Gareth Evans Doctrine of Bonhomie in International Relations

By Con George-Kotzabasis—January 24, 2012

Gareth Evans the former minister of Foreign Affairs and presently Chancellor of the National University in Canberra, in an article published in The Australian, on December 26, 2011, under the title Peaceful Way in a World of Grey, argues that a confrontational approach is rarely the best means of tackling serious issues. He contends “that Manichaean good vs evil typecasting, to which George W. Bush and Tony Blair were famously prone…carries two big risks for international policymakers.” The first risk is that such thinking restricts the options of dealing optimally “with those who are cast as irredeemably evil,” and the second is by seen the world in “black-and-white terms” engenders “greater public cynicism, thereby making ideals-based policymaking even harder.” To strengthen these two points he uses the “debacle,” according to him, “of the US-led invasion of Iraq…should have taught us the peril of talking only through the barrel of a gun to those whose behaviour discuss us” (M.E.), while conceding that “sometimes threats to civilian population will be so acute as to make coercive military intervention the only option, ( M.E.) as with Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya.” Conversely, as a non-confrontational smart benign diplomacy he uses his own negotiations “with the genocidal butchers of the Khmer Rouse,” that were “acutely troubling, personally and politically, for those of us involved,” but which “secured a lasting peace in Cambodia.” He caps his argument by saying that one must see the world beyond the “two dimensions, economic and geostrategic,” and add a third: “every country’s interest in being, and being seen to be, a good international citizen.” (M.E.)

This is not Fukyama’s The End of History but the re-writing of history, and distorting it to boot, on a grand scale. Evans by a divinely made eraser rubs out all evil from the pages of history. But let us respond to his points in sequence. It is obviously true that for a policymaker to see the world in black-and-white terms would be utterly wrong. But likewise, to see the world solely in grey colours without the colour of blackness casting its evil shadow in most human affairs is to paint the world in the colours of wishful thinking. The task of statesmanship is to see the world not with the eyes of the ‘good citizen’ but with the piercing eyes of the political scientist who perceives the nucleus of evil that potentially exists in all human action motivated by ideology or extra mundane religious beliefs. It is to identify and separate the irreconcilable from the inconsolable enemy and act commensurably to the dangers issuing from these two substantially different foes.

The attacks on 9/11 were not the attacks of “good international citizens” but of evil ones driven by eschatological divinely directed goals. Bush and Blair promptly and insightfully recognized that they were facing a deadly irreconcilable enemy that could not be mollified by any ‘benevolent’ actions they could take toward him—they were already depicted by this foe as “Great Satans”—but had to be completely defeated in the battlefield. Further, astute strategy would not allow such an irreconcilable foe to become stronger but to defeat him while he was still weak and hence at less expense in human loses and materiel. The invasion of Iraq had this aim, to prevent the nexus of fanatic terrorists with weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and nuclear ones supplied deliberately or inadvertently by rogue states rigidly belligerent against America and generally the West. In the aftermath of 9/11 no statesman could underestimate the possibility of such a great threat consummated by nuclear weapons that would annihilate their people. As the success of one such attack against a western metropolis would be the ultimate incentive for Alahu Akbar terrorists to become serial users of WMD and nuclear ones against the West and its Great Satan America. And this can be illustrated comparatively and plainly by the success of the first car bomb that brought in its wake a succession of innumerable car bombs used by the terrorists against their enemies.

Indubitably, the invasion of Iraq would have been a “debacle,” due to serious tactical errors American strategists committed during the initial stages of the occupation, such as the disbanding of the Iraqi army that fuelled the yet to come insurgency, if it was not for the Surge that under the savvy new strategy implemented by General Petraeus, had not turned a potential defeat into real victory. A victory, moreover, that planted the seeds of democracy in Iraq and by establishing a nascent democratic state there soon became the catalyst that disseminated the ethos of freedom and democracy among the masses in the region and the great potential this entails for all the countries in captivity to brutal and authoritarian regimes. And one must bear in mind that the Arab Spring is the legitimate offspring of the American gate crashing of the dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein and the transplanting of democracy in Iraq made in the U.S. However, one must not be unaware of the great dangers that could lie in wait in this transformation of democracy among those countries whose peoples in considerable numbers are imbued with the religious fervour of Islam, that Islamists, like Hamas in Gaza, could attain political power through the ballot box. And developments in Egypt after the fall of President Mubarak with the Muslim Brotherhood and extreme Salafists gaining a majority of seats in Parliament at last week’s election, are not encouraging for those sections of Egyptian society that believe in individual freedom and democracy.

