Loading...
Loading...
Click here if you don’t see subscription options
John ThavisDecember 22, 2003

During the countdown early this year to the war in Iraq, Pope John Paul II and his Vatican aides wasted no opportunity to broadcast their opposition to a U.S.-led invasion. They warned that besides being unjust, an invasion would be counterproductiveit would leave many dead and wounded, destroy Iraqi infrastructure, increase the hardships on civilians, increase political pressures on Iraqi Christians, ignite civil strife in the country, weaken the United Nations and foment global terrorism.

Fast-forward eight months, and it seems that most or all of the Vatican’s warnings were accurate, but no one is saying I told you so. On the contrary, several top cardinals have warned against a pullout of U.S. and allied troops from Iraq, especially after deadly attacks on soldiers there. The Vatican’s own representative in Iraq has said military withdrawal now would be the worst option.

To those who view Iraqi attacks on U.S. and allied soldiers as legitimate resistance to an illegal occupation, the Vatican has offered no support whatever. After the explosion of a truck bomb at an Italian army headquarters in Nasiriya, Iraq in mid-November left 19 dead, Italian bishops denounced the attack as terrorism. The pope seemed to sign on to that definition a few days later, when he spoke of the wicked work accomplished by terrorists in Iraq. The pontiff and Italian bishops joined in honoring the dead Italian soldiers, saying they were engaged in a mission of peace. When a lone Italian bishop objected to the sanctification of Italy’s military operation in Iraq, he was sharply criticized and asked by a leading Vatican official to explain his statement.

Has the Vatican changed its mind about the war in Iraq? It’s not that the Vatican position has changed, but the situation in Iraq has been completely transformed, said one Vatican official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The Vatican clearly said no’ to the war. But at a certain point, you have to manage the situation that has been created in the way that does the least damage, he said. If the military pulls out of Iraq now, the country would fall into chaos. The vase has been broken, and we have to try to find a way to mend it. Of course, there is the problem that the more deeply one becomes involved in this project, the greater the tendency to justify that involvement, he said.

Before the war, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican secretary of state, raised U.S. diplomatic hackles when he warned that the United States might find itself in a Vietnam-like quagmire in Iraq. I told an American friend, Hasn’t the lesson of Vietnam taught you anything?’ he said at the time.

But today, as the problems mount and the death toll rises in Iraq, Cardinal Sodano has said that now is not the time for recriminations. What Cardinal Sodano and others at the Vatican emphasize is the need for Iraqis to govern themselves as quickly as possible and for the United Nations to have a greater say in the interim running of the country. But with Iraq’s political vacuum, self-governance seems impossible now.

Any country that finds itself under occupation does not think the ruling authority represents the people, Archbishop Fernando Filoni, apostolic nuncio to Iraq, told the newspaper Corriere della Sera. But there’s a crisis of power in Iraq. The people need a leader, someone who talks to Iraqis as an Iraqi, and that leader isn’t there, he said. Archbishop Filoni said that with no short-term political solution in sight and no real plan for civil harmony that involves Iraq’s ethnic and religious communities, a military pullout now would leave Iraqis in a terrible crisis.

Before the war began, the Vatican frequently relied on then-Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, the Vatican foreign minister, to articulate the arguments against the use of force. He was recently named a cardinal and left his diplomatic post because of ill health, and the Vatican has generally fallen silent on the day-to-day situation in Iraq.

At the same time, Cardinal Camillo Ruini, papal vicar of Rome and president of the Italian bishops’ conference, has assumed a higher profile. His public influence peaked during the period of national mourning and the state funeral for the Italian soldiers killed in Iraq, when the cardinal said there should be no withdrawal of Italian troops from their great and noble mission. To those who asked whether the soldiers died in a war that should not have been fought, Cardinal Ruini replied: They are victims of terrorism, pure and simple.

The handful of European countries that have contributed soldiers to the current military operation in Iraq include four with heavily Catholic populations: Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain. Even many Europeans who opposed the war supported sending soldiers to help restore order in Iraq in the immediate aftermath of the hostilities. But now the soldiers are coming under fire, and there is debate over whether their engagement is part of an illegal occupation, a peacekeeping mission or a reconstruction project.

That’s the $100 million question, said one Vatican official. He noted that no one at the Vatican had really spoken on this issue. Rather than define what it is, right now we need to try to help make things work as much as possible, he said.

The Vatican, with its 2000-year history of diplomacy, well understands the international scene and the exigencies of war-making and peacemaking. So while it rejects a military pullout in Iraq, it would certainly be justified in saying, with regard to postwar Iraq, I told you so.

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
20 years 3 months ago
On the contrary, the Vatican has every good reason to keep quiet for a while and to re-examine its position on Iraq. Any "I told you so" should be going from the Coalition towards the Vatican, and not the other way around.

The war would be unjust? So what do you call the Hussein regime of terror, torture, and repression?

An invasion counterproductive? What were Saddam's policies (killing the Kurds, invading Iran and Kuwait, stealing oil revenues from the Iraqi people, etc., etc.)?

Increased pressure on Iraqi Christians? What about outright murder and mass-graves of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis?

Civil strife? What do you call what was happening before the war? Was the brutal repression of non-Sunis a picnic?

Weaken the United Nations? The UN has already demonstrated its impotence time and again, and it has opted on its own to take the path of fecklessness and temporizing in the face of murderous tyranny.

Foment global terrorism? What was going on with Saddam's government's monetary incentives for homicide bombers against Israelis, his attempted assassination of the U.S. president, his rape of Kuwait, his hospitality to Al Qaeda, and probably so much more that we have yet to discover? Was this going to get better with 20 or 40 more years of Bath-party policies?

