Editorials
AFTER THE ISRAELI STRIKE Is the world a more or less dangerous place after the Israeli air strike on Iraq's nuclear reactor? Is the security of Israel itself strengthened or diminished? The New...
...But instincts can only be the starting point for thinking a problem through...
...some balance of military capacities...
...So, too, they do not simply regret the recourse to arms before further diplomatic initiatives were at least explored...
...Paradoxically, a Begin victory may turn a salutary shock for the rest of the world into a self-inflicted defeat for Israel...
...for another, it was far more efficient...
...Or was it established with an eye to the Israeli elections on June 30...
...The problem with this criticism is that it asks Israel, or any other nation confronted with a development like Iraq's, to sacrifice its immediate security interests for the overall stability of the international system...
...But as a visit to the Latin American church will tell you, the U.S...
...The New York Times did not mince words in its opinion: "Israel's sneak attack . . . was an act of inexcusable and short-sighted aggression...
...But to examine the overall pattern of Iraq's procurement of nuclear technology and fuel and not to conclude that a weapons capacity was a major consideration demands an almost willful naivete...
...Finally, if the raid on Iraq cements the election victory of Menachim Begin, a leader who yields little to (he fiercest of his Middle East adversaries in the unreliability and irresponsibility of his declarations, whose long-range attitude toward the central issue of Palestinian autonomy appears unyielding, and whose supporters have been as riddled with corruption and anti-democratic impulses as were Mr...
...Perhaps one way of altering that reality, changing observers into actors, is to let people know they have rights, and provide channels for their assertion...
...For in breaking the inhibition against preemptive strikes of this sort, Israel also forced the nations to recognize that Emperor Nonprolifer-ation has no clothes...
...Time will tell...
...So with the church...
...Or theologians ask the bishop to mind his own competence...
...Here is where the profoundest objections to the action lie...
...Furthermore, is it true that once bperational, the reactor could not have been destroyed without subjecting Baghdad to massive radiation, a claim that, according to Anthony Lewis, has been questioned by a study prepared by the research service of the Library of Congress...
...Newsweek, for example, refers to "nuclear scientists" who say that "the danger zone would probably not have extended much beyond 1,000 feet even if the Osirak reactor had been in operation.'' These points demand further clarification...
...Ours is a litigious society...
...Israel's assertions about timing and the later danger of radioactive fallout are central to its case...
...The right and freedom to exercise the apostolate and share in the ministry of the church...
...By insisting on the right to aggressively define their security needs over a wider and wider zone, the Israelis have only lent real weight to their neighbors' fears...
...making justifiable demands, on the other hand, represents an act of hope...
...but nations cannot put permanent trust in intentions, there must also be In keeping with Commonweal's usual summer schedule, the next two issues will be dated July 31 and August 28...
...If the Israeli raid shocks the West out of its dithering complacency about nuclear nonproliferation, the world will be safer for it...
...But time for what...
...As a familiar bit of folk wisdom has it, you trust your mother, but you tell her to shuffle the cards, and President Zia is nothing like our mother...
...Such thoughts as these may counter a natural and healthy suspicion of a preemptive attack like Israel's - but, still, there is more to be said, and on both sides of the debate...
...To no avail...
...and European nations...
...Of course, further diplomatic attempts were possible...
...That's the way it ought to be...
...Black Africa could do the same against South Africa...
...The U.S., they argue, was wise to resist the temptation of a strike against the budding nuclear capabilities of Russia and China...
...It even avoids referring to Israel in its official statements, substituting phrases like "the Zionist entity" to indicate Israel's illegitimacy...
...Critics of Israel complained, for example, that it had not exhausted all the diplomatic possibilities before taking this dangerous step...
...They should be disentangled, nonetheless, because in large measure those questions remain open ones: the answers depend on where the world and Israel, in particular, go from here...
...Instead, they reject the notion of a preemptive strike against nuclear facilities altogether...
...there are risks...
...Yet so far there is absolutely no sign of any such guarantee from Pakistan, and no sign that Reagan administration officials are worried over this fact...
...Liberal instincts run rather automatically against the settlement of disputes between nations by military action...
...Until recently, American efforts were devoted, very sensibly, to checking this further step in nuclear proliferation...
...Three facts about the Israeli-Iraq conflict seem indisputable...
...Once again, Israel has bought time...
...There has been considerable debate over whether the Iraquis had already embarked on the process of manufacturing weapons, or could do so in the near future...
...It tried to talk the French and Italians out of supplying Iraq with the threatening technology...
...But in contrast, say, to Israeli air strikes in Lebanon, this was as nearly an anti-military example of military action as a pacifist could imagine - aimed not at people but at death-dealing property, a kind of neutron bomb in reverse...
