14.F 76/2:
.HRG.105-725
S. HRG. 105–725
UNITED STATES POLICY IN IRAQ: PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY AND PRIVATE POLICY
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EASTERN AND
SOUTH ASIAN AFFAIRS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
SEPTEMBER 9, 1998
a
Pennsylvania State l
JAN 1 9 1999
cements Colecion
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON : 1998
50–913 CC
For sale by the U.S. Government Printing Office
Superintendent of Documents, Congressional Sales Office, Washington, DC 20402
ISBN 0-16-057791-8


CONTENTS
Eagleburger, Hon. Lawrence S., Former Secretary of State ...
Indyk, Martin S., Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs,
Department of State
Kirkpatrick, Hon. Jeane J., Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute;
and Former U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Wash-
ington, D.C. ..........................................................................................................
Murphy, Richard W., Senior Fellow for the Middle East, Council on Foreign
Relations .......
Prepared statement
Woolsey, Hon. R. James, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency, Wash-
ington, D.C. .....
relations
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......
(u
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For example, in May of this year, principals of the National Secu-
rity Council instructed the heads of all relevant U.S. agencies to
issue new directives, ensuring that UNSCOM and IAEA inspec-
tions would receive high priority support throughout our govern-
ment. The Secretary of State issued that directive to State Depart-
ment officials on June the 23rd of this year.
On the diplomatic front, we have taken the lead in rebutting and
disproving Iraq's contentions in disputes with UNSCOM before the
Security Council. Secretary Cohen, Secretary Albright, and the rest
of the President's foreign policy team have travelled the world, at-
tempting to keep the heat on Iraq, in demanding that it cooperate
with UNSCOM.
The suggestion that this administration urged other governments
not to support UNSCOM turns the truth on its head. It is exactly
the opposite of what we have been doing.
A second fact is that, Iraqi intransigence aside, UNSCOM's in-
spection efforts have continued to make important progress during
the time that we were accused of not supporting UNSCOM's in-
spections. For example, just this summer, UNSCOM was able for
the first time to conduct inspections of sensitive sites where it
found new evidence that Iraq had lied about the size of its chemical
weapons stocks.
A third fact that we have to take into account is the importance
of maintaining Security Council and coalition unity in dealing with
Iraq. There is a very hard-headed reason for this: Unless we are
prepared unilaterally to send tens of thousands of American ground
troops into Iraq to remove Saddam and destroy Iraq's military in-
frastructure, we are not going to eliminate by force Iraq's ability
to conceal and possibly reconstitute its weapons of mass destruc-
tion.
If we are not prepared to take such action, we will have to rely
on the help of others, through sanctions, support for inspections,
and acceptance of the need to use military strikes for limited objec-
ecessary. This fact has an influence on the tactical deci-
sions we have to make.
As I suspect the veterans among you, like Senator Robb, would
agree, there is a great value in any confrontation in being able to
choose your own timing and terrain. Saddam's provocations are de-
signed with political purposes in mind: to spark a reaction, to di-
vide the Security Council, to isolate the United States, and to di-
minish support for sanctions. Our strategy is to deny Saddam that
opportunity and to keep this world spotlight not on what we do,
but on what Iraq is failing to do—which is to comply with its obli-
gations under Security Council resolutions.
A fourth fact is the importance of maintaining the integrity and
independence of UNSCOM. The continuation of UNSCOM's work is
essential if we are to achieve our goal and the international com-
munity's goal of eliminating Iraq's capacity to pose a serious mili-
tary threat to its neighborhood. Unfortunately, if UNSCOM is to
succeed, it must, among other things, both be and be perceived to
be independent.
It is ironic that Scott Ritter and Saddam Hussein both argue
that UNSCOM's independence has been compromised by the
United States. If we were to agree with Scott Ritter on that point,


in this regard, other intrusive inspections were going on at the
same time, and we were supporting those inspections.
And when Chairman Butler, a short time later, decided to pro-
ceed with intrusive inspections, under the leadership of Scott Rit-
e supported those inspections, which were to take place in
early August. The issue became moot, however, when Iraqi officials
informed UNSCOM on August the 4th that they were halting any
further cooperation. At that point, we believed it was best to let the
onus fall clearly on Saddam Hussein. And Chairman Butler agreed.
We also knew that some in the Security Council were planning
to blame UNSCOM for the renewed breakdown in cooperation.