The Saddam regime had thoroughly de-legitimatized itself. What was needed was not a theory of just war, therefore, but rather some idea of the moral imperative to intervene in a timely way to stop these abominations.

20 years 3 months ago
I, too, was disappointed by the fading of the Vatican voice. The Holy Father's message for January 1st, the World Day of Peace, has relieved me tremendously.

We have been told often that Hussein is not a pleasant man or that he oppressed his people. It would be interesting to see more attention paid to the timeline of Saddam's rule. It might be embarassing to many who favored a war against this tyrant to discover that Hussein was a client of the United States at the time he developed and used weapons of mass destruction. If an impartial trial were held and his co-conspirators were taken to task, our current President's father and much of his cabinet could find themselves on the defendant's bench.

If the United States would stop arrogantly intervening in other countries' internal affairs, we might have less to fear from terrorists today. It seems incredible that we do not learn that our clients can easily become our enemies: from Ho Chi Minh to Saddam Hussein, not forgetting Bin Laden, we have been fighting with our former friends. Unfortunately, many thousands of people - both American and foreign - have died because our leaders make bad decisions.

This war was immoral and, as the Holy Father reminds us in his message, "the end does not justify the means."

20 years 3 months ago
I very much appreciated Mr. Thavis article, "Has Vatican Changed Position on Iraq?"

Especially riveting is the quotation by an un-named Vatican official: "The vase has been broken, and WE have to find a way to mend it."

I am curious if the Vatican official's opinion would alter if the proverbial shoe was "on the other foot." For example, I ask, how would the official react if a precious Vatican vase was pre-emptively broken and became subject to radical Islamic design engineers?

As Mr.Thavis' article suggests, I trust others in the Vatican are astute enough to sense the proliferating Islamic disaffection for the Bush administration's neocon engineers in Iraq. Some very decent people simply do not want to place Bush's new wine into their old wineskins.

20 years 3 months ago
On the contrary, the Vatican has every good reason to keep quiet for a while and to re-examine its position on Iraq. Any "I told you so" should be going from the Coalition towards the Vatican, and not the other way around.

The war would be unjust? So what do you call the Hussein regime of terror, torture, and repression?

An invasion counterproductive? What were Saddam's policies (killing the Kurds, invading Iran and Kuwait, stealing oil revenues from the Iraqi people, etc., etc.)?

Increased pressure on Iraqi Christians? What about outright murder and mass-graves of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis?

Civil strife? What do you call what was happening before the war? Was the brutal repression of non-Sunis a picnic?

Weaken the United Nations? The UN has already demonstrated its impotence time and again, and it has opted on its own to take the path of fecklessness and temporizing in the face of murderous tyranny.

Foment global terrorism? What was going on with Saddam's government's monetary incentives for homicide bombers against Israelis, his attempted assassination of the U.S. president, his rape of Kuwait, his hospitality to Al Qaeda, and probably so much more that we have yet to discover? Was this going to get better with 20 or 40 more years of Bath-party policies?

The Saddam regime had thoroughly de-legitimatized itself. What was needed was not a theory of just war, therefore, but rather some idea of the moral imperative to intervene in a timely way to stop these abominations.

20 years 3 months ago
I, too, was disappointed by the fading of the Vatican voice. The Holy Father's message for January 1st, the World Day of Peace, has relieved me tremendously.

We have been told often that Hussein is not a pleasant man or that he oppressed his people. It would be interesting to see more attention paid to the timeline of Saddam's rule. It might be embarassing to many who favored a war against this tyrant to discover that Hussein was a client of the United States at the time he developed and used weapons of mass destruction. If an impartial trial were held and his co-conspirators were taken to task, our current President's father and much of his cabinet could find themselves on the defendant's bench.

If the United States would stop arrogantly intervening in other countries' internal affairs, we might have less to fear from terrorists today. It seems incredible that we do not learn that our clients can easily become our enemies: from Ho Chi Minh to Saddam Hussein, not forgetting Bin Laden, we have been fighting with our former friends. Unfortunately, many thousands of people - both American and foreign - have died because our leaders make bad decisions.

This war was immoral and, as the Holy Father reminds us in his message, "the end does not justify the means."

20 years 3 months ago
I very much appreciated Mr. Thavis article, "Has Vatican Changed Position on Iraq?"

Especially riveting is the quotation by an un-named Vatican official: "The vase has been broken, and WE have to find a way to mend it."

I am curious if the Vatican official's opinion would alter if the proverbial shoe was "on the other foot." For example, I ask, how would the official react if a precious Vatican vase was pre-emptively broken and became subject to radical Islamic design engineers?

As Mr.Thavis' article suggests, I trust others in the Vatican are astute enough to sense the proliferating Islamic disaffection for the Bush administration's neocon engineers in Iraq. Some very decent people simply do not want to place Bush's new wine into their old wineskins.

The latest from america

The 12 women whose feet were washed by Pope Francis included women from Italy, Bulgaria, Nigeria, Ukraine, Russia, Peru, Venezuela and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
"We, the members of the Society of Jesus, continue to be lifted up in prayer, in lament, in protest at the death and destruction that continue to reign in Gaza and other territories in Israel/Palestine, spilling over into the surrounding countries of the Middle East."
The Society of JesusMarch 28, 2024
A child wounded in an I.D.F. bombardment is brought to Al Aqsa hospital in Deir al Balah, Gaza Strip, on March 25. (AP Photo/Ismael abu dayyah)
While some children have been evacuated from conflict, more than 1.1 million children in Gaza and 3.7 million in Haiti have been left behind to face the rampaging adult world around them.
Kevin ClarkeMarch 28, 2024
Easter will not be postponed this year. It will not wait until the war is over. It is precisely now, in our darkest hour, that resurrection finds us.
Stephanie SaldañaMarch 28, 2024