Word: iraqi
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...eyes of some nations. It wasn't just Republicans who suggested that Clinton had ordered the assault in a Wag the Dog effort to avert impeachment. That theory--though erroneous--echoed in Britain's Parliament, in French editorials and throughout the Arab world. FOR MONICA'S SAKE, IRAQI CHILDREN ARE DYING read a sign waved during a demonstration at a Cairo mosque. From Russia and China came deep grumblings that the U.S. had overstepped itself. Said Boris Yeltsin: "The U.S. and Great Britain have crudely violated the U.N. charter and generally accepted principles of international law and the norms...
Anyone who wanted to predict the timing of the air strikes merely had to consult Richard Butler's calendar. The head of the U.N.'s Iraq inspection team, known as UNSCOM, had been telling diplomats for weeks that he intended to give the Security Council a crucial report on Iraqi compliance by Dec. 15. Delivered right on schedule, it showed that the Iraqis had been up to their usual tricks: concealing equipment that could be used to make bioweapons, blocking interviews with workers at suspicious sites, lying about sealed documents detailing the military's past uses of chemical agents...
...President needed no prodding for war. A month earlier, Clinton had ordered a meticulously planned assault and called it off only at the last minute, when Saddam promised full cooperation with UNSCOM. At the time, Clinton declared that war would come without warning if Saddam misbehaved again. Months of Iraqi duplicity had convinced the White House that UNSCOM wouldn't get compliance. So when he got advance word on the contents of Butler's report on Sunday, Dec. 13, the President, in Jerusalem at the beginning of his Middle East trip, had no good choice but to act. He gave...
...much for America's image. But it could well bolster Saddam's. He has always believed defiance, as in surviving a military onslaught, brings admiration. That's why Saddam's fall from power--the ultimate goal of the Administration--seems as elusive as ever. The already weak Iraqi opposition groups to whom the U.S. has given its blessing watched last week's raids with a sense of mounting dread. The Administration has so far withheld outright military assistance for a guerrilla campaign, and would-be recipients fear the bombings will create a false impression of progress toward Saddam's ouster...
...Meanwhile, says Thompson, Iraqi warplanes haven't budged, and ground installations haven't fired a single surface-to-air missile at their assailants. "Saddam knows from eight years ago that whatever he uses, he'll lose," he says. "He seems determined to curl up in a little ball until this is over." That end might come by Sunday. Then again, it might...