December 2001/
January 2002

Views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of the AFSC.

Iraq: Raising the Stakes

Sarah Graham-Brown, a contributing editor of Middle East Report, is author of Sanctioning Saddam (St. Martin's Press, 1999). The following is excerpted from Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP) Press Information Note 77, November 28, 2001. To subscribe to the MERIP PIN distribution list, Email ctoensing@merip.org and provide your address in the text message box, with "SUBSCRIBE PIN" in the subject line.

Since September 11, Iraq has been squarely in the sights of US hawks, notably those in the Bush administration who chafe at the "unfinished business" in Iraq since 1991. Policymakers who want a much more aggressive military stance on Iraq see the "war on terrorism" as an opportunity to push for "regime change," or proactive attempts to topple Saddam Hussein. For those policymakers who are reluctant to commit to military action--especially given the continuing uncertainties about the outcome of the war in Afghanistan and the fate of Osama bin Laden--the new political climate has offered the possibility of a renewed attempt to change sanctions policy. Short of that, rolling over the oil for food program allows the US time to settle ongoing disputes within the administration on future military action, without immediately jeopardizing its Arab coalition.

Buddhists in front of Boston Public Library, Copley Square, during weekly Justice with Peace Coalition vigil © Pat Rabby

The Republican right in Congress and elements in the Bush administration, of whom the best known is Undersecretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, have upped their pressure since September to "go after" Saddam Hussein. The issue, for the administration, is less whether regime change is a good idea than whether it is achievable and if it should be a priority for the US at present.

By all accounts, supporters of regime change have been greatly heartened by developments in Afghanistan. Especially in the Department of Defense, analysts think that bombing has worked in bringing down an unwanted regime, though less euphoria is evident in other parts of government. But recently several other, less challenging candidates for US military action--notably Somalia, Yemen and Sudan--have been named as places that harbor al-Qaeda and related networks.

Justification for Action against Iraq

If Iraq were chosen as a target, either in the coming months or further down the line, the US would need some form of justification, given international skepticism and opposition. But the circumstantial evidence connecting Iraq to al-Qaeda or the anthrax attacks has not convinced doubters, who so far have included even Britain, staunchest supporter of the US. The main evidence so far relates to hijacker Muhammad Atta's meeting in Prague with Colonel Muhammad Khalil Ibrahim al-Ani, allegedly a senior Iraqi intelligence officer, and the so-called "hijackers' training camp" at Salman Pak in Iraq.

Seeing the weakness of this evidence, hawks increasingly look for justifications in Iraq's putative weapons of mass destruction, including the possibility that Iraq might use or might have used biological weapons. [see "Don't Blame Saddam for This One" by Scott Ritter, Peacework November 2001] Bush's November 26 comments on Iraq emphasized the demand that Iraq should allow UN weapons inspectors to return to Iraq. A week earlier, Undersecretary of State John Bolton had singled out Iraq, along with North Korea, Libya, Syria, Iran and Sudan, as states developing biological weapons: "The US strongly suspects that Iraq has taken advantage of three years of no UN inspections to improve all phases of its offensive biological weapons program." Until recently, public discussion of sanctions policy has made few references to renewed inspections by UNMOVIC, the revamped UN inspectorate.

Iraq has vowed to reject any renewed effort to get the weapons inspectors of UNMOVIC into Iraq. It seems likely that most policymakers in the US are skeptical of ever returning the inspectors, but efforts to revive this issue, invoking Resolution 1284 (1999) or 687 (1991) might create more international acceptance of military action.

The more general claim that Saddam Hussein remains highly dangerous and evil may also be used as a justification. National Security adviser Condoleezza Rice stated recently: "We do not need the events of September 11 to tell us that Saddam Hussein is a very dangerous man, a threat to his people, the region, and the US." This argument runs counter to years of US assurances that Saddam Hussein is being "contained" and hence is unlikely to convince most other states of the need for military action. A further possibility would be to hope that Iraq itself takes some provocative action--such as advancing above the thirty-sixth parallel into areas under Kurdish control or toward Kuwait. For the moment at least, Iraq's leadership is keeping a low profile, undoubtedly expecting attacks.

Hawkish Options

The lack of international consensus for expanding the war to encompass Iraq does not mean that US hawks will abandon the push for military options altogether. The least dramatic military option would be to increase sorties over the no-fly zones and bombing attacks, despite the proven ineffectiveness of this strategy. If regime change is the goal, a major air war akin to Desert Fox, with bombing focused on regime targets, has been proposed, along with establishing bases within Iraq for elements of the Iraqi opposition.

Some hawks have gone so far as to suggest a US ground invasion of the southern oilfields--reviving an Iraqi National Congress (INC) proposal from the mid-1990s for a "no-drive zone" in southern Iraq. Clearly this would be a high-risk strategy. Another, similar approach would be to establish a US military presence in the Kurdish-controlled north and conduct a bombing campaign in the hope of causing the regime to collapse as the Taliban did in Afghanistan.

Little Rethinking

The tendency to focus on military action rather than political strategy is very marked among the proponents of regime change. The question that has plagued US efforts to remove Saddam Hussein since 1991--who would succeed him--has not been fully confronted. On the right, acceptance of the INC has replaced the search for a pliable general to rule Iraq in Saddam's stead. But the INC's track record leads many to doubt whether this uneasy coalition could hold together, especially in the face of unpredictable political currents that might emerge within Iraq if the Ba'thist regime fell.

The sense of unfinished business in Iraq, which undoubtedly haunts members of this administration to varying degrees, touches on broader issues than the fall of Saddam Hussein. So far, September 11 has not brought any serious rethinking of US policy in the Gulf region. Would political change in Iraq be accompanied by a new US approach to the oil states of the Gulf, including both Iran and Iraq? It remains to be seen whether the US will question long-term alliances with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, given their implicit connivance in the rise of the Taliban and al-Qaeda through both official and unofficial financial support. Finally, the elimination of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction in UN Security Council Resolution 687 was linked to the goal of regional disarmament. No progress has been made in the last decade. The US war against terrorism seems unlikely to further this cause.

Previous Article    Next Article