Analysis - By Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Dec 26 2002 (IPS) — As in 2002, war looks poised to top the 2003 foreign-policy agenda – not only Washington’s war against al-Qaeda, probably Iraq, and possibly even North Korea – but also the wars within the administration of President George W. Bush.

For now, the two contending forces – the neo-imperialist hawks centred around Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and the realists led by Secretary of State Colin Powell – appear more or less evenly matched, although the current military build-up and rhetorical heavy breathing around Iraq give momentum to the hawks.

But the situation is so fluid and the variables so many that it would be foolish to predict who will be on top this time next month, when Washington’s invasion preparations for Iraq will be virtually complete, let alone one year from now.

And to anyone who believes that Bush has already made up his mind about going to war with Iraq, let them contemplate the exquisite ambiguity of the president himself, expressed in an almost surrealistic interview this week in ‘US News and World Report':

"And it’s very important for the American people to know my sentiments about military engagement, that I will use our military as a last resort and our first resort, and I understand the consequences of military action."

What is certain is that, as in 2002, entire regions of the world outside the broad new ”band of crisis” – that begins roughly between Kenya and Palestine in the west, runs through South and Central Asia, and ends between the Korean peninsula and Indonesia in the east – will get very little high-level attention from this administration. Not unless Powell can dramatically shift the balance of power in his direction.

Indicative of the continued marginalisation of entire continents was the White House decision last week to indefinitely delay Bush’s scheduled first trip to Africa, which was to have begun Jan. 10.

Despite the appalling toll of HIV-AIDS – which takes twice as many African lives each day as were killed in the Sep. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon – and even the rapidly growing U.S. investment in West Africa’s oil and gas resources, the continent will remain mostly off the radar screen during 2003.

The only exception will be the Horn of Africa, due to its relevance to the ”war against terrorism”, both as a base for military action in the Arabian Peninsula and as a region that may harbour al-Qaeda activists and sympathisers, such as those who struck at Israeli tourist facilities in Kenya last month.

The rest of Africa will be ”managed” by some increased contributions to the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria and a few hundred million dollars more in development aid for the region via Bush’s new Millennium Challenge Account (MCA).

Latin America will also find itself marginalized by the more urgent requirements of the anti-terror war. As a result, the continuing political tug-of-war in Venezuela, the growing U.S. involvement in and the intensification of the civil war in Colombia, and even the spectre of financial collapse in Brazil under the incoming government of President-elect Luis Inacio Lula da Silva will be handled primarily by mid-level officials in different bureaucracies pursuing different aims.

Only when a really serious crisis appears will the woefully unprepared higher ranks be called in to take action.

Even European countries may find themselves largely ignored by the administration, except to the extent that they are willing to support U.S. efforts against terrorism, Iraq, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. To the extent that they oppose U.S. initiatives, they will be denounced as appeasers, and the trans-Atlantic divide that the Bush administration helped open as a result of its outspoken opposition to the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court (ICC), and other multilateral initiatives will continue to widen.

Virtually everything will depend, however, on the intra-administration battles between the hawks and the realists and their allies outside the administration and beyond U.S. borders.

The hawks, a coalition of hard-line Cold War veterans like Cheney and Rumsfeld, predominantly Jewish neo-conservatives closely allied with the right-wing Likud government in Israel, and Christian Right activists, are backed up by some heavyweight arms manufacturers and the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives, as well as strategically placed cohorts in the National Security Council and the State Department.

Their vision for the coming year features a U.S. invasion and occupation – unilateral if necessary – of Iraq that will transform the entire Mideast region in a way that will permanently shift the balance of power there to an Israeli-Turkish axis that, with U.S. help, will dominate the region.

They also favour intensifying the war on radical Islamists, including Lebanon’s Hizbollah, with or without the cooperation of host states and confronting – to the brink of war if necessary – both North Korea and Iran on their nuclear programmes.

The realists, not nearly as numerous at the higher levels of government nor as well networked outside the administration, make up for their deficiency of numbers with the breadth of their supporters.

They include Bush’s father and top officials in his administration; much of the top military brass; regional specialists in the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); the leadership of the Senate foreign relations committee; European leaders, the most influential of whom is British Prime Minister Tony Blair – who has talked tough to impress the president but urged him to follow the U.N.’s route to Iraq; and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

Their vision for 2003 emphasises the importance of both avoiding unilateral action and constant consultation with European and regional allies and the U.N. Security Council; shifting responsibility for administering a post-invasion Iraq to the U.N.; focusing heavily on reviving a credible Israeli-Palestinian peace process; and dialogue with both Iran and North Korea over their nuclear programmes.

Realists also favour moving other interests up the foreign-policy agenda, including Africa, Latin America, and even global warming.

In the last two years, both sides have won key policy battles, which, however, have never really ended. While the realists, for example, won on China policy and on the decision to go to the Security Council for weapons inspections in Iraq, the hawks are still battling for going to war with Iraq regardless of what the inspectors conclude and have made little secret that they still believe China represents the greatest long-term threat to U.S. military dominance and should be confronted earlier rather than later.

While the hawks succeeded in getting the administration to back Israel’s Likud government on the Palestinian conflict, Powell and his allies are expected to resume their fight with renewed vigour after the Israeli elections at the end of next month.

Meanwhile, under what circumstances the U.S. will invade Iraq, the administration’s post-invasion plans, and how far it will take the current and increasingly dangerous stand-off with North Korea over its decision to reactivate its Yongbyon nuclear plant remain very much up for grabs at the dawn of 2003.