While Americans bask in the warmth of good economic news, America's leaders are making forceful moves abroad. In Iraq, Clinton is imposing a moral code with the threat of pulverizing attack if not accepted. However, in Indonesia and Bosnia, he is pursing peace making with justice. PNS editor Franz Schurmann explains the difference between the two approaches and why one will have cataclysmic results while the other will reap rewards. Schurmann, professor emeritus of history and sociology at UC Berkeley, reads widely in the Arab press.

Seasoned Arab observer Kamal Baqraduni recently noted in the influential Arab language daily Al-Sharq Al-Ausat that great wars erupt when great economic and political crises coincide. As Americans bask in the warmth of good economic news, it appears their leaders are preparing for just such an eventuality.

Defense Secretary Cohen warns of ethnic strife erupting in East Asia, meaning Indonesia. Fed Chairman Greenspan warns of East Asian financial crises spreading to our shores. Treasury Secretary Rubin urges Congress to approve money for the IMF to avoid a major crisis in the United States.

Meanwhile a huge Anglo-American armada is assembling in the Persian Gulf, getting ready to pulverize Iraq which refuses to bow to Washington's will.

Pentagon strategists now say cross-border and ideological wars are no longer in the cards. Instead there will be civil conflicts and terrorism. A lot of civil conflict comes from economic deprivation. Terrorism almost always pursues political goals. Between them, Indonesia and Iraq could become a source of both.

In 1965, a pro-communist coup and subsequent counter-coup in Indonesia led to a massacre -- by some estimates, half a million people were killed, including some 200,000 ethnic Chinese. The United States, anxious to see Indonesia turn into an anti-communist bastion, looked the other way.

Now there are growing fears that another such mega-massacre could occur. With over 200 million people, Indonesia is Southeast Asia's giant. A repeat of 1965 could end the economic boom in the entire region.

This possibility has the U.S. worried enough to assemble a large fleet at its base in Singapore. Now it tells the Indonesian military to protect the Chinese. If the U.S. plays a key role in preventing a second Indonesian genocide, blessings will rain down on President Clinton.

Iraq, unfortunately, so far presents no such opportunity. Unlike Indonesia's Suharto, Iraq's Saddam Hussein is portrayed in the U.S. media as a Hitler who has to be destroyed before his biological and chemical weapons kill innocents all over the Middle East. Maybe, some officials imply, massive destructive force like that used to bomb and burn Germany into surrender in World War II will be needed to get rid of him.

There are plenty of people in the Arab world who consider Saddam to be evil personified. But consider a journalistic poem by the well known Arab political commentator Ghassan al-Imam on the outcome of such a military venture:

"The cat and the mouse -- an entertaining game.

But a useless war?

Beware--beware.

A horseplay war will make you laugh.

An all-destroying war and the tears will pour out."

Why is America so concerned about Indonesia now when it was silent in 1965? One answer is provided by the late historian David Potter who argued that the search for wealth has all along driven American history. Then Indonesia was poor, now it is rich.

By contrast, Iraq once was rich but now it is poor and diseased. Even its oil is not that important. If the search for wealth doesn't explain what America is doing in Iraq, the answer lies in a deeper moral yearning prevalent in all American wars --to play the role of "good guy" fighting "bad guys."

Moral laws come down from some higher authority, be it God, a prophet or the state. If people have faith in that authority, the force unleashed can be tremendous. In 1945 America got such faith from all over the world, including Germans and Japanese.

But now, we live in an era when states, including the U.S., have been discredited. The good-guy/bad-guy syndrome no longer works. Civil conflicts and terrorism can only be ended through justice.

Justice has to be worked out on the ground by the parties involved in disputes guided by a powerful but fair adjudicator.

In Indonesia and Bosnia, America is acting as an adjudicator concerned with justice at the bottom. On the other hand, in Iraq America is imposing a moral code and threatening massive punishment if it is not accepted.

There is a good chance that killing Saddam and pulverizing Iraq will set off a chain reaction of explosions that will convulse the entire Middle East, including Israel and Palestine.

Failed moral authority can lead to cataclysms. What Iraq and the entire Middle East need is peace with justice. And America, if it stops pushing an outdated morality, has a great chance to be the peacemaker.

At this point, it will take a miracle for Clinton to get peacemaking blessings from Middle Easterners, but miracles do occur from time to time. If he can make peace with justice in the Middle East he has a chance of going down in history as only one other American president has in this century--Franklin Roosevelt. But if he opts for bombing Baghdad as Lyndon Johnson opted for bombing Hanoi, it won't be long before he's out of office or a lame duck long before his time.