By early 1980, the US had decided that Iran was a much greater threat to world peace than Iraq. That proved to be a very costly mistake.
Later in 1980, Iraq invaded Iran in one of the clearest cases of naked aggression since WWII. The goal was to annex some territory in the southwest of Iran, although there is some dispute as to how much. Later events suggest that Saddam wanted the oil rich Khuzestan province, which contains most of Iran’s vast oil reserves. In a shameful act of “realpolitik”, the US supported the aggressor in the war.
Advocates of realpolitik like to portray their critics as fuzzy-headed idealists that don’t understand the realities of national security. In fact, it was the realists who ended up undermining US interests in the Middle East. We thought that Iran’s leader was the Hitler of the Middle East, whereas the 1980 invasion showed that it was Saddam Hussein that more closely resembled that famous aggressor. As a result, the US did nothing to verbally discourage Saddam from later invading Kuwait, and this passivity led to the Gulf War of 1991 and the far more costly Iraq War of 2003.
The long sad history of our policies toward Iraq and Iran have important lessons for today. Imagine the US is confronted by two great powers. Our foreign policy establishment insists that the larger of the two countries is the biggest threat to world peace. Later events prove this not to be the case, as the leader of the smaller of the two great powers proves himself to be the “new Saddam Hussein”, a militarist that invades one neighbor after another, with grandiose dreams of annexing territory to enlarge his country.
One would hope that our foreign policy establishment had learned the lessons of Iraq and Iran, and understood the need to update their beliefs as new information came in. One would hope that they’d respond to evidence as to which power was the greater threat to world peace. Alas, that does not seem to be the case.
The US has decided to support Ukraine with military aid. We’ve also decided (wisely in my view) not to go to war with nuclear armed Russia. Unfortunately, President Biden has made it abundantly clear that the US does intend go to war with nuclear armed China if a war breaks out between China and Taiwan. And the entire US foreign policy establishment seems on board with this project. China is viewed as “the real enemy.”
Make no mistake, in a US-China war the US would likely be the aggressor. China has no interest in attacking the US. And China has enough nuclear weapons to destroy all of our major cities. While a nuclear war is unlikely, once two nuclear-armed countries go to war there is a danger of escalation getting out of control, especially if the country that is attacked ends up on the losing side of a conventional war.
A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be a morally unjustified action. Nonetheless, China is only a threat to Taiwan (which the US and most other countries officially regard as a part of a unified China.) Russia is a threat to many countries throughout Eastern Europe, which are internationally recognized as sovereign, independent nations. There is simply no comparison between the two cases.
When a US administration can only defend its foreign policy with a series of blatantly misleading statements, it is clear that there is something wrong with the policy. A country that is doing the right thing ought to be able to tell the truth.
READER COMMENTS
Jeremy Goodridge
Oct 8 2022 at 7:31pm
Would you support Taiwan with military aid if China invaded Taiwan, similarly to what we are doing now in Ukraine?
Scott Sumner
Oct 9 2022 at 1:39am
Yes.
Mactoul
Oct 8 2022 at 11:02pm
Unified China doesn’t imply unified under communist rule.
Invasion of Taiwan is far more threat to US than Ukrainian. Russia posed no threat whatsoever to European countries– witness economic cooperation between Russia and Europe.
Anonymous
Oct 12 2022 at 6:20pm
Huh? Ukraine is a European country, no? Other Eastern European countries seem to disagree as well.
Mark Brophy
Oct 8 2022 at 11:25pm
Our interests aren’t at stake in Ukraine as they are in Taiwan, a major trading partner that makes many of the chips that our industries depend upon. We’re wasting money and lives in Ukraine but Taiwan would be worth defending almost as much as Canada and Mexico.
Scott Sumner
Oct 9 2022 at 1:45am
If you study the history of military aggressors like Putin, you’ll see that there’s far more at stake in Ukraine. Putin is a threat to the entire world, as he doesn’t accept the idea of national sovereignty. China does. The Russian conventional military may be subpar, but they still have far more nuclear weapons than China. And Putin has proven to be is a much more reckless figure than Xi.
Saying that Ukraine is not that important is like someone in 1938 saying Czechoslovakia is not that important. That’s not the point. It’s what comes next.
Again, look at what the foreign policy realists said about Iran and Iraq back in 1980. And look how that approach worked out.
TGGP
Oct 9 2022 at 8:50am
Czechoslovakia fell apart after the Munich agreement. Ukraine has not. Rather than Germans seizing Czech military equipment and using it for further conquests, the Ukrainians are seizing large amounts of Russian equipment.
Jon Murphy
Oct 9 2022 at 7:42am
Given that logic, wouldn’t it make more sense to ally with China? China represents about 16.9% of total US trade. Taiwan, about 1.9%. And while our chip trade does involve Taiwan considerably, we import more from Maylasia and South Korea.
My point here is that looking at solely trade reasoning, as Scott points out, misses the point.
TGGP
Oct 9 2022 at 9:00am
Iraq was not a threat to “world” peace, as it had such limited ability to project power beyond its immediate surroundings. The important thing about Hitler is not merely that he invaded other countries (the same was true of Mussolini, who was less of a threat), but that his invasions succeeded so often in conquering other countries because the Wehrmacht was perhaps the most effective army in the world at the time. Similarly, Napoleon Bonaparte was a far bigger threat than Napoleon III, though the latter initiated the Franco-Prussian war by foolishly invading German territory.
