Don't Focus on Killing Hussein as Iraq Fix

In recent days, as the United States has moved closer to a decision to bomb Iraq again, there have been calls for a tougher U.S. policy that would remove Saddam Hussein once and for all.

House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.), among others, have embraced this goal. Calls for Hussein's head should be seen for what they are: political posturing and wishful thinking divorced from the realm of serious policy. Like it or not, the Iraqi leader is probably here to stay and Washington must accommodate itself to this reality.

Those who advocate the elimination of Hussein say it could be done in one of three ways: air strikes, covert action or a new ground war. None of these options is a realistic basis for U.S. policy.

An air campaign to kill Hussein is clearly the most attractive approach. The United States has extraordinary intelligence capabilities and could conceivably pinpoint Hussein's whereabouts. American forces also have advanced "bunker-buster" bombs that can burrow deep into the ground and destroy fortified command centers. Yes, there is an executive order in place that prohibits the assassination of foreign leaders. But President Bill Clinton could plausivably argue that Husssein's death in a U.S. air strike had been accidental. Who would complain?

But taking out Hussein in this way is a long shot. The Iraqi leader knows the United States would like his death and has taken measures to protect himself. He moves constantly, keeping his whereabouts secret from all but a handful of confidants and rarely sleeping in the same place two nights in a row. During the gulf war, the United States pounded command centers throughout Iraq for five weeks and, according to some reports, did seek to locate and kill Hussein. No such luck. What reason is there to believe that a much shorter bombing campaign would succeed where Desert Storm failed? Not much.

In any case, the surgical assassination of Hussein might not be a complete solution. The Baathist party structure over which Hussein presides is among the more extensive totalitarian systems in the world. Killing Hussein won't eliminate that structure. Instead, an equally ruthless successor might emerge to perpetuate all the Iraqi policies that so irritate the international community.

In more elaborate fantasies entertained by some in Washington, a guerrilla insurgency or military cabal in Iraq could topple not only Hussein but also the Baathists. This, too, is extremely unlikely. Beyond the Shiites in the south and the Kurds in the north, both of whom have been reduced to impotence, Iraqi society does not have major pockets of dissent that can be expanded into successful challenges to Hussein's iron-fisted rule.

The United States has been down the covert-action path before in Iraq, without result. Most recently, in 1996, two dissident organizations in Iraq that received covert aid from Washington were decimated by Hussein's security forces. Even if it made sense to initiate a new and larger-scale U.S. covert operation in Iraq, such an enterprise would be unlikely to bear fruit for several years.

As for a new ground war, this option is clearly not in the cards. In the years since the gulf war, a growing chorus of critics have argued that the Bush administration erred in not pushing all the way to Baghdad during Operation Desert Storm. The most rabid in the "kill-Hussein lobby" say that now is the time to finish off the job.

Yet, a ground campaign to destroy Hussein was not an appealing option in 1991 and it is not one today. Extending the goal of Desert Storm to bring down Hussein would have resulted in an enormous loss of Iraqi life as U.S. forces obliterated all potential threats on the road to Baghdad.

Even if it were a desirable option today, a ground campaign would be diplomatically impossible to pull off. It is simply unimaginable that an American plan to invade Iraq and occupy Baghdad would ever receive international support. After all, many countries currently oppose even the punitive bombing of Iraq. In the end, the international community is probably stuck with Saddam Hussein for the foreseeable future. Over the years ahead, containing Iraq is sure to be an unrewarding task for the United States.

Those who mislead the American public with promises of a quick fix undermine the domestic support needed to sustain this long-term containment policy. Military action against Iraq may well make Hussein more pliable and put United Nations inspections back on track. Or it may achieve none of these goals. But one thing is clear: No matter what the United States does, Saddam Hussein will probably still be in power at this time next year.