To summarize, if the allegation is that we sought to influence the
pace of UNSCOM inspections, we did. But we did it in order to
have the greatest chance of overcoming Iraqi efforts at deception.
If we had not, we would not have been doing our job.
If the allegation is that we have undermined the effectiveness
and independence of UNSCOM, the answer is we have not. On the
contrary, we have been the foremost backer of UNSCOM.
If the allegation is that we have retreated from our determina-
tion to achieve our goals in Iraq, the answer is that we have not
and we will not.
In the Security Council now, even members who have been most
sympathetic to Iraq's point of view can find no excuse, or even
sense, in Saddam's last actions. Accordingly, we are seeking to take
advantage of this new environment to press Council members to
take the steps necessary to enforce the Security Council's resolu-
tions.
Iraq's latest refusal to cooperate with UNSCOM is a direct chal-
lenge to the Council's authority. And we seek, in the first instance,
to have the Council make a firm and principled response.
We recognize that this has put us back on the ladder of poten-
tially escalating confrontation with Iraq. So be it. We will not ac-
cept the indefinite blockage by Iraq of inspection activities of
UNSCOM and the IAEA. And we will insist that Iraq live up to
its commitment to cooperate with UNSCOM's monitoring activities.
For all its bluster, Mr. Chairman, Iraq remains within the strate-
gic box that Saddam Hussein's folly created for it 7 years ago. As
we look ahead, we will decide how and when to respond to Iraq's
actions based on the threat they pose to Iraq's neighbor's, to re-
gional security, and to U.S. vital interests. Our assessment will in-
clude Saddam's capacity to reconstitute, use or threaten to use
weapons of mass destruction. The bottom line is that if Iraq tries
to break out of its box, our response will be swift and strong. But
we will act on our own timetable, not on Saddam Hussein's.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Senator BROWNBACK. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I appreciate the
statement. And I appreciate your service to your country. You have
toiled for years in a tough region of the world and doing a great
deal of work, and I appreciate that.
Nonetheless, there are some questions that remain some very se-
rious questions. You have started and you have touched on some
of those, and I would like to have you address some of those, if we
could. Scott Ritter testified last week—and I have to tell you, I
think he is an American hero. The President, before he resigned,


talked about Scott Ritter and the destruction of weapons of mass
destruction that the inspection team had done, that more were
being destroyed by the inspections regime than were destroyed dur-
ing the Gulf War. And here is a stand-up guy that is out doing his
job.
In the hearing that we had, a lot of people were challenging him,
saying he was dictating U.S. policy. He says, look, I am not here
to talk about U.S. policy, I was an implementer on the ground of
this, and I was told twice actually more than that—but I was told
twice that you cannot go in, and that that came from U.S. direc-
tion, that we could not go in and do inspections.
And he stated as well at that hearing that the information that
they had was very important, it was time sensitive information,
that it was such that it had a very short shelf life to it. If it was
not used, was not acted upon, that the information, the missiles,
or the information regarding missile technology and systems for
Iraq would be moved quickly and they would not be able to get it.
And both times they were stopped by U.S. action.
Now, I take it from what you are saying here today that you do
not deny that the U.S. did step in to delay those inspections on
July 15th and August 4th?
Mr. INDYK. Mr. Chairman, as I explained. there were two in-
stances—those two instances-in which the administration spoke
to Chairman Butler, in July and August, as you indicate. In July,
we were briefed about a number of inspections that were going to
take place as part of this intrusive inspection. And we had ques-
tions about one of those possibly two of those. I want to be very
careful here.
And we asked those questions of Chairman Butler. Our concern
and our only motivation, as I said in my previous remarks, was to
ensure that Saddam Hussein would not be the beneficiary of in-
spections that did not produce results.
Now, I cannot, from my vantage point, my particular vantage
point, give you any judgment about how time sensitive the informa-
tion that Mr. Ritter said he had at the time how time sensitive
it was or was not, or where, and all of that. That was something
that Mr. Butler had to make a decision about, not the administra-
tion. That is the kind of operational issue which is in his purview,
not ours. We simply raised questions about
Senator BROWNBACK. But you were making an operational deci-
sion, then, were you not?
Mr. INDYK. Certainly not, sir. We raised questions. We did sup-
port the inspections that Mr. Butler decided on and which were
going to take place a short time later. Those were, as I understand
it, the same or similar inspections, with an adjustment. That may
or may not, because I am not aware of the exact details,
taken into account the particular concern we had about whether
this particular inspection was going to be productive.