...Will parishioners now sue for the removal of pastors who can't preach, or parents of children in public schools claim a greater share of parish monies for the religious education of their children...
...What is our quarrel with it...
...But the crucial deadline, according to the Israelis, was not posed by the actual production of weapons but by the fact that the Iraqui nuclear facility was about to go "on-stream," after which point its destruction would have spread radiation over the surrounding populated area...
...By demonstrating the violability of Saudi air space, the Israelis may have assured the sale of U.S...
...Further diplomatic attempts are always possible...
...And even today, the church's bold defense of human rights in some quarters is undercut elsewhere by the fact that within the, church effective procedures for remedying an abuse of authority are often lacking...
...We certainly would like to see any possible Soviet evil intentions toward Pakistan frustrated, and it is precisely this goal that the Reagan administration argues will be achieved by our aid...
...In their eyes, it sets a precedent in international relations that is more dangerous than living with a nuclear adversary...
...Argentina and Chile might face each other's sudden attacks...
...It has never signed an armistice with Israel after any of the Mideast wars...
...So far, they have been only peripherally challenged...
...Third, the Iraqui nuclear effort was directed toward obtaining the capacity for nuclear weapons...
...The right to the protection of one's reputation, to respect for one's person, to activity in accord with the upright norm of one's conscience, and to privacy...
...church is still largely formed by clerical movers and shakers, and by lay spectators...
...Second, the war aims of the two nations are not symmetrical...
...Israeli diplomatic efforts stretch well back in the last decade, however...
...We've had more time than most editorialists to ponder the questions above...
...And to date, it may have abided by international safeguards against diverting nuclear materials for weapons use...
...over whether Baghdad could have a bomb in hand by the end of this year, or in two years, or in ten years...
...We simply do not believe that pumping hundreds of millions of dollars in aid into Pakistan under President Zia is going to produce a stable and secure nation, one that might be better able to resist the spread of Soviet influence...
...Or will women push demands for fuller participation in all church ministries...
...but they all have fallen short of the mark...
...Iraq, on the other hand, clearly challenges Israel's very existence as a nation...
...The beam in our own eye, it would seem, is difficult to remove...
...Belleville's bishop seems willing to trust a process that will demand of all diocesan administrative bodies that they clarify their competence, basic policies, procedures, and standards...
...Belleville's bill of rights includes the following: • The right and freedom to hear the word of God and to participate in the sacramental and liturgical life of the church...
...By further embarrassing Egypt's Sadat, Mr...
...Israel's intentions may be (largely) defensive...
...What is more, he's put muscle behind his words by establishing a truly representative board of conciliation and arbitration with sweeping jurisdiction to handle disputes that arise regarding marriage cases, labor union contracts, cases of canonical penalties, doctrinal disputes, and the affairs of seminary and institutions of higher learning in the diocese...
...Given these realities, why was Israel's strike any less justified than the raid Iran made on the same nuclear facility last September...
...Had the precedent been otherwise established, Pakistan might have struck at India, as India today might strike at Pakistan...
...The right to free assembly and association in the church...
...Did we learn nothing from the lesson of Iran about the folly of pumping arms into corrupt and dictatorial regimes...
...The New Republic was no less certain: "Faced with this threat, Israel had little choice but to take its defense into its own hands...
...As for the administration's pious hope that helping Pakistan with conventional arms is the way to encourage it to give up its nuclear ambitions, we suppose this may be conceivable- conceivable, yes, but is it really very likely unless the U.S...
...Zia is hardly famous for his devotion to human rights, to understate the matter badly, and it is small wonder that his domestic political opponents are greatly worried about the uses to which he will put the arms we are going to give him...
...An act of hope that in the church, above all, the real presence of God's justice is heard and acted upon...
...In a church which is decentralizing authority, says the bishop, distributing it among personnel boards, liturgical commissions, parish councils, and other such bodies - in effect, going at least half-way back to the presbyterian form of church organization that marked colonial Catholicism - discretionary authority must be limited, and individual and group rights defined...
...President Carter promptly offered Pakistan $400 million in military aid, and President-Dictator Zia just as promptly scorned his offer as "peanuts...
...Indeed, considering that Israel is far more vulnerable to nuclear attack than the extensive territory of Iran and that Iraq's quarrel with Iran is far more limited in scope, isn't the Israeli raid far more justified...
...It seems there may be a new Reagan doctrine in the making: just as there are no violations of human rights worth worrying about on this side of the Iron Curtain, so too there are no nuclear bombs worth worrying about unless they are in the hands of obvious enemies- today's enemies, that is, not tomorrow's.enemies, that is, not tomorrow's...
...For other critics of Israel's action, the question of Iraq's nuclear ambitions is irrelevant: they are willing to take it for granted...
...True, the individual state may benefit from that overall stability, but enough to outweigh the burden of dealing with a threatening nuclear neighbor...
