This report examines the key questions being asked by the international community regarding the justification provided for the invasion of Iraq and engaging in regime transition via war in Iraq. The report employs data from a series of earlier reports as it classifies the arguments made by the U.S. and UK governments.
This report provides an assessment of the intensive inspection activity of UN weapons monitors in Iraq, which was mandated in Security Council Resolution 1441 in 2002. Issued just after the January 27 update to the Security Council on UN inspections provided by chief of operations, Hans Blix, the report concurs with Blix’s assessment that “Iraq has on the whole cooperated rather well so far” with UN inspectors.
“Sanctions, Inspections and Containment: Viable Policy Options in Iraq” by David Cortright, Alistair Millar, and George A. Lopez in Iraq: Threat and Response, edited by Gerhard Beestermöller and David Little (LitVerlag, 2003) pp. 127-147.
“A Case for Concern, Not a Case for War,” by Glen Rangwala, Nathanial Hurd, and Alistair Millar in The Iraq War Reader: History, Documents, Opinions, ed. Micah L. Sifry and Christopher Cerf (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003).
Joint Resolution 114 of the Congress of the United States stipulates that if the president decides to use force he must certify why “diplomatic or other peaceful means” will not adequately meet U.S. interests. This report shows that peaceful and diplomatic options are available and can be successfully implemented to achieve U.S. objectives.
“Disarming Iraq: Nonmilitary Strategies and Options” by David Cortright and George A. Lopez, Arms Control Today, vol. 32, no. 7 (September 2002), pp. 3-7.
This study outlines practical policy options for reducing and containing the Iraqi weapons threat without resort to armed force. It suggests steps for reformulating UN sanctions in Iraq. It proposes a diplomatic bargaining strategy for gaining Iraqi compliance with renewed UN weapons inspections. And it calls for the development of an “enhanced containment” system of financial controls and externally based border monitoring to limit Iraq’s military potential and prevent the regime from acquiring weapons of mass destruction.
This report provides preliminary analysis of what recent arms embargo cases reveal about how to improve the implementation and enforcement of arms embargoes. It also discusses some of the recommendations for arms embargoes formulated at the recently concluded Bonn-Berlin high level meetings on this policy area.
Following the publication of The Sanctions Decade — lauded as the definitive history and accounting of United Nations sanctions in the 1990s — David Cortright and George Lopez continue their collaboration to examine the changing context and meaning of sanctions and the security dilemmas that the Security Council now faces.
In recent years, international attention has turned toward the use of targeted, “smart” sanctions that minimize unintended humanitarian consequences and focus coercive pressure on responsible decision makers. Some of the world’s leading sanctions experts and practitioners join together in this book to provide the first published account of the emerging theory and practice of smart sanctions. The essays examine recent uses of targeted financial sanctions, travel sanctions, and arms embargoes, and offer recommendations for improving their design and implementation.
