CHAPTER 9: RESEARCH FINDINGS
9.2 Research Findings
9.2.2 Objective 2: To Analyze the Role of National Interest in the Context of Humanitarian Military
29 In an interview on 19 June 2015 in Addis Ababa, Simon Badza noted that, “In Rwanda people were massacred in the face of the same humanitarian masters.”
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The question of the role of national interest in HMI has been the central ethical question in this research.
This is proven by the fact that the hypothesis of this thesis was; national self-interests are the main motivating factor in the undertaking of HMIs. The research showed that national self-interests dominate in the decision by powerful countries when they decide to undertake HMIs. The majority of the interviewees agreed that national self-interests although publicly concealed are always taken into consideration by decision makers of powerful countries before deciding on undertaking any HMI.
However, it is important that there was no consensus among respondents on what an HMI is in relation to HMI as well as the real meaning of HMI.
Firstly, it is important to note that Mandaza (2015)30 and Nyuykonge (2015)31 (interviewees) argued that there is nothing like an HMI. The two argued that there are military interventions and humanitarian interventions. Furthermore, they urged that once there is more of military combat in HMI, then the intervention ceases to be humanitarian. In their conceptualization, the two put forward that a humanitarian intervention should not be dominated by combat military personnel. The two interviews are in support of a humanitarian intervention that is dominated by civilian personnel. It is because of this that the two put forward that what has dominantly become known as HMI is to them simply military interventions which are always defined by national self-interests under-currencies.
Kurasha (2015)32 on a different note argued that the notion of HMI is by itself unethical. He noted that, every single life from an ethical perspective is sacred and cannot be unjustly sacrificed for anything.
Kurasha went on to postulate that when the powerful western countries led by the USA argue that they are intervening on humanitarian grounds, they will be driven by the pursuit of their interest mostly resources, drawing parallels between Iraq (2003) and Libya (2011) on one hand and Rwanda (1994) on the other. He went on to point out that after the intervention in Iraq and Libya, the intervening forces left the people exposed to more appalling humanitarian catastrophes. Kurasha stated that, “What is humanitarian is contrasted with what an animal does. If an action is going to live me in a street, then you have reduced my life to live like an animal. Humanitarian action should lead to humanitarian life. These interventions are leading people to live and run away like animals”. On the notion of “running away
30 Mandaza is a Political Analyst, Academic and Director of SAPES Think Tank and Publisher.
31 Nyuykonge is a Senior Researcher at ACCORD.
32 Kurasha is a Researcher, Academic, Publisher and Programme Coordinator at the Zimbabwe Open University.
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animals”, Kurasha meant the mass dangerous migrations undertaken by many people from war zone including Syria and Libya were the hand of the powerful countries has been visible.
On another note, Kurasha questioned the whole notion of what is termed national self-interests. He stated that, “They cannot be called (national) self-interest. They are class interests. It is a few economic barons who determine the policy of the United States. It is not the national interests of the United State but the interests of a few. The interests of big banks and economic tycoons determine the foreign policy of the USA. It is not about the USA nation but of a few.” This is in line with the theoretical arguments presented in chapter 1 which argued that the question of national interests should be understood from the concept of the ‘self’. From this notion, one will be able to understand the argument by Kurasha that what are called national interests can in most cases be alien to the majority of the citizens, hence the question of how such can be seen as the aggregate of the interests of all.
The dominance of national self-interests was argued to be the driving force behind the undertaking of HMIs. This, as argued by respondents, is proven by the differences in responses to humanitarian disasters, specifically those which are politically and militarily perpetrated by state leaders. In some cases, there has been swift responses as was the case in Libya as noted earlier on as well as in Kosovo, in others there were half-hearted responses as was the case in Somalia and calls for political solutions as is the current case in Syria, while in other cases there is total neglect as was the case in Rwanda.
Badza (2015) stated that, “The reasons for the existence of a state is national interest both at home and abroad. Even if it means undertaking a war disguised as a humanitarian war, it will still be done. For me I will always say that national interest is the core guiding line. In real politics, altruism is wishful thinking.
National interest is at the core of all military interventions under humanitarian umbrella.”
On a related note, Salim Ahmad Salim (2015) forwarded a different view in regards to HMIs. Ahmad Salim postulated that there are national interests and racial connotation to the undertaking of HMIs. In his postulation, when there is a humanitarian catastrophe that calls for HMI in Europe, powerful countries from the Western hemisphere come with a swift reaction because such catastrophes are seen as a dent on white supremacy. However, when there are similar catastrophes in Africa and other less developing countries the powerful countries neglect such issues and when they take action it is mostly done in giving financial and military support while those indigenous peoples are left to sacrifice their lives. Ahmad Salim cited the interventions in Kosovo, Somalia and Rwanda as illustrations.
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The arguments put forward by interviewees was also dominant in most debates by scholars on the subject. Köchler saw the practice of HMI as a façade for the pursuit of national self-interests. He argued that all major HMIs that are used by liberalists scholars to argue that HMI was established by customary international law was simple the moralisation of the pursuit of geo-strategic interests in the Ottoman Empire and the Mediterranean Sea. While other theorists and scholars like Grotius (1625), Teson (2003) and Walzer (1977) saw HMI as an ethical practice that was undertaken to deal with gross human rights abuses by national leaders or those whom they support, the thesis proved that examples given are contested and at best proved that HMI is the pursuit of national self-interests in a moralised manner to counter internal and international condemnation. For instance, the thesis argued that the example noted by Grotius that the wars of Constantine against Maxentius and Licinius were simple battles for the control of the Roman Empire.
Teson acknowledged, so does Walzer, the influence of national self-interests. Teson, however, argues that national self-interests and humanitarianism can be compatible of the intervening country do so based on clear humanitarian reasons and that both the intervening country and the subject country benefit.
However, this, as argued in the thesis is against the tenets of humanitarianism and HMI. Badza (2015)33 stated that, “As long as humanitarianism is applied in a selective fashion it remains hypocritical and illegitimate. Hence there is no humanitarianism.” The selective application of HMI is driven by national self-interests were in cases where powerful countries see no benefit, they ignore the catastrophes or simply pay lip-service in the form of what may sometimes be called a political solution. The question of the compatibility between self-interests and humanitarianism is the subject of the section that follows.