President Bush plans to push for military action against Iraq this week, and will ask Congress to grant him authority to strike unilaterally if Saddam Hussein does not comply soon with United Nations mandates.
Saying Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was ”not going to fool anybody” with his offer to re-admit weapons inspectors, Bush said top lawmakers had pledged to vote on an Iraq resolution before the November 5 midterm elections.
”It’s an important signal to the world to see that this country is united in our resolve to deal with threats that we face,” he said as he met with Republican and Democrat leaders of the US Senate and House of Representatives.
Bush’s proposed congressional resolution would give him ”maximum flexibility” to carry out any war plans, regardless of UN actions, said a senior White House official, as quoted by the Washington Post.
The newspaper said that the administration was preparing ”an unprecedented diplomatic push”, that may include a UN Security Council resolution, saying that Iraq was in ”material breach” of international law for its failure to comply with a series of UN mandates. The newspaper said this phrase has been used in the past as international authorisation for military action.
Bush warned the United Nations last week to expect unilateral US action if the world body fails to take strong action to disarm Baghdad.
Russia responded to Saddam’s suggestion by saying there was now no need for any new UN resolution. France, also a veto-wielding permanent UN Security Council member, has publicly appeared to hesitate.
White House officials said Bush still wants firm UN Security Council action to strip Baghdad of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, but emphasised anew that he had not ruled out unilateral US action.
”We must and will take whatever steps are necessary to defend our freedom and security,” Vice President Dick Cheney said at a political fundraiser in Connecticut.
”There’s no question from an American point of view, the best way to know that his weapons of mass destruction have been destroyed is through regime change, no question,” White House representative Ari Fleischer agreed here.
Senate Democratic Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who earlier had suggested lawmakers would act after approval of a UN resolution, said Saddam’s offer had ”thrown off” Security Council members but predicted the world body would eventually rally fully behind Washington’s position.
”I believe at the end of the day, the United Nations is going to be where it needs to be, standing strong in opposition to his ploy and recognising that it’s just that,” he said in the White House driveway.
Meanwhile, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld urged lawmakers to vote their support for possible action against Iraq immediately, without awaiting action by the United Nations.
”Delaying a vote in Congress would send the wrong message, in my view, just as we are asking the international community to take a stand and as we are cautioning the Iraqi regime to respond and consider its options,” he said.
Protesters briefly disrupted Rumsfeld’s statement, unfurling banners and chanting ”inspections, not war” before they were escorted from the hearing.
But Rumsfeld expressed skepticism Iraq would ever agree to unfettered inspections intrusive enough to ensure Baghdad no longer has weapons of mass destruction.
A new inspections regime would have to be ”so intrusive and so powerful that it has the ability to enforce itself,” said Rumsfeld. ”And of course, that kind of force people generally call something other than inspectors.”
Fleischer said there was no reason to trust Iraq on inspections, ”based on Iraq’s actions in the 1990s, when they lied, when they deceived, when they created such a climate that the inspectors could not do their jobs.”
Bush himself emphasised he was confident the world will see through Saddam’s surprise announcement on Monday that he is ready to readmit UN inspectors without conditions.
”When we continue to make the case about his defiance, his deception, his, the fact that time and time again, dozens of times he has told the world, ‘oh, I will comply’ and he never does, that the nations which long for peace and care about the validity of the United Nations will join us,” he said. – Sapa-AFP