In Forbes.com today, a business group comes out against sanctions to support Aung San Suu Kyi:
New sanctions against Myanmar, where pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been detained for a week, would do nothing to force the government to relinquish power, a U.S. business coalition said Friday.
Continued…
“The proposed new sanctions will bring … neither freedom nor democracy to the Burmese people,” said Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council and co-chairman of USA Engage, a coalition of over 670 businesses, agriculture groups and trade associations opposed to unilateral sanctions.
“Existing U.S. sanctions have accomplished exactly nothing — other than to hurt a population that is in desperate need of economic aid,” Reinsch said in a statement.
Surf over to the NFTC website, and notice that they oppose all boycott activity, including congresional atempts to limit business given to German and French companies in response to their psoitions on the Iraq War.
Surf over to the USA Engage website, and notice that they are an equal-opportunity supporter of international trade with thugs, as they support trade with Castro as well.
Engine Charlie lives; we obviously shouldn’t let little things like politics get in the way of $366 million in annual import/export business.
I’ve always had mixed feelings about sanctions. On the one hand they choke a government of much needed funds, hopefully drying them out to a point where they feel the hurt. At the same time they affect the population. It reminds me of chemotherapy. The tumor dies (sometimes), but the rest of the body gets hammered in the process.
I’m not saying to not have them. I think they’re a useful tool when used in conjunction with other diplomatic pressures. I get the feeling sometimes, though that they’re used too sweepingly, too often, almost as a quick fix. Something to say, “See! We did something!” when nothing really is being done at all.
I’ve usually seen sanctions as more of an organizing tool and as a public repudiation of a government.
I’m not someone who believes that because Nike moves a plant out of fear of boycott that a repressive government will fall. But not only do I feel it’s useful to send a message to repressive thugs, but I am coming to think that if correctly implemented, it’s a way of making kleptocracy less attractive.
A.L.
Sanctions will have little or no effect on the Burmese junta. Most of their money comes from drug trafficking or money laundering, which is proscribed anyway. Sanctions will simply close down the last legitimate business in Rangoon. They are a weasel way to lending an appearance of action.
The practical way to topple the Burmese junta is to instigate a destabilization program against them. The Burmee government is the equivalent of a narcotics cartel in control of a UN-recognized nation. It’s like the Taliban in principle, but written smaller.
While Burma is not a national security priority, to the extent that the War on Drugs is valid effort, the junta in Burma must be destroyed. The United States has attempted to oppose them on the cheap, using Aung San Suu Kyi as an army of one. That’s shameful for so mighty a nation as America, and it’s time to invest the appropriate amount of energy in making certain this result happens. Sanctions are not and will never be enough.
Interesting tidbit – Charlie Wilson’s actual quote isn’t the same as the one he’s credited for. At his Senate confirmation hearing, Wilson actually said: “For years, I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors — and vice versa.”
Important change in emphasis and primacy there. That said, I don’t have a lot of patience for the activities you describe here.
If the War On Some Drugs is a not valid activity (it is not,
see http://windsofchange.net/archives/003370.html )
then the best way to economically impact the Burmese government
is to legalize the distibution of opiates to those who want them.