From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Thu Aug 29 2002 - 11:09:30 MDT
Desert Storm II would be a walk in the park
by Kenneth Adelman
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POLICY abhors a vacuum. That is why there is
now a raging debate on śregime changeť in
Iraq, as reflected by this public airing of
differences with my friend Wesley Clark, the
former Supreme Allied Commander Europe.
No such debate was conceivable six months
ago. Then, President Bush and his gifted
national security team laid out a clear
direction: foreign states are either with us, or
against us, in the war on terrorism. Saddam
Hussein™s relentless drive for nuclear weapons,
and ever more biological and chemical
weapons poses a dire threat to civilised
nations. Time is not on our side: the longer we
wait, the more danger mounts.
So we waited. The President™s urgency
dissipated. The White House warnings ceased.
The Administration muddled.
Into this policy vacuum have recently paraded
experts, including Wesley Clark, who disagree
with forcing a śregime changeť in Iraq. They
generally concede that Saddam Hussein is a
vile monster. Yet, having gone that far, they go
no further. Most critics prefer tough
śdiplomaticť and śeconomicť actions against
Iraq, stepping up śthe international pressureť,
and the like.
Been there. Done that. All non-military options
have been tried, and failed. Nothing but force
can separate Saddam from the levers of power.
The case for śregime changeť boils down to
the huge benefits and modest costs of
liberating Iraq. Saddam Hussein constitutes the
number one threat against American and
European civilisation. He is expanding his
chemical and biological weapons day by day,
and marching closer towards nuclear weapons.
Some critics doubt Saddam™s ties to terrorism.
They somehow forget the 1994 Iraqi attempt to
assassinate George Bush. Add on the first
bombing of the World Trade Centre in 1993,
which killed innocent Americans, then Iraqi
involvement seems evident. The terrorist
mastermind fled to, and probably today lives
in, Baghdad. Saddam now bestows on
Palestinian families of homicide bombers some
Ł16,000 each. This litany leaves aside
Saddam™s probable connection to September
11, which I believe exists but which is,
admittedly, tougher to prove conclusively.
Some critics claim, as did Brent Scowcroft, the
former US National Security Adviser, that
there should be ścompelling evidence that
Saddam had acquired nuclear weapons
capabilityť, to justify attacking Iraq. But one
need not have been a National Security
Adviser to wonder if that would really be the
best time to garner support from Turkey,
Kuwait, Qatar and the Europeans.
It seems a lot smarter, and safer, to free Iraq
before the world™s most destructive ruler
acquires the world™s most destructive weapon.
I will be blunt: demolishing Saddam™s power
and liberating Iraq militarily would be a
cakewalk.
In 1990 before Desert Storm, we heard
warnings galore about Saddam™s mighty army.
Yet when the sand settled, his military did not
perform sufficiently to warrant being called a
paper tiger. Remember that gaggle of Iraqi
troops, thousands in fact, trying to surrender to
an Italian film crew? Not one American tank
was destroyed in the Gulf War, which kept US
casualties to less than 2per cent of those of
Iraqi troops. And most of our casualties came
from śfriendly fireť and random Scud flings.
The Iraqi forces are far weaker now. Saddam™s
army is less than a third of its size, and relies
mostly on obsolete Soviet tanks. The Iraqi Air
Force is half its former size. Iraqi forces have
received scant spare parts and no weapons
upgrades for nearly 12 years.
Meanwhile, American power is much fiercer.
The advent of precision bombing and real-time
battlefield Intelligence has dramatically
improved US military prowess. The US
military of Desert Storm used primarily (90-
plus per cent) dumb bombs. Against the
Taleban in Afghanistan, more than 80 per cent
were smart bombs. Unmanned Predators with
Hellfire missiles and Global Hawk
intelligence-gathering did not exist, or were not
deployed, during the first Iraqi campaign. They
surely would be now, to devastating effect.
This time we would insist on the removal of
Saddam and his henchmen as our sole goal.
We could then work with the international
community to rerun what the UN managed in
Afghanistan: establishing a democratic, non-
militarised government that destroys all
weapons of mass destruction.
Once President Bush announces our objective
to rid the world of Saddam Hussein, defections
from Iraq™s army may come even faster than a
decade ago. Dancing in the streets of Baghdad
will be even more joyous than that in Kabul
after its liberation. How would such liberation
happen?
By US forces knocking out Saddam™s
headquarters, communications, air defences
and fixed military facilities through precision
bombing.
By establishing military śno-drive zonesť.
By arming the Kurds in the North, Shias in the
South, and his opponents everywhere.
By using US special forces, and some ground
forces with protective gear, against chemical
and biological weapons.
By stationing theatre missile defences against
Iraqi Scuds.
By the President announcing that any Iraqi, of
any rank, who handles Saddam™s weapons of
mass destruction, in any form. will end up in
Guantanamo Bay, at best.
A military operation to demolish Saddam and
his mass destruction weaponry ” and to
liberate his long-suffering people ” would
constitute the greatest victory of all in the war
on terrorism. Otherwise, there can be no
security: just a huge policy vacuum and a lot of
vapid talk.
Kenneth Adelman was assistant to Donald
Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, from
1975 to 1977, and UN Ambassador and arms-
control director under President Reagan.
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