wfn.org | Church Leaders Call For Alternatives to Military Attack on Iraq

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

18-February-1998 
98058 
 
    Church Leaders Call For Alternatives 
    to Military Attack on Iraq 
 
    by Alexa Smith 
 
LOUISVILLE, Ky.--Conceding that there are no easy answers in the standoff 
between the Clinton administration and the Iraqi government over weapons 
inspections, worldwide ecumenical leaders are continuing to push for 
patient diplomacy instead of military intervention. 
 
    In statements issued within days of each other, a nine-member World 
Council of Churches (WCC) delegation to Iraq, the National Council of 
Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. (NCC), the International Policy Committee 
of United States Catholic Conference (USCC) and the Cyprus-based Middle 
East Council of Churches (MECC) insist that humanitarian - not military - 
options need to dominate decision-making in the U.S., to take what the NCC 
calls the moral "high ground," even though the Clinton administration is 
now readying for possible airstrikes against Iraq. 
 
    The statements also agreed on the need to reshape the economic 
sanctions applied by the United Nations during the Persian Gulf War - a 
source of ecclesiastical guilt ever since the mainline denominations argued 
for the imposition of sanctions seven years ago as a way of avoiding the 
war.  Since then, sanctions have been credited with stopping needed 
rebuilding to Iraq's almost inoperable infrastructure, wrecked by 
airstrikes during the war, and with contributing to massive malnutrition, 
disease and, by conservative estimates, the deaths of more than one million 
Iraqis, half of them children. 
 
    Only the MECC calls for outright lifting of the sanctions, though the 
WCC delegation called for a "thorough review" of the sanctions based on the 
WCC's 1995 policy guidelines on the application of sanctions. 
 
    At press time, the delegation was reporting to the WCC's Executive 
Committee in Geneva.  The delegation was expressing alarm at the 
"worsening" of suffering among ordinary Iraqis in recent months that has, 
it argues, "galvanized the population against foreign intervention" and has 
"significantly reduced" the witness of the Christian community there, many 
of whom are emigrating to avoid further economic hardship. 
 
    In a four-page letter to Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, the 
chairman of the USCC International Policy Committee, Archbishop Theodore E. 
McCarrick of Newark, argues that major military action now runs the risk of 
violating the church's traditional criteria for "justifiable use of force," 
what is commonly called just war theory.  He wrote: "Means short of war 
must be found to contain and overcome the Iraqi regime's threat to its own 
people and to the world. 
 
    "We fear that the use of military force in this case could pose an 
undue risk to an already suffering civilian population, could well be 
disproportionate to the ends sought, and could fail to resolve legitimate 
concerns about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction." 
 
      The NCC argument is based more on the moral ambiguity of using force 
as a way of meeting intransigence - particularly in a complex situation 
where quick solutions are often "morally suspect and historically 
dangerous." 
 
    In a Feb. 16 letter to President Bill Clinton, the NCC's officers said: 
" ... The choice of muscle is the suspect equivalent of belligerence, 
always morally ambiguous.  Embracing such a choice is a special temptation 
reserved for strong men and women who see themselves pursuing a course that 
is right.  Even our earlier military action failed to end repressive 
government in Iraq or stop the potential for belligerence. 
 
    "Our counsel: resist.  The lure of military muscle is sometimes a false 
attraction." 
 
    The letter goes on to point out that, though there are strong pacifist 
traditions within the NCC's member communions, the NCC is not, overall, a 
pacifist body.  "Historically many of our churches have affirmed the 
defensive use of military power and even its deterrent value in a sinful 
world. 
 
    "We have however never supported its `first strike' use.  We cannot," 
the letter continues, "support it now." 
 
    The hardships faced by Iraqi civilians is behind religious leader' 
opposition to military action - the same reason why churches are beginning 
to push for reshaping sanctions, something the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A) 
General Assembly called for in 1996.  "The people of Iraq have suffered 
right, left and sideways," said the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, the 
denomination's stated clerk, who wrote his own appeal to President Clinton 
urging "restraint in both the use and threat of military force" in Iraq 
Jan. 30.  "We acknowledge," he told reporters, "the responsibility [to 
investigate] amassing weapons in Iraq ... 
 
    "But do it through the United Nations.  And keep in mind the suffering 
of the people of Iraq." 
 
    The 1996 PC(USA) document asks the U.N. Security Council to consider 
lifting the embargo on all but military-related goods, and the 
denomination's 1997 human rights report urges "continued easing" of 
economic sanctions against Iraq in a way that does not support Iraq's 
ability to invade its neighbors. 
 
    According to NCC Middle East liaison David Weaver, more churches are 
becoming increasingly vocal that massive use of force is not the way out of 
the current impasse - just as they are questioning the wisdom of continuing 
to punish ordinary Iraqis for their government's actions with tight 
sanctions.  The American Friends Service Committee, for instance, is making 
more than 1,000 "Friendship Kits" for Iraqis.  The Church of the Brethern 
is urging U.S. restraint.  The United Methodist Church is arguing that 
there is "no moral" rationale for "inflicting further injury on any who 
hurt as the Iraqi people presently do." 
 
      The NCC  goes even one step further, proposing that U.S. policy shift 
toward "an aggressive humanitarian embrace" of the Iraqi people - a 
strategy that would draw Iraq out of its isolation and would undercut the 
"demonizing portrayal" of the U.S. by the Iraqi government, a portrayal 
military action would only confirm. 
 
    "We're not just trying get out of the diplomatic impasse," Weaver told 
the Presbyterian News Service.  "But we're trying to suggest creative 
alternatives ... the economic sanctions have had a catastrophic impact on 
the Iraqi people who are unable to affect the outcome." 
 
    McCarrick bluntly stated the Roman Catholic Church's position on 
further airstrikes and on strict adherence to the U.N. sanctions in his 
letter to the Secretary of State.  Acknowledging that the government of 
Iraq has "done little to alleviate the suffering of its own people and has 
even exacerbated it;" McCarrick continued, "It is wrong to punish the Iraqi 
people for actions of a government they cannot control ... 
 
    "According to the reports of our brother bishops and other reliable 
sources, adequate food, clean water and health care are lacking for 
hundreds of thousands of people.  To contribute significantly, though 
indirectly, to their hunger and disease is unconscionable, no matter how 
egregious the actions of their leaders," he wrote.  "We cannot fail to heed 
their cries for help." 
 
    Both the USCC and the NCC are urging national leaders to shift the 
terms of the embargo so food, clean water and health care may be provided 
for the Iraqi people. 
 
    The MECC's statement puts it this way: "The sanctions that were imposed 
to coerce the Iraqi government to comply with the cease-fire agreement 
have, in seven years, done nothing to change Iraqi policy or mobilize the 
people to change the government.  In fact, the opposite effect can be 
noticed: a greater nationalistic feeling and sense that the West 
(particularly the U.S. and the United Kingdom) are unjustly punishing Iraq. 
Malnutrition, previously unseen diseases, a marked lack of medicine and 
food supplies, the unavailability of spare parts to repair cars, 
ambulances, water sanitation plants, and other necessary machinery, and a 
general feeling of hopelessness prevail among the general population. 
 
    "The MECC," it says, "calls upon the international community to lift 
the economic sanctions against Iraq." 

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