As the dust settles with an eerie hazmat glitter on this year's opening of the United Nations General Assembly, I'm finally ready to give up on that Bush-coined phrase, "axis of evil." It's not an axis anymore. It's turning into a global conglomerate.
Putting a positive spin on this process, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has called this 64th opening of the General Assembly "one of the most engaged" that the U.N. has seen "in years." Which in its own surreal way it was, with an extraordinary parade of despots emerging from the distant woodwork to posture on the U.N. stage.
Part of this engagement was surely due to the extended hand of President Barack Obama. He has been at pains to explain that on his watch there will be no more of that deplored old U.S. unilateralism. America's retooled approach to the U.N. now revolves around unconditional affection (and funding). Pushing a multilateral message, Obama spoke (at the climate summit) and spoke (to the General Assembly) and spoke again (chairing the U.N. Security Council).
Watching the hubbub around him, I kept thinking of the old saying: Be careful what you wish for--you just might get it. Obama is getting engagement all right, including talks with Iran this week in which American soft-power diplomacy will seek to address such hard facts as Tehran's hidden construction of a uranium enrichment facility under a mountain on a military base.
But to an alarming degree, Obama's multilateral dream is also taking on a nightmare life of its own. When you invite thugs into your parlor with offers of "mutual interest and mutual respect," and present yourself as a soft touch, there's a certain risk that instead of becoming your polite pals, they will collude to steal the silver and trash the house.
As long as America was playing global cop, there was at least some damper on that sort of behavior. Dictators' dormant years didn't start with President George W. Bush. They began with the Soviet collapse that culminated in 1991, leaving a lot of the world's old despotic fellowships either kaput or in disarray, and disinclined to challenge American might. President Clinton had a unipolar world more or less thrust upon him, and thus came the fleeting era of the "peace dividend" and "the end of history." That ended not only with Al Qaeda's attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but also with signs that broader threats to the free world were again on the rise--thus, Bush's labeling in 2002 of the Iran-Iraq-North Korea axis of evil.
Now, with Obama pointedly backing America away from the old role of top cop and urging all and sundry to look for shared interests, some of the world's most enterprising despots are taking the hint. The trouble is, they aren't looking for shared interests with the free world. They are feeling much freer to seek out shared interests among themselves.
Two prime examples are Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi and Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez. Both were absent from last year's less "engaged" U.N. assembly opening, held during the final days of Bush. Al-Qaddafi, despite being relieved of U.N. sanctions some years ago, had never attended a U.N. General Assembly until this year. Chavez skipped it last year, after a 2007 performance in which he said that Bush's appearance there, earlier that day, had left the place smelling of sulfur.
But both al-Qaddafi and Chavez came to this assembly as part of the starting lineup of U.N. talent. Each, in his own way, paid tribute to Obama's declaration that "we share a common future." Al-Qaddafi called him "my son" and wished he could be president of America forever. Chavez, in a press conference at the U.N. after his speech, had critical words for the U.S. government but kind words for Obama himself. Referring to his photographed handshake with Obama at a Summit of the Americas in April, Chavez said: "When we met, there was chemistry between us … He was very cordial. He came over, he said, 'Hello Chavez.'"
Having enjoyed the festivities at the U.N. in New York, both al-Qaddafi and Chavez took off for starring roles in an assembly of their own, at an Africa-South America summit hosted this past weekend by Venezuela. This was the second such Africa-South America (ASA) summit, the first having met in Nigeria in 2006. This group endeavor is now evolving at speed, with Chavez declaring, "We are here to change history and create a new socialism, a new world."
Held at a resort hotel on Venezuela's Margarita Island, this summit marked al-Qaddafi's first trip to South America. Some 30 heads of state attended, including Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe. At this shindig, al-Qaddafi was welcome to pitch the tent that was nixed by local authorities during his visit to New York. He set it up near the swimming pool. Chavez celebrated al-Qaddafi's attendance by calling him "one of the great leaders of this century," and presenting him with a replica of Simon Bolivar's sword.
They both got down to business seeking ways to reshape the world to better suit their own visions of multilateral engagement. During the summit, they called for a new defense alliance: a South Atlantic Treaty Organization, or SATO, meant to function as an "anti-imperialist" front among the nations of Africa and Latin America. After the summit, Chavez and al-Qaddafi lingered on together to sign a joint document proposing a definition of terrorism that would exempt anyone they might regard as involved in "the legitimate struggle of the people for liberty and self-determination"--which in U.N. lingo has long been code for the likes of Palestinian suicide bombers, Hezbollah, and other terrorists attacking the free world.
They also discussed the creation of a special African-South American bank. Coming from the likes of Chavez and al-Qaddafi, that's a proposition that ought to worry U.S. investigators already looking into growing ties--financial and otherwise--between Venezuela and U.S.-sanctioned Iran.
These doings south of the border have been overshadowed in the news this week by breaking stories on Iran's nuclear program, and much of the coverage has centered on such entertainment as al-Qaddafi's shopping spree at the resort hotel arcade on Margarita Island. But this brand of despotic engagement is anything but harmless buffoonery. Nor is "development," Libya- or Venezuela-style, a boost for the future of the ordinary people of the Third World. With this add-on excursion from U.N. headquarters to Venezuela, Libya, in the person of al-Qaddafi himself, is reaching right into America's backyard. Chavez, in turn, has been networking with a wide array of despotic governments--notably Iran, but also with the likes of Russia, Syria and Belarus--pursuing alliances, business partnerships and weapons deals.
Not least, the Venezuela-Libya South-South summitry has to be a comforting prospect to Iran's rulers, as they face whatever the U.S. next pitches their way to try to stop Tehran's nuclear program--whether in the form of deals, tighter sanctions or both. The world's burgeoning networks among despotic states provide a rich maze of interconnected ways to evade sanctions and cheat on any deals. Some of these despots may have their quarrels with each other. But the greatest threat they all face is that any further global spread of genuine democracy might topple them from power. They have a shared interest in bullying, damaging and diminishing America and other developed democracies.
Those interests can also be seen in the zeal with which rulers of countries such as Burma and North Korea, while smothering, jailing and slaughtering their own people, profess themselves deeply concerned about the humanitarian implications of "climate change." They expect, of course, that countries such as the U.S., which already pour money into a vast array of U.N. eco-programs, will pour even more into their collective, despotic pockets in the name of environmental goals.
Obama's quest for shared interests with even the worst of the worst has done nothing to engender greater freedom. His extended hand has done nothing yet to turn America's enemies into decent partners, let alone friends. It is proving effective, however, as an inspiration and invitation for world-class thugs to walk right past him and engage with each other.
