Making Sense for Somalia

As violence continues to ravage Somalia, as anarchy prevents any viable system of internal justice, and as famine and hunger still kill many Somalis every day, the United States has begun a dramatic pullout from perhaps out first solely humanitarian intervention ever.

And we should be glad.

U.S. envoy to Somalia Robert B. Oakley's declaration that the U.S. had fulfilled its goals in Somalia and was now ready to leave is a welcome beginning to what we hope will be our post-Cold War foreign policy. The announcement was followed by a promise this Thursday by UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali that as of May 1, the Americans will no longer be running the show in Somalia. U.S. forces will be replaced by a bonafide UN force, of which American troops will comprise no more than a quarter.

What is so remarkable about the American withdrawal and the arrival of a UN force that actually has foreign troops in it (as opposed to, say, the "UN" coalition against Iraq) is that it is happening at all.

This, of course, is something of a surprise to those who objected to the mission from the beginning. The standard line was that we would be in Somalia--and then the rest of the world--forever, as we plunged down the slippery slope of humanitarian aid. The mission's critics worried that a policy of sheer benevolence provides the U.S. with no clear stopping point. Sure, Somalia is better off now than before the intervention, but it still doesn't have a government, and people are still starving--but people are starving everywhere, and this argument could expand forever. So the surprise is that our government in these past few weeks has finally recognized that it can't do everything. Our Bushera will to save a country with a military mission from God (remember Panama?) syndrome is over.

Actually, this was never much of a threat. After decades of heinously self-interested Cold War foreign policy, the danger that a single humanitarian precedent could send the U.S. down the path of no return is inconceivable. As we let the Kurds rot in northern Iraq, it is simply comic to imagine us committing our military to a policy of global famine prevention.

The real gift in our withdrawal from Somalia has little to do with not worrying if we can solve all of Somalia's problems. It is our new relationship with the United Nations. We are actually following--really following--the principles of collective action, and this marks a big transition.

Despite the use of the word "coalition" and an occasional reference to the "world community," the intervention in the Persian Gulf was essentially our doing.

And in Bosnia we are pushing the limits of cooperation by failing to support the Vance Owen peace plan and conducting an independent airdrop of food. But come May 1, the U.S. is voluntarily giving up its leadership status to a multilateral force that really is multilateral.

It didn't have to be this way. The UN was not interested in invading Somalia before the U.S. did, and we have had little history of accepting even our allies running the program when we're involved. And American public opinion firmly supported U.S. aid to Somalia.

The fact of the matter is that we did have to drag the UN in--we forced their hand by insisting that we would pull out relatively quickly no matter what--and perhaps we could have done a better job rebuilding the Somali state by ourselves. But this is precisely why it is encouraging that we were able to shirk the role of world leader and become one power among many. American hubris has doomed many a plan, and some rationality is nice for a change.

Of course, I don't mean to imply that the American pullout is the dawn of a New World Order. It's just a big step.

In fact, one thing that the Somalia intervention demonstrated was the way this country continues to look down on the Third World. Bosnia's civil war is described in almost mythical proportions: It has evil Serbs, innocent Muslims and a smattering of genocide. But it is still a war between intelligent people, as far as the U.S. is concerned.

The Somali civil war receives a vastly different characterization. Gone is the World War II language, and instead the warlords are described as "petulant children" (The New York Times).

And according to U.S. envoy Robert Oakley, "This country has lived off the dole for as long as I can remember. In the future, the Somalis will have to work harder at earning it rather than getting it."

The so-called "dole" was actually military aid by the U.S. and USSR designed to rip the country apart in bloody civil war. But this is conveniently forgotten, as it is inconsistent with our picture of dependent Third Worlders.

What exactly separates the Serbs from the warlords such that the former are Nazis while the latter are "petulant children" is anyone's guess, but this patronizing attitude toward the Somalis reminds us that however much progress the U.S. withdrawal represents, we have a lot further to go.