ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, September 4, 1996 TAG: 9609040097
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
THE CLINTON administration's decision to attack Iraqi air-defense installations is justifiable. The immediate question is whether the limited retaliation will suffice to stop Saddam Hussein's aggression, or whether further U.S. military involvement lies ahead.
The longer-term question is whether America can afford to continue going it alone in such police operations, even when they are justified.
Republicans and others may be tempted to suspect an "October Surprise" at work in September - that is, a foreign crisis contrived to make the president look more presidential as the election approaches.
But Bill Clinton didn't provoke this crisis. Saddam did.
Over the weekend, the Iraqi despot sent tens of thousands of ground forces into a Kurdish area carved out as a safe haven by the United Nations Security Council. Saddam's blatant violation of a 1991 U.N. resolution required a response, in part because experience with him suggests that he would react to timidity or ambivalence with further aggression.
To be sure, Tuesday's attacks are more open to question than the last two instances when U.S. cruise missiles were launched against Iraq - during the Gulf War, after Iraq had invaded Kuwait; and three months into Clinton's presidency, after Iraqi agents were caught in a plot to assassinate George Bush. The provocation this time is less compelling: Saddam's forces on Saturday moved into northern Iraq in support of one Kurdish faction that is fighting another.
Also worth asking is how seriously alternatives to military action were considered. Before Saddam's move, the United Nations had planned to permit limited sales of oil to pay for humanitarian needs, thereby partially lifting an economic embargo against Iraq. Slamming shut that opening would have been an appropriate - even a preferable - response, certainly initially, to Saddam's defiance.
Such second-guessing does not, however, make measured retaliation against Iraqi military sites anything close to an outrage. Nor does it change the fact that Saddam's violation of international law demanded a decisive reply. Anything less would have undermined the Security Council resolution's credibility and encouraged Saddam to test further the will to stop him. In the past, he has shown a willingness to disregard not only diplomatic protests, but reason.
The more serious question, especially for the future, is why America had to act alone. Among leaders of U.S. allies and Security Council members, support for the missile strikes is probably greater than is publicly admitted. And America does need to show leadership in such situations. If we waited, say, for France's support before doing anything, nothing would get done.
Still, America cannot play the sole policeman for every regional dispute across the globe - and particularly in a region that combines vast oil wealth with an utter lack of democracy, Israel excepted.
Notably, Tuesday's missile strikes targeted southern Iraq, far from where the Kurds are, in part because that is where Saddam poses a threat to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Yet the Saudis asked the United States not to use Saudi-based aircraft in the attack.
Prospects in that part of the world are darkening quickly. Israeli-Arab peace talks are stalled. Proof may be found to substantiate the suspicion that Iran was behind the recent bombing of U.S. soldiers in Saudi Arabia. And war may resume between Iraq and Iran. (Tensions between the two helped spur Iraq's intervention with the Kurds.)
Defending the integrity of U.N. resolutions, as America did this week, is fine. But, in the long run, it would be better to help the United Nations defend itself.
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