<p> Clinton's charge sends Saddam into retreat, but taming him is
another matter
</p>
<p>By Nancy Gibbs--Reported by Dean Fischer/Kuwait City, Lara Marlowe/Baghdad,
J.F.O. McAllister and Mark Thompson/Washington
</p>
<p> Restless, reckless and tired of being rebuffed, Saddam Hussein
once again looked poised to carry out an epic feat of self-destruction.
By sending 20,000 fresh troops to breathe heavily across Kuwait's
border and then withdrawing them after America clenched its
fist, he managed to remind the world that he was a loose cannon,
derail the momentum toward lifting the U.N. sanctions that are
bleeding his people dry and burnish the prestige of an American
President sorely in need of a foreign-policy success. "It was
a godsend," said a U.N. diplomat at the Security Council. Exulted
a State Department official: "Saddam blinked, he turned tail,
and if he tries it again, we're going to whack 'em."
</p>
<p> The President stood tall, in Iraq as in Haiti, and the tyrants
backed down--it all should have made for a happy ending. Someone
even faxed the White House the headline from the New York Daily
News: CLINTON 2, BULLIES 0! Clinton liked it so much he asked
chief of staff Leon Panetta to get him a copy. So how was it
that even as the forces of Operation Vigilant Warrior steamed
into the Persian Gulf, Clinton's sweet victory became so sticky?
The President won near universal praise for a fast and firm
response to Saddam's latest challenge to Kuwait's security.
But the minute the enemy seemed to be tamed, he had to contend
with rambunctious allies: France and Russia, having condemned
Saddam's latest gambit, tried to block any effort to punish
him for it. Iraqi troops did pull back, but not all the way.
That left Clinton searching for some way to secure victory without
firing a shot, while ensuring that this time Saddam stays put
for good. It has not been easy. On Saturday, the U.S. had to
negotiate carefully to avoid a Russian veto before winning a
unanimous U.N. Security Council resolution demanding that Iraq
withdraw its troops from the Kuwaiti border.
</p>
<p> The Administration took Saddam's threats seriously from the
start. A congressional investigation last year found that Iraq
had rebuilt most of its conventional Gulf War arsenal, including
200 munitions factories, and that much of its war machine--some 2,500 tanks, 1,800 artillery pieces and 300 combat planes--had survived Desert Storm. Two weeks ago, when Saddam dispatched
20,000 of his elite Republican Guard south to join 50,000 regular
army troops on the Kuwaiti border, Pentagon officials did not
share the view of many diplomats that it was all part of a bluff
to pressure the U.N. to ease economic sanctions. They were surprised
at how efficiently the troops could be deployed. "This just
wasn't some innocent exercise," argued General John Shalikashvili,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. The Iraqis' heavy ammunitions
loads and the presence of extensive supplies convinced officials
that Saddam was thinking of invading Kuwait.
</p>
<p> Clinton's bold response actually carried little risk, at least
politically. By dispatching thousands of troops and hundreds
of planes, the President made clear the U.S. intention to defend
Kuwait's sovereignty by whatever means necessary. To charges
that he overreacted, he had a sturdy alibi; the mixed messages
sent by the Bush Administration in 1990 were widely blamed for
encouraging Saddam to overrun Kuwait without fear of reprisal.
For once Congress was united in support; Clinton phoned Bush
on Monday and got his blessing as well. Even Saddam's onetime
allies, like Jordan and the P.L.O., supported the President's
stance.
</p>
<p> In a sense Saddam granted Clinton a reprieve, and just in time.
The U.S. faced growing pressure in its efforts to keep Saddam
in his cage. American and British officials have long argued
that there could be no easing of the sanctions imposed after
the Gulf War unless Saddam abided by all U.N. resolutions. That
would mean at minimum allowing an intrusive monitoring system
to ensure that he built no more weapons of mass destruction
and recognizing Kuwait's sovereignty and borders. Administration
officials also called on Baghdad to halt its attacks on the
Kurds in the north and Shi`ites in the south, return Kuwaiti
prisoners and property and improve its human-rights record.
</p>
<p> In private U.S. officials go even further: the sanctions must
stay until Saddam goes. Better to continue a pattern of confrontation
and standoff, U.S. officials argued, than allow Iraq to rebuild
its economy and weapons capabilities. The U.S. hard line inspired
sympathy for Iraq among some foreign diplomats, who agreed with
Iraqi U.N. Ambassador Nizar Hamdoon's assertion that "the U.S.
keeps moving the goalposts."
