics are not at work. They mean what they say.

Spiegel: The mission is to give authority and effect to America’s superior power and establish an American empire. What characterizes an empire in the present world political situation?

Kennedy: According to the traditional definition, the Brits assumed rule in Bombay, managed colonial troops and local collaborators and controlled foreign relations. This idea of empire is too simplistic for complex conditions. If you had visited Buenos Aires around 1900, you would have also believed in the British Empire. The rail system was built by Scottish engineers. With ship connections to Liverpool and Southampton, all the investments came from London. The architecture was European. The export products, meat and food were taken to England.

Spiegel: Was this a kind of informal empire?

Kennedy: Precisely. When you look nowadays at those countries where American influence is so enormous – South Korea, the Philippines to Afghanistan and the Gulf states, this looks like an empire, acts like an empire, runs like an empire , whines like an empire and probably is an empire.

Spiegel: From time immemorial, doubt has persisted whether the US could act like an empire since its citizens are not ready to pay the price of empire.

Kennedy: I think Americans could pay the price if they were convinced of the cause and at least believed the cause worthwhile. The apprehension of Americans is not a question of costs – even if 43,000 reservists and national guardists were recently sent to Iraq.

Spiegel: The American armed forces are mainly recruited from the lower class. Does that cause anger?

Kennedy: The elite no longer serves nowadays. Only a single senator has a son in the military. In the Second World War, Churchill couldn’t keep his son from fighting in the Balkans. Roosevelt desperately attempted to restrain his son but realized he had the duty to march off into war. But where are the children of this administration today?

Spiegel: Which is harder – the military confrontation with the guerillas in Iraq or the problems in legitimating the war?

Kennedy: Up to now the military threat has been modest. To be sure, losing a dozen soldiers a week is sad and depressing news. However Henry Kissinger spoke at Yale University about Cambodia’s bombardment and the TET-offensive of the Vietcong in the Vietnam war. He said the decision to expand the war was made at a time when 500 Americans were killed every week in attacks of the Vietcong coming across the Cambodian border.

What alarms me in Iraq is the withdrawal of the Red Cross, the United Nations and the World Bank. The whole logic of the Bush administration was to chase out or capture the monster. Now many from the United Nations, UNICEF and the World Food program are leaving. The opposite happens. Saddam is calm, the military remains and the civilian relief organizations held back because they can’t afford the risk.

Spiegel: Are you pessimistic about the future of Iraq?

Kennedy: I am pessimistic. What happens in Iraq affects the whole region. We have a substantial long-term problem in our relations with the Arab world. I also don’t see any political solution at the Palestinian-Israeli front. The Israeli premier Sharon makes everything much worse with his ferocity. The forces of rage and frustration are too strong. America didn’t instigate this. Unrest and anger were already widespread in the whole Islamic world from Algeria to Indonesia. The situation worsens as America increases the unrest. I am really despairing concerning the Middle East.

Spiegel: Do you, a Brit in America, see America’s future as overcast?

Kennedy: No, I am very confident. America has enormous intellectual and civil resources. Even demographically the US is far better positioned than most European countries that look to a darker future. Moreover the geographical expanse of the US has a psychological effect. This breadth encourages the idea that the people and the country can constantly renew and re-invent themselves.

The governing in Washington may err. The generals commit mistakes in Baghdad. From time to time, there may be an anthrax strike or a surprise terrorist attack. Still a mammoth country with nearly 10 million square miles and 288 million people can only be really ruined in a very drastic scenario.

Spiegel: Do you believe the US will remain the world power for an indefinite time?

Kennedy: No, I believe the US could lose its hegemony to China in 50 years. There are credible predictions that China with its steady growth rates will become the greatest worldwide economic power. The US could fall to second place followed by India. This will not be a catastrophe for the Americans as long as they can keep their territory, their resources and their per-capital income stable.

Spiegel: Professor Kennedy, thank you for this conversation.