Although Britain's world-renowned military historian and Daily Telegraph defence editor John Keegan supports the war and thinks that it has been a success, his new book, 'The Iraq War', is not blindly triumphalist.

He is worried that the psychological impact on the wider Muslim world and its political effects on transatlantic relations - particularly between the United States on one hand and the Franco-German Europe on the other, with Britain attempting to bridge the communication and perception chasms.

In Keegan's observation, the Muslim world seems to see in the Iraq war the confirmation of "the West", particularly the United States, being prepared to use overwhelming military superiority "to keep Muslim subordinate", while many Europeans "was outraged by the spectacle of raw military force supplanting reason and legality as the means by which relations between states are ordered". (pp 218-219)

However, expressing the worry does not mean that Keegan himself agrees with the anti-war Muslim and Franco-German European worlds. What appears to be overwhelmingly popular opinion may not be morally right in certain circumstances, especially when crimes against humanity and genocides are issues at hand.

' V egetarian crocodile'?

In Keegan's words, the Iraq war is a better guide to what needs to be done "to secure the safety of our world than any amount of law-making or treaty-writing can offer". He also quoted British philosopher Thomas Hobbes as remarking that "covenants without swords are but words". (p109)

In this regard, Keegan certainly directs his criticisms against some well-meaning Europeans and liberals the world over on their belief that Saddam Hussein and his regime could be turned into what humorously cynical Chinese would call "vegetarian crocodiles" by making more arms inspections, international treaties and global "laws".

According to Keegan, the Europeans and liberals seem to think that what has succeeded among them could also be successful with Saddam's regime in Iraq. What the latter seem to have forgotten is that between 1980 - when Saddam launched his war against Iran and 1991 - when he invaded Kuwait and fired missiles at Israel, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain - 12 years had intervened; and between 1991 and 2003, another 12 years lapsed.

In the entire 24 years, there had never been any sign of Saddam's regime becoming "vegetarian", despite many UN debates, resolutions and inspections, economic embargoes, military encirclement and containment, creation and enforcement of southern and northern "no-fly zone" as well as even selective missile strikes ordered by the President Bill Clinton and Prime

Minister Tony Blair in Operation Desert Fox in 1998.

(For the Anglo-American's more peaceful attempts to change the behaviour of Saddam's regime as well as the accumulated frustrations, see Kenneth M Pollack's 'The Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq', New York, Random, 2002)

So, the 2003 Anglo-American decision to confront Saddam's regime head-on and militarily has its historical perspective as, according to Keegan, Operation Iraqi Freedom was devised as early as 1995. However, unfortunately, in the heat of the global debate, the historical perspective and context seemed to have somehow lost, especially among the younger generation of journalists, commentators and peace activists.

It is therefore to Keegan's credit that he has restored the historical perspective and context in his narrative and discourse, although Kenneth Pollack's book has more details.

Of course, it cannot be said that the anti-war governments in Franco-German Europe and Muslim world are, like the well-meaning younger journalists, commentators and peace activists, also ignorant about the historical perspective and context of the decision to invade Iraq in 2003.

These governments and political leaders seemed to be more concerned with how to check-and-balance and downsize the United States than to effectively solve the long-standing threats posed by the Saddam regime to the security of the world, Middle East and the Iraqi people. In 'The Iraq War', Keegan therefore also examines their motives, albeit respectfully and discreetly.

Keegan also attempts to explore the various paradigms of Islamic schools of political thoughts, and examine their rationality or the lack of it.

Extinction of April Glaspie's career

However, Keegan is not also uncritical of certain aspects of the United States's errors and mistakes as well as misjudgments.

Former US ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie who met Saddam on the eve of the latter's invasion of Kuwait in 1991 is singled out for criticism because, in the crucial meeting, Glaspie wrongly gave Saddam the emboldening or encouraging impression that the US would not intervene even if Saddam's army marched into Kuwait. Keegan opines that "her exchange with Saddam can only be described as disastrous and rightly led to the extinction of her career". (p 74)

Meanwhile, despite Keegan's opinion that the Saddam's regime was bad enough in 2003 to call for its termination and change by military means, Keegan also gives due credit to Saddam and his Baathist regime for some socio-economic improvements they had brought to Iraq up to the 1970s.

According to Keegan, "Saddam was also a social progressive. He sought to abolish illiteracy, raise educational standards and improved the status of women, in sharp distinction to the policies of many of the rulers of neighbouring states". Saddam sought to extend the privileges of the few to the many and with success. The Baathist revolution created a sizable middle-class and consolidated the country's education establishment.

"Had Saddam been content to persist simply as a moderniser, he might have become a widely respected Middle Eastern statesman, with friends throughout the region and in the Western world," adds Keegan. (pp. 48-49)

Without doubt, if we can only afford the time to only read one post-war discourse of the 2003 war on the Saddam regime, Keegan's 'The Iraq War' is that one insightful and thought-provoking book.

JAMES WONG WING ON is chief analyst of Strategic Analysis Malaysia. He is a former DAP member of Parliament for Kampar (1990-1995) and a former columnist for the Sin Chew Jit Poh Chinese daily (now Sin Chew Daily). He read political science and economics at the Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.