Empire Lite

The second reason Iraq’s recovery will be delayed — if not bungled altogether — is the United States’ dogged refusal to cede any responsibility for the occupation to the United Nations. As a result, there is very little prospect of substantial financial contributions to Iraqi reconstruction from other countries. Last week both Chris Patten, the European Union commissioner for external relations, and French President Jacques Chirac made it plain how reluctant the Europeans are to subsidize an Anglo-American occupation they sought to prevent.

This matters because the United States is unlikely to spend as much money on either aid or reconstruction as the Europeans would. Official figures suggest that EU member states allocated $19.7 billion dollars to foreign aid in 2001, compared with an American figure of $10.7 billion. But according to recent figures from the Center for Global Development in Washington, European aid to developing countries is worth three times more when adjustment is made for conditions, costs and interest payments.