There is, moreover, a fundamental inconsistency in Gareth Evans’s argument when he supports military intervention in the case when civilians are killed or threatened to be killed by an authoritarian regime, like Muammar Gaddafi’s, but not when civilians are killed and are threatened to be killed in their hundreds of thousands in the future by fanatic Islamists as it happened in New York and Washington. Lastly, his mentioning of Cambodia and the negotiations with the Khmer Rouse, in which he was directly involved, that brought a “secured a lasting peace” with the backing of “good old-fashioned containment and deterrence,” as a triumph of reason over bellicosity, he overlooks the fact that the Pol Pot regime by the time of the negotiations was already removed from power as a result of being defeated by Vietnam militarily in 1979, and existing as a weak resistance movement in West Cambodia.  

It is by such a collage of diplomatic misapprehensions and awkward inconsistencies that the former minister of foreign affairs attempts to breathe life into his narrative of “a good international citizen” and the “cause of human decency” and insert it into the maelstrom of human conflicts often ensuing from Caesaro-Papist sinister ideologies. The doctrine of bonhomie in international relations can only be indulged over a café latte.

I rest on my oars: your turn now…                        

An Exchange between Kotzabasis and Professor Varoufakis on the Merits and Demerits of Capitalism

The following exchange between me and Professor of  Economics Yanis Varoufakis at Athens University took place on his blog

http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/ about the capitalist system under the post:

Ending 2011with a fable for our times-December 24, 2011

December 24, 2011 at 03:14 #

Kotzabasis says,

Is Amartya Sen’s absolute prosperity and relative inequality of the capitalist system vulgarly to be replaced by Yanis Varoufakis’s “despicable inequality?”

Professor Varoufakis distorts and defames the whole history of the dynamism of entrepreneurial capitalist wealth that shot up the standard of living of the masses to “Himalayan” heights. To claim that capitalist “wealth …needs poverty to flourish,” is just an ornamental academic trapping empty of history and fugitive from serious thought. Capitalism, like everything else in life, was never meant to be “stable” but a process of Schumpeterian “creative destruction.” But this can only be understood and accepted by realists and not by heroic ideologues, like Professor Varoufakis.

Professor Varoufakis says,

• December 24, 2011 at 15:32 #

It is always good to encounter intransigent Panglossian views in the post-2008 world. There is something touching about undying faith, even when of the toxic variety.

1. December 25, 2011 at 01:48 #

Kotzabasis says,

Professor Varoufakis

Are capitalist entrepreneurial creativity, wealth, and prosperity based on “intransigent” “Panglossian” naivety? And is the history of capitalism to be truncated and concentrated naively and un- imaginatively between 2008 and 2011 for you to make your uninspiring and toxic argument?

Professor Varoufakis says,

December 25, 2011 at 11:56 #

No, capitalism’s wonders have nothing to do with Panglossian naïveté. But your determination to portray it as the best of all possible systems exudes it. As for my assessment of capitalism, and your claim that I truncate the latter’s history to a period around 2008, feel free to judge it. But only after you acquaint yourself with it. (For had you read it, eg either of my last two books, you would have realized that I truncate nothing. And that I go to great lengths to analyse capitalism’s contradictions, something that entails a celebration of its achievements as well as an exposition of its failures.) Till you are prepared to become acquainted with what I am really saying, before you attack it, I shall treat you as no more than a minor Panglossian.

Kotzabasis says,

December 26, 2011 at 02:46 #

Professor Varoufakis

Thank you for your advice how to overcome my “minor Panglossian” status. But unfortunately for me I’m bound to retain it, as your crass defamation of capitalism in your POST, hardly incentivized me, to use a term of your “little man” John Howard, to read your books and be acquainted with your thoughts. And indeed, my preference is to be “treated… as a minor Panglossian” than go through the treat to major on your ‘Pandistortions’ and jaundiced strictures on capitalism.