Scott Sumner
Oct 9 2022 at 3:31pm
Hitler was defeated, despite his powerful army. But suppose he had had nuclear weapons? Putin does. I’m not saying Putin will use them, but the risk is far higher than with China. Putin is more erratic than Xi.
Also keep in mind that Ukraine’s limited success is partly due to the supply of weapons from America. Lots of people on the right (including Trump) oppose that military aid.
TGGP
Oct 10 2022 at 8:43pm
Putin may have nukes, but the US has a lot more (and better missile technology) and could pulverize him.
Trump gave Ukraine military aid. But I suppose given how erratic he was he could have opposed his own actions 🙂
Anonymous
Oct 12 2022 at 6:22pm
Didn’t Congress give the military aid and Trump slowed it down to try to prompt an investigation of Hunter Biden?
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Oct 9 2022 at 9:53am
There can be no doubt that China is much more a threat to the US and to liberal democracy in general than Russia. The problem with US policy toward China has been to seek a weaker China rather than as stronger US and many of our policies: restricted immigration of high skilled people, high structural deficits, no tax on net CO2 emissions, and trade restrictions that go beyond strategic goods (if any can be confidently identified) weaken the US without weakening China even if that were a reasonable objective.
We have a perfectly stable status quo in Taiwan: we and the CCP pretend that Taiwan is a part of CCP China. The failure of CCP to honor its commitments on Hong Kong do not bid will for the status quo, but for now it holds.
MarkW
Oct 9 2022 at 11:57am
Unfortunately, President Biden has made it abundantly clear that the US does intend go to war with nuclear armed China if a war breaks out between China and Taiwan.
But fortunately nobody can be sure if Biden is actually in charge of U.S. foreign policy as aides have immediately walked back his various statements and claimed that there has been no actual change in the U.S. stance of strategic ambiguity (and also that Biden’s remarks are consistent with that policy — which is absurd, but maybe helps with the ambiguity part?) Also fortunately, it’s very unlikely that Biden will still be president after 2024.
Phil H
Oct 9 2022 at 1:43pm
I don’t disagree with the point, but I’m not sure this analysis is right. Russia is declining; China is rising. Whether it takes Ukraine or not, I can’t see how Russia could be a direct threat to the USA in the next 20 years.
The position with China is quite different. The US still holds a very influential position in east Asia. If China begins to flex its muscles, and takes Taiwan, it may be able to dominate east Asia, particularly rich east Asia, in a way that it has not done previously.
However, this is just a bunch of guesses from someone who doesn’t know anything about foreign policy. It seems like there’s a plausible story to be told of the dangers of China; but to be honest, I suspect that “the USA has no strategic plan” is closer to the truth.
Scott Sumner
Oct 9 2022 at 3:33pm
Neither China nor Russia will attack the US with conventional forces. So in both cases the threat is nuclear weapons. Russia has many more of them than does China, and Putin is much more likely to use them. Hence Russia is the far greater threat.
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Oct 9 2022 at 2:42pm
There is a lot of wisdom in this post, but I’d point out that Iran had decided the US was a bigger threat than Russia before we supposedly decided that Iran was a bigger threat than Iraq.
steve
Oct 10 2022 at 5:02pm
We did participate in overthrowing Mossadegh and putting the Shah in power so there was some justification for their belief.
Steve
TGGP
Oct 10 2022 at 8:47pm
There was no rational thinking about Iraq vs Iran as greater threats that went on prior to our invasion, as a realist might advocate (they opposed the invasion). Afterward the same people who advocated the invasion got upset that Iran predictably got stronger. Of course, the enormous cost of that invasion only speaks to their foolishness rather than our policy during the Iran-Iraq war (any advantages from which Iraq could have derived were more than wiped out in the much cheaper Gulf War).
Mark Z
Oct 10 2022 at 2:28am
A slight variation on Phil’s point: China, being larger and more powerful (and on the rise while Russia is on the wane), is a greater threat to liberal democracy in the long run. It can better serve as a role model for non-democratic governments, and has more economic might it can use to incentivize nations into its sphere of influence and away from (presumably salutary) western influence.
MarkW
Oct 10 2022 at 7:00am
That may be true, but there is still no reason to commit the U.S. to direct war with China in the case of a Taiwan invasion. And, in fact, Xi’s more bellicose stance toward Taiwan (and dalliance with Russia) has already hurt its economic prospects, reduced its influence in the region, and also its ability to serve as a role model.
bb
Oct 10 2022 at 6:48pm
Scott,
While I agree that both parties seem way to willing to have a Cold War 2.0 with China, I suspect that the reason our policy is different for Ukraine and Taiwan is really about seizing the initiative. Once the invasion started, it was too late to make threats. Russia had seized the initiative and took that option away from us. For a whole host of reasons, mostly having to do with our NATO allies, we probably didn’t have the option to offer a security guarantee prior to the invasion. I suspect that Biden and team wish they couldn’t have promised a stronger response prior to the invasion. I also suspect that they get less push back from our Asian allies when making the threat. I don’t feel at all qualified to have an opinion on whether it is wise. I just don’t think they are taking a more forceful approach to China because they think China is worse than Russia.
And I also think our obsession with Iran is almost as crazy as our obsession with Cuba. I hope I live to see Iran as a friendly nation that I can list someday.
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