Baghdad blues
UNITED NATIONS Ñ Once again the Iraqis seem to have shot themselves in the proverbial foot. The recently concluded talks in Vienna between UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and the Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri, ended in a mood of acrimony and inconclusiveness. While the Iraqis have predictably refused to re-admit UN weapons inspections teams, the practical result is that the Baghdad regime has given the green light for American military actions against SaddamÕs regime.
The almost set piece shadow boxing showdown between intrusive UN weapons inspectors and intransigent Iraqi officials have become the stuff of legend Ñ Iraq hides its weapons of mass destruction, the UN teams look for them with various degrees of politically directed deliberation, and Washington views the entire episode as a dangerous diversion allowing SaddamÕs regime time to build and hide its arms.
Since the end of the Gulf War the and the imposition of UN sanctions and arms inspections, Saddam Hussein has traditionally played the cat and mouse game with both the Security Council and the international inspectorsÑin other words allowing general access but then restricting specific on site inspections. Thus the teams were in country, but practically speaking, in checkmate.
For the past four years no UN teams have been inside Iraq allowing a serious shortfall to the inspection process and for all practical put purposes making SaddamÕs transgressions a fait accompli which the world community would rather conveniently forget about.
But given the ongoing war on terror and the Bush AdministrationÕs keeping Iraq in its gun-sights, Saddam knows full well that he is targeted as a member of the Axis of Evil. Yet the Baghdad regime also knows that enthusiasm for a rerun of the 1990-91 Gulf War, has little momentum among either moderate Arabs or Western European allies. While Iraq was properly vilified for its invasion and occupation of Kuwait in 1990, thereÕs little international outcry about SaddamÕs regime today.
And despite years of strangling UN economic sanctions on SaddamÕs Iraq, the Security Council remains much more in the letÕs make a deal mode than any hawkish Anglo/American enthusiasm to turn up the heat on Iraq. LondonÕs Financial Times writes, ÒAnalysts say that Iraq would try to drag out the diplomatic process and would likely to allow inspectors back only when it felt a US military attack was imminent.Ó
Ominously, the Financial Times warns that Iraq has been looking to the former Soviet Ukraine for a wealth of weapons technology Ñ and probably getting it.
IÕm surprised that Saddam did not allow some glimmer of false hope to the Secretary General over the weapons inspection issue. This would have prepared the stage for ÒcompromiseÓ and diplomatic delay, perhaps leading up to the usual shell game once the teams were back in Baghdad.
Momentum for a military solution to the festering crisis has been building in Washington Ñ curiously or not so curiously coinciding with the Iraqi/UN talks in Vienna, the New York Times published a ÒleakedÓ virtual war plan for an American attack on Iraq in which a massive multi-pronged operation aiming to topple Saddam.
While Washington is right to want to finally rid the region of the dictator Saddam, thatÕs easier said than done and not a simple rerun of the 1990 Gulf War or the successful overthrow of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan last year. In Afghanistan, regional warlords were able to fight the brunt of the battle against Taliban with American air power as backup. One of the key fundamentals of the Afghan campaign were local warlords who were fighting each other as much as the Taliban theocracy in Kabul.
US Special Forces worked splendidly with AfghanistanÕs multi-tribal quilt and local levies in the classic mode. Iraq really does not present such an opportunity save for the long suffering Kurdish minority who are not exactly elated about serving as proxies for a second shot at Saddam only to be perhaps left in the lurch as in the past.
Thus putting together a political/military coalition as did the first Bush Administration in 1990-91 is no longer so simple either, even after the riveting horrors of September 11th. While the British and the Turks will be strong players in any military endeavor, other Europeans and Russia will press for diplomacy.
Given the unknown genie of his weapons of mass destruction Ñ biological, chemical and perhaps nuclear Ñ SaddamÕs Iraq poses a ticking geo-political time-bomb to U.S. and allied Middle East interests. After September 11th we can only second guess at our peril.
John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense
issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.
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