And Mr. Ritter went in with Chairman Butler to conduct those
inspections, which we supported, in early August. In other words,
we are talking, in effect, about the same time line in terms of in-
spections, which were adjusted by Chairman Butler. And those
were his operational decisions.
have


13
planning in July. That is why he was going into Iraq with Mr. But-
ler just a very short time later.
They were as far as I know, there was considerable overlap be-
tween the inspections he wanted to conduct in July and the inspec-
tions he was authorized to conduct by Mr. Butler in August a short
time later, and we supported those inspections that he was going
to conduct.
We had no problem with those inspections. We wanted him to go
ahead with those inspections. I personally was briefed by the dep-
uty chairman in New York a few days before they went to Bagh-
dad, and I made clear that we had no problem with that.
I should emphasize that he was at that time also briefing other
members of the Security Council who did have problems, but we
did not.
The second set of inspections were blocked by Saddam Hussein
and, as I explained, we then thought tactically it was better to keep
the focus on Saddam Hussein's blockage. Those inspections would
not have occurred because of his blockage, not because of anything
we did or did not do.
Senator COVERDELL. Parenthetically, coming to the second point,
would it not have been better to have executed the inspection and
demonstrated to the international community the blockage, rather
than just accepting the blockage, and it strikes me that that did
not play.
Mr. INDYK. Senator Coverdell, that is a judgment call. We felt in
the circumstances, and I think we continue to feel that our judg-
ment was the right one in those circumstances, because you had a
situation where the Iraqis clearly were blocking the inspections
where their Revolutionary Command Council issued a proclamation
that they would not cooperate with UNSCOM any more, that it
was much better to allow that to stand on its own two feet.
If I can remind you that UNSCOM and particularly its chairman
were under withering assault throughout this period by members
of the Security Council and, as I alluded to before that very mo-
ment one member of the Security Council was already charging
Iraq with provocation-excuse me, UNSCOM with provocation even
as the RCC, the Iraqi Revolutionary Command Council was issuing
its communique blocking the inspection, so bear in mind that con-
text.
People can have different views about what was the best thing
to do, but it was our view that it was the best way of approaching
this, since Saddam Hussein in our view had blundered, had re-
vealed his obstructions to the world again, that we should keep the
focus there and that that would redound to our advantage in our
efforts to get a united Security Council response to his violation of
Security Council resolutions.
Senator COVERDELL. Mr. Secretary, I am going to have to depart,
and I apologize to the chairman, but I just would say in closing
that I think the testimony that Mr. Ritter gave needs to be re-
viewed again by the administration, but there are clear inconsist-
encies here. Those things happen in this city, but they are particu-
larly meaningful on this point and the assertion and documentation
ith regard to a case being made for his removal is pretty clear in
the testimony from the previous hearing.
50-913 98 - 2


20
which is so important that we went to war over it, our relation
with Iraq.
And so I think the administration has violated its obligations to
us in this regard, and to UNSCOM, and that they owe us all some
sort of explanation and perhaps apology.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator BROWNBACK. Thank you for joining us, Ms. Kirkpatrick.
We appreciate it very much, and we look forward to having some
questions with you.
Mr. Woolsey, thank you for being here in front of the committee.
STATEMENT OF HON. R. JAMES WOOLSEY, FORMER DIREC-
TOR, CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Mr. WOOLSEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In addition to endors-
ing Ambassador Kirkpatrick's remarks, let me make just a few
points, perhaps derived from Ambassador Indyk's testimony, and
let me preface this by saying, I have a rather bipartisan view to-
ward our policy with regard to Iraq.
I think from the closing hours of the war in 1991 we have made
a number of mistakes in dealing with Iraq. I think the war stopped
too soon. Even if one does not believe we should have continued on
to conquer the country, we could have done a lot more damage to
Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard than we did.
I think we were hurt badly by not protecting the Shia in the
South when they rebelled in 1991. I think we erred badly in per-
mitting the flight of helicopters around Iraq and in not establishing
a no-fly zone over the entire country when we had the forces and
the support there to do it, including from the Government of Tur-
key.
I believe we erred badly in 1993, when President Clinton re-
sponded to the assassination attempt against former President
Bush by putting a few cruise missiles on an empty building in the
middle of the night.
I think we erred badly in 1996, when we stood aside and our pi-
lots watched from the air while supporters of democracy in Iraq
were massacred in northern Iraq.
