Clinton's dangerous options in defying Saddam Hussein

By Jonathan Power

LONDON (JP): Clinton's sex life in the White House is surely only his wife's concern. It certainly shouldn't spill over into the nation's business and even more certainly it shouldn't spill over into foreign affairs.

And yet we have officials in the Kremlin telling the New York Times that "they were increasingly worried that President Bill Clinton, enmeshed in a deepening scandal at home, would attempt to assert his leadership abroad with a rapid military strike on Baghdad".

Pace, Moscow. There were some good and sound reasons for a military strike long before the scandal broke. If ever there was a case for using military force in the post-communist world this is probably it.

There are no doubts about Saddam Hussein's moral qualms -- he has none. He has used poisonous gas not only during his war with Iran but against his own people.

There are no doubts about his geopolitical ambitions -- he has tried unsuccessfully to absorb Kuwait, he has threatened Israel with total incineration and he has given every indication that he wants to be master of the Middle Eastern universe. Anyone who steps in his way, whether it be a too inquisitive British journalist or a dissident son-in-law meets a quick execution.

UN sanctions and the arms inspectorate that goes with them are essential tools in keeping Saddam Hussein tied down. Without these he could develop, in the due course of time, the potential to be even more destructive than Adolf Hitler.

Saddam has now made it clear that he is intent on circumscribing the activities of the UN inspectors who have asked for access to the so-called presidential palaces and the other off-limit sites. They've been rebuffed and it is reasonable to assume that is where the research and development work on weapons of mass destruction is taking place.

While it may be true that the inspectors have dismantled the harder-to-hide nuclear weapons program there can be no surety that they've had much success with chemical and biological weapons that don't need much more in the way of facilities than a kitchen sink.

Nevertheless, what should give Clinton pause is not how a military strike would play in scandal-seized Washington but the low chance of it being a success. If, indeed, these suspect plethora of palaces are repositories of weapons research we can be sure they are deeply bunkered.

Air strikes would only have a limited impact, and if the target list was widened to power supplies, military command centers and the like, the collateral civilian damage would be immense and the political damage even counterproductive. (Iraqi public opinion is no more likely to turn against Saddam than it has on previous occasions.

Besides, Arab public opinion at large, frustrated with American reticence in pushing Israel to honor the Oslo accords has sunk into one of its sour, anti-American moods).

The alternative, a massive, get-it-over-with ground assault meant to depose Saddam once and for all would require a military build up equal to that of the Gulf War. Has America, bereft of allies, except possibly Britain, got the stomach for that?

What is needed most in Washington is patience. The threat from Saddam Hussein is not imminent. If sanctions continue they will go on clipping his wings both economically and militarily. If the inspectors can continue at least to monitor the nuclear situation, as they say they can, that is the most important. The threat from the kind of chemical and biological weapons that can do a modern western army any serious harm are probably a decade's research away. The types of such weapons Saddam can manufacture today are just too primitive for effective battlefield use against a modern western army.

Anyway, America is quite capable of getting the message through to Baghdad, as it did at the time of the Gulf War, that if they were used in any encounter retribution would be swift and severe.

A policy crafted on these lines is not likely to be seriously questioned by the Security Council, particularly if Washington is prepared more explicitly than it has in the past to agree in principle to the lifting of sanctions if the arms inspectors are one day satisfied. And unity in the Security Council is America's best asset in keeping Saddam Hussein's big threats under wraps -- and waiting the tyrant out. In ten years a lot can change. Yes, Iraq can develop recombinant DNA research and eventually manufacture a deliverable super biological weapon. But, more likely, he'll go the way of all previous Iraqi despots and be overthrown.

The purulent debate over Clinton's sexual escapades has a healthy side. It is, contrary to Kremlin fears, probably putting big decisions like bombing Baghdad on hold. It is to be hoped that by the time Washington recovers its sense of proportion on Bill Clinton's sex life it also has had time to fashion a sense of proportion on Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.