The Gulf Are We Ready to Wage War?

By Lisa Beyer

If anyone but Lieut. General Calvin A.H. Waller had been responsible, the blooper would have had "disinformation" written all over it. After all, it would be advantageous for Washington to lull Saddam Hussein into a false sense of security. And what better way than to have the deputy commander of American forces in the gulf tell a group of reporters that the U.S. would not be ready to attack come Jan. 15, the deadline that the U.N. has given Iraq to pull out of Kuwait?

But it was Waller who blurted out that unexpected assessment last week, and for those who know him, it was altogether plausible that this was a simple case of a guileless Army man putting his boot in his mouth. "He's a hell of a good soldier," said a friend of Waller's, "but that doesn't make him a competent spokesman."

Other colleagues were less generous. "Stupid," said a fellow officer of Waller's remarks. "Absolutely imbecilic," said another. Soldiers are not supposed to tell such secrets to the enemy. In truth, what Waller said should come as no surprise to anyone who has been tracking the progress of American deployment in the gulf. That he said it, however, was a shocker. Waller's indiscretion signaled to Saddam that the Rubicon may not be crossed on Jan. 15, thereby undercutting Washington's effort to scare him out of Kuwait without a fight.

It may prove, of course, to have been a false message -- the Bush Administration may opt for a swift war after all. But now that a senior officer has made headlines with his reservations, the political risks of such a move have been multiplied. Should a mid-January offensive bring high casualties, President Bush would stand accused of sending U.S. soldiers into battle unprepared, something he has repeatedly promised the American people he will not do.

Waller's conclusion that not all U.S. forces will not be set to go until perhaps the middle of February proceeds from some rather basic arithmetic. By last week the U.S. had 280,000 troops in the gulf theater. An additional 150,000 are scheduled to join them. But because the military's transportation systems are overloaded, some ground forces now in Europe and the U.S. are not due in Saudi Arabia until late January. Even if all of them were in place by the U.N.'s cutoff date, it would take two or three weeks to acclimatize the new arrivals.

Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney had conceded before Waller piped up that not all the troops would be "combat ready" by mid-January. But Cheney did not suggest that this should force a postponement of any offensive; Waller did.

Administration officials quickly scrambled to undo the effects of Waller's candor. Secretary of State James Baker claimed that the general's comments were intended to keep Saddam guessing. Countered a U.N. diplomat: "When an official states publicly that something is disinformation, that's when you know it is not." Meanwhile, White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater told reporters that "what ((Waller)) really said is they might not be as ready as they would like to be."

In fact, that was not what Waller said, but perhaps he should have. Like any prudent general, Waller was being supercautious. "The military services never tell you they've got enough," says a senior admiral. "They always want just a few more."

But do they really need more -- more time, more troops, more planes? Many military experts say no. Virtually every realistic strike plan calls for an intensive air bombardment before any ground troops advance. By all accounts, the air forces in the region are lined up and ready to go. The forward thrust on the ground might not begin for days or even weeks, giving the foot soldiers additional time to crank up.

The Pentagon must also weigh the hazards of waiting. One concern is troop morale, which was not helped last week by the capsizing off Haifa of an Israeli boat carrying American sailors from shore leave to their ship. At least 19 seamen drowned. Another worry is that given a breather, Saddam would improve his field communications and strengthen his supply lines, currently the weak links in Iraq's defenses.

More time might also mean more opportunities for the Desert Shield coalition to fray and more chances of another flare-up in Israel's occupied territories that would strain ties between the U.S. and its Arab allies. Last week the U.S. repaired some of the damage caused by the Temple Mount killings in Jerusalem in October by voting with the rest of the U.N. Security Council for a resolution criticizing Israel's management of the territories and calling for U.N. monitoring of the Palestinians' safety there. In a separate statement, the council endorsed an international peace conference on the Arab- Israeli conflict.

There has never been anything magical about Jan. 15 per se. Establishing a credible deadline, however, did have the merit of conveying to Saddam that his choices were only two: "move it or lose it," to quote Colin Powell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Though no one has said 12:01 a.m. Jan. 16 is the moment of reckoning, President Bush has done his best to give that impression. The U.N. resolutions against Iraq, he said, should be enforced "right on schedule." Bush underscored the idea by rejecting Baghdad's proposed date of Jan. 12 for a meeting between Baker and Saddam. Washington says that would not allow enough time for Iraq to withdraw before Jan. 15. Attempts to schedule that meeting and a visit to Washington by Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz remained stalled last week.

Whatever day the Administration may have in mind for an attack, the best hope for averting war is to convince Saddam Hussein that D-day is coming -- before it arrives. But the Iraqi President has given no sign that he is coming to that conclusion. Last week's high-level contradictions won't help him see the light.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE

CREDIT: TIME Chart

*Projections by the Dept. of Defense

CAPTION: Total U.S. forces to be deployed by Feb.1: 430,000

With reporting by Dean Fischer/Dubai and Bruce van Voorst/Washington