But to come to the gist of the matter in hand, my riposte to you was not to either of your two books, which, as I imply above I have not read. My reply was specifically to your post where you wistfully and wrongfully write, “Should we dare to hope of a new era in which WEALTH NO LONGER NEEDS POVERTY TO FLOURISH,” and of the illusion that “capitalism can be stable” and where you vulgarly and gracelessly contend that capitalism creates “DESPICABLE INEQUALITY,” and in your reply to my first post where you refer to the “post-2008 world.” It might well be that these ‘populist flourishes’ had not meant to be of any intellectual seriousness and their only aim was na deleazei ( to allure) and enthuse the ignorant to rush and become volunteer workers to your construction of your ‘matchsticks’ good society, as a replacement to the infernal deeds of capitalist society. But could one do this at the cost of one’s intellectual integrity?

And it is most surprising that the Gargantuan, indeed, Cyclopean efforts that you have put in your Modest Proposal(MP)—although one must note that Cyclopean efforts without a Ulysses are fated to be wasted efforts—have the aim to save Europe, a system that according to you produces genetically “despicable inequality.” Fortunately, however, for those condemned to this despicable inequality, but unfortunately for you, Andreas Koutras’s fatal Jovian bolts demolished to ashes the MP, from which no contriving number of revisions to it will give rise to a Phoenix solution that will salvage the European Union from its peril.

Lastly, to state that “to analyse capitalism’s contradictions… entails a celebration of its achievements as well as an exposition of its failures,” is to state the obvious.

Professor Varoufakis says,

December 27, 2011 at 04:33 #

Impressed by your dedication to keep knocking down my (according to you) already demolished, and perpetually ridiculous, arguments, as well as by the amount of time you dedicate to a blog (mine) which you consider unworthy, I shall continue to post your comments. Carry on Sir!


Kotzabasis says,


Professor Varoufakis
With your Kazantzakian character I could never imagine that you would not post my comments.

President Obama Sails into Iranian Maelstrom under False Colours

The following piece was written two years ago and it is republished here for the readers of this new blog.

By Con George-Kotzabasis

The Iranian political turbulence brought to the eyes of the world the Islamic Republic’s long incubation of its monster child of military dictatorship. The keepers of the quintessential Koran’s Justice disrobed themselves of their religious white garments and donned the black robes of Islamofascism to commit their injustice to their own people. To survive as the true guardians of Islam and its conferred political power the post-election torrential wave of dissent that rose against them, they are resorting, true to the nature of the ‘imamocracy,’ to the brutal instruments of the police baton and the gun against their own believers. In this unequal struggle between brute force and ‘slogan-armed’ civil disobedience it’s not hard to guess who is going to be the victim. But history might have its revenge: In this temporary victimization of civilians and ‘modern’ Iran might also be the hole in which the brutal imamocracy will be buried.

In this crucifixion of the Iranian people the Obama administration, both on moral and political grounds, cannot assume the role of Pontius Pilate and take the stand of intellectual, moral, and political neutrality on the grounds of political realism. The art of realpolitik is not only to react to events but more importantly to foresee the probable contours in which these events are shaping and be pro-active in their shaping. The Administration has failed abysmally in this art. Within one week of the events unfolding in Iran President Obama abandoned his initial cautious “meddling” argument and adopted, after the latter was overcome by events and as a result of internal criticism of his position, a less cautious course by calling on the Iranian government “to stop all violent and unjust actions against its own people,’’ and warned it could not expect “the respect of the international community” if it failed to “respect the dignity of its own people and govern through consent, not coercion.” But despite this apparently tougher position, President Obama still missed the mark, as we will explain further down.

There are a lot of eminent people who support this ‘realist’ position of Obama such as Henry Kissinger and Paul j. Saunders, CEO of the Nixon Centre , and the political commentator Taylor Marsh of the Huffington Post. The gist of their argument being that for Obama to have come out in support of the opposition would not have helped the latter as it would have been painted by Iranian propaganda as being agents of the U.S., Kissinger stating that showing “public support for the opposition would only be used by Ahmadinejad,” and would damage any prospect of a favourable diplomatic outcome on the grave issues between the United States and Iran in future negotiations. According to Kissinger the Administration would place itself in a great diplomatic handicap if it put itself behind the people who are behind Mousavi. Another argument being put by Taylor Marsh is that you have to accept the world as it is and you have to “engage your adversaries,” as if it was only a matter of accepting it without changing it by choosing the right time to engage your enemies. All of these arguments of course are respectable and fit to be put in the realist frame of politics. But in this case it’s a dusty frame and needs cleaning.

