The Need to
Stay Tough With Saddam Hussein
By JONATHAN POWER
LONDON-- The western world, in particular Washington and
London, is too often besieged by inner hobgoblins who warn
it of the threat of militant Islam, rogue nations intent on
the development of nuclear and chemical weapons, redoubts of
unreformed communism in Cuba and North Korea. Most of it is
overstated, an unpersuasive zero sum, often
counterproductive. But nobody can exaggerate the danger of
Saddam Hussein. He is indeed a "cretin, a monster"--the
words of a distinguished French journalist, Jean Daniel,
unbelievably now being sued by none other than Saddam
Hussein in a French court for "insult and defamation." "The
damned don't cry," wrote Eugene O'Neil, "but in this case
they never stop trying to make everyone else weep and gnash
their teeth. The sheer arrogance of the world's premier
bully is chilling almost beyond belief.
Early next month there will be another reminder of Saddam
Hussein's formidable staying power, just when the world is
apparently wearying of the thug who persists in attempting
to surmount every obstacle and triumph against all
adversity.
Rolf Ekeus, the equally determined Swedish diplomat,
chairman of the United Nations Special Commission on Iraq,
is due to present the next biannual report. Already it is
clear what he's going to say: Despite the most vigilant arms
control inspection regime ever mounted, including U-2
high-altitude reconnaissance flights, helicopter monitoring
with ground-penetrating radar and over 100 optical cameras
displayed in crucial factories around Iraq, Saddam Hussein
is still engaged in secret operations to build weapons of
mass destruction.
Thanks to his uniquely intrusive monitoring--in the sky,
on the ground, Mr. Ekeus has a pretty good idea of what is
still going on. For example, he has reason to believe that
Iraq may still have a number of working missiles with
warheads--maybe as many as 20 remain hidden. During a three
week excavation mission at Dawra near Baghdad in late
January UN inspectors uncovered 4 undeclared missile
engines.
Since the end of the Gulf War, getting on for six years
ago, and the beginning of Mr. Ekeus's investigations, it has
been a long game of cat and mouse. At every turn Saddam
Hussein has denied what later turned out to be evident.
Mr. Ekeus first uncovered a large-scale nuclear weapons
program, with a cumulative cost of around $10 billion and
employing some 15,000 people. Later, he discovered an
offensive biological program with warheads at the ready.
In his early days Ekeus always got the full backing of
the Security Council. In 1993, when Iraq blocked air access
to the UN inspectors the Security Council went along with
western air strikes against suspected sites. But late last
year, when Iraq thwarted attempts by UN inspectors to gain
access to Iraqi Republican Guard facilities, waning
unanimity on the Security Council seriously undermined the
UN inspectorate. Ekeus was forced to compromise and settle
for only limited access.
Now that Iraq has finally agreed to the UN's offer of a
partial lifting of sanctions (as long as Iraq only spends
the money on food and medicine, war reparations and the
like), Saddam Hussein obviously feels he has some room for
manoeuvre to prize the sanctions door further open.
Tragically, he has an audience for such a view, both in the
Security Council, with Russia and China and, to some extent
France, and with Arab neighbors nearer home.
Despite everything he has done with war and weapons,
despite maintaining the worst human rights record in the
world, he appears able still to command an audience. The
oil-rich United Arab Emirates has tried hard recently to
persuade other neighbors that the time had come to normalize
diplomatic and economic relations with Iraq. Two of the most
important countries in the neighborhood, Egypt and Jordan,
while not going along with this move have not strongly
repudiated it either. The urge to make peace with Saddam
Hussein hangs in the Arabian air. Their argument is that the
danger of the present situation is that the only people in
Iraq who suffer are the ordinary people, not the ruling
clique and the only gainer is fundamentalist Iran which is
trying to position itself as the dominant military power in
the Gulf.
But Iran is not and probably never will be in the same
league. And as for the sorry people of Iraq there is little
more that the outside world can do for them until they start
to open their own eyes. At least now they have food and
medicine. It is more than obvious that any further opening
of the door would allow Iraq to resume its nuclear weapons
program. Its main assets, its scientists and technicians,
are still intact and fissile material could be obtained on
the Russian black market. Even though the UN blew up Iraq's
germ warfare plant last June another could be rebuilt,
underground.
The world cannot afford to have Iraq running amok. The
remaining sanctions must stay in place. Mr. Ekeus must be
backed to the hilt in his work. The world's prime bully must
never be allowed to intimidate us all again. Judge Saddam
Hussein by what he does not what he says.
March 26, 1997,
LONDON
Copyright © 1997 By JONATHAN POWER
Note: I can be reached by phone +44 385 351172
and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
|