17 January 1999. Thanks to Anonymous.

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http://www.nytimes.com/library/review/011799unscom-review.html

The New York Times, 17 January 1999

The Case of the Spies Without a Country
By Tim Weiner

WASHINGTON -- Throughout this murderous century, diplomats and dreamers
have envisioned a world in which nations would transcend their
boundaries, dispel their differences and band together to preserve peace
against dictators and despots.

This vision of world federation helped create the United Nations. And it
engendered the U.N. Special Commission, charged with disarming Iraq
after the 1991 gulf war.

The commission, known as UNSCOM, became an international intelligence
service for the new world order. It was the first of its kind -- and, it
now seems, maybe the last.

For the more secret its work became, and the more estranged the
enforcers of disarmament grew from each other, the less UNSCOM could
withstand accusations of serving the last superpower, its main supplier
of spycraft: the United States.

More than 7,000 weapons inspectors from around the world served UNSCOM
over seven years, spying on Iraq, surveying its military and industrial
plants, trying to do what smart bombs could not: destroy nuclear,
biological, chemical and missile programs hidden by Saddam Hussein.

Ideally, intelligence can achieve victory without war. But espionage is
a uniquely national enterprise. While nations may share interests, spy
services rarely do. "There are friendly states, but no friendly
intelligence services," notes a spokesman for Russia's foreign
intelligence agency. When spies from two countries shake hands, they are
often trying to pick one another's pockets.

When the going got tough for UNSCOM, it sought U.S. spy technology. U.S.
intelligence gladly provided it but would not share it with the world.
The more secretive UNSCOM's work became, the less open it could be with
its member nations.

"If secret information is open to all member states, it won't work,"
said Gordon Oehler, former director of the CIA's Nonproliferation
Center. "If you let in the French, the Chinese, the Russians -- that
would kill it."

So much for international cooperation. In March the special commission
adopted a U.S. eavesdropping system so secret that only a handful of
Americans, British, Australians and New Zealanders had full access to
it.

This, understandably, led to tensions, notably between the Americans on
one side and the Russians, the Chinese and the French on the other.

The special commission began as a unique experiment. It was assembled
quickly after the 1991 gulf war, when Iraq was shattered and powerless
and the world seemed united in the determination to disarm that country.
It assumed unconditional power to do its work.

"It brought together communities -- intelligence, military,
non-proliferation -- from around the world, and it brought new thinking
about how to do inspections," said David Albright, president of the
Institute for Science and International Security, who served as a
nuclear-weapons inspector in Iraq. Its leaders thought they could disarm
Iraq in no time -- "possibly as little as a year," its chairman, Richard
Butler, said last week.

But, as Butler conceded, "it has taken eight years, and the job is still
not completely finished."

Not until 1995 did the inspectors understand that Iraq had an
extraordinary system to hide its secret weapons programs. Now three more
years have gone by trying to pierce that shield. And as it turned out,
the secret weapons -- the foundation of Saddam's power, the ace in the
hole with which he might someday trump the world -- were hidden by the
same soldiers and spies whose duty it is to make sure that the Iraqi
dictator dies peacefully in bed. That made piercing the Iraqi veil far
more difficult than anyone had expected, and prompted the Americans to
roll out the particularly sophisticated and sensitive equipment that
yielded a a product they were reluctant to share too widely.

"Iraq is a sovereign nation, and there are limits to what you can do if
that nation wants to hide things from you," Oehler said. "The best you
can do is make it very painful for them if they won't go along." Iraq
has endured great pain -- including perhaps $150 billion in lost oil
revenues -- to defy disarmament.

"The lesson is you can't disarm a country unless you're willing to
occupy it and forbid them the trappings of a sovereign nation, such as a
military force and the right to built that force," Oehler said.

But no one has been willing to conquer Iraq in the name of world peace.
And America's French and Russian partners on the Security Council are
increasingly eager to resume business with Baghdad, which owes them
billions of dollars.

Now the international coalition assembled by President George Bush for
the gulf war has dwindled to two nations: the United States and Britain.
Their four-day attack on Iraq in December was "the first time in history
that a nation has gone to war to stop the spread of weapons of mass
destruction," said Joseph Cirincione, director of the nonproliferation
project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

If so, it failed, said Scott Ritter, the former marine who resigned from
UNSCOM in August to protest what he called a lack of U.S. support. His
accusations have helped raise suspicions that the Americans used
information supposedly gathered for UNSCOM to precisely target Iraqi
units closely linked to Saddam.