</p>
<p> Even U.S. allies like France and Turkey that had helped fight
the Gulf War were eager to welcome Iraq back into the fold.
For months Baghdad had been negotiating deals with former trading
partners, all of them hoping to reopen a hugely lucrative market.
And Iraq was making progress on other fronts: Rolf Ekeus, the
U.N. official charged with setting up the system to monitor
weapons building inside Iraq, was about to report to the Security
Council that Iraq was in provisional compliance with that significant
U.N. requirement.
</p>
<p> Thus Hamdoon himself was apparently caught off guard by Saddam's
sudden belligerence. Intelligence sources told TIME that the
senior Iraqi leadership split over the decision to shift from
a diplomatic offensive to a military one. Hawks on Saddam's
revolutionary council persuaded Saddam to send the soldiers
south. But a State Department official says Deputy Prime Minister
Tariq Aziz "is not happy with this muscle flexing. He thinks
it's counterproductive and it just gets the back up of the international
community." A U.N. official standing near both Aziz and Hamdoon
when the news of troop movements came says, "They had a look
of shock on their faces. Hamdoon actually seemed to pale."
</p>
<p> Saddam's move was so baldly self-defeating that it left even
seasoned Iraq experts wondering what he could have been thinking.
Many analysts argue that he had watched dictators from Bosnia
to North Korea turn threats into concessions from an unsteady
American President and assumed that he could do likewise. Successfully
menacing Kuwait would have shown his neighbors that he was ready
to take by force what he couldn't win by diplomacy, and that
they had better play along. By confronting the West he could
convince his own people that he was fighting to relieve their
suffering. The deployment of troops coincided with a new domestic
austerity program, which cut each citizen's rations for sugar,
rice and flour up to 50%. A UNICEF report revealed that 2.5
million Iraqi women and children were suffering from malnutrition
because of the sanctions. "The feeling here is that the Americans
will try to maintain the sanctions come hell or high water,
to achieve their unstated objective of overthrowing the government,"
says a Western diplomat in Baghdad. "Saddam probably thought
he had nothing to lose."
</p>
<p> Though this latest showdown did highlight the suffering of the
Iraqi population, it also confirmed that Saddam has become their
worst enemy. A U.N. resolution back in 1991 permitted Saddam
to sell $1.6 billion in oil and keep $962 million of it to spend
on humanitarian aid as long as the rest went to Gulf War reparations
and to fund the U.N. monitors in Iraq. Saddam refused even that
limited offer, on the ground that foreign control of the spending
was a humiliating violation of Iraqi sovereignty. "Saddam does
not want to see sanctions lifted in part, because he thinks
it undercuts lifting them in whole," says Patrick Clawson of
the National Defense University. "So he holds his own people
hostage."
</p>
<p> Clinton's next move will be much harder to choreograph. "This
is not over," said a senior U.S. official. "I think ((Saddam))
will try to find a way to say to the U.S. and the international
community that neither we nor he can win the game according
to its existing rules, so that we must change the rules and
give him what he wants." As the U.S. began floating possible
options, some allies insisted that it might be more dangerous
to keep Saddam a pariah than try to come to terms with him.
For one thing, there are still huge financial stakes involved.
The moment Iraqi troops began to pull back, French Defense Minister
Francois Leotard distanced himself from Clinton's position.
Leotard said Iraq had not violated any U.N. sanctions or done
anything illegal. Clinton's massive deployment, he added, was
"not unconnected with domestic politics." Neither, of course,
were Leotard's comments; the Gulf War and subsequent embargo
have cost French taxpayers an estimated $8.7 billion in unpaid
government-guaranteed loans.
</p>
<p> Moscow, an ally of Iraq's until the end of the cold war, is
also eager to rebuild economic ties. Iraq owes Russia at least
$7 billion, money that Moscow desperately needs. A month ago,
Russia and Iraq negotiated an economic protocol that could be
worth $10 billion, which could go into effect as soon as U.N.
sanctions are lifted. On Monday, Boris Yeltsin called Clinton
to tell him that Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev was heading
off on a mission to Baghdad. Clinton said fine, so long as he
delivered the message to Saddam that Iraq was in trouble and
the international community was united, and to pull his troops
back immediately. So the White House was distressed when, on
Thursday, Russia and Iraq issued a joint declaration in which
Russia would seek a timetable for the lifting of sanctions,
once Iraq recognized Kuwait's sovereignty and borders. U.S.
