The Hindu Business Line : <I>After veto, what?</I>

The US President, Mr George W. Bush, has not sprung any surprise by refusing to sign into law the Bill passed by the Congress tying up the sanction of $124 billion for meeting the expenses on the US military formations in Iraq with the withdrawal of combat troops by October 1 and the complete military pull-back within the following six months. He had given clear advance notice of his determination to exercise his veto in case the Congress went ahead with it.

The Congress can over-ride the veto and force the President to give his assent to the Bill in its present form only if it can re-enact it with a two-third majority. Such a possibility is non-existent given the razor-thin majority of the Democrats in both the Houses and the resistance of the Republicans to any course of action that will be tantamount to loss of face for their party and the Administration.

The only way, therefore, of avoiding the looming crisis in financing the US military establishment in Iraq is for the President and the Congress to work out a modus vivendi, incorporate it in a freshly drafted legislation and get it passed in time. It is clear from public opinion surveys that the Americans would like nothing better than being rid of the albatross of Iraq round their neck. The number of American casualties there is mounting (approaching 4,000), so much so even the military brass in Washington and Iraq must be wanting to bring to an end the entrapment in a country about which everything is unfamiliar and in which hatred and hostility for the US is rife.

Doomsday threats

Hence, there has to be some commitment from the President's side that will take account of the overwhelming national sentiment for the pullout of the American presence by a specified date in the near future. It will not do for him merely to state flatly that the time-table contained in the vetoed Bill was "a prescription for chaos and confusion".

His historical sense will tell him that all such doomsday threats held out in the past to silence criticism had never materialised. For instance, when the British had set the date for withdrawal from India following the visit of the Cabinet Mission, it was described by Winston Churchill as a "shameful flight", and a motion of condemnation of the Government was brought in Parliament to the effect that the withdrawal was a betrayal of India's minorities, "a gambler's throw" and an invitation to chaos and civil war. Well, India, falsifying all the prophecies, is alive and well. Then, there is a parallel of 80 years ago with reference to Iraq itself (then called Mesopotamia) in which the British got mired, with widespread Shiite insurgency resulting in more than 2000 British casualties. At that time too, Cassandras predicted downright deluge without Britain's tutelage, but Parliament saw to it that Britain just left, leaving Iraqis to themselves. They managed to survive and thrive, until the US and the UK mucked up things again.

Moral: Quit when you can, not when you must. Do not think of yourself playing God to other peoples and nations. Without your calling it, the tide comes in; without your twirling it, the earth doth spin!

B. S. RAGHAVAN