Iraq war seen within weeks

2003-01-28 20:26

Alistair Lyon

London - The United States, wooing allies for war, may not wait much beyond the next UN inspectors' report on Saint Valentine's Day before unleashing an invasion to disarm Iraq and topple President Saddam Hussein, analysts say.

"We'll hear a deafening drumbeat from the United States in the run-up to February 14," said Iraq expert Toby Dodge of Warwick University. "I would be surprised if the air war had not started within seven days of that."

The tone from Washington and London is already grim, despite appeals from many other capitals for the inspectors to be given more time to prove whether Iraq is defying a Security Council resolution which effectively told it to disarm or face war.

Britain joined the United States in declaring Iraq in "material breach" of UN disarmament demands on Tuesday, a day after chief UN arms inspector Hans Blix told the council that Hussein had not come clean about stocks of lethal weapons.

'Unbelievable' refusal British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said a further report by UN weapons inspectors on February 14 was not an ultimatum, but warned Iraq that its "unbelievable" refusal to comply with UN demands had diminished chances of a peaceful outcome.

"The US-British deployment will be in place towards the end of February. They could start the air campaign a bit ahead of that, but probably won't," said Sir Timothy Garden, a defence expert at London's Royal Institute of International Affairs.

"What happened yesterday (at the Security Council) keep everything bubbling along till mid-February when the Americans, Brits, Australians and anyone else involved will say, 'We are going to do this anyway', and challenge the council to come up with a resolution to support it," Garden said.

"The more war looks inevitable, the more Saddam is likely to start obstructing the inspectors," he added, arguing that this would create a self-reinforcing impetus for conflict.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has urged more time for the UN experts and opposed any solo US action, said on Tuesday Moscow could toughen its line if Iraq hampered the inspectors.

Military timetable

Some oil experts pay more heed to US troop deployments and the uncompromising rhetoric of US President George W Bush than to the diplomatic skirmishing at the United Nations.

"What's driving the timetable for war is not diplomacy but military readiness," said Roger Diwan of consultancy PFC Energy in Washington.

"If the US needs more time to get the military in place it will use that time to seek diplomatic backing but, whether it gets that backing or not, we still expect war to start some time between the middle of February and early March."

George Joffe, a Middle East specialist at Cambridge University, said a ground war could not start before the end of February because US and British forces were not yet in place.

"They might start an air war, but not before February 14. That's when they will say 'enough is enough'," he said, noting that the Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca would be over by then.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell was quoted on Tuesday as saying he recognised that a new UN resolution authorising military action in Iraq would make it "easier for a lot of countries to join in". However, he told the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad "it's not a condition to start military action".

Sir John Moberly, a former British ambassador to Baghdad, said attempts by the United States and Britain to secure a second resolution might delay war, but not indefinitely.

"When they judge the moment favourable in terms of international support and when they are militarily ready, they will not wait. The machine is lumbering forward," he said.

Iraq, responding to Blix's report, promised more cooperation with the inspectors, but few analysts expect a switch in its behaviour dramatic enough to stay Washington's hand.

'At the gates of Baghdad'

Saddam has made a series of defiant remarks in the last few days, promising defeat for US forces "at the gates of Baghdad", urging his military men to be on guard against treason and ridiculing US propaganda leaflets dropped over Iraq.

Garden said that the Iraqi leadership was now likely to be debating whether to "give more to the inspectors to cause more dissent in the Security Council" or simply get on with preparing their defences for a war that now looked inevitable.

"Everyone is making clear the inspectors will have a bit more time, but not very much," a British official said. "Unless Iraq changes its fundamental attitude now, time is running out."

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak shares that conclusion.

"The United States is determined to get rid of weapons of mass destruction regardless of the price," al-Ittihad daily in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday quoted him as saying.

"The strike is coming unless Iraq abides by the resolutions of the international legitimacy and unless it stops putting obstacles in front of international arms inspections," he said.

- Reuters