Preempt. The word is on a thousand tongues in a dozen capitals. You hear it as far apart as Beijing and Washington. In the corridors of London's Whitehall and in the halls of European power. Not a day goes by without it being spoken, many times, in Israel's defense headquarters, the Kirya, in Tel Aviv. It can be heard in Aman, Damascus, and Cairo, over and again. And, of course, in the very focus of the world, Saddam Hussein,s Baghdad. Preempt. Will he strike first against the ever-approaching war machine of the United States? In war rooms around the Western world, the question has been honed down to one scenario. Some time between now and the onset of the holy month of Ramadan, Iraq launches from its southern city of Iraq a scud missile. Its warhead is filled with one of the deadliest poisons on VX nerve gas. As it streaks through the desert night sky towards its target the American military headquarters in Kuwait three of Saddam's armored divisions roar out of Basra towards the Kuwaiti border. They have less than 40 miles to travel. That is the preemptive scenario senior officers at America's Central Command have warned President Bush could happen. Worse, they have told him at best there is only a 50/50 chance of preventing the Basra breakout from succeeding. Anthony Cordsman, a former director of Intelligence Assessment at the Pentagon and a ranking expert on Saddam's potential tactics, told Globe-Intel: It will be most difficult to stop Iraq from entering Kuwait the more so as Saddam is clearly ready to accept massive damage from our counter air strikes. While President Bush has rejected Saddam's proposal to have a meeting with the head of the UN inspection team, the fact is that Bush also knows his planned assault on Iraq holds more dangers for him than he is publicly admitting. There is the danger from Saddam's estimated 40 tons of chemical and biological weapons. There is the possibility that Iraq has sufficient nuclear material obtained from North Korea to create at least one dirty bomb. There is the very real risk that Saddam will launch squadrons of his pilots in kamikaze attacks. Unlike their Japanese predecessors in World War Two, who often had some distance to fly before they reached their targets, Iraq's suicide bombers are only minutes away from some of the 7,000 US troops already stationed in the broiling Kuwaiti desert. Many are in tent camps close to the Iraqi border. While US forces have been inoculated against anthrax and are training in chemical/biological warfare suits they will have to wear all the time once hostilities start, the truth is that these precautions have reduced their fighting capability. Preempt.The real danger is that Israel, sensing that the Basra breakout will also be the precursor to an attack on Tel Aviv, will launch its own preemptive assault. John Pike, an analyst with the respected Global Security says, Israel is a factor no one can factor in with certainty. Senior members of Israel's own intelligence community have told Globe-Intel that should Iraq launch a bio/chemical attack against the country, then the retaliation will almost certainly include a suitable nuclear response. Israel has over 200 nuclear weapons at its facility in the Negev Desert. In the past weeks, a number of weapons have been deployed to front-line Israeli Air Force squadrons. Preempt. When could such at attack come? While Israel remains America's closest strategic partner in the Middle East, it may, in the end, not follow any pre-planned battle plan Washington is preparing. Tel Aviv sources Globe-Intel have spoken to say Bush's rejection of Saddam's invitation to discuss the idea of allowing UN weapons inspectors back into Iraq now makes war inevitable. They predict it will come, in the words of one Mossad analyst, sometime between early October and January 2003. The one certainty is that a preemptive Iraqi strike against Kuwait would inevitably wreck the battle plans now being put together for an all-out assault on Saddam. We would have to divert a huge number of troops, or even assemble another coalition to liberate Kuwait, said a high-level Pentagon source. There are other imponderables. What would Iran do? There is mounting evidence that it is building up its own nuclear capability.Washington has already warned Moscow about continuing to supply such materials to Teheran. Then there is the role of China. Will it seize upon US preoccupation with Iraq to reinforce its own power base in Iran? Syria and Egypt are also two problems that remain unresolved for Washington. While its leaders remain politically opposed to any attack on Iraq, its people might rebel and drive its hard-line military leaders to strike against Israel. The only certainty is that the furnace summer heat may turn out to be the precursor to something ever fiercer in the Middle East.
TUESDAY AUGUST 06/02
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