Bill and Hillary Clinton (now U.S. Secretary of State under Barack Obama) imposed very severe sanctions against Iraq in an attempt to overthrown Saddam Hussein in the early 1990s. The Clinton imposed sanctions killed a million or more Iraqi civilians by means of malnutrition and disease. Many of the Clinton’s victims were children under the age of five. Reports by the United Nations and several humanitarian groups have documented the deaths and Ramsey Clark, a former U.S. attorney general, published two books detailing the effects of the sanctions and the loss of life that has resulted - “Impact of Sanctions on Iraq: The Children Are Dying” and “Challenge to Genocide: Let Iraq Live”. UNICEF estimated that 500,000 child deaths are attributable to the Clinton sanctions. As the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram noted, despite U.S. support for the “oil for food” agreement that allowed Iraq to import substantial amounts of food and medicine, “the American position toward Iraq cannot be described as anything but coercive, aggressive, unwise and uncaring about the lives of Iraqis, who are unnecessarily subject to sanctions and humiliations.” Was it all worth it? The sanctions did not oust Saddam Hussein.

Observers from around the globe continued to react to the latest U.S. trade sanctions against Iran and North Korea. U.S. imposed trade sanctions are viewed by a majority of countries as “interventionist” and “hegemonic,” violating international trade norms. Most countries see U.S. unilateral sanctions against any foreign states as being illegal under International Law.

Any and all economic sanctions are prohibited by the UN Charter. Article 2 (3) of the UN Charter requires States to settle their international disputes by peaceful means; and Article 2 (4) of the Charter requires States to refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity and political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations.

The 1970 Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States prohibits all countries from using economic measures if its aim is “to coerce another state in order to obtain from it the subordination of the exercise of its sovereign rights”.

No state, not the United States, China, Russia, England, Canada or the EU states, has any legal authority to impose sanctions on any other state. Why not? Any form of attack that causes harm to another is by law, an assault. Sanctions are an assault on another country’’s sovereignty. Sovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a territory. Any form of attack that attacks a foreign country’s sovereignty is an act of war. Any country that imposes sanctions against another is committing an assault, an act of aggression, an act of war. When the attack is financial in nature it is still an act of war because great harm and damage can be caused to the attacked country’s financial integrity and prosperity as well as cause grave harm to the attacked country’s civilian population. All sanctions have resulted in a physical cost. In all incidences of sanctions the victims are civilians. Sanctions cause the death of innocent civilians. Sanctions don’t attack armed forces personnel or political leaders they attack civilians. Any attack against civilians is a war crime. What may have started out as imposing financial restrictions always results in a direct attack, aimed at civilians - clearly a war crime. Attacking civilians, one of the most serious war crimes, is a gross human rights violation. Every time the U.S. imposes sanctions against a foreign state they are using a weapon that has uncontrollable effects. Such illegal use of sanctions against another state can be expected to cause harm to civilians (in the Clinton’s Iraq sanctions over 1 million civilians were killed, 0 politicians and 0 Iraqi Army and the Iraqi National Guard personnel) or civilian objectives in excess of the political and direct economic advantage anticipated. If the U.S. is allowed to continue to impose sanctions against Iran and North Korea innocent civilians will be their victims. Thousands of Iranian and North Korean civilians will die, not from a devastating natural disaster or a civil war or military invasion but as a direct result of a U.S. financial attack against their sovereign state.

Any attempt to punish foreign governments through unilateral sanctions and secondary boycotts is an unwelcome obstacle on the road to greater freedom of commerce. That development bodes ill for U.S. citizens, for America’s diplomatic relations with their major trading partners, and for the poor of the targeted nations who are the most likely victims of economic sanctions. U.S. government restrictions send the wrong message about America’s belief in the positive influence of private investment and fail to recognize that U.S. companies help foster greater economic and political freedom for people in developing nations.

U.S. imposed sanctions have several deleterious effects, among them: angering U.S. trade partners and allies–especially in the EU; having no effect on ending terrorism or toppling dictatorships; and stirring up anti-American sentiment everywhere. While the U.S. may have “very good reasons” for taking a tough line against nations that reportedly
support terrorism, the policy is still “very wrong.” Washington has no right to assume that it has the legal authority over all other nations by telling other countries where to invest and with whom to trade.

Unilateral Sanctions Are Bad Policy

Unilateral sanctions simply do not work. There are no examples of U.S. unilateral economic sanctions changing the basic character or significant policies of a foreign nation. The 35-year economic embargo of Cuba, a tiny country less than 90 miles from the US coast, is a monument to the ineffectiveness of unilateral economic sanctions as a foreign policy tool.