I think we erred badly, and I appreciate the support of some
members of this committee, in taking a very harsh and proce-
durally unsound stance against some Iraqis who had fought
against Saddam, an issue that has come up in other contexts I am
involved with.
I think we have erred badly in criticizing Scott Ritter, the Gov-
ernment has, for the principled stand that he has taken, and I be-
lieve that this set of errors in dealing with Iraq has spanned, now,
some seven-plus years.
It is almost as if we have in a random set of circumstances—al-
though we have done some useful and positive things I will cer-
tainly admit-nonetheless in an important subset of our dealings
with Iraq we have seemed to punish and deal harshly or at best
ignore those who are struggling for democracy and against Saddam
Hussein, and have appeased and there is no real other word for
it-appeased Saddam himself.
Now, I believe Ambassador Indyk is a very able public servant,
and a dedicated one, and I take issue with some of the things he
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In the regional environment, in terms of openly cooperating with
us, there has been a sea change. President Clinton was able 2
years ago to convene virtually all regional leaders, along with many
other world leaders, to an anti-terrorism conference at Sharm al-
Shaikh. This was in 1996. That kind of attendance could not be du-
plicated today.
The critics, both foreign and domestic, of America's current policy
toward Iraq, on the question of the humanitarian program, would
argue that it should be maintained, and that linkage should be
kept between economic sanctions and military sanctions. I do not
think those should be separated, as some have recommended to
your body-not by today's panel but in letters circulating in the
Congress.
There needs to be a better dialog between this administration
and the Congress. You have authorized funds to stimulate unity
among Iraq's fractious opposition elements. You should, you will, I
am sure, continue to demand an accounting of the administration's
efforts. But you must accept that there are likely to be no quick
results in that regard.
In sum, Washington should focus its energies on obtaining Secu-
rity Council cooperation against any effort by Saddam to reactivate
his weapons program or attack his neighbors. The diplomatic op-
tion offers no quick fix. But it should, and it can be developed to
support our interests rather than undermine them.
Thank you, sir.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Murphy follows:)
Prepared Statement of Richard Murphy
The Administration is accused of weakening if not withdrawing its support for
UNSCOM. It is well to recall our longstanding objectives in Iraq. True, last Feb-
ruary the Administration stressed its readiness to launch a military strike on Iraq
if Baghdad continued to obstruct UNSCOM's operations. As the Secretary of State
outlined to the New York Times August 17, “We will decide how and when to re-
spond to Iraq's actions, based on the threat they pose to Iraq's neighbors, to regional
security and to U.S. vital interests ... (including) Saddam's capacity to reconstitute,
use or threaten to use weapons of mass destructions." Therefore according to the
Secretary of State our core objectives remain the same: Washington seeks (a) to cur-
tail Baghdad's ability to produce weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and (b) to
deter Iraq's aggression against its neighbors. These objectives remain well within
our capabilities to achieve.
The shift of the past months has been towards giving more emphasis to pursuit
of our diplomatic options than to a military strike. Critics here and abroad have as-
serted that Washington is following a “new” policy of deterrence. This is not new.
From the beginning, one element of our policy has been to contain, i.e. deter Iraq
from future aggression. We can and will keep Iraq from attacking it neighbors. Both
readiness to use military force to support US interests and Baghdad's clear under-
standing that we will do so are vital to deterrence.
UNSČOM has been of great value in tracking down and supervising the destruc-
tion of Iraq's existing WMD stocks. Its presence has also made it easier to limit the
chances of further cheating by Iraq. If Saddam's latest challenge is allowed to stand,
UNSCOM is finished. There have been no surprise inspections since Iraq's an-
nouncement in the first week of August that it had suspended cooperation with
UNSCOM and the International Atomic Energy Agency. It has extended its inter-
ference to routine monitoring operations. How long Iraq should be allowed to block
inspections is a pressing and legitimate issue for debate. But going it alone against
Iraq militarily would deepen America's diplomatic isolation and could cost American
lives. Indulging in bellicose rhetoric, meanwhile, only damages American credibility.
I am not privy to whatever discussions may have taken place between US officials
and UNSCOM Director Ambassador Richard Butler about the inspection process, in
particular about the timing of surprise inspections. But I believe the Administration


37
We have held you here longer than I intended to. I appreciate
deeply your patience and your commitment and what-all you have
done for your country. Thank you very much.
The committee is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:20 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned.]