By Dominique Vidal

The Rand Corporation has just published a timely study of nation-building (1), much appreciated by Paul Bremer, President Bush's special envoy in Iraq: "A marvellous how-to manual for post-conflict stabilisation and reconstruction. I have kept a copy handy since my arrival in Baghdad and recommend it to anyone who wishes to understand or engage in such activities." It compares seven United States nation-building operations since 1945 (Germany and Japan after the second world war, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan in the 1990s). That Rand published it makes it doubly interesting. The US Air Force originally set up this research and development organisation in 1948 and, though it later became an independent body, it has often been an active contributor to debate within the administration.

The study explains that Germany and Japan showed that democracy was transferable and societies could, under certain circumstances, be encouraged to transform themselves; the two operations set a standard for post-conflict nation-building not since matched. In the next 40 years there were few attempts to replicate these early successes. Of the 55 peace operations mounted by the UN since 1945, 41 came after 1989.

The study says that during the cold war the US and the Soviet Union each - and, in some cases, both -propped up weak states for geopolitical reasons; but denied such support, these and other states disintegrated. Since the end of the cold war, the US has felt free to intervene not just to police ceasefires or restore the status quo but to try to transform war-torn societies fundamentally. However, "the costs and risks associated with nation-building have remained high. The US has not embarked on such endeavours lightly."

In 1993 it pulled out of Somalia at the first sign of resistance. In 1994 it opted to let an international force restore order in Rwanda. It hesitated before joining European troops in Bosnia and before committing itself to a military intervention in Kosovo. But each time "US-led intervention has been wider in scope and more ambitious than its predecessor". During the 2000 presidential campaign George Bush criticised the Clinton administration's extensive involvement in nation-building operations and objected to the concept. But, as president, Bush, "adopted a more modest set of objectives when faced with a comparable challenge in Afghanistan". In Iraq the US "has taken on a task with a scope comparable to the transformational attempts still under way in Bosnia and Kosovo and a scale comparable only to the US occupations of Germany and Japan. Nation-building, it appears, is the inescapable responsibility of the world's only superpower."

Postwar success in Germany and Japan obviously owed much to their highly developed economies. However, the study explains: "Nation-building is not principally about economic reconstruction; rather, it is about political transformation." The US has failed to install viable democracies in Somalia, Haiti and Afghanistan because all three countries are divided ethnically, socio-economically or tribally. The study notes that hatred between communities is "more marked in Bosnia and Kosovo, where the process of democratisation has nevertheless made some progress". It concludes that the real difference is in the efforts of the US and the international community. After the fighting the US and its allies invested 25 times more money and 50 times more troops, on a per capita basis, in Kosovo than in Afghanistan. They spent $800 per person in Kosovo and only $200 in Germany (2001 prices).

But the US, which accounted for half of the world's gross domestic product in 1945, only represented 22% in 1990, making "international burden-sharing both politically more important for the US and more affordable for other countries". This explains why, all through the 1990s, Washington "wrestled with this problem of how to achieve wider participation in its nation-building endeavours while preserving adequate unity of command". In Somalia and Haiti it wanted rapid intervention by a UN-funded international force. In Bosnia, then Kosovo, Nato enabled it to combine unity of command with broad military participation.

The authors observe that Kosovo was undoubtedly the best amalgam to date of US leadership, European participation, broad financial burden-sharing and strong unity of command. The US was able to maintain a satisfactory leadership role while paying only 16% of the reconstruction costs and fielding only 16% of the peacekeeping troops. Success on this scale mainly depends on "the ability of the US and its principal allies to attain a common vision of the enterprise's objectives and then to shape the response of the relevant institutions, principally Nato, the EU and the UN, to the agreed purposes".

The study weighs up the pros and cons of multi lateral and unilateral operations. It notes that multilateral nation-building is more complex and time-consuming but considerably less expensive. But unity of command and broad participation are compatible if the major participants share a common vision. Resources are important. "The higher the proportion of stabilising troops, the lower the number of casualties suffered and inflicted."

But how do the study findings apply to Iraq, the "most ambitious programme of nation-building since 1945"? The challenges are enormous. There is no tradition of democracy, and deep ethnic and religious differences. The middle classes have disappeared and organised crime is rife. Iraq has assets. Once its national administration has been rebuilt it will reduce the burden on international institutions, and the country has huge oil reserves. However, "the pre-war splits in the UN Security Council make it much harder for the US to adopt the burden-sharing models adopted in Bosnia, Kosovo or even Afghanistan . . . the US was unable to undertake many pre-war preparations that would have eased postwar transition."

The survey observes that reconstructing Iraq will need "an extensive commitment of financial, personnel and diplomatic resources over a long period". For its fifth operation in a Muslim country in just over a decade, "the US cannot afford to contemplate early exit strategies or leave the job half completed. The real question should not be how soon it can leave, but how fast and how much to share power with Iraqis and the international community while retaining enough power to oversee an enduring transition to democracy."

The message is clear. To cope with chaos in Iraq, Rand advocates the continuation of US operations but as multilaterally as possible, guaranteeing US leadership and sharing costs. The omissions are as revealing as the assertions: the study takes no account of ordinary people, as if they had no say in reconstruction. The only exceptions are Germany and Japan, where "the surviving population was disinclined to contest defeat".

Nor does Rand refer to the profits US companies reap from such operations. The pillage of Iraq by firms often closely linked to prominent members of the administration is turning into a major scandal. In October the Centre for Public Integrity (2) revealed that "more than 70 American companies and individuals have won up to $8bn in contracts for work in postwar Iraq and Afghanistan over the last two years. They donated more money to the presidential campaigns of George Bush than to any other politician over the last dozen years." The top beneficiary is Kellogg, Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, which Dick Cheney directed from 1995 to 2000, when he became Bush's running mate. He claims to have had no further contacts with the company since, but Halliburton paid him $205,298 in 2001 and $162,392 in 2002, plus a $34m golden handshake. He will be paid a deferred salary for another two years and owns $433,333 in Halliburton shares. Not that the Rand Corporation mentions such trivial details.

(1) America's Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq, Rand, Santa Monica, 2003.

(2) "Windfalls of War", Centre for Public Integrity, Washington, October 2003.

Translated by Harry Forster

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