Statecraft. Margaret Thatcher

NATO casualties. Rightly or wrongly, most leading US politicians judged that American public opinion was not prepared to face the risk, let alone the reality, of losses in Kosovo.

      This may not, in fact, have been true. And if it was true it may have reflected poor leadership, or uncertainty about the declared (and undeclared) war aims. Or again it may, paradoxically, have been the effect of the enormous importance of television coverage in modern crises. By making so vivid the suffering of people in distant lands, television greatly increases pressure for intervention. But at the same time, by dramatising even more the grieving of the families of servicemen who are lost, it undermines national resolve to fight and to risk casualties.

      America’s commitment to the world’s security is so extensive, and the sacrifices it makes so considerable, that it ill behoves America’s allies to complain about reluctance by American families to sustain losses in other people’s wars. But American leaders should recognise that this reputation, however unjustified, has given encouragement to America’s enemies. This is all the more poignant when, as in Kosovo, the refusal to risk the loss of allied aircraft, and so to envisage operations below fifteen thousand feet, dented our effectiveness in preventing the ethnic cleansing of a civilian population we were committed to protect.

      By contrast, the technological dominance of America, which had been such a factor in the Gulf, was by the time of Kosovo eight years later still more evident. In the Kosovo operation, however, it was less America’s superiority over the Yugoslav army, which actually proved quite adept at protecting itself, but rather America’s superiority over her NATO allies that was now most remarkable. The facts here speak eloquently for themselves.

      Although all nineteen members of NATO made some contribution to the operation, that of the United States was overwhelmingly dominant. America paid for 80 per cent of the cost – Britain and France made up most of the rest. The US supplied 650 of the 927 aircraft that took part in the air campaign. The US flew two-thirds of the strike missions. Almost every precision-guided missile (PGM) was launched from an American aircraft. The US was alone in contributing long-range bombers, which dropped about half the bombs and missiles used in the campaign.

      The cause of this imbalance was not generally, with the notable exception of the Greeks, any lack of commitment by the rest of NATO, and certainly not by Britain. The problem was rather that America’s allies had neither the quantity nor, above all, the quality of weaponry required to be effective partners of the US. Thus while the British flew more than a thousand strike missions, three-quarters of the munitions we dropped were unguided. When poor visibility interfered with PGMs that relied on laser-designation or optical guidance, only the Americans had the technology (in the form of the Joint Direct Attack Munition) which allowed them to attack targets in all weathers. Finally, it was US intelligence which identified nearly all of the bombing targets in Serbia and Kosovo.

      Is Kosovo, then, the shape of things to come? In one respect, at least, it should not be. We should be extremely wary of the doctrine of humanitarian interventionism as the main, let alone the only, justification for the use of force. There is, after all, a far more traditional alternative. Sovereign states have a right of self-defence which precedes the United Nations Charter and is not dependent on it, or on votes in international forums. Other states have a right to come to the aid of countries which are the victims of aggression. That is what military alliances like NATO are about. The habit of ubiquitous interventionism, combining pinprick strikes by precision weapons with pious invocations of high principle, would lead us into endless difficulties. Interventions must be limited in number and overwhelming in their impact.

      There is always a risk in attempting to make observations about conflicts that are still underway, as is the case of that against bin Laden and the Taliban at the time of writing. On the other hand, if broad conclusions about the conduct of interventions are to be of practical value they must also be applicable in special cases – even one as special as that which now confronts America.

      Moreover, the experience of recent years does indeed help, if only in knowing the pitfalls to avoid. The action against bin Laden and his network and the state that has harboured them is morally just, legitimate and necessary. America does not require anyone’s agreement to act in self-defence against an unprovoked attack on its own people. It needs the support of countries whose territory or airspace are required for the conduct of operations. It may also find it valuable to receive practical help from its allies: Britain has been particularly active, for which the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, deserves much credit.

      But it is important not to allow ever wider coalition-building to become an end in itself. As we saw in the Gulf War of 1990, international pressures, particularly those exerted from within an alliance, can result in the failure to follow actions through and so leave future problems unresolved. So far, though, I am heartened by the fact that President Bush seems to have concluded that this is an American operation, and that America alone will decide how it will be conducted.

      When democracies go to war, it is natural that they invoke the highest moral principles. That is always especially true of America’s wars. And such principles are indeed truly involved in the present conflict. It is not mere rhetoric to state that democracy, liberty and tolerance are all under threat from violent Islamist fanatics embracing terrorism. But winning wars requires more than moral fervour: it demands clear thinking about targets and timetables, accurate estimates of the enemy’s strength and intentions, pre-emptive action to minimise risks and guard against consequences. That is all the more so in this war against terrorism, because we are primarily dealing with distant lands and, in large part, unknown conditions.

      In such circumstances, the conclusions I drew above about the need to limit the aims of interventions, while maximising their effect, are especially germane. It is doubtless true that the West should have done more in earlier years to prevent Afghanistan becoming a political powderkeg. And we should now supply humanitarian aid. But I would caution against open-ended attempts at nation-building. What matters, above all, is to neutralise the threat which resulted in the outrages of 11 September. That means taking out the terrorists and their protectors, and not just in Afghanistan but elsewhere too – a large enough task even for a global superpower.

      America’s action against bin Laden and the Taliban also demonstrates one other feature about interventions, which we should not overlook. The American people immediately understood that what happened on 11 September was an act of war against them. They responded accordingly. The military commitment by the United States and the willingness of its citizens to sacrifice their lives are testimony to how nations behave when their very survival appears at stake. They remind us that in the modern world only nation states will fight wars at sufficient cost in blood and treasure to achieve lasting victory.

      The question of whether to act in Afghanistan was unusually clear-cut. But, more generally, knowing when and how to intervene is as much a matter of instinct as of reflection, although one does of course also need to reflect. The interesting arguments over foreign policies based on moral imperative versus those based on pragmatic national interest are really in the end only that – interesting. The greatest statesmen in the English-speaking world – men like Winston Churchill and Ronald Reagan – adopted policies that always contained both elements, though in different measures at different times. I should therefore prefer to restrict my guidelines to the following:

       Don’t believe that military interventions, no matter how morally justified, can succeed without clear military goals

       Don’t fall into the trap of imagining that the West can remake societies

       Don’t take public opinion for granted – but don’t either underrate the degree to which good people will endure sacrifices for a worthwhile cause

       Don’t allow tyrants and aggressors to get away with it

       And when you fight – fight to win.

      MILITARY PREPAREDNESS – MATÉRIEL

      Whatever cosy euphemisms we may want to adopt, defending our interests in battle is what our armies, navies and airforces ultimately exist to do. They are not well-suited to act as policemen,