Supporters of sanctions often point to South Africa as a success story, but the facts tell a different tale. It is unrealistic to credit the U.S. congressional vote for sanctions in October 1986 with the overthrow of apartheid. It was not outside forces but powerful and well-organized domestic political forces that, after a three-decades-long struggle, achieved the peaceful overthrow of an anachronistic system that had no moral standing.

Because of the limited nature of the sanctions, the volume of U.S.-South African trade did change significantly, and many African governments that condemned apartheid continued to trade with South Africa behind the scenes. Disinvestment in South Africa led many Western companies to reduce their community-based funding of anti-apartheid organizations, according to the Investor Responsibility Research Center. After General Motors sold its plants, the new owners renewed sales to the South African military and police–which GM had ended–and reduced wages and total employment at the facilities.

To the extent that outsiders influenced developments in the country, it was through the discipline of market forces–banks were reluctant to make or renew loans in an unstable environment–and international expressions of opprobrium, such as banning South African participation in forums such as the Olympics. That helped shame the Afrikaner elite and, in combination with other forces, to lead to its abandonment of white-only rule.

It is also important to note that the economic sanctions against South Africa were multilateral, whereas all recent U.S. sanctions have been unilateral. In an effort to compel multilateral support from US allies, legislation passed by Congress in 1996 established secondary boycotts against firms doing business with Cuba, Iran, and Libya.

Such sanctions harm US diplomatic relations with friendly countries, as evidenced by the threat of US major trading partners to retaliate against US measures that penalize their companies. Other nations object particularly to the extraterritorial authority the U.S. government assumed over citizens of foreign countries.

It is vainglory to believe that by adopting unilateral sanctions America is “leading by example,'’ since nations throughout the world not only have refused to support recent U.S. sanctions but have actively opposed them. Leaders in France, Italy, Britain, Germany, and much of the rest of the world view economic sanctions as counterproductive and generally favor them only in extraordinary circumstances, such as war.

Without multilateral support, American trade sanctions can succeed only if a U.S. company is a monopoly supplier of a good or service to the targeted nation, which is not the case virtually anywhere in the world. In the absence of a monopoly, U.S. unilateral sanctions simply transfer business from an American company to a foreign competitor in the same market.

The goals of U.S. economic sanctions are often unrealistic. A bill seriously considered by Congress in 1996 would have banned all investment in Burma (Myanmar) unless the president of the United States certified “that an elected government of Burma has been allowed to take office.'’ Clearly, the details of the situation in Burma differ from those of the situations in other nations, yet setting a standard that requires a trading partner to have an elected government is a dangerous precedent, since that would lead to questions about whether U.S. companies would some day be prevented from doing business in the vast majority of countries in Africa and the Middle East, and much of the rest of Asia, including China.

To have any hope of effectiveness, any US imposed boycott would require the cooperation of China, Russia, and other foreign nations, which in most cases doesn’t happen. In fact, foreign countries are choosing, not isolation, but closer engagement with the country that is a target of US sanctions. Where the US forbids US companies from doing business with a sanctioned state other nations are taking over lucrative contracts that the US companies may have had or were negotiating for. Sanctions only imposes restrictions and financial loses for US companies as only US citizens are required to abide by US made laws. No other country in the World is bound by US laws. The US has legal jurisdiction only over it own people and only within the United States national boundaries.

In the past U.S. unilateral sanctions against foreign states have served primarily to transfer lucrative business from US companies to foreign firms without accomplishing larger goals. To date, those U.S. corporations that have pulled out of US sanctioned states have seen their investments being quickly replaced by companies from Asia and Western Europe. The US loses sustained by their government’s non legal binding imposition of sanctions has always resulted in foreign states’ financial gains.

As economic leaders, US companies should be encouraged to enter, not discouraged from entering, new markets. U.S. foreign investment not only is profitable for those companies that invest wisely; it also helps foster greater economic growth in developing nations. The companies help those nations advance their social, political, and economic institutions. The removal of American influence is often unfortunate because U.S. corporations tend to increase the wages and labor standards in the countries in which they operate.

A 1988 study from Johns Hopkins University estimates that over a 25-year period the embargo against Cuba cost US companies $30 billion in lost exports, while the diplomatic benefits gained by the United States were nil. To avoid becoming entangled by new U.S. sanctions against energy investments by any company in Iran and Libya, many European oil companies and suppliers are redesigning their procurement policies to exclude US equipment makers. That will put at risk $billions in U.S. exports and thousands of export-related jobs, according to the Petroleum Equipment Suppliers Association.