The attack was a final blow with which "the U.S. killed UNSCOM," Ritter
said. "The U.S. brought its own credibility and objectivity into
question. And the U.S. lost a lot of its moral authority to lead on this
issue."

Now UNSCOM is banished from Iraq and bloodied by international
infighting. The United States is back to taking potshots at Iraq,
playing Globocop, a role that alienates it from much of the rest of the
world. America's allies in the region are fed up with Saddam, but their
patience for U.S. bombing raids is wearing thin.

Butler bravely hopes for a new and improved UNSCOM. But now the French
and the Russians are proposing lifting the oil embargo on Iraq in
exchange for a new system of overseeing Iraqi weaponry -- and the
Russians want to abolish the special commission altogether. The United
States is against those proposals. In any case, Iraq will not submit to
more inspections unless it is freed entirely from the eight-year-old
economic embargo.

The experiment in international intelligence is over. No one knows how a
new arms control regime can be installed in Iraq. And no one knows how
much more pain Iraq is willing to endure to hide its secret cache.

Today, on the eighth anniversary of the launching of the gulf war,
Iraq's chances of rebuilding a secret arsenal look good. The future for
world federations devoted to disarmament looks bleak.


Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company

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http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-01/17/127l-011799-idx.html

The Washington Post, 17 January 1999, Page B01

Desert Fox Delivery
Precision Undermined Its Purpose

By William M. Arkin

When U.S. bombs and missiles fell on Iraq on the evening of Dec. 16, one
of their principal targets was Saddam Hussein's sleeping quarters on the
outskirts of Baghdad. But that was only one of the sites on the
military's list of places to bomb in the sprawling Radwaniyah complex
adjacent to the now-vacant Saddam International Airport.

The targeting list was stunning in its specificity. Bombs were dropped
on separate buildings that house secret units of the infamous Special
Security Organization (SSO) and the Special Republican Guards (SRG),
including the barracks of the 5th Battalion of the 1st Brigade, the 8th
Battalion of the 2nd Brigade, the 3rd Artillery Battalion, and the 1st
Armored Battalion of the 4th Brigade.

Thanks to the hard work of the United Nations Special Commission
(UNSCOM), U.S. targeters know a lot more about the Iraqi regime today
than they did during the Gulf War in 1991. The United States and Britain
now have a diagrammatic understanding of the Iraqi government structure,
as well as of the intelligence, security and transport organizations
that protect the Iraqi leadership. The same mission folders that UNSCOM
put together to inspect specific buildings and offices in its search for
concealed Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD) became the basis for
the targeting folders that missile launchers and pilots used in
December.

Welcome to the true Operation Desert Fox.

It is clear from the target list, and from extensive communications with
almost a dozen officers and analysts knowledgeable about Desert Fox
planning, that the U.S.-British bombing campaign was more than a
reflexive reaction to Saddam Hussein's refusal to cooperate with
UNSCOM's inspectors. The official rationale for Desert Fox may remain
the "degrading" of Iraq's ability to produce weapons of mass destruction
and the "diminishing" of the Iraqi threat to its neighbors. But careful
study of the target list tells another story.

Thirty-five of the 100 targets were selected because of their role in
Iraq's air defense system, an essential first step in any air war,
because damage to those sites paves the way for other forces and
minimizes casualties all around. Only 13 targets on the list are
facilities associated with chemical and biological weapons or ballistic
missiles, and three are southern Republican Guard bases that might be
involved in a repeat invasion of Kuwait.

The heart of the Desert Fox list (49 of the 100 targets) is the Iraqi
regime itself: a half-dozen palace strongholds and their supporting cast
of secret police, guard and transport organizations. Some sites, such as
Radwaniyah, had been bombed in 1991 (Saddam's quarters there were
designated "L01" in Desert Storm, meaning the first target in the
Leadership category). Other sites, particularly "special" barracks and
units in and around downtown Baghdad and the outlying palaces, were
bombed for the first time.

National security insiders, blessed with their unprecedented
intelligence bonanza from UNSCOM, convinced themselves that bombing
Saddam Hussein's internal apparatus would drive the Iraqi leader around
the bend. "We've penetrated your security, we're inside your brain," is
the way one senior administration official described the message that
the United States was sending Saddam Hussein.

