To war or not: what the polls say

NEW YORK, Nov. 13 - With an election victory at home and a seal of approval from the U.N. Security Council on Iraq, the Bush administration is pressing hard on the Iraq issue. The world could be drawn into an American-led war with Iraq within months. But do Americans and the rest of the world really support a war with Iraq?

Poll conducted in several countries over the past few months have consistently shown that international public opinion is against a war in Iraq. But in the United States, support for a war backed by the United Nations has increased, though opposition to sending ground troops has increased slightly over time.

But does public opinion really matter?

“Public opinion can act as a constraint — eventually the public demanded the end to the Vietnam War,” noted Clyde Wilcox, a professor of government at Georgetown University.

Iraq not a top issue for Americans
Polls conducted since August show that opposition to unilateral U.S. action in Iraq has increased. Opposition to unilateral action also has increased in the United States, according to polls, yet more than 50 percent of Americans surveyed at any given time support war with U.N. backing and less than 35 percent oppose war.

Since Republicans made significant gains in the midterm elections, do these numbers mean that Americans will support President Bush in his plans for war if Iraq doesn’t meet U.S. demands for disarmament — even if it means the United States has to go it alone?

Not necessarily.

Polls conducted in the weeks before the elections showed that less than a fifth of those surveyed considered Iraq a top campaign issue. “The public has shown considerable confidence in the president, but it wasn’t a mandate for war,” said Stephen Hess, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute. “The election was a result of localisms, and the president was able to use his popularity to galvanize the results in his favor.”

The same opinion was echoed by Wilcox. “Few voters were thinking about the Iraq war when they voted. This was not a big shift in public opinion, really,” he said.

Wilcox believes the GOP recruited better candidates, had more money and did a better job getting out voters.

What to the opinion polls say
The latest USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll, taken after the U.N. vote on Iraq last Friday, shows that 59 percent of those polled favor and 35 percent oppose “invading Iraq with U.S. ground troops in an attempt to remove Saddam Hussein from power.” The figures represent a slight increase over the last month in those who favor war and a slight decrease in those who oppose it.

In general, recent opinion polls in America have shown a trend of increasing opposition to sending American troops to Iraq. Yet they show variable results about taking action against Iraq without the support of allies or the United Nations. What accounts for this discrepancy?

“The public has ambivalent opinions about the war,” said Wilcox. “It is worth remembering two things. First, many Americans cannot find Iraq on a world map or even know where to start looking, and second, the administration is pushing harder for the war at some times than at other times.”

Lee Sigelman, a professor of political science at George Washington University, believes that much of the variability in the polls “simply reflects differences in question wording.”

The international perspective
While Bush may have gained support from the electorate as well as from the United Nations, he hasn’t been able to win global approval for war in Iraq. The international community, unanimous in its opposition to an American-led war, is wary of America’s all-powerful role in world politics.

“Bush’s arguments for war are all a load of piffle,” said a recent column in The Times of Oman. “The staple of his reasons is that Iraq has for long violated U.N. resolutions. In a speech to the U.N. General Assembly last month, the president took the moral high ground by referring to broken treaties, unilateral subversions apropos Iraq. But the reality is that the U.S. is second to none in kicking the U.N. at its teeth.”

Even in Britain, the only major nation that supports America’s threat of military action against Iraq, support slumped to its lowest level last week. The weekly Guardian/ICM tracker poll, which began Aug. 23, shows that 1 in 3 support military action, down from 42 percent after the terrorist attack in Bali, Indonesia, last month. Opposition to the war started at 50 percent but has settled at around 40 percent. In Ireland, the public opposes military action by the United States without U.N. approval by a margin of almost 3 to 1.

Canadian support has fallen to only 38 percent, compared with 52 percent in January. The percentage of Canadians against joining a war nearly doubled, with 44 per cent saying they would oppose participation.

For the most part, an anti-war attitude permeates Europe.

In Italy, one recent poll showed that nearly 90 percent of those surveyed opposed war against Iraq and 95 percent were opposed to any Italian participation. In another poll, 97 percent of Germans were against German participation in the war. Nearly two-thirds of French people were also opposed to their country becoming involved in a military strike, even if it had U.N. support. More than 82 percent of Swiss were against a military attack against Iraq without a U.N. mandate, while 75 percent of four Norwegians were against any U.S.-led operation to oust Saddam.

Asian countries are also opposed to the war. Eight out of ten people in Hong Kong are against military intervention in Iraq. Seventy-seven percent of Japanese oppose a U.S. military attack on Iraq. In Australia, only 45 percent approved of an American military strike.

However, just like the Europeans, 68 percent said they would support Australian involvement in a U.S.-led war that was backed by the U.N.

In Moscow, a poll showed 53 percent of Russians opposed U.S.-led military operation. In Czechoslovakia, only 42 percent support a military operation and 49 percent are against Czech troops being deployed.

Will public opinion matter?
World opinion may not affect U.S. war plans, and Bush is unlikely to face severe opposition at home.

“Americans in general are an apolitical nation,” said Hess. “Except for certain issues like recession, which affect the food on their table, they elect someone and expect him to do the right thing. And right now, they have considerable confidence in the president after his response to 9/11 and the war in Afghanistan.”

Said Wilcox, “The public will rally behind a war with Iraq. If the war goes badly — if we lose a lot of troops and Saddam gets away and smuggles out biological weapons that are used against Americans — that would be pretty unpredictable. If the war goes as the administration wants, then the public will support it.”