
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 6, 1991                   TAG: 9102060269
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

BUSH: IRAQ COULD EASE PAIN WITH COUP

As he prepares to decide whether to commit American forces to a ground war, President Bush sent a signal to Iraqi military leaders Tuesday that they have a last chance to avoid huge casualties and a crushing defeat - by overthrowing Saddam Hussein.

During his televised news conference, the president went to considerable lengths to question Saddam's judgment and his compassion for Iraqi troops. At the same time, Bush refrained from criticizing the Iraqi officers and soldiers who are waging battle under Saddam's leadership.

While insisting that the United States has not added the overthrow of the Iraqi leader to its war objectives, Bush quickly added: "Now, would I weep? Would I mourn if somehow Saddam Hussein did not remain as head of his country? . . . There will be no sorrow if he is not there."

Moments later, the president stopped a questioner and returned to that theme with more emphasis. "It would be a lot easier to see a successful conclusion [to the war], because I don't believe anybody other than Saddam Hussein is going to want to continue to subject his army to the pounding they are taking, or his people to the pounding that is going on."

His comments call to mind the Bush administration's unsuccessful effort in May 1989 to persuade the Panamanian Defense Forces to overthrow Manuel Noriega.

At that time, Bush issued a more direct, public invitation to foreign military leaders to initiate a coup. "They [the Panamanian Defense Forces] ought to just do everything they can to get Mr. Noriega out of there," the president said. "He's one man, and they have a well-trained force."

A White House official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, maintained that rather than trying to foment an uprising among Iraqi troops, Bush's remarks Tuesday were aimed "more at correcting the impression we're out to pound Iraq into rubble." He said the idea that the United States was trying to remove Saddam from power "doesn't play well in the Arab world and it's not true."

While the administration would be happy if Iraqi soldiers put down their arms and walked across the border, this administration official said, Bush wasn't trying to incite a rebellion against Saddam. Nevertheless, he acknowledged, "I'm sure he [Bush] would want it."

An administration official later said that the president's remarks were not aimed at Iraqi military officers or troops.

"The type of information you can get to them is propaganda through leaflets, and anything you can get to the other side during a war situation they know is propaganda," he said.

Some Mideast analysts contend that no matter how badly Iraq is faring in the war, the United States has little chance of fostering or inspiring an Iraqi military coup.

"Even those Iraqi officers who question the wisdom of occupying Kuwait and trying to defend it do not want to cede to the United States the right to treat Iraq like Panama and to install new regimes at whim," asserted Yahya M. Sadowski, a Middle East specialist at the Brookings Institution.

The Bush administration, Sadowski said, may not understand the intensity of Iraqi nationalism and patriotism. "Saddam Hussein may be an ugly dictator, but to most Iraqis, he's our dictator," he said.

by CNB