Without the target list, such a view seems like sheer bravado. With the
target list, a host of new questions arises: Is the administration's
view of Saddam Hussein's hold on power in line with reality? And what is
the feasibility, not to mention the legality, of what amounts to an
aerial assassination strategy?

The origins of the Desert Fox target list go back to October, when
high-level discussions in Washington led to the conclusion that military
action was not only inevitable, but that it might actually achieve
something. The Joint Chiefs of Staff and the U.S. Central Command
(CENTCOM), headquartered in Tampa, began to articulate the military
mission of "degrading" and "diminishing" Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction. Gen. Anthony Zinni, the CENTCOM commander, insisted that
the United States only bomb Iraqi sites that had been identified with a
high degree of certainty, according to officers involved in the process.

Given the UNSCOM data flowing in, there was no end of choices. Seven
broad target categories were created, including two--"WMD security" and
"command and control"--that would accommodate the new intelligence
reports and cover an effort to shake the Iraqi regime to its core.

By November, a plan was in place. WMD targets themselves were small in
number, given Zinni's directive. The main emphasis would be on Iraq's
short-range missile program. The Bush administration had acceded to a
Soviet proposal in 1991 to allow Iraq to have missiles with a range
under 150 kilometers. U.S. intelligence had concluded that Iraq was
using the short-range facilities as a cover for redeveloping long-range
missiles.

All of the suspected facilities--Ibn al Haytham, Karama, Al Kindi in
Mosul, Shahiyat, Taji and Zaafaraniyah--were under UNSCOM camera
monitoring. In fact, UNSCOM had cataloged specific pieces of
irreplaceable equipment that, if destroyed, would set back any
conversion effort.

There were non-missile WMD targets as well: the Biological Research
Center at Baghdad University, which UNSCOM concluded was the office of
the head of Iraq's biological weapons program ("Doctor Germ," they
dubbed her), and two airfields--Al Sahra near Tikrit and Tallil in the
south--which were believed to house drone aircraft that could deliver a
biological cloud in an attack.

Some have criticized the Desert Fox campaign for not going after
suspected production sites of biological or chemical agents. The common
refrain is that the United States avoided such targets because of the
potential for collateral damage, but this is not true. The targeters
could not identify actual weapons sites with enough specificity to
comply with Zinni's directive.

At a Pentagon briefing on Jan. 7, Zinni said the ease with which
chemical and biological agents can be manufactured, particularly for
terrorist type use, made bombing of potential dual-use facilities (such
as pharmaceutical plants) futile. "There isn't going to be anything
militarily" to eliminate or signficantly degrade those capabilities, he
said, "if they're that easy to . . . establish."

How could a 70-hour bombing campaign possibly generate an outcome that
the utter defeat of the Iraqi army and tens of thousand of airstrikes
over 43 days failed to deliver? The answer is again in the target
list--and in the administration's belief that ever more accurate bombs
and unprecedented target data can have far-reaching reverberations.

Desert Fox's most significant departure from Desert Storm is its
targeting of offices associated with Saddam Hussein's entourage and
advisers, the Iraqi intelligence and Ba'ath party organizations, and the
security and transport apparatus that is so essential for Saddam's
survival. Many of these top-level targets were hit in 1991 (Gen. Henry
Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, calls them "highly
visible symbols of the regime"), but the 1998 campaign locked in on
sites not even known eight years ago. For example, the office of Abed
Hamid Mahmoud, Saddam Hussein's chief of staff, was attacked, albeit
under the innocuous target name of "Secretariat Presidential Building."
The SSO computer center as well as intelligence archives also were
targeted. In 1991, only two installations associated with the protection
of Saddam Hussein were hit. In Desert Fox, this group makes up 20
percent of the total of all targets.

Other targets also reflected the strategy to weaken the regime's
control. Two corps and four division headquarters installations of the
"regular" Republican Guards were hit, as were helicopter bases at
Samarra East, K2 airfield near Baiji, Taji and Kut. Like the decision to
allow short-range missiles, the United States was snookered into
allowing Iraq the use of its helicopters after Desert Storm, and they
were subsequently used to suppress the Shiite and Kurdish rebellions.
The misstep has stuck in the U.S. craw ever since.

