Ten years on Saddam still in power

MARK URBAN:
Nothing quite like it had happened since 1945. Half a million servicemen and women, fighting under American leadership. Thousands of combat aircraft pounding targets, week after week. It was war without limits, both sides even considered using weapons of mass destruction. At the head of the American Armed Forces, there was uncertainty. Was this the right way to proceed? Could it end in another Vietnam? Right up until the bombing started, General Colin Powell had his misgivings.

SIR PATRICK HINE:
He was a definite dove. When I called on him in Washington, in October 1990, he told me quite clearly, he thought it would be folly to go to war, in order to get Saddam out of Kuwait. He would have gone on for at least two years, applying sanctions.

URBAN:
Two years?

HINE:
Yes. Up to two years is what he said to me. I argued with him that that was totally unrealistic, because we had a very large number of forces in the theatre at that time, and you couldn't keep them there for two years. Saddam would have claimed a victory, that we just didn't have the guts to go in, and sort him out.

URBAN:
Once the battle was joined, these doubts had to be banished. The Pentagon dealt with its anxiety, by bombing, trying to shatter the Iraqi forces before any ground attack. A new kind of warfare was defined. Day by day, the intelligence reports came in to this underground headquarters, and experts collated a bomb-damage assessment. And it revealed that air power had destroyed two-thirds of the Iraqi air force, and about half of the army. The ground war, when it started, lasted just four days and consisted of driving through the shattered remnants. This was, really, the first war in history won by air power, something with profound implications. The air war model was repeated in the Balkans by President Clinton. But those who served Bush the father, believe Bush the son has a better understanding of the political purpose of war.

JOHN BOLTON:
I think the Persian Gulf war was a classic use of military force, in support of national interests, and I think many of the military interventions that took place over the Clinton administration, were interventions that were not really in support of significant American interests. That's why there has been so much opposition in Congress to kind of, casual use of military force. But I think there is a very strong support, bipartisan basis, across the American electorate that, if we need to use force, whether we have Security Council approval for it or not, we will use it in defence of our national interests.

ANNOUNCER:
I am pleased to announce that, at midnight tonight, all United States and coalition forces will suspend offensive combat operations.

URBAN:
The Gulf War was ended by President Bush on the advice of Colin Powell, a decision which still causes rancour among the British allies.

TOM KING:
There was no discussion about the ending of the war. That was very much decided in Washington. Obviously, they had the overwhelming bulk of the forces there, but it was the one time when the really close co-operation and consultation between particularly ourselves and the Americans, and other members of the alliance, broke down. That was decided in the White House, and we suddenly learnt that they were proposing to stop. But I personally have always thought that another 24 or 48 hours, and some real damage inflicted on the Republican Guard, would probably have tilted the balance of power in Iraq quite significantly, and could have led to a different outcome, which might have been rather happier for the future of Iraq, and for the whole of that region.

URBAN:
In bringing Saddam Hussein down?

KING:
Yes.

URBAN:
Powell and the White House had been disturbed by images of the slaughter of Iraqi forces. The final destruction of the Republican Guard would have required more of this. With hostilities over, the coalition put weapons inspectors into Iraq, and bound its economy with sanctions. A huge amount of nuclear and chemical weaponry was destroyed, but over the years, the Iraqis have gained much sympathy for the human cost of sanctions. This system collapsed in December 1998, when President Clinton ordered a new wave of air strikes. Saddam Hussein had kicked out the weapons inspectors. Sanctions, meanwhile, have been crumbling, imports and exports increasing apace. But American policy has been reduced to one of drift. Perhaps those with the greatest incentive for the current impasse, to end are those who are still required to fly over Iraq.

HINE:
I think they are concerned there is this stalemate situation, I don't know where it's leading. Certainly, it is containing Saddam in a military sense, until such time as a new political initiative is found, and one which will persuade him to see reason.

URBAN:
The air operation over Iraq continues virtually day to day, and while American and British airmen are risking their lives in those skies, the system of economic sanctions is collapsing. Everybody agrees it can't go on, but while many countries think now is the time to abandon the whole package, America has got a new administration that wants to toughen it all up again. Many, though, are concerned by the plight of poorer Iraqis. Today, anti-sanctions demonstrators picketed Parliament. In other former members of the Gulf Coalition, feelings have been even stronger. That will define the new administration's diplomatic strategy.

GEOFFREY KEMP:
If what General Powell means, is strengthening those sanctions, that we believe are going to have most impact on Saddam Hussein's military capability, that is to say sanctions on all military transfers, dual-use technology, then I think that can be done. I think there is a will to do that, not just in this country, but in Europe, and even in the Middle East and possibly Russia. Where I think there is less enthusiasm, is for general sanctions which are seen to hurt the Iraqi people more than they hurt Saddam Hussein and his regime.

URBAN:
As Secretary of State designate, Colin Powell once more is putting his faith in sanctions. And the objective?

BOLTON:
I don't think there is any possibility of a workable weapons inspection regime being recreated. Maybe we were naive in the first place, but it's just not going to work now. I think, instead, we need effective economic sanctions, to preclude Saddam from getting the economic resources he is now using, to recreate his conventional weapons capability and his capability in weapons of mass destruction.

URBAN:
Saddam's people show their contempt for America and its values, but it is they who pay, whether in battlefield casualties or suffering from sanctions, and Colin Powell must find a way to change that, if he is once again to put Saddam under pressure.