...Begin's declaration, Iraq has never specifically threatened the use of nuclear weapons against Israel, its leaders have spoken with anticipation of the destruction of Tel Aviv...
...It hasn't helped much...
...The problem is that pursuing them may permit a critical moment to pass, after which military action, should diplomacy fail, is no longer possible...
...Nonproliferation should be a high priority item for collective action by the U.S...
...THE PAKISTAN BOMB Seven years ago India exploded its first nuclear device, imitating its enemy, China...
...We can only applaud, therefore, the recent news from heartland-U.S.A., the diocese of Belleville, Illinois...
...This, of course, has been recognized in principle, and sloughed off miserably in practice...
...Had there been due process in the church around the turn-of-century Modernist crisis, or later, when the thinking of people like Teilhard de Chardin, Henri de Lubac, and John Courtney Murray was being suppressed by narrow scribes, current "crisis Catholicism" might today be much less of a critical condition...
...Nixon's, then whatever was gained in the air near Baghdad will be lost at the ballot boxes in Israel...
...The more we know, and the more we know what we don't know, the knottier the issues become...
...Yet each preemptive action, though it set the world on the edge of crisis, offers only temporary respite...
...church does not yet belong to the people as it does for many of our Latin sisters and brothers...
...it reflects the current conventional wisdom in foreign policy, it follows the accepted pattern of cold and not-so-cold war, and it conforms to the general Reagan policy of throwing money at politico-military problems...
...Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the psychological effect of the raid on Israel's own security and the chances for peace in the Middle East...
...CHURCH DUE PROCESS Growing by leaps and bounds, as any adolescent knows, is always painful...
...If the world's nations have a general stake in forestalling preemptive strikes, then it would seem that the responsibility for preventing proliferation ought to rest with the nations as a whole, and especially with those which weigh most in the international system...
...Israel could be a target for a fistful of Arab nations-and vice versa...
...No one supposes Israel to have designs on Iraqui territory...
...Perhaps inevitably, India's archrival Pakistan then set off on the same route, openly and surreptitiously securing the wherewithal which it hopes will in turn give it,The Bomb...
...Was this date-given as either the beginning of July or the beginning of September-accurate...
...Passive, silent majorities, after all, represent cynicism...
...The bishop there, William Cosgrove, has just promulgated a meaty bill of ecclesial rights...
...Now the Reagan administration has come up with a $3 billion program of military and economic aid, and lo and behold, it has been, accepted...
...That means a reversal of the administration's attitude, which so far has subordinated concern with the spread of nuclear weapons to its unwillingness to cross any nation on our side of the East-West conflict and to its apparent belief that in this realm as in all others the free pursuit of self-interest is a reliable mechanism that, in any case, cannot be usefully regulated...
...AW ACS to Riyadh and, in any case, hardened that nation's resolve to strengthen its armed forces...
...In comparison, the U.S...
...And here we come to several of the unknowns in this episode...
...It would be going too far to compare the Israeli act tb the Berrigan brothers' assault on potential first-strike weapons at the King of Prussia General Electric plant: for one thing, the Israeli raid did kill one individual...
...It is here that the real significance of the Israeli raid may eventually depend on what the world does next...
...Begin has only made it all the more likely that once the return of the Sinai is completed a year from now, Egypt will see no reason not to close ranks with the other Arab nations...
...The right to education, to freedom of inquiry, and to freedom of expression in theological matters...
...The right and freedom to speak and to be heard and to receive objective information regarding the pastoral needs and affairs of the church...
...Then the Russians marched into Afghanistan, making neighboring Pakistan appear a likely target for additional Soviet aggression, and the American tune changed...
...True, it may also have been pursuing the legitimate right of any state to develop nuclear technology for energy reasons, however superfluous that energy source may appear in such an oil-rich land, or simply to expand a prestigious or potentially useful scientific infrastructure...
...But it is on this basic thesis that we remain totally unconvinced...
...The 1968 nonproliferation treaty, with its more than one hundred signatories, the efforts of the International Atomic Energy Agency to patrol nuclear energy facilities, and the brave but uneven attempts of the Carter administration to enforce some discipline on Western trade in nuclear technology deserve respect...
...And while, contrary to Mr...
...First, Iraq is a nation essentially at war with Israel...
...There is nothing particularly novel about all this...
...In the end, the search for profit by Western firms, each nation's fear of losing out to competing economies, and the desire to maintain diplomatic leverage with nations threatening to seek their technology or fuel elsewhere, have poked wide holes in the anti-proliferation safeguards...
...Permanent nuclear security would require repeated preemption, and against an enemy increasingly humiliated, determined, and secretive...
...gets some kind of guarantee in advance...
Vol. 108 • July 1981 • No. 13
