Why Scapegoat Germany, Japan? : Saudi Arabia and others haven’t given enough

Congress has given broad bipartisan support to President Bush’s Persian Gulf policy, even as its dissatisfaction grows over the actions of certain other countries in the effort to resist and repel Iraq’s aggression. Defense Secretary Dick Cheney heard plenty about that from the Senate Armed Services Committee this week. Too much of the gulf burden, senator after senator charged, is being shouldered by the United States, while others are doing too little to meet their international responsibilities. The complaints are valid, if not always precisely directed.

Two things in particular disturb Congress: One is that the long anticipated peace dividend--the savings in defense spending that were expected with the end of the East-West confrontation--is in danger of being consumed by the soaring costs of transporting and maintaining a still-growing military force in the gulf area. The other is the perception that some countries that depend heavily on the free flow of oil from the gulf--Germany and Japan are most often if not necessarily most fairly singled out--aren’t making contributions to burden-sharing commensurate with their national interests.

Cheney sets a price tag of at least $15 billion on gulf operations for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. These are incremental costs, that is, costs over and above what would have been spent anyway to maintain the forces involved. The projection also assumes that there will be no war, and so no need to replace the munitions and equipment that would be expended in battle.

Some offsets, to be sure, have already been lined up. Kuwait’s exiled government, believed to have $100 billion in overseas investments, says it will kick in $2.5 billion to help cover U.S. expenses through the end of this year. Saudi Arabia and the smaller gulf emirates promise to contribute billions more. Cheney expects that non-U.S. funding will cover about half of the projected $15 billion cost for the coming year.

That’s not enough. And while Japan and the richer European states could undoubtedly foot a bigger part of the bill without undue pain, the major oil- importing countries should not be tarred with all the blame. The fact is, there’s a lot of money available to underwrite the U.S.-led defense of the Arabian peninsula right there in the region.

Oil prices have about doubled since Saddam Hussein seized Kuwait, yielding an enormous bonus to all oil producers. Saudi Arabia alone stands to earn between $2 billion and $3 billion more each month because of these aggression-forced higher prices. There ought to be no question about it: As much of that windfall as is necessary ought to be committed to covering the U.S. costs of defending the gulf states.

Yes, other friends and allies should be pitching in more. But it is the governing regimes of the peninsula--Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Oman--whose independence and very survival are being guaranteed by the U.S. presence. For them, underwriting most of the economic costs of that presence should be considered cheap indeed, given the likely fatal alternative.