In all grave momentous political conflicts between opposing parties there is a process of polarization that definitively removes any doubting ‘Thomases.’ That is, there are no middle ground societal forces to which one of the opposing parties could appeal for its support that could tip the balance in its favour. Clearly therefore, in such a situation propaganda becomes redundant and obsolete as there is no middle ground to be influenced by it. And this is exactly the present situation in Iran. Moreover, in such polarized conflicts both sides are fighting for their political and physical survival and they will use all means that are conducive to it. Hence Ahmadinejad and the imamocracy will concoct all kinds of conspiracies and lies, including of course the lie that the ‘Great Satan’ is behind the opposition, but who is going to be convinced of the truthfulness of such a lie other than their own solid supporters? Kissinger of course is fully aware from his wide experience and sagacious nature of this process of polarization and its consequences, but remarkably in this case of Iran is drawing the wrong conclusions from it. I would argue on the contrary, since diplomacy is the continuation of war by other means, to paraphrase Clausewitz, that President Obama should calibrate his tougher response to the nascent military dictatorship in the following terms: That the United States and many other nations of the world would find it very difficult to engage with a regime that in the eyes of its own people and of the world is an illegitimate regime. Thus by casting a shadow of isolation from the world over the Khamenei-Ahmadinejad Theocracy, President Obama could tip the balance indirectly in favour of the ‘modernist’ opposition forces and the great potential this would have for the future of Iran, and indeed serve as a paradigm for all the Middle East. As such a statement by Obama could further spread the division among the ruling elite with the great possibility that some of its key members defecting to the opposition and thus opening an opportunity for the opposition to take over power. Thus Obama by taking this stronger stand could be the latent force that would facilitate the transfer of the governing power from the imamocracy to the reformist opposition which despite the conservative religious origins of its leaders could severe the up till now conflation of religion and politics. Due to the fact that this powerful movement behind the opposition is propelled by modernist forces of the young educated generation whose desire for real democracy in Iran is unabated and inextinguishable, more so by the present martyrdom of so many young Iranians whose embodiment is the beautiful and spiritually brave Neda Salehi Agha Soltan, who was shot by a goon of the military dictatorship.

Obama’s ‘Latter Day’ Criticism Ineffective and Too Late

President Obama in the last few days has escalated his criticism of the Iranian regime but he has done so at the ebb of the protest movement of the opposition when he should have done so at its flow and in stronger terms as has been suggested above. And like a conductor of an orchestra who has missed his notes, he aborted a potentially brilliant performance by bungling it. Instead of letting himself to be overcome by the rapidity of events he should not have missed the opportunity to at least ‘pilot,’ if not directly influence, these events to the favourable port of the opposition. But, alas, political short-sightedness pays a heavy price.

It is obvious that President Obama was more concerned to save his new foreign policy which is pivotal on his unconditional diplomacy with the adversaries of the United States than to imaginatively save the great potential for democratic change that the protest movement in Iran had not only for its own country, but next to Iraq, for the whole Middle East, including the resolution of the complex and intricate issue of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Instead Obama chose to sail into the rough seas of Iran under the false colours of his diplomacy. And already the sails of this diplomacy are in tatters as a result of the unfolding events in Iran, as we predicted in a short article ten days ago. David Axelrod, one of his most astute and chief advisors by now is touting and foreshadowing the Republican’s ‘spectre’ of conditions in any future talks with Iran.

But the danger of this naive unconditional diplomacy is still present if Obama continues to be hooked to it. And unlike Agamemnon who sacrificed his daughter Iphigenia to the goddess Artemis to propitiate the winds that would take him to his triumph at Troy, Obama might be sacrificing the long term strategic interests of his ‘daughter’ America on the altar of the faltered winds that will never raise his diplomacy to triumph.

I rest on my oars: your turn now...