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- <text id=93TT0949>
- <title>
- Jan. 25, 1993: Saddam Doesn't Get the Message
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1993
- Jan. 25, 1993 Stand and Deliver: Bill Clinton
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- THE WEEK
- NATION, Page 16
- Saddam Doesn't Get the Message
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p>Instead of retreating after an allied air strike Iraq keeps
- provoking the U.S
- </p>
- <p> Enough was finally enough for George Bush. He had simmered
- through weeks of Saddam Hussein's devilishly creative cheating
- on U.N. Security Council resolutions. The Iraqis kept piling on
- the defiance with daily forays into Kuwaiti territory to haul
- away weapons and equipment, while Saddam continued to play a
- shell game with antiaircraft missiles in the southern no-fly
- zone of Iraq. Faced with such brazenness at the beginning of
- his last week in the White House, Bush raged against the dying
- of his presidency.
- </p>
- <p> The attack was first ordered on Monday. But bad weather
- delayed its execution until Wednesday night, when 80 U.S. Navy
- and Air Force planes took off from the carrier Kitty Hawk and
- four air bases in Saudi Arabia. With 30 French and British
- warplanes joining in, they struck four SAM missile and four
- radar emplacements in the no-fly zone. Iraq responded with only
- light antiaircraft fire, and all the allied planes returned
- safely.
- </p>
- <p> Sizing up the effects of what it called "a very small
- mission," the Pentagon reported that the bombs had destroyed
- only one missile battery and damaged the radar installations.
- Destruction wasn't the point, Washington insisted, because the
- intended message was political. Said Bush: "I would think that
- Saddam Hussein would understand that we mean what we say, and
- that we back it up." Bill Clinton told a news conference in
- Little Rock that his policy toward Iraq is the same as Bush's.
- </p>
- <p> Saddam, with his usual bluster, warned Iraqis that
- "another great battle" had begun. After another ultimatum from
- Bush on Friday, the Iraqis promised to allow weapons inspectors
- to fly to Baghdad, but would not guarantee their safety. The
- crisis escalated through the weekend when Iraqi radar threatened
- U.S. jets over the northern no-fly zone and an American F-16
- shot down an Iraqi MiG-29. Baghdad seemed intent on contesting
- control of its skies. Washington said that Saddam would receive
- no further warning before the U.S. retaliated in force.
- </p>
-
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
-
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