Viewing the Gulf from gondolas

Press, 22 June 1987, Page 20

Viewing the Gulf from gondolas

From the “Economist,” London

For summiteers who want a challenge, the Gulf war is Himalaya-class. Yet the seven Western heads of Government did not get far when they tried- to tackle it this month at their meeting in Venice. Nobody but a mullah could take offence at their bland calls for a negotiated end to the war, for “just and effective measures” by the United Nations Security Council to promote a settlement, and for freedom of navigation in the Gulf to be preserved. The day the summit ended, a mine in the Gulf blew a hole in a Greek tanker carrying Kuwaiti oil _ a real-world reminder of the main questions the summiteers left unanswered. Are the West’s Interests imperilled by recent events in the Gulf, and is there a way to end a seven-year war that now poses the big-

gest danger to the worm's peace? The West’s interests in the Gulf are simple to describe. Russia should be kept from getting a grip on a region that the West depends on for much of its oil; the Gulf has to be kept open to shipping; Iran should be stopped from crushing Iraq and becoming too overweening a power in the Middle East. These aims may yet require America to use force. But, for all the ructions of the past few weeks, the Gulf may be settling back into a state that the United States can live with. American and Russian warships will be prowling side-by-side there, as they have done for some time; and Kuwait has talked both Russia and America into protecting some of its oil traffic by putting it under their flags. The oil is still getting out,

and the Soviet Union has been at pains to say that its Gulf fleet and its commitment to Kuwait will not be expanded. Little of this is to the Iranians’ liking, and the sword America has been waving in the direction of their yet-to-be-deployed Chinese missiles overlooking the Strait of Hormuz has made them nervous. American talk of a preemptive strike is useful — the missiles would substantially raise the threat to Gulf shipping — even if the act itself would not be.

The threats against Iran drum home the right message: if you use your Silkworm missiles to sink our tankers, we will bomb your missile sites into oblivion. If the state of the Gulf itself is more satisfactory than it once seemed, however, the state of the Gulf war is not. The longer the war goes on, the greater the risk of a destabilising Iranian victory.

The super-Powers’ contest for influence in the Arab world does not prevent them from sharing an interest in seeing the war brought to a negotiated end. Yet even if America and Russia can find enough common ground, to make a joint stand, they have few suitable instruments for ap-, plying pressure to Iran. Cutting. off arms supplies shows little promise. The Americans want a Security Council resolution which would cut off a combatant that refuses peace talks — presumably Iran, since Iraq says it is willing to talk. The resolution deserves support, but it has been languishing in the Security Council. The French, who supply Iraq, and the Chinese, who sell Iran its missiles, have been resisting it. Once passed, it might not do much good. A gentlemen’s agreement over the past few years that it was bad form to sell arms to Iran has

done little to staunch the flow. An alternative, if the war took a more alarming turn, might be a boycott of Iranian oil; but, with so much of the world’s oil now trading anonymously through the spot market, this weapon, too, would probably miss its target

A wearying haul lies ahead in any event; a regime as intract: able as Iran’s will not easily be budgeted.

The West needs to keep a steady eye on a few essentials: keeping the Russians at bay and the Gulf open to shipping; maintaining the military balance between the two combatants; pressing Iran to negotiate; thinking ahead to how it can shore Up the Arab states of the Gulf if Iraq eventually cracks.. under Tran’s assaults. All irksome tasks, -but the Gulf matters too much for the West to neglect them. ;

Copyright — The Economist.