The illusion that sanctions are cost free also necessitates reintroducing the concept of private property into the sanctions debate. It is one thing to stop sending U.S. government dollars to a distasteful regime; it is quite another to prevent private individuals and companies from legally using their own property in another country. The economic loses sustained in the US by their government imposing of sanctions against any foreign sovereign state is never factored in nor made public by the US government. If a U.S. company is lawfully extracting natural resources from mines say in Indonesia and Congress bans all investment there, that US corporation will suffer great financial losses. When the US government imposes any such non productive sanctions against foreign states do we ever hear of the negative affect those sanctions have on US companies? Do we see reports on the financial loses and workforce loses of US companies affected by US government imposed sanctions against foreign sovereign states? The real financial loses sustained under US imposed sanctions is always incurred by US corporations and the end result is a severely weakened US economy and higher US unemployment numbers.

Instead of sanctions the United States should maintain a flexible asylum policy to help victims of persecution from any country and should not provide financial assistance to oppressive regimes. But the United States cannot force other governments to become democratic, or even to treat their citizens humanely, though we should encourage, primarily through diplomatic means, moves toward more freedom.

Current US sanction policies have hurt US companies while accomplishing little else. More engagement with the outside world, through increased tourism and a proliferation of trade and investment activity is needed not isolation.

Undoing current sanctions and refraining from imposing new unilateral sanctions against Iran, North Korea, Cuba and other nations is the best policy course for the United States. Such sanctions have always proven ineffective, eschews normal diplomatic channels, and undermines US international relations. U.S. companies are often hurt, not only directly, but indirectly because they gain a reputation as unreliable suppliers. Congress should at a minimum adopt reforms that make clear to the public the costs of such sanctions to individual U.S. companies and to the U.S. economy as a whole. The U.S. should abandon the practice of attempting to improve the conduct of other nations by restricting the freedom of its own citizens.

In June, 2006, Ramsey Clark, a United States lawyer and former United States Attorney General, wrote an article criticizing US foreign policy in general, containing a list of 17 US “major aggressions” introduced by “Both branches of our One Party system, Democrat and Republican, favor the use of force to have their way.”

Clark’s List of “Major Aggressions” by the United States of America

(1) Regime change in Iran (1953) the Shah replacing democratically elected Mossadegh; Eisenhower (R);
(2) Regime change in Guatemala (1954) military government for democratically elected Arbenz; Eisenhower (R);
(3) Regime change in Republic of the Congo (Léopoldville) (1961) assassination of Patrice Lumumba, Eisenhower (R)
(4) the Vietnam War (1959–1975), Eisenhower (R), Kennedy (D), Johnson (D), Nixon (R);
(5) Invasion of the Dominican Republic (1965), Johnson (D);
(6) The Contras warfare against Nicaragua (1981–1988), resulting in regime change from the Sandinistas to corrupt capitalists; Reagan (R);
(7) Attack and occupation of Grenada (population 110,000)(1983–1987) Reagan (R);
(8) Aerial attack on the sleeping cities of Tripoli and Benghazi, Libya, (1986) Reagan (R);
(9) Invasion of Panama Regime Change (1989–1990), George H. W. Bush (R);
(10) Gulf War (1991), George H. W. Bush (R);
(11) “Humanitarian” occupation of Somalia leading to 10,000 Somali deaths (1992–1993) George H. W. Bush (R) and Bill Clinton (D);
(12) Aerial attacks on Iraq (1993–2001) Bill Clinton (D);
(13) War against Yugoslavia (1999) 23,000 bombs and missiles dropped on Yugoslavia, Bill Clinton (D)
(14) Missile attack (21 Tomahawk Cruise Missiles) destroying the Al Shifa Pharmaceutical Plant in Khartoum which provided the majority of all medicines for Sudan (1998) Bill Clinton (D);
(15) Invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, Regime Change (2001–present) George W. Bush (R);
(16) War of aggression against Iraq and hostile occupation (2003)-present George W. Bush (R);
(17) Regime change in Haiti (2004) Democratically elected Aristide for three years of chaos and systematic killing, George W. Bush (R).

In 1991, Clark accused the administration of President George H. W. Bush, J. Danforth Quayle, James Baker, Richard Cheney, William Webster, Colin Powell, Norman Schwarzkopf and “others to be named” of “crimes against peace, war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” for its conduct of the Gulf War against Iraq and the ensuing sanctions in 1996, he added the charges of genocide and the “use of a weapon of mass destruction”. Similarly, after the 1999 U.S. bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Ramsey charged and “tried” NATO on 19 counts and issued calls for NATO’s dissolution.

In 2002, Clark founded “VoteToImpeach”, an organization advocating the impeachment of George W. Bush and several members of his administration. For the duration of Bush’s terms in office, Clark sought, unsuccessfully, to bring Bush to stand trial for impeachment. Clark was an opponent of both the 1991 and 2003 Persian Gulf War conflicts - “War Crimes: A Report on U.S. War Crimes Against Iraq”