Word: iraq
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...discuss the Butler report. The group agreed air strikes were the right response. Clinton then got assurances of British participation from Prime Minister Tony Blair. At 10 p.m. Tuesday, Peter Burleigh, acting American ambassador to the U.N., called Annan and suggested he begin pulling U.N. personnel out of Iraq. When Annan consulted Berger on Wednesday morning, the National Security Adviser told him the situation was "very serious" but not that Clinton had already ordered an attack. Except Britain, no Security Council members received so much as a phone call informing them of the pending action...
...even within the American military, there were private grumblings about the campaign's awkward timing. "Saddam has been kicking Bill Clinton in the teeth for more than five years," said an Army officer. "And we have to attack on the eve of his impeachment? Give me a break." Iraq Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz lashed out at UNSCOM for giving Washington an advance look at its report, calling Butler "a cheap pawn in the hands...
Among the more serious consequences of last week's action could be a breakdown--or at least a slow erosion--of the consensus for sanctions against Iraq. China has long called for a lifting of the embargo to ensure an uninterrupted flow of imported oil. Lawmakers in Moscow too muttered darkly about unilateral removal of trade restrictions. Even if sanctions survive, there's no guarantee that Saddam will become less dangerous, just as a toothless UNSCOM didn't keep him in check...
...American goal was simple: to cripple Iraq's ability to brew and deliver weapons of mass destruction. Because biological and chemical weapons can be made quite easily, the Pentagon went after the bigger things--like missile factories and the Special Republican Guards--vital to the weapons' protection and production. And there was another wrinkle: while Pentagon officials said they avoided hitting storage sites that might spew deadly plumes of toxins, they privately conceded they had no idea where such stockpiles might be even if they wanted to attack them...
...Administration's best-case scenario, the bombings will lead either to Saddam's downfall or to fuller inspections by UNSCOM, assuming a chastened Iraq allows the teams to return. At worst the air war will end UNSCOM inspections for good without having done much to debilitate Saddam's capacity to manufacture his lethal weapons. UNSCOM has been stymied by Saddam to the point of impotence, but it did provide a mechanism for measuring how and when sanctions could be lifted. Its demise could boost sentiment among Arab nations to drop the embargo, with Russia and China possibly pulling...