Secretary of State Warren Christopher was blunt that there could
be no quid pro quo. "Iraq's efforts to intimidate Kuwait and
the United Nations must not be rewarded," he said on his way
home from visiting troops in the gulf.
</p>
<p> But faced with wavering allies, Clinton had limited options
because he has not given up his passion for multilateral action.
Some officials made the case that the Iraqi troop movements
constituted a violation of the 1991 cease-fire agreement, and
that the U.S. had the right to respond with or without U.N.
consent. From Washington and neighboring states like Kuwait
and Saudi Arabia, there came a chorus of hawks suggesting that
the U.S. decide how it preferred to dispose of Saddam and then
let the allies decide for themselves which side they are on.
"When you're dealing with repeat offenders returning to the
scene of a crime," said a State Department official, "we feel
we have the right to pre-empt before they get to Kuwait."
</p>
<p> At the extreme were those who urged that the U.S. should finish
the job, either pushing forward into Baghdad or targeting Saddam
for assassination. Such sentiments are shared by many of the
troops of the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division, particularly
those who fought the Iraqis in the Gulf War four years ago.
"I think we should cross the border and put them out of business,"
said Army Specialist John Cannito of Orlando, Florida, who had
recently arrived in Kuwait. But reconstructing the huge Desert
Storm armada and occupying Iraq would be impractical, and killing
Saddam--aside from moral and legal counterarguments--presents
practical problems too. First, targeting Saddam would not be
easy; security is extremely tight, and multiple coup attempts
have already failed. Second, it would not be cheap. If Iraq
were beheaded, the U.S. would be forced to install new leadership
and help rebuild a large, broken country.
</p>
<p> Early in the week the most frequently floated proposal was a
U.N. resolution to create some kind of "exclusion zone" that
would extend the no-fly zone south of the 32nd parallel into
a "no-drive" or "no-walk" zone. Iraqi planes are already barred
from flying over the border area; a new exclusion zone would
bar heavy equipment, tanks and artillery from southern Iraq.
But France was adamant that it would not accept such measures,
which could lead to the effective partitioning of the country,
and by midweek officials in Washington had come up with a more
modest plan. Saddam would have to withdraw the 20,000-strong
Republican Guard that he had moved into the border zone, but
he could leave the 50,000 regular-army troops there. Any future
redeployment of the Guard would be taken as provocation and
grounds for a U.S. response. When the retreating Republican
Guard looked to be hunkering down within 100 miles of the border,
Defense Secretary William Perry, just arrived in Kuwait, warned
of the consequences. "If these forces stay in the south, we
will expand our current deployment plans and take appropriate
action to deal with this threat," he said. "We're talking about
military action," he added, lest there be any misunderstanding.
</p>
<p> American military planners noted that there were indeed advantages
in focusing on the Republican Guard rather than trying to enforce
a complete demilitarized zone. A hair-trigger exclusion zone,
where every tank and artillery piece that sneaks in constitutes
a violation, would allow Saddam to keep U.S. troops busy with
cat-and-mouse games or, worse, force them to turn a blind eye.
Furthermore, creating a military vacuum below the 32nd parallel
could lead to a collapse of Baghdad's authority in the territory
and possibly invite an incursion by Iran--an even less appetizing
prospect.
</p>
<p> U.S. officials were also eager to find some solution that would
at least superficially hold the alliance together. In fact,
the best policy, most analysts in Washington agree, is to do
exactly what the U.S. has been doing all along: wait Saddam
out and wear him down. Saddam, they note, is much weaker than
he was five or 10 years ago. He remains powerful in Iraq because
he has crushed his opposition, but on an absolute scale, his
power is shrinking, his military is smaller, his money has run
out.
</p>
<p> But he is still a threat. "If Saddam ever thinks the sanctions
are never going to be lifted, he could say to hell with this,
I'm not going to be the nice guy anymore," admits a State Department
official. "But if the sanctions are lifted soon, then it also
removes his incentive for being a nice guy. In a way we're caught
in the same bind." So far, two American Presidents have not
found a way to eliminate Saddam or civilize him. Washington
may have to settle for finding the least objectionable way of
living with him.
</p>
<p> QUESTION: Is President Clinton doing a good job or a bad job
handling the situation with Iraq?
<table>
<row><cell type=a>Good job<cell type=i>61%
<row><cell>Bad job<cell>25%
</table>
</p>
<p> From a telephone poll of 800 adult Americans taken for
TIME/CNN on Oct. 11-12 by Yankelovich Partners Inc. Sampling