More than a dozen eavesdropping and jamming units, telephone exchanges,
and radio and television transmitters were attacked in Baghdad, Basra
and the south, Abu Ghraib, Rashidiya (just north of the capital) and
Tikrit. Part of the goal of disrupting telephone and television service
was to impede military communications and undermine Iraqi propaganda
efforts. But attacking secret police archives and intelligence stations
also has the purpose of disrupting Baghdad's ability to monitor the
internal situation.

Desert Fox pleased many active and retired officers who played a role in
the 1991 air war. These Desert Storm insiders say they feel vindicated
by the administration's decision to target the Iraqi leadership. They
felt they were constrained Saddam Hussein in earnest in 1991, and argue
that the United States and the world is still paying the price for
Washington's hesitation at the time.

But there is also disquiet. "A good concept, but too little, too late,"
said one senior officer. Not only was Desert Fox constrained by time,
breadth and the sheer physical destruction possible with 1,000 weapons,
but a host of other priorities--to minimize civilian deaths, prevent
U.S. casualties and deflect political fallout--undercut the overall
goal.

According to military sources, there was no leeway in the strict
timetable, and the decision to achieve surprise before Ramadan served to
give Iraq a 30-day break. Attacks were mounted only at night, ceding
daylight hours for recovery and dispersal. An Iraqi sanctuary existed
above the 35th parallel. And certain targets were avoided altogether,
such as electrical power sites, for fear of a cascading effect on the
civilian population and negative publicity.

To administration officials, the plight of the Iraqi people is the only
hot-button issue that could undermine their "topple" strategy. Saddam
Hussein and his cronies have built installations and institutions to
insulate themselves and their lives from Iraqi society at large.
Saddam's guardians have been showered by extra pay and treatment. To
inflict further harm on this privileged inner circle, CIA analysts added
the Tikrit food warehouse and a distribution manifold on the Gulf coast
south of the Basra refinery to the bombing list--part of an "economic
strangulation" plan to disrupt the illicit cash and rations pipeline.

Two pitiful targets to achieve that goal? More than anything else, it is
the very precision and economy of Desert Fox that ultimately undermined
its true purpose. "The Iraqis are professional cruise missile
recipients," one recently retired four-star general observed in December
as bulldozers and laborers arrived at bombed sites on the Monday after
Desert Fox ended. With almost half the population unemployed, rebuilding
is as close as anything to a national jobs program in Iraq.

CENTCOM estimates that it will take Iraq from one to two months to
restore the smuggling operation from the Basra refinery. And then it
will undoubtedly be bombed again.

William Arkin, an independent defense analyst, spent two months in Iraq
after the Gulf War and has written extensively on Operation Desert
Storm. His column, DOT.MIL, appears every other Monday on The Post's Web
site, www.washingtonpost.com.

Zeroed In

Of the 100 targets on the list for Operation Desert Fox in Iraq, 87 were
hit. A breakdown of the seven categories and their key areas is as
follows:


COMMAND AND CONTROL: 18 of 20 targets hit

Abu Rajash, Jabul Makhul, Radwaniyah, Republican (Baghdad), Sijood
palaces

Ba'ath party headquarters

Iraq Intelligence Service headquarters


Ministry of Defense

Ministry of Industry

Presidential Secretariat Building

State radio and television


WMD INDUSTRY AND PRODUCTION: 12 of 12 targets hit

Biological Research Center (Baghdad University)

Ibn al Haytham missile R&D center

Karama electronics plant

Al Kindi missile R&D facility (Mosul)

Shahiyat liquid engine R&D, T&E facility

Zaafaraniyah fabrication facility (Nidda)


WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION (WMD) SECURITY:

18 of 18 targets hit


Directorate of General Security headquarters

Special Security Organization (SS0) headquarters

Special Republican Guards (SRG) headquarters

SSO Communications/Computer Center

SSO/SRG barracks (Abu Ghraib, Radwinyah, Baghdad, Tikrit)


REPUBLICAN GUARDS: 9 of 9 targets hit


ECONOMIC: 1 of 1 targets hit

Basra refinery distribution manifold


AIRFIELDS: 5 of 6 targets hit


AIR DEFENSES: 24 of 34 targets hit


Sources: U.S. Central Command, Department